When we arrived in Gondar we planned to stay a few days to rest and relax and to decide if we want to go trekking in the Simien Mountains National Park. That decision was cut short when met the Belgium couple we did the Lake Tana tour with. They were planning to do a four day trek and leave for the Simien Mountains the next day. They were looking for people to share cost with. All of it seemed like a good idea. We did a quick tour of Gondar and left the next morning for the Simien Mountains. The Simien Mountains are stunning! There is just no other way to describe them. There are large plateaus bounded by sheer cliff faces with some of the cliffs being up to 300 meters high and straight down. ... read more

There is a lot top be said about expectations especially if they are not met. I read about the famous monasteries, which are dotted around the shoreline and islands of Ethiopia’s largest lake, Lake Tana. I imagined extensive compounds and large impressive decorated churches. Well there is non of that. The compounds are small and so are the churches. From outside they are unimpressive as there is virtually no decoration and they are mainly made out of wood, straw and mud. The decoration inside is slightly better and there are lots of paintings on the wall. Some of the paintings and churches date back to the 16th century, that’s at least one plus point. Compared to anything that was done back home during that time it all fails to compare. The only thing that made my ... read more

Why Ethiopia The reason why we are in Ethiopia starts with a visit to a Colombia shop a few years back. In this store I stumbled over the bored husbands section where the shop provides a few seats, a coffee table and a coffee table book. Not being a bored husband but curious I picked up the book and you guess right it was about Ethiopia. It looked like a great country (as all countries do in those kind of books) full of old stuff to look at. Just what I like and I decided then that I will go to Ethiopia one day… Talk about quick a decision processes… The one thing to do before going to Ethiopia is to ignore the warnings on the government websites and hope for the best. Ethiopia seems to ... read more

If someone told you that I paid USD500 to see some apes in the jungle then you might laugh at him and call him a liar (especially if your name is Marc ;). Fortunately this time you would be wrong. Not that it was my idea to go and visit them. Kellie insisted on it in the beginning and I'm glad she did. There are three countries which still have Mountain Gorillas left which are Uganda, Democratic Republic of Congo (which is neither democratic nor a republic) and Rwanda. There is a limited number of gorilla trek permits each day in each country and our luck (or misfortune depends on how you look at it) had it that we went to Rwanda to see the gorillas. Rwanda issues about 40 permits per day (I leave it ... read more

A Serengeti safari is must when you are in Tanzania. That’s at least what David Attenborough and Bernhard Grzimek make me believe when I saw their documentaries when I was young (back then in the good old days) and right they are. But let me start from the beginning. We arrived after the visit with God in Arusha where we were greeted by a friend of our WorldVision guide. The WorldVision dude asked us a while ago if we want to do a Safari and we told him to give us some information but don’t book anything. In good African tradition he ignored that and organized the Safari for us anyway. Wasn’t that bad as the price seemed to be very good. Too good to be true actually and you know what they say about that. ... read more