Ethiopia and Somaliland

December 2013

Most people of my age have one image of Ethiopia – that of starving people in the famine of 1984-85 and the Live Aid concert. Indeed, when I said I was going there, the question most asked was ‘Why?’ I used to joke that I was off to find the ‘fastest thing on two legs in the world?’ What is it? A chicken running through an Ethiopian village.

Ethiopia was never on the Top 10 list of countries to see. But when I discovered that Turkish Airlines were introducing a regular service to Addis Ababa with a very competitive price (at ¥365 about half the price of an Ethiopian Airlines flight) over the Xmas period, it seemed a perfect opportunity to pay it a visit. In advance, we had to get malaria tablets and make sure our Immunisations (typhoid, polio, diphtheria, and tetanus) were up to date. I also sent our passports off to get Multi-entry Ethiopian visas and a visa from the Somaliland Mission in London. It was a bit strange to talk to them on the phone and ask how they wanted payment. “Just send cash” they replied. We did get the visas and invoices.

My road mate Trevor dropped Wendy and I at Birmingham Airport on Saturday December 14th for the 16:30 flight to Istanbul. In-flight food and entertainment was good. Since Wendy had never seen Istanbul, it was an excuse to have a one night/day stop over. Arriving around 22:30pm, we purchased £10 visas upon arrival and grabbed a taxi to the Han Hostel Hotel about 10 minutes drive from the airport. It was surprising to find bunk beds in our narrow room, but it was en-suite and clean and ideal for a late night arrival.

I had last visited Istanbul in 2008 as Trevor and I drove en route to Mongolia but all we saw then were traffic jams and the Bosphorus Bridge over to the Bosphorus Strait into Asia. I had toured the city back in 1997 as part of a trip to Bulgaria and also way back in 1988.

On Sunday morning, at breakfast, we met an English/Turkish women who loaned us her bus card. We caught a local bus down to the old part of Istanbul and walked to the Blue Mosque (1606-16) where we were fortunate to get in to see it just before morning prayers. This was followed by the Aya Sofia (527-565), the original cathedral which is Istanbul’s most famous building. The Hippodrome was nearby which was the centre of the city’s life for 1400 years.

We also visited the Basilica Cistern, an extraordinary subterranean structure (built in 532AD) which had a roof 65m wide, 143m long and supported by 336 columns arranged in 12 rows. A final walk through Gulhane Park bypassing Topkaki Palace took us to the waterfront where the ferries depart. A city bus took us back to the hotel along grid locked streets. Picking up our backpack, we caught a taxi back to airport for the 19:00 flight to Addis Ababa.

We touched down at 0210 local time on Monday December 16th at Addis Ababa Bole Airport. With our pre-purchased visas we were able to skip that queue, but at immigration we had our fingerprints taken on both hands and facial recognition photos. The airport was virtually deserted. I used an ATM to get 300 Birr (around £100) of local currency. December 2013 currency rates were: £1 = 30.83 Birr, 1 Euro = 25.95 $1 = 18.8.

Walking out of the terminal, the taxis were waiting in the car park. There was no public transport at this time of night and we were hostages to aggressive charging. We laughed off the ambitious $50 starting price, held out at $25 and eventually settled on $20. It was still extortionate but it was 3am and we had a nice hotel reserved called the Solo Te on Mariam Road

The rather tatty taxi rumbled through the back streets for a few kilometres. There was no life on the streets except for the occasional dog. The driver took us to the locked hotel car park at the back. A night watchman wrapped in warm blankets, let us in and someone gave us a key. I had arrived in country 125.

It was a lovely room, but I was up and out by 8am to find an Ethiopian Airways office to check internal flights and prices. My internet research had told me that airfares booked internally were a third of the normal price, making it cheap and faster to get around the country faster. But when I sat down to interrogate the options, I was told that the prices had risen recently, removing the discount. This put a spanner in the works regarding completing the entire historical circuit in the time available and we’d be bussing what we could.

It made sense to book a bus ticket to Bahir Dar so after breakfast, we packed up and checked out. I made a couple of calls and reserved a room nearer the bus terminal. At the nearest intersection, we spotted a policeman and asked him which bus to catch into the centre. He waved one down. You pay the conductor through a window before you enter (1 Birr). I thought we were on Bole Street, but once aboard, I discovered that we weren’t. Wendy struck up conversations with a couple of girls. We were heading to the ‘stadium’. One of the girls, a student, escorted us through the new overpass road works and pointed us towards Merkal Square. It was just a vast empty space with traffic rushing past on one side. All buses depart and arrive here and taxi’s hover around touting for fares.

I found the Selam Bus Company office. This is a private bus company offering limited but more comfortable journeys than the Government buses. I sat with a row of people waiting to be seen. There were seats available to Bahir Dar the following morning for 334 Birr (£11 - better than a $150 flight) and I booked the tickets. The only issue was that we were supposed to be at the bus by 5am.

Ethiopia has it’s own time. Their clock starts at sunrise (which is officially 6am every day). So 7am is 1 o’clock, 8am is 2 o’clock etc. At 6pm the clock resets again so 7pm is 1 o’clock again. Therefore on the ticket, it said we should be at the bus at 11 o’clock. Very confusing. The Ethiopians call our time “Habesha time” (Gringo time). Throughout the trip we always had to double check to see if it was Ethiopian or Habesha time.

While I was waiting in the office, Wendy struck up a conversation with two youths in the office. She was invited to their village and when she said we were leaving tomorrow, she was invited to a traditional coffee ceremony. Alarms bells rang. Every guidebook alerts you to the scam of ‘friendly students’ offering you a traditional coffee ceremony. You get taken somewhere, plied with honey wine, food maybe some entertainment and then charged extortionate rates before you are let out. I pulled her aside and told her to ignore them.

Addis Ababa is Africa’s fourth largest city (3.4 m pop) and its diplomatic capital. It is also the world’s third highest capital city (2400m). Located pretty much in the centre of the country it can initially appear overwhelming with beggars, cripples, taxi drivers and hawkers all clamouring for your attention. You can feel somewhat besieged but soon learn to shrug people off. You will get the same old questions “Where are you from?” “What is your name?” and “Where are you going?”

We caught a bus up Bole Road to the first intersection and found the Rita Hotel just off Democratic Republic Congo St. It took a while to find it down an alleyway where precarious wooden scaffolding surrounded a towering building being constructed next door. It looked like it could collapse at any minute. Inside the gate of the guesthouse, was a small secure courtyard. We got a room with a generator running outside. It was nothing special and only for one night. But it did cost $50, which was overpriced. I got the impression that the owner was a bit of an opportunist. When I talked about us needing to get to the bus station by 5am, he said he’d call a friend. The price he came back with was 250 Birr - £8. The ride was probably a mile and a half. I said I’d find our own taxi. ‘Too early for taxis’ he replied. Whatever. I’m not paying £8.

I went out and explored the vicinity, which didn’t have much - a couple of poorly stocked mini supermarkets and an ATM for more cash. The maximum withdrawal is only 4000 Birr (£130) in Ethiopia. I found St George’s beer across the road in a stall. It was only 10 Birr a bottle but I had to leave 50 Birr as a bottle deposit. That evening, we found a local restaurant that was westernised and did things like soup, chips and sharwarmas.

