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Published: September 29th 2010
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From Mekele we took a 4-5 hour bus ride south to Waldia. From there, we missed the last bus to Lalibela, so the three of us (we had an Austrian guy with us) paid for a 'private' minibus to take us on the 4 hour drive. The overly aggressive driver dropped us off in the middle of town and not to the hotel we wanted him to take us, so we walked to another hotel called Asheton Hotel and checked in. We ended up spending 3 nights there. The big thing to see in Lalibela is the 11 midieval rock-hewn churches. They were carved into the rocks between 1137 and 1270 AD during the Zagwe dynasty. These churches are unique in the fact that some of them are full monolithic, which means that they are carved completely free from the rocks. The churches were split up into 3 different groups around town. St. George church, the most famous one, was isolated and stood alone from the rest. We spent two full days wandering around the churches, through the corridors, grottoes, tunnels, passageways, and crypts making sure we didn't miss anything. Each of the churches had a replica of the Arc of
the Covenant. The public is not allowed to even look at the replicas. Each replica was hidden tucked away behind curtains in the corners of each church, usually protected by a monk that would be responsible for each individual church. I was fortunate enough to be able to sneak a peak (when no one was looking) and saw three different replicas in three of the churches. I got pictures of two of them. We also attended two different coffee ceremonies while in town. They are a popular local tradition all over the country.
After we were done in Lalibela, we were fortunate enough to get two seats on a minibus that went straight to Addis Ababa. It normally takes two days by bus, but with this minibus, it took 16 hours. We were slowed down a bit when we lost our breaks and had to wait to get them fixed. After returning to Addis, we decided to try a different area of town and found a small hotel off of Bole Rd, which is a more modern part of the city and closer to the airport. We ran into some minor drama with a street hustler, so the next
day we relocated to a small hotel called Mr. Martin's Cozy Place. This ended up being a good move. It's the only hotel I've found in Ethiopia that has a backpacker feel to it. It's owned by a German guy who now lives in Indonesia. His brother in law runs it. We made good friends there instantly, and reserved our room for the next time we planned on going back to Addis. While we were in town for the 3 nights, we took a break from the local food and went to as many other Ethnic food places as we could. We even spent an afternoon at the Hilton hotel to get in our 'Western' fix. When being on the road for a long time, sometimes its good to go somewhere that feels more like home, at least for a little while.
Next was a 4 hour bus ride down to Shashemene. Haile Selassie had set up land in this town for Rasta's to settle. There were loads of Rasta's from all over the world, mostly from the Caribbean. We checked into a hotel called Zion Train Lodge, which was owned and run by a Rasta family from Paris.
Mummified Human Remains
outside St. George Church in the cliff It was very isolated, peaceful, and quiet. We spent three nights there. During this time, we hung out at a place called the 12 Tribes of Israel. Apparently they have locations all over the world, with their headquarters in Shashemene. I think we were the only people there without dreadlocks. We relaxed and listened to Reggae music. During our stay, we also bought some banana art work from a Rasta that had moved there from the Carribean. His work was so good, I bought a piece. He would only use banana leaves in his work, and would not use any paints or dies. I purchased a picture of the African continent that will hopefully survive the trip back. He was a very interesting guy, had lived an interesting life, and also had a lot of Haile Selassie memorabilia in his shop.
The next day we traveled a whole 14K East towards the Bale Mountains to a small village with some hot springs called Wondo Guenet. They had a few pools, one of which felt like a hot tub. I had been wanting to find someplace like that for months. We only spent one night at the hot springs. While
I was there, I ran into a guy from South Africa who was riding his motorcycle from Cape Town to Israel. I had met him before in Cape Maclear, Malawi. I cannot count on two hands the number of times I've run into the same people again on this trip, even people I hadn't seen in months.
After relaxing at the hot springs, we took a bus back to Shashemene and continued on down to Awasa, which was only about 24K South of there. It was a nice city with a nice lake, but there really wasn't too much to do there, so we only spent one night and then headed back up to Addis to spend our last 4 nights back at Mr. Martin's Cozy Place. During this time, we went back to our favorite restaurants and bars, and got some souvenir shopping done. Our last night in Ethiopia, we bought a small Keg of micro beer from the German beer garden and threw a party for our friends at our hotel room. We figured we would say goodbye to Ethiopia with style.
Ethiopia has been one of the most interesting places I have ever visited in
my life. It has its own culture, its own language (Ahmeric), writing, and time. Here they have Ethiopian time and European time. European time is the real time the rest of the world recognizes, and Ethiopian time is 6 hours off. The sun comes up at 12 Ethiopian time and goes down again at 12 Ethiopian time. I forgot to mention this in my last blog, but Ethiopia also has 13 months in their year. Each month has 30 days, and 13th month has the last 5, which was Sep 6-10th. September 11th was their new year, which we celebrated. On that day, the year changed to 2003. Their tourism here advertises people to come to Ethiopia, where you are 7 years younger. They still have a lot of signs for the Ethiopian millennium, which was obviously only 3 years ago. Addis itself is home to the African Union. A lot of foreign nationals travel and live here. The city is growing very rapidly. With prices here being so cheap (we spend about 7 USD/night for a room and about 2-3 USD for meals here), and increasing tourism and construction, out of all of the places that I have been
semi-monolithic church
its ceiling is connected to the cliff in Africa so far, I see this town as having the biggest potential for foreign investment, which is welcomed by the government and the people. Traveling around Ethiopia can be a challenge mentally and physically, but it is well worth the rewards you will get from the experience.
Tonight we are going to fly Ethiopian Airlines to Cairo, making a quick pit stop in Sudan. I think we are going to spend almost two weeks in Cairo and Alexandria while we wait for my dad and brother to arrive, and then we are going to take them on a whirlwind tour of as many ruins as possible down the Nile River as they are only going to be in Egypt for one week.
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John
non-member comment
I would like to make comments on your post. I am glad that you seem to have had enjoyed your visit to Ethiopia but I don't appreciate your indifferent to local religious tradition, i.e. you sneaking to take a look the replace of the Arc of the Covenant. I urge you to delete the pictures you took right away, you don't understand the significant of it. Secondly, describing the time difference between Ethiopia and Europe, you refer to European time the "real" one. Really? what make that a real and the Ethiopian one "unreal." There is no real or unreal about it, it is just different it work for all. John