Advertisement
Published: January 18th 2010
Edit Blog Post
Work Health
They could do with the CFMEU over here. With Addis we completed the northern Ethiopian loop and are now moving south towards the Omo Vallley and, eventually, Kenya. We are now in Abu, or Abba, Minsch sittuated between two large lakes and the jumping off point for the Omo Valley and the Southern Tribal Peoples area of Ethiopia. The track down has taken us into the Bale Mountains, through Shashemene. We haven't covered massive distances in the last week or so - it is still only 360 km as the crow flies from Addis - but there have still been some big driving days. The roads are not flash.
Road building has been one of the constants of the trip through Ethiopia. It seems that every major road is under construction. This would not be much of a problem normally, and it will be great in a few years time when things are more complete, but they do construct roads with very little apparent thought given to the needs of the travelling public. The strategy is to set out to construct long roads, 129 km was the last bit. You then close the road, set up a very basic set of detours and get stuck in. In construct6ion
Road Works
on the main road leading out of Addis. When they are all done it will be great. Until then...? terms this makes a lot of sense. Get all of your blasting and clearing done in one hit, then build bridges, cart and lay gravel and, finally, set up on bitumen plant and do the whole lot in one go. In the meantime, though, the vehicle traffic has to deal as best it can with long stretches of rough detours that receive minimal, if any, care and maintenance all the time driving alongside gravel or bitumen roads, long sections of which could apparently be used without too much difficulty. Of course, most people aren't really affected by the road construction. Most don't have motorised vehicles and can quite happily avoid the road blocks and make good use of the roads under construction without the annoyance of the trucks and buses that are out on the detour..
As we have moved south we have been warned that the locals may not always be as friendly to tourists as they have been up north. There are still a lot of smiles and waves and, while there are a few who clearly don't want any tourists, or perhaps anyone, to come through, the majority seem OK. There is a tendency on the
Moving House
A new perspective on calling in the movers part of most of the kids and many other younger people to beg. A wave and a smile generally turns quickly to an up turned palm and a pained, pleading expression. Requests for pens, money, t-shirts etc are constant. I am not sure what other travellers have done to generate such an expectation. It settles down in the towns while you are walking around but the truck still tends to attract crowds in some places.
We generally don't give to those who beg and plead alongside the truck but made an exception for one girl. We travelled in to an area between Lake Abiata and Lake Shala. The road in was rough and we were moving slowly and past a school so we picked up a large group of kids running with us.Most were not begging. They were just running and having fun. There was one girl we noticed who seemed to run particularly well and also seemed desperate. Next morning when we set off she was there again. She ran about 8 km with some quick sprints where the truck was able to pick up some pace. There were others running as well but none could keep it
Big Farms
South of Addis. Big commercial farms up for as long as this one. Once, she, and we, had run the legs off all of the boys and she was the only one left we gave her some clothing that people had decided to get rid of, some money and pens. She was absolutely knackered but very happy and thankful. Probably the wrong thing to do but she certainly worked for it.
We have normally found that, even if people can be initially quite aggressive in their requests they settle down pretty quickly and are prepared to smile, laugh and joke, even about the request they have just made. There was a woman who, pretty accurately lobbed a couple of rocks at the truck. I thought she must have something against us in particular but found the next day on a local bus that the kids were lobbing rocks quite happily at that one as well. This happened in the Bale Mountains near one of the entrances to the National Park We found out later that the Park had been created 14 years ago, with funding from some major environmental NGOs. The land had previously been farmed for many thousands of years. It was removed with
Running of the Kids
They can go for long distances. what people consider minimal compensation and there is still a lot of ill feeling. If a government had taken my land on the behest of a bunch of foreigners and left me with bugger all I suspect I might consider lobbing a few rocks. Perhaps more.
Shashemene is the apparent birthplace of the Rasta religious movement. They consider Haile Selassie the second coming of Jesus Christ and are not completely convinced that Haile is in fact dead. We visited what was supposed to be a museum or headquarters. It wasn't really worth going to with a few photos and other documents around but not much or anything else. The Rasta school, on the other hand, was worth a visit. This is a private school and has competitive entry. There are 360 students across all of the primary grades. They claim to achieve 100% success in the exams for secondary admission. All classes learn English and a lot a taught in English to prepare kids for secondary and college where more of the instruction is in English. Those of us who visited the school were very impressed with the teachers, students and the organisation that seemed to support it all.
Hot Springs
But you needed to be careful washing your clothes. Too hot and a couple of chemicals along with it They received a decent donation.
Up into the Bale Mountains and once more we had to deal with altitude. We went up to about 3,600 meters to the national park and camped a little below that. Some of us took a local bus up to the Sanetti Plateau where the highest point is 4,377 metres. We didn't have time to walk to the top but did walk around the plateau for a few hours.While there we spotted 12 of the 300 Ethiopian Wolves that inhabit the Park. There are only about 4,000 of these still alive. Our guide and the bus driver seemed to think we were a pretty lucky group.
Of course, we are now a bit more experienced with altitude and it didn't provide the problems some had in the Simien Mountains. We follow the advice to drink plenty of water and not to over exert and it all pans out pretty well. There is a minor management issue that can occur though. You see, the more you drink the more you need to empty out. The truck normally pulls up every 2 hours or so but, if you really are drinking a lot then that
can become a long time. Balance in all things is required.
Also in the Bale Mountains a lot of us climbed aboard horses for a ride through the park to see Nyala - like a kudu - red backed deer, warthogs - lots of them - monkeys, baboons and any number of birds. A lovely ride although it started to become a bit painful after a few hours. Our guide for the horse ride was particularly struck with the age of some of the riders, mine in particular. There are not a lot of old people around here.
Our next stop really should have been for longer. Wendo Genet has great hot springs and an excellent swimming pool. Still up at 1878 metres but very comfortable. We stayed in a resort in our tents. Lovely green grass and in a beautiful tropical garden. Best camp for a while. Monkeys all over the place and great hot showers. Unfortunately, we only had one night there and back on the truck to head to Abba Minsch. This seems to be a large-ish town and there is supposed to be a good internet cafe here. With luck I will get this
post up but I suspect there still wont be enough to load photos.
Into the Omo Valley in jeeps tomorrow and for the next four days. This is supposed to be a highlight of the trip. Sounds a lot like a people watching safari. Not too sure about that. We will see.
Advertisement
Tot: 0.601s; Tpl: 0.014s; cc: 8; qc: 27; dbt: 0.0215s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.2mb
sarah
non-member comment
That's a pretty small horse...