My alarm went off around 4am on the Tuesday morning. Wendy is never great at getting up this early but she did get better with practice and we got a lot of that on this trip. The owner produced omelettes and black coffee in the courtyard, which I devoured before we left the compound and walked to the intersection. A taxi was dropping someone off and offered us a ride for 100 Birr. It was a lesson in never accepting an asking price in Ethiopia.

At Merkal Square, there were crowds of people waiting but no buses. Then half a dozen Salem buses rolled in as well as a few Sky buses (their competition). It was then a case of discovering which was heading for Bahir Dar. Which was none of them because it hadn’t arrived. It rolled in around 5.20am. Then we lined up to have our luggage tagged. It was quite organised – or at least people knew the system and no one cut into the line. What I couldn’t work out was the scrum to get on board when they finally opened the doors. We all had reserved seats so why were people trying to squeeze on ahead of others. I wondered if there was a problem with double booking seats but there wasn’t. I think they just wanted to get in away from the cold. Many locals wore blankets to keep warm. Kids would come round with trays of sweets, chewing gum, cigarettes and Coke. We saw very few people smoking in Ethiopia. It must be a luxury over here. Finally aboard, we found the seats had legroom but didn’t recline. The bus pulled away in the darkness. Everyone had their curtains closed. It was the start of our first 10-hour bus journey.

The CIA website says of Ethiopia: “Unique among African countries, the ancient Ethiopian monarchy maintained its freedom from colonial rule with the exception of a short-lived Italian occupation from 1936-41. In 1974, a military junta, the Derg, deposed Emperor Haile Selassie (who had ruled since 1930) and established a socialist state. Torn by bloody coups, uprisings, wide-scale drought, and massive refugee problems, the regime was finally toppled in 1991 by a coalition of rebel forces, the Ethiopian People's Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF). A constitution was adopted in 1994, and Ethiopia's first multiparty elections were held in 1995. A border war with Eritrea late in the 1990s ended with a peace treaty in December 2000.

The 27th largest country in the world is a landlocked high plateau (highest mountain 4500m) with a central mountain range divided by Great Rift Valley. Its natural resources are small reserves of gold, platinum, copper, potash, natural gas and hydropower. Arable land only accounts for 13% of land use. The major crops are cereals, pulses, coffee, oilseed, cotton, sugarcane, potatoes, khat, cut flowers along with hides, cattle, sheep and goats.

Current environmental issues include: deforestation, overgrazing, soil erosion, desertification, water shortages in some areas from water-intensive farming and poor management. Ethiopia's economy is based on agriculture, which accounts for 46% of GDP and 85% of total employment. Coffee has been a major export crop. The agricultural sector suffers from poor cultivation practices and frequent drought, but recent joint efforts by the Government of Ethiopia and donors have strengthened Ethiopia's agricultural resilience, contributing to a reduction in the number of Ethiopians threatened with starvation.

The 94m population is divided into 12 main ethnic groups and three main religions: Ethiopian Orthodox 43%, Muslim 34% and Protestant 17%. 45% of the people are under 15 years old and the general life expectancy is around 60 years. There is a literacy rate of 39%. Average annual income is $1200 and 29% fall below the poverty line.

The Lonely Persons Guide said “Ethiopia’s landscape impresses in both scale and beauty. It has an amazing backdrop of canyons, chasms, lakes, savannah plains and high plateaux” while Bradt Guidebook said “There is nothing in sub-Saharan Africa that prepares the visitor for the wealth of historical and cultural treasures both ancient and living in northern Ethiopia.” This was why we were headed north on the usual ‘Historical loop’ of 2500km that the majority of tourists do.

On leaving Addis Ababa, the Bahir Dar road climbed the eucalyptus tree filled Entoto Hills into the high moorland landscape of rolling hills and long plains where we saw Amhara people who rarely wear shoes and all the men carrying wooden staffs. The main 560km road between these cities via Dejen and Debra Markos is now sealed for all but the steep 30km stretch that passes through the Blue Nile Gorge between Goha Tsion and Dejen.

The scenery was indeed wonderful. Lots of herds of cattle, sheep and goats being tended by shepherds, families harvesting hay in their fields, half a dozen cattle roped together in a line and marched around in a circle over maize to squeeze the seeds out. These became familiar sights wherever we travelled around the country.

Mid morning, with the sun rising quickly, we climbed a series of switchbacks over some mountains and down into a river valley where we crossed the Blue Nile River. Shortly after, the bus stopped and everyone piled out to disappear into the bushes for toiletries. Men and women were not divided by the road. Everyone just headed anywhere they could.

We did have an official (late) lunch stop in Debre Markos (2410m). The hectic restaurant had waiters/waitresses rushing around with fulfilling orders of local food. We sat down and I pointed at someone’s meal. It looked like tripe but was a large round tray with sourdough flatbread called Injera. On top was a bowl of beef stew called Wat. On the bread was a pile of orange spice. I ripped apart the bread, grabbed some meat and dunked it in the orange stuff. Repeat until all bread gone. It was a bit bland but an experience repeated at various stops on bus journeys.

Rolling into Bahir Dar late in the afternoon, the small bus station was full of touts looking for hotel custom. Once we had our backpack, we grabbed a 3 wheel rickshaw called a bajaj in Ethiopia and headed for the Ghion Hotel down by the lake. The guidebooks were right when they said the rooms were tired and worn but it was right by Lake Tana and in a great location. A pre dinner stroll along a path by the lake had us spotting a flock of pelicans floating off shore.

We had a couple of issues. In our room, I went to shut the wooden bathroom door and it stuck firm. I then discovered that there was no handle on the inside to pull it and I couldn’t get out. Wendy wasn’t strong enough to push the door so she had to get someone to force it. Then at the outside restaurant, Wendy ordered chicken and rice. When it appeared it didn’t taste like chicken. It wasn’t off, but it had no flavour I had ever tasted and even I failed to eat it – which was a first. We discovered later in the trip that cat is often served up instead of chicken. I think this was our first cat meal! They did serve red wine, but it was called Gouder, which was pretty undrinkable. Later on we found Axumite wine which was sweet and palatable. With the threat of mosquitoes by the lake, we lit a mosquito coil in the room but I think it was the wrong season for mozzies.

Bahir Dar (pop 170,000) lies at 1830 metres. It has wide streets shaded by palm trees and sweeping views across Lake Tana’s shimmering blue waters. This is the largest body of water in Ethiopia, broadly circular in shape measuring 65km in diameter with a surface area of 3673km. It’s average depth is 14m and it is dotted with more than three dozen islands. It is also the official source of the Blue Nile River.

I went for an early morning stroll and saw the Zege Peninsula ferry filling up with women wearing colourful clothes. A large flock of pelicans sheltered in a lagoon. The streets were already buzzing with whining rickshaws. Bahir Dar has grown rapidly in the last few years, based mainly on the tourist industry.

Skipping breakfast at the hotel (I can’t think why), we signed on to the half-day boat trip to see some of the monasteries on Lake Tana for 300 Birr each (about £9). Most monasteries date from the late 13th and 14th centuries though the current buildings were erected later. The murals adorning the walls are “full of colour, life, wit and humanity of Ethiopian art at its best and provide a compendium of Ethiopian saints and martyrs” (Brandt). It’s a popular tourist activity and when we were led up the road from the hotel to the small boat, other people joined us. These were an Ethiopian couple who had moved to Australia and three South Africans – a father and two sons who had ridden motorcycles all the way here from Johannesburg. Ethiopia was the only country where they couldn’t get bike insurance. There was also a funny German man who managed projects to plant trees in developing countries and an English women called Natasha who had originally gone to Mozambique for her trip, discovered fighting going on and had rapidly switched to Ethiopia. We all got on well, swapping stories.

It was a lovely sunny day as we putted out across Lake Tana in the sunshine. We saw locals paddling Tankwa canoes. These are made from woven papyrus and can take huge loads. Their design came from ancient Egypt when Ethiopia was an important trading partner and probably came up the Blue Nile.

The thickly forested Zege Peninsula sticks out into the lake. It was full of birds and we saw a large sea eagle perched on top of a tall tree. It took over an hour to reach the far end of the peninsula. A couple of youths were waiting at the small wooden jetty. “You must hire a guide” they said. “6 people per guide”. No we don’t was the unanimous reply. The guides were pushy. Wendy and I let them lead off some of the others who were busy arguing. We eventually followed the path up through the forest of lemon and coffee trees to the oldest monastery called Bete Maryam which was founded in the 13th century. En route, there were people with stalls trying to sell trinkets and religious stuff.

The monastery from the outside was a walled compound. The main building was circular with an outside walkway and then an inner sanctum (maqdas) which was decorated with some excellent colourful murals. To get in, we had to pay another 100 Birr each. This was probably at least double the official price because no receipt or ticket was issued. The German guy said “Ethiopia loves to charge us our skin tax” meaning white people paid much more. Wendy opted to sit outside in the sun and while I was in there was pestered by the ticket people telling her she must buy a ticket and go in. She gave them short shrift.

We had an hour and it was a relaxing stop, before we boarded the boat and pottered back round to another jetty. A longer walk took us up to Ura Kidane Meret – the largest and most famous monastery. There were also a lot more stalls, and one place offered coffee ceremonies. Wendy opted to stay here. She was joined soon after by another boatload of people. Chatting away, they asked her to guess where they were from. Wendy guessed ‘German?’ No, they were Israelis. Whoops.

Hardly the most attractive on the outside, the circular church was built in the 16th century. The inner sanctuary had beautifully painted walls from between 100 and 250 years ago. They had an incredible jumble of murals. Some of the figures looked like a young Michael Jackson with a big afro haircut. A priest dressed in bright purple robes and a hat hovered about. We had at least another hour at this stop and it was nice not to have to rush around.

On the way back to Bahir Dar, we stopped in at the Kebran Gabriel the closest monastery to the town, which lies on a tiny forested crescent. This was a male only monastery and was not decorated as vividly as the previous two. Most of us took a pass on this and another 100 Birr admission and chatted to each other. On the next island was another one called Entos Eyesu – where supposedly monks and nuns live together. The guide books said it was not worth the admission and only two got off the boat to have a look. I felt that the first two had been enough to give me an excellent idea of Ethiopian monasteries and you could take great photographs. I didn’t need to see every monastery on the lake.

Back on shore around 2.30pm, we said good bye to everyone after our five hour excursion. It had been a lovely way to spend the day. Recommended. At the hotel, we asked if there was a minivan heading for Gonder. We didn’t want to spend another night at this hotel and Gonder was only four hours up the road. The reception said that two others were waiting for it and within 30 minutes, a minivan did turn up. This saved us going back to bus station to find one.

I knew however, from previous experience in other countries that we would not leave until it was full. Sure enough, we headed back to the bus station area and parked up. ‘Others coming’ the driver said. I got out and had a walk around. I quickly picked up a local with his ‘where are you from?’ patter. Where are you going? Gonder. When. Now. He followed me around and then tried to tell me about a charity and his shop, both of which would love my money. I walked back to the minivan.

We then drove around for over an hour trying to find passengers. Trev and me had had this experience in Tajikistan where we spent two and a half hours doing the same thing in a one horse town where even the horse had left. The minivan gradually filled up, but under the seat in front, there was some luggage and Wendy and I could hardly move our feet. It was nearly full (i.e. packed) but the driver was still looking to fill the last seat. The two French guys who joined us at the hotel had had enough. They got out and demanded their backpacks get removed from the roof. ‘It will be dark soon and its dangerous to drive at night. We have spent too long driving around. We’ll go tomorrow’. At the prospect of losing two passengers, the driver changed his mind and we were off.

It was a good road. As we were leaving town, we saw lines of uniformed school pupils walking down the side of the road. I thought they had a long school day. We discovered later that Ethiopian schools have an ‘early’ and ‘late’ shift. Half the pupils attend five hours in the morning and the others do the afternoon. They switch shifts every week. This allows everyone to get some education but also for the children to help out on the land during the day. Every school had its own colourful uniform – orange, purple, green, burgundy. Everybody wore one. They seemed to really value the opportunity to learn.

The drive to Gonder was smooth despite the fact that herds of goats or cattle were crossing the road at various points, people walked down the side of the roads in the dark and donkeys and carts were unlit. Each village or town we passed was bustling with stalls and rickshaws. The driver was good even if he spent half the time on his mobile phone. The ride improved considerably when we were able to push the luggage forward and move our feet. A young kid with a lovely smile sat next to me, looking at my attempts to take photos before the sun set. He was over the moon when we offered him a western sweetie.

About three and a half hours and 180km later, we pulled into Gonder. We were now 748km from Addis Ababa. It seemed a large place. We were dropped in the centre. I had a hotel in mind and we discovered that we were only half a mile away. We walked up a hill and along the side of the walls of the ‘Royal Enclosure’. A security guard sat out the hotel gates.

The Lodge de Chateau Hotel www.lodgeduchateau.com was a relatively new hotel and the up to date guidebooks had it as the best place to stay in town. We were taken to a nice spacious en suite room with nice furnishings. The bed looked a little small for the two of us, but we would manage. We asked the youth at reception if there was anywhere to each. He said ‘Master Chef’ about 5 minutes away and insisted on walking us there. It was located up a dark unlit lane.

The restaurant also had a security guard. When we entered, we discovered that the family run place was about to close. It was 9pm, but the jovial owner/chef insisted on welcoming us. He said that ‘pepper steak’ had been the special tonight and that sounded fine to us with cold glasses of St George while we waited. The meal was delicious, the best meal we had on our trip. As we ate, the chef came back and chatted. He had worked in Abu Dhabi in the United Emirates for three years as a chef and earned enough money to come back and open up his own restaurant. After the meal, he and his wife insisted on walking us back down to the main road near our hotel. We said we’d be back tomorrow night.

It was nice to wake up in a nice room on Thursday December 19th. When we asked about breakfast, we were taken up some stairs to a terrace of tables and chairs and plants and a marvellous view of the tin roofed stone houses and the mountains shrouded in mist as the sun rose. It was like another world after the Ghion Hotel and very affordable at $50 a night. After a lovely breakfast, we met Mr Seyoum, the friendly owner. Was everything all right with the room? Yes, but the bed was a bit small. No problem. We will have you moved and within 15 minutes we had been moved next door with a large bed.

While Wendy relaxed, I went walkabout. Firstly, I tracked down the Dashel Bank, which had the only ATM and withdrew 8000 Birr in two transactions. Then I went to the Ethiopian Airways office to ask about flights to Axum and Lalibela and finally the Selam Buses office to find out bus routes and times. We would make up our route as we went along.

Gonder came across as a busy city with the streets full of people and rickshaws. It was prosperous in the centre with shops and offices. With a population of 227,000, it is the 4th largest city in Ethiopia and lies in a bowl of hills. Surrounded by fertile land, it originally lay at the crossroads of three major caravan trade routes. Consequently, Emperor Fasiladas made Gonder his capital in 1636 and it flourished for over a century.

It was a lovely sunny day and Gonder preserves a treasure trove of history. The tall 17th century stone walled compound of 70,000 sq. metres of the Royal Enclosure (Fasil Ghebbi) next to the hotel contained half a dozen medieval palaces and was a UNESCO World Heritage site. It was virtually empty. With no one hassling us, it was almost like an idyllic oasis of calm with the noise of the traffic and city kept at bay behind the walls.

The most impressive and oldest building is Fasiladas Palace. Built around 1640 it is 32 metres tall and had four 4 domed towers. Climbing up a stone staircase to the first floor, the tall rooms were empty but you could sense the history coming out of the walls. The Second floor and watch tower were off limits. Behind the palace were the remains of a Turkish bath complex and storage areas. Later on, we came across the ruins of Fasiladas Royal Archive building. It was now a shell having been bombed by the British during World War Two when the Italian Army chiefs used this compound as their base.

The Palace of Iyasu I (1682-1706) next to Fasiladas Palace had a saddle shaped vaulted roof over some of the structure. We had also bombed this during the war. It was originally sumptuously decorated inside.

Other ruins in the enclosure included Bakafa’s castle, some stables, an enormous banquet hall, some church ruins, more Turkish baths and Mentewab’s castle (1730-55) still in good condition. There were even some lion cages. Apparently lions symbolised Ethiopian royalty and they were kept here as late as 1990. A massive green/blue lizard over a foot long sunned itself off the side of the walls. We probably spent three hours in this Royal Enclosure just pottering around and taking some wonderful photographs. Admission was a respectable 100 Birr. Recommended.

Gonder has other ruins of Fasiladas but I was only interested in one other sight, that of the Debre Berhan Selassie Church. It was supposedly a mile away from the Royal Enclosure and I agreed with Wendy that we would get a rickshaw. As we headed up the road from our hotel, we saw a group of formally dressed women all walking in a group. Some held umbrellas. I was trying to get photos when a youth yelled. ‘It’s a baptism.’ Apparently after a child is baptised, the women all separate and walk back to the mother’s house to celebrate while the husband looks after the child and does his thing with the men.

The youth spoke good English and was soon joined by two mates. They fed us information and asked about English football. I don’t follow it so I was pretty hopeless and when they exclaimed disbelief, I explained that football was an expensive sport to watch and I felt it obscene that some earned more in a week than I would in my lifetime.

Where were we going? To the church. They said they would take us there. They told us that they played for a football club but they didn’t have a ball. Would we buy them one? If it’s cheap enough I joked. One of them ran off to find one, while we were led to a church but it wasn’t the church we wanted. The youth came back with a decent ball and the stall owner. ‘Only 500 Birr’ £15? Piss off. That’s more expensive than it would be in England. ‘ How much you pay?’ Nothing. We’re not buying it. They trailed along with us pleading to buy the ball. No. Go away. In the end I said “What don’t you understand about the word NO!?

When they had disappeared, we asked a local for directions to the church and when told realised that these youths had taken us out of our way to stall us while they got the ball. It made us feel bad because of this experience that if anyone came up to make conversation during the rest of the trip, we were naturally suspicious and thinking ‘What do you want?’ We found the correct road but it was an upward climb. Wendy on the look out for a rickshaw asked the price and then walked away when the inflated price was offered. It got steeper and steeper but we got to the church.

Legend has it that if it wasn’t for a swarm of bees, the Debre Berhan Selassie Church would probably have been destroyed in the 1880s like most of Gonder’s other churches by marauding Sudanese Devishes. As such, it is the only surviving example of a church when Gonder was full of them from its days as the capital. It is surrounded by a large stone wall and 12 rounded towers that represent the 12 apostles. The two tiered building with a thatched roof was entered through an arched door. There was a sign nearby saying that married couples who had had sex in the previous 24 hours or any woman who was menstruating could not enter. Inside, it was very dark. There were well preserved paintings on the walls but it was the roof with its rows and rows of painted winged cherubs, representing the omnipresence of God, that drew your eye. I think it’s the only example of its kind left in the country. We listened to guides telling other westerners about the paintings.

Back outside, we started walking back down the hill and a rickshaw stopped. The 50 Birr starting price was reduced to 20 Birr and we climbed aboard. There was another women inside. We motored back to the centre and dropped the woman. As we headed towards our hotel road, a large herd of goats were crossing the street. I tried to get a photo but failed and slipped the camera into my daypack.

We were dropped just up the road from the hotel. As I paid, a crowd of locals came up. The rickshaw took off and then I checked for my camera. It wasn’t in my bag, which was slightly unzipped. I had got out first so if I had left it on the seat or it had dropped to the floor, Wendy would have seen/kicked it. I looked around and saw nothing. We can only conclude that when I was paying the driver, someone stuck a hand in my pack and pulled out the camera. Initially, I thought I’d left it in the rick shaw and ran up the road hoping to find our man, but its difficult to choose from fifty in the vicinity. I couldn’t believe it. I had only lost something before in Cuba when my day pack as snatched off my back. It had my passport, camera, guidebooks and money. This was just a camera and it was hardly expensive, but I had got such great photos from the trip so far. I put on a brave face but felt dejected. Until I had my next beer.

I went walkabout wondering if there was a camera shop to find a replacement. A youth asking if I needed something led me to his ‘sister’s shop’ which sold mobile phones. She reappeared with two cameras. That was their total stock. Neither were perfect and I stalled especially at the asking prices.

Walking back to the hotel, an elderly man stopped me to ask what was wrong. I explained about losing my camera. ‘You must report this to the police. They can do something. There is a police station down there.’ He grabbed a kid and told him to take me there. It was at the bottom of our hotel road. When I got there, a plain clothed policeman said it was the wrong police station. He found me a rickshaw, told the driver to take me there. It was at the other end of town. I got out and walked in.

A young policeman asked what I wanted. His English was poor as I tried to explain in body language about the pickpocket. He shrugged his shoulders and went outside and started to chat and laugh with people. After five minutes of nothing happening, I gave up and started walking back to the centre. The young policeman and another caught me up and said they would take me to the ‘Tourist Police office’. Ironically, this was half a mile from the hotel and where we had been dropped the night before.

The wooden hut had half a dozen police officers. No one really spoke English so they found someone who could and I explained my story to the third set of policemen. One of them produced an Ethiopian/English form which I filled out. I asked about a crime number. ‘This is an application to report a crime’ the translator replied. Eh? They have to investigate first before they decide to make it official. It will take two days. I didn’t like to tell them I was leaving the next morning. I decided to go back to the camera shop and buy the cheaper camera. But when I inspected it properly, I discovered it took AA batteries. It would be a waste of time. When I arrived back at the hotel, I found Wendy in the reception area with the hotel Manager and two policemen. They had come to investigate and also apologise for the loss of the camera. The manager said that Gonder had a rising crime rate especially with tourists and he was hoping that they would try and crack down on the pickpockets.

I then remembered that I had stored my AA credit card in the camera pouch when I had withdrawn money that morning. Without any details, I had to call the AA in the UK using the road breakdown number on a card in my wallet to get the correct number and then cancel the card. Nothing had been withdrawn since losing it. After sorting out the mess, we returned to Master Chef where I had the fish special while Wendy couldn’t resist the pepper steak again.

From Gonder we could have done a day trip into the Simian Mountains but it would have been a 6 hours return trip with maybe 3 hours there and at $120 a person, it was out of our price range. When we had sat down and discussed the rest of our route, it was obvious that without the planned internal flights we were short of time to do everything. We could now either head north to Axum and then south to Lalibela but then be stranded in Addis Ababa for the remaining couple of days, or we could skip Axum to allow us enough time to head east to Harar and over into Somaliland. The attraction of an extra country and the fact that we had already paid £30 each for visas meant that I’d have to sacrifice another major historical site in Ethiopia but maybe do it when the surrounding countries became safer.

We got up early on Friday December 20th for our breakfast. The sun was just breaking over the horizon. The owner of the Lodge de Chateau was kind enough to take us in his van down to the minivan area, find a vehicle going east and then negotiate a price and work out with the driver how we would swop minivans to reach Gashena. Minivans only have a 150km range in Ethiopia so you have to change. Despite my experience of Gonder, I would still thoroughly recommend the place especially the Lodge de Chateau and Master Chef. In retrospect, they were the nicest places we stayed and ate in Ethiopia.

We set off in a packed minivan, but we had been seated near the front with extra legroom. We returned down the road towards Bahir Dar which we had done before in the dark. We passed through a town called Addis Zemen and then near Werota, there was a junction. We turned left heading eastwards for Gashana. The scenery was a repeat of attractive rural landscapes – shepherds with goats, sheep or cattle, small farmsteads with the families out harvesting crops or tending their land. Low lying yellow hills lay on either side punctuated by occasional small rivers or large dry riverbeds. We had been told that the driver would drop us in a town and arrange the change, but a minivan pulled up along side before then and we were told to switch. ‘My son’ said our driver pointing at the other driver. Our backpack got moved from one roof to the other and we squeezed into the packed seats. The other passengers were intrigued by two westerners climbing aboard.

The two journeys took around six hours. When we climbed out at Gashana bus terminal, it was just an enclosed area with a bus and a few minivans waiting. There is only one reason to come here and that is to get to Lalibela and everyone knows it. The bus conductor came over to say that the bus was going to Lalibela and that tickets were 200 Birr each. I don’t think so. It was only two hours away. I stalled while he looked indignant and checked out the minivans. None were going there. One youth took the piss by offering us a private van for 2000 Birr. We were surrounded by locals looking at the strange westerners and everyone wanted to rip us off. It was the kind of place you just don’t to be but you have no choice. Kids walked up with palms outstretched yelling ’Give me money/chocolate/pen’ (delete as applicable). I just replied ‘Give ME money’.

After about an hour, the bus was ready to board. A lot of people were waiting to board. I knew we would get on because we would get overcharged. Eventually we agreed on 100 Birr each (the local rate was 60). There was no choice really. The bus was leaving with or without us. I climbed up a ladder outside the back of the bus to have the backpack secured. The guy on the roof tried to claim 10 Birr for the privilege. I was the one who had hauled it up there!

The journey to Lalibela started on a sealed road which then disintegrated into a bumpy rocky track. We were sat on the back seat, packed in with three others. It was a scenic trip over the hills with the usual rural landscapes. A youth who was sat in front started a conversation. He told me about his family and their farm and Ethiopia’s problems and how he wanted to become a politician to sort them out. I should have made more of an effort to engage him, but I let him talk on while I put my head on my arms on the headrest in front. The stolen camera, the long uncomfortable rides, the unpleasantness of Gashana and the incessant questions – Ethiopia was dragging me down.

Fortunately we were headed to Ethiopia’s most famous sight and my spirits lifted. Lalibela is a strange isolated town set high (2630m) in the wild craggy mountains of Wolo and vast rocky escarpments of Lasta. Its fame rests on its medieval capital status when rock-hewn churches were carved entirely out of rock and which are still functioning and mostly in excellent states of preservation. Guidebooks often rank the churches as the 8th wonder of the ancient world.

Lalibela is strung out down a mountainside. The bus stopped at the terminal at the top of the town. We caught a minivan to the ‘centre’ which was a few minutes drive and then stayed on it down the hill to where most of the hotels are located. We could see the white roof structures towering over some of the churches on the way down. The old houses of Lalibela are of a design unlike anywhere else in Ethiopia – two story circular stone constructs that huddle in an amorphous mass over the steep slopes.

Opting for the Alef Paradise hotel, we got a basic en suite room. All our rooms in Ethiopia had hot water boilers, which you turned on for 30 minutes to heat water. This hotel was prone to power cuts but we located the power box outside the room and could re-set it ourselves. There was a nice view of mountains from the room. I went walkabout to check out any shops (virtually non-existent) and restaurants (far and few between except in hotels). Walking up the hill from the hotel, I came across tracks up to one of the rock church complexes and went to have a look. Children followed me around with the usual what is your name-where are you from-please give me money routine. You’d certainly get fit living in this town with all the hills to climb.

We opted to eat at the hotel. The menu was limited and had comical misspellings such as ‘staffed cabbage leaves’, ‘lamb chop served with vegetable or ice’, ‘tibes served with brad or injera’ and ‘chicken carrie with rice’. Wendy opted for soup, bread and chips. But the hotel had run out of potatoes so no chips. I had the spaghetti bolognaise. First the food took an age to appear (even though there were only 6 other diners). Then only half the cutlery was provided. A spoon would have been useful for soup. When Wendy asked for some butter, honey was bought and there was only one set of salt and pepper for the whole restaurant. We didn’t realise this until we had asked for salt/pepper before the meal and it was dumped on our table, only to be removed as soon as our food arrived and taken to another table before we had a chance to use it. Throw in a power cut during the meal and the impression was not of a competent kitchen/waiting staff. How we longed for MasterChef in Gonder. At least you could get a cold beer at the hotel.

The next morning we popped next door to a local café and sat at a table. We were served milky coffee and honey type bread called Dabo that was freshly baked and delicious. Then we caught a minivan up the hill to the official Rock Cathedrals entrance. The admission fee had skyrocketed to $50 a person. The ticket was valid for 5 days as if most tourists had 5 days available but did not include the out of town stuff. They were using the UNESCO World Heritage Site as an excuse and like Ethiopian Airlines, they were milking the Tourist dollar for all it was worth. The site is not worth $50 whatever you read and I think it will put off some tourists, especially the backpacker market from coming. There also seemed to be a scam at the passport office. We handed over a crisp $100 bill but only got one written ticket. I was asked for my passport number. When it was first checked, it was as if we had only paid for one person. I ended up writing Wendy’s passport number on as well.

The Lonely Person’s Guide wittered that “Lalibela is history and mystery frozen in stone, its soul alive with rites and awe of Christianity at its most ancient and unbending.” It was a capital of the Zagwe dynasty in 12th/13th centuries and the rock churches supposedly date from time of King Lalibela (1181-1221). True believers say all work was completed in 23 years and that this was possible because every night the earthly workforce was replaced by a celestial one. But the buildings are so different from each other in style and artisanship that they probably took longer to construct than Lalibela’s reign. Lalibela was known as the ‘New Jerusalem’

What can you say about the rock churches of Lalibela? The churches are big – several in excess of 10m high. The Brandt Guidebook was accurate when it said “Carved below ground level, they are ringed by trenches and courtyards, the sides of which are cut into with stone graves and hermit cells and connected to each other by a tangled maze of tunnels and passages. In size and scope, the church complex feels like a subterranean village”. Yet each individual church is unique in shape and size, precisely carved and minutely decorated. The thirteen churches are split into two major sets – the North-western group (7 Churches) and the South Eastern Group (5 churches) which in reality are less than a kilometre apart and the isolated St George’s Church.

Entering the North-western group via a wide trench, the Bet Medhane Alem (House of the Saviour of the World) resembled a massive Greek temple more than a traditional Ethiopian church. It was impressive for its size (33.5m by 33.5m and over 11.5m high) and majesty and said to be the largest rock-hewn church in the world. The building was surrounded by 36 large rectangular columns and the interior consisted of a barrel-vaulted nave and four aisles with 36 columns supporting the gabled roof. We had to take our shoes off before entering any church, but no one tried to guard our shoes for a price.

A short tunnel led to a large courtyard containing three churches. Bet Maryam was small yet designed and decorated to a high standard and the only church with porches hanging off it. 13m high, it was probably the first church that was built in Lalibela. Bet Meskel was a tiny semi-chapel carved into the northern wall of Bet Maryam’s courtyard and Bet Danaghel (House of Virgin Martyrs) was a slightly larger chapel. The other two - Bet Golgotha & Bet Mikael were twin churches which shared an entrance and formed a semi monolith. To be honest, the Bet Medhane Alem and Bet Maryam were far superior to the others and it didn’t really take very long to inspect them. We could have hired a guide and heard about the backgrounds and stories but Ethiopian religion is not really my speciality. Of course, without a camera, it was a lot quicker to sightsee.

There were no signposts to the other set and wandering around, we stumbled across Bet Giyorgis, an isolated monolith resting off on its own. St George’s Church is Lalibela’s masterpiece. Representing the apogee of the rock hewn tradition, it is the most visually perfect church of all, a 15m high three tiered plinth in the shape of a Greek cross; a shape that required no internal pillars. From a viewpoint, the shape looked amazing, but it was viewing it close up that really brought home the fact that it had been carved out of solid rock as a single structure. Yellow and red mosses on the sides of the brown rock gave it a strange glow in the sun. To get to the entrance I followed a narrow trench down to a courtyard. Inside, the windows and illuminates the ceiling’s large crosses. I thought this church was spectacular and revisited it later in the day.

When we had arrived at the main entrance earlier that morning, we had found white robed pilgrims in their hundreds wandering around the main strip and gathering under some trees. Many of the women were crying and wailing. Initially, we thought they were early devotees who had arrived to celebrate the Ethiopian Christmas on January 6th (the Ethiopian calendar is also 7 years behind ours – it was still 2006). We learnt that these people were attending a funeral. There were at least a thousand people – anybody who had ever had anything to with the dead man. They certainly know how to do a funeral in Ethiopia. Donkeys were covered in red blankets with white crosses on them.

Leaving Wendy to rest under a tree by St George’s church to take in the views, we could see a mass of white on the hills and a moaning noise that only a crowd can make. When I joined the main road, they were all coming back from their wailing and I had stand aside while they passed in a continuous group for five minutes. Many women carried umbrellas to shelter from the sun.

It took a while to track down the other group of churches and I eventually found them accidentally by following a narrow carved trench into the hills. The Bet Gabriel-Rufael was an imposing twin-church which marked the main entrance to the south eastern group. Once I had negotiated the security guard carefully checking my ticket, it was accessed by a small walkway high over the moat-like 5m deep trench below which was an impressive way to enter the church. The trench was filled with green water. The entrance is apparently flanked to the west by a sloping sliver of hewn rock called ‘The way to Heaven’. Inside the church, I had the dark interior to myself, save for a young boy dressed in white robes who chanted and sang to himself. It was very atmospheric and I felt as if I could have been there at any time during the last 500 years. I was able to climb out of one of the windows onto the platform and stare down at the trench and across to the entrance.

Back over the walkway, I followed a tunnel and winding series of trenches and stairs and came across a napping security guard. He pointed at a hole and said ‘Paradise’. I had to climb down some rocks into a tunnel. I was plunged into complete darkness and while I could stand up, I had to reach out to feel my way along the walls. It was over 50m long and curved round blocking out the sunlight at either end until you were close to the exit. It was an amazing experience to then re-appear and find Bet Merkorios. This was more deteriorated than the others and may have originally been a courthouse or prison in the medieval town. I kept walking following a trench and eventually found an exit to the complex, but returned and did the tunnel again and reappeared before the security guard. Maybe it was because I had the south-eastern complex to myself but I preferred it to the first cluster, which always gets the plaudits from the guidebooks as the ones to see. I also found it strange that for such a world famous sight, I had pretty much seen everything in around four hours.

I had been gone 90 minutes and the churches were about to close between 12-2 so I returned to Wendy at St George’s. She had been intrigued by the funeral mourners and the locals going to and coming from the Saturday market which was bustling down a dirt track close by.

We went to explore the market which was a series of stall selling clothes, shoes, materials, household goods etc. Women sat on the ground with piles of locally grown vegetables. There was also a donkey park nearby where all the donkeys were tethered, used to carry stuff too and from the market. As we wandered around, we attracted youths that tried to make conversation and attempted to lead us to various stalls, and wondered why we would just walk off on a different route. Various people had all told us about the famous ‘Saturday market’. It was ok as an example of local market but it was only aimed at the locals. There was nothing for tourists to buy.

It was a roasting hot day and climbing up a hill out of the market we came across a local hotel with a dark bar and went in for some cold beer. At 30p a bottle, it is always difficult to find a reason not to stop, but the churches were reopening and I wanted Wendy to experience the ‘tunnel’. She loved it and insisted on doing it again. We pottered around and revisited everything I had seen before lunch. There were some tourists in the complex after lunch but not enough to still make it feel crowded. We heard singing and chanting coming from a cave somewhere. A group of pilgrims were doing something in there. A priest appeared dressed in purple and let me have my photo taken with him on the mobile phone.

As we explored the complex, I spotted a new church that I hadn’t seen before, but I couldn’t see how to get to the entrance. I followed a ridge to no avail and then took a route that seemed completely the wrong direction but it eventually led me to Bet Emanuel, a 12m high free-standing monolith and Lalibela’s most finely carved church. It was more impressive from the outside than inside but I was pleased to have found it. Then I had to climb back up the hills to find Wendy who had waited near the first church at Bet Gabriel-Rufael. While she was waiting, an old woman dressed in a white gown came and tried to communicate and kissed her knees.

It had been a lovely day. I don’t think you can come to Ethiopia and not see these rock churches but they weren’t worth the $50 admission fee. I have seen rock churches in India, far more intricately carved and cheap to visit. If Ethiopia had a major tourist industry, I think they would be better known and visited more. So it was nice to see many of them virtually tourist free while the opportunity is still there.

We had switched rooms in the hotel for the second night. I wasn’t sure how we were going to get to Addis Ababa so late in the afternoon, I walked all the way back to the ‘centre’ of town and visited Ethiopian Airlines who wanted over 5000 Birr to fly to Addis Ababa in two days time. I then walked to the bus station and picked up two youths who chatted about English football and asked where I was going etc. They were able to tell me that the bus was leaving at 5am the next day and talking to the ticket man, I bought two tickets to Dessie for 150 Birr each where we would stay overnight. The two youths stuck with me and showed me a shortcut back down to the hotel.

I found Wendy nursing a beer and chatting to Giuseppi. He was an Italian who had been travelling for 3 years and visited 70 countries. He tried to travel as cheaply as possible. He would hitchhike where possible and when he arrived in a place, he would go to a hotel and offer to do odd jobs as payment for a room for the night. He was staying at our hotel and sorting out their electricity! Giuseppi was a real spirit. He said he would just toss a coin. This road or that. This hotel or that one. Somehow he had survived though he obviously had some finance to fund visas etc. He had been attacked in Honduras but was penniless and only had his coin. They let him keep it.

That night, we avoided the hotel restaurant and walked down the road looking for somewhere. There was nothing obvious but I spotted a large hotel complex and thought they must have somewhere to eat. We came across an informal row of tables and a TV showing English football. Three large American women sat in a row, heads down all peering and tapping into their smart-phones like the three monkeys. We started to talk to the closest called Meryl. She was an English teacher in Jordan and had come with her friends on an organised tour of Ethiopia. They had only been in the country a couple of days and would be flying everywhere.

When Wendy said she was ordering a bottle of Ethiopian red wine, Meryl was interested and said she’d split the cost but when the wine arrived it was the undrinkable Gouder. After the first sip, Meryl nearly spat it out and left it well alone. The hotel had a very tasty set meal and it was nice to chat to Meryl and hear about Jordan and exchange views on her observations of Ethiopia so far.

Back at the hotel, I still had to work out how we would get to the bus station by 5am. Walking with a. backpack was out of the question – it would take at least an hour. I talked to Mulu, the receptionist. He said that minivans didn’t run that early but that we could order one. He said it might be 300 Birr. £9 for less than 3 miles? After further discussion, he said that he might know someone going to Dessie tomorrow and made a call. The offer came back at 600 Birr each. I said we already had bus tickets and it would still be cheaper to find a minivan to the station. Another call. 400 Birr. OK. I arranged to be picked up around 7am at the hotel.

On another sunny day – Sunday 22nd December, our minivan driver called Manus picked us up. He was a jovial man and spoke good English. We drove up to the centre and he picked up some of his ‘friends’. Wendy sat up in the front passenger seat which meant she could get a great view and chat to Manus about Ethiopia in general.

Outside Lalibela, the road deteriorated into rubble. We were taking a different route out, bypassing Gashana to the south and heading south east towards Dilbe and Woldia. The scenery was some of the most stunning we saw in the country. The low lying yellow hills broken up by wide valleys full of farms and grazing lands with herds of cattle and goats. The big new sighting today were camels. They were in the fields or walking down the road. It never occurred to me that camels would be in Ethiopia. It seems obvious now. We would see them for the rest of the trip.

The road got really rough with huge boulders covering large dry river beds. At one point, his friends had to get out and remove rocks so the van could get through. Occasionally in villages, he would stop and local women would come to the windows to sell baskets of cooked beans. At one point, the minivan stopped so that two of his friends could get blessed by a priest standing at the side of the road (‘blessing for a good journey’). It was a hard drive but probably our most memorable during the trip. When we reached Woldia, we stopped for lunch and then headed for Dessie along the sealed road. About 30km north of Dessie, we spotted Lake Hayk.

It took around 7 hours to reach Dessie and he dropped us at the New Fasika Hotel just off the main strip and helped us check in. It was supposedly the best hotel in town, but it was still pretty ordinary. Since no one likes to drive at night in Ethiopia and you can’t reach Addis Ababa from Lalibela in less than 13 hours, everyone is forced to break the journey.

I went out to explore, find a supermarket for snacks and the Sky ticket office for a bus to Addis Ababa the following day. Dessie (pop 131,000) lies at 2600m near the base of Mount Tossa. It is a major provincial town but has nothing for the tourist to see. We contented ourselves with a meal at a local restaurant. They had ‘London Bus Burgers’ on the menu. We decided on a starter of chips and beer and when a plate of chips arrived, we intimated that we both wanted a plate. The male waiter looked at us with a ‘Are you sure?’ look on his face. The other plate arrived and was finished. It was a bit of a shock when the burgers arrived. They were huge (and really tasty with cinnamon in the flavouring) and also had a plate of chips as big as the ones we had just eaten. Suffice to say, I finished my burger and chips, but Wendy’s chips remained untouched. It was rather embarrassing since they were such good chips.

A 4am rise gave us enough time to shower, pack, drink coffee and walk down then main strip to the bus that was waiting. Inevitably, we didn’t leave until after 5.30am. Everyone kept their curtains closed until the sun had risen. More rural scenery which was starting to look very familiar. We were given rolls and water on the bus and also stopped for lunch somewhere – Debre Birhan? It took around 7 hours to reach Addis Ababa.

Dropped at Merkal Square, we caught a bus up the hill to the first intersection of Bole Road and went to check out the Selam Pension instead of Rita Hotel. This was on Gabor Street on the other side of the road. Once we were let in through the high security gate, we found a courtyard and much better hotel with three floors and it was much cheaper (328 Birr). I would recommend this hotel if you need a cheap central option.

We were still not sure of the situation in Somaliland. I was pretty certain that if they had given us visas then it was safe to enter. But Giuseppi said he was avoiding it and someone else had asked if we were sure it was safe. South Sudan had kicked off since we had arrived and who knows what impact that had had in neighbouring countries. With part of the afternoon left, we decided to visit the Somaliland Embassy but after two bus rides, stopping numerous people for directions and much walking, we discovered that it had re-located and no one knew where. Outstanding. We would have no choice but to see what happened on the border. Back at Merkal Square, Wendy had a beer at a café next to the ‘Red Terror’ Martyrs Memorial Museum while I went to the Selam Buses office to try and book tickets to Harar for the next day. The bus was full but there was a bus to Jigiga further east and we could get off at Harar. I had to use an ATM to get money out. There were beggars sitting around the area.

We decided to visit the small ‘Red Terror’ Martyrs Memorial Museum which relies on donations. I had been a bit lazy on reading Ethiopian history past Gonder’s heyday and I wasn’t sure what this museum was about. It revealed the fall of Emperor Haile Selassie in 1974 and the horrors of life under the Derg regime which held onto power until 1987. They were in charge when the famine of 1984 hit the country and tried to turn down international assistance and pocket the raised charity money

They were tough bastards who embraced communism as an ideology and paranoid about everyone, held onto control by systematic torturing and killing of anyone they suspected of opposing them. This included the emperor and two ex-Prime Ministers. It is estimated that they killed half a million people during their supremacy. I had seen the ‘Killing Fields’ in Cambodia, but I hadn’t realised that the same thing had happened in Ethiopia.

The museum contained walls of photos and names of just some of the people killed under the Derg. There were small display cabinets filled with human remains dug out of mass graves. Some of the skulls and other bones were displayed alongside a photo of a victim and their personal artefacts that were found on them when they had been killed (e.g. a toothbrush). As we wandered around the rooms, we came across a guide leading a couple. They were speaking in English. The man had obviously once lived in Ethiopia but had left. He would point at a photo and say ‘I used to go to school with him’ or ‘I knew this man and his two brothers’. It was very moving. It’s small, with not much English information but it has a real impact on you. Recommended.

That evening we dined next to the Salem Pension. An outside courtyard contained tables/chairs and a wood fire in a brazier. Charlie Chaplin movies were projected onto an outside screen. They did good pizza and St George beer.

The pension organised a taxi for 5am to take us down to Merkal Square. A lot of buses all turned up at once and we went from one to the next to ask for Jigigu. Our bus was the last to arrive. It was another long 525 kilometre 10 hour bus ride to Harar via Debre Zeit, Awash Mieso and Asbe Teleri.

Arriving late afternoon, we were dropped outside the old city. There was a new small hotel. With the help of a local, we caught a minivan and found it, but it was full. So we grabbed a rickshaw to our second choice – the Heritage Plaza Hotel. When we asked for a room, they said they were full – but that was for double beds. They did have a room with two single beds. It was a large room, but the mattresses on the bed were knackered. When you lay on one, it lurched over to one side. The hotel said we could have a double room tomorrow.

Considering it was Christmas Eve, there was no indication of it. Harar was a Muslim town. They didn’t do Christmas. I went walkabout to see if I could find any shops or restaurants. There wasn’t much and I grabbed some snacks from a stall. Across the road from the hotel, another small shop sold beer with a large deposit on the bottles. The hotel restaurant had closed down. The black and white TV in our spacious room had one local channel. I’ve had worse Xmas eves.

Wednesday December 25th would be spent exploring Harar (pop 122,000). The town grew into a crossroads for commerce between Africa, India and the Middle East and lies at the centre of a fertile agricultural area, renowned for its high quality coffee. It is now famous as an old walled Islamic city. Erected in the 16th Century, the thick 5m high walls run 3.5km around the old town called Jugal. Inside the crumbling walls, 368 crooked cobbled alleyways are squeezed into just 1 sq. km, along with 82 mostly tiny mosques and 100 shrines, 2000 traditional and symbolically designed stone Harari houses and animated markets. It is now an UNESCO World Heritage Site.

There were six gates into the old town. We caught a rickshaw to the Shoa Gate which had a small market next to it. The first impression I had inside the gates were of local people begging and what looked like a dead person lying on the street. How many flies does a person have to have on their face before they are dead? I think he was a junkie, completely unconscious but who knows.

We followed our nose along the main alleyways, turning left here and right there to see what we came across. The old Harari houses had overhanging wooden balconies on the first floor. Some had picturesque courtyards. The walls were painted in whites, light greens, aqua blues and browns. A main alley was full of tailors sitting behind sewing machines on tables. The shops all sold materials where Wendy had a field day looking for specific designs. Another market sold food and vegetables.

One guidebook had said the Old City was reminiscent of Fez in Morocco. I’ve been to Fez and this was hardly in its league. It was like a mini version with little of the hustle and bustle of Fez. I would even say I was a little disappointed with it. Yes, it was interesting to watch everyday life; the first wave of purple and yellow uniformed schoolchildren leaving the school with the girls wearing head-dresses, or local men attending a mosque for prayers, or the tailor at work (not much work today). It came across as a dusty poor quarter isolated from the new town.

While I did some exploring, Wendy rested in the shade and was adopted by a deaf youth who fended off other people trying to get her to go with them to their shops. When I returned, he led us to his family house where someone was painting baskets and they had a room full of tourist tat. We couldn’t carry any of it and we still had to get into Somaliland. We reluctantly left empty-handed.

I thought I’d be wandering the alleyways all day, but without a camera, there was little to stop and look at. We eventually exited at Harar Gate and walked back to the hotel. It was around 27’c that day and a real roaster. For the rest of the afternoon, we rested up, sunbathing and reading on the terrace and drinking beer, just enjoying not being hassled by people. I must be getting old. We got a better room and moved.

That evening, I spontaneously thought of visiting the ‘Hyena Men’. This is a bit of a tourist gimmick where a couple of men feed hyenas every night outside the city wall. Hyenas are not exactly the tamest of animals but I guess these ones are used to a nightly routine where they know they get food. We caught a rickshaw down around the old town to where they supposedly operate. We were greeted by a posse of four aggressive youths demanding 200 Birr. We knew the going rate was 50 Birr a person. They were the most aggressive Ethiopians we had come across and there was no back down. “No 200 Birr. No show.” Then I guess we won’t bother. “No Birr!” and we decided not bother. It was probably on ‘YouTube’ anyway and it wasn’t a must do on our trip. We went to a western hotel and had a nice meal in a nice ambience far away from the grubby hand to mouth existence of the Hyena Men. Happy Christmas.

The following morning on the 26th, we were at the minivan station by 7am. A minivan was almost full and ready to roll to Jigigu. We got the local price of 40 Birr, got in and were away within 10 minutes of arriving. I think we were glad to leave Harar.

It was a short hop eastwards of 106km and in between the two towns the scenery was wonderful. We drove through the ‘Valley of Marvels’ which Brandt guidebooks described as “a desolate landscape of red earth, low acadia scrub, forbidding cacti and tall chimney-like termite mounds…. and renowned for its gravity defying balancing rock formations.”

Jigigu (pop 145000) is the capital of the Somali Region of Ethiopia, the last major town before the border and it was summed up by the Lonely Person’s guide as “There’s little to see and less to do in Jigigu.” As we drove past schools there were signs on the walls such as “Learn today to earn tomorrow” and “Teachers make professions possible”. Most of the town seemed to have dry dust roads. Only the main roads were sealed.

Before we headed for the border, we needed to plan our return to Addis Ababa. We were flying home early on Sunday morning. Today was Thursday and we needed a flight on Saturday or it would be another long day on a bus followed by the flight home. The scruffy minivan/bus terminal lay out of the centre and a rickshaw bumped its way over the ruts and dropped us at Ethiopian Airlines. This was a small office above a shop. There was a queue of people all held up by some complaining man who refused to budge until he was satisfied with the outcome.

About 30 minutes later, we were seen. There was a flight on Saturday morning at 10.15 arriving 11.30. Perfect. The price was 7816 Birr about £127 each and they only took cash. So we reserved the flights and walked the nearest bank which had no ATM. I then changed £250 English Pounds. The Manager sat us down at his desk while someone checked the exchange rate over the phone and someone else fed my notes through a fraud detection machine. Someone made a photocopy of the notes. The Manager said they had never seen English Pounds before so the staff were excited. We got the Birr and returned to Ethiopian Airways and queued up again and finally paid for the flights.

Wendy was dying for the toilet. But try finding a toilet in Jigigu. We went into a restaurant. They had no toilet. We tried a local hotel but there was nothing obvious in the lobby. We asked a policemen and he couldn’t tell us. I thought that the bus terminal must have a toilet somewhere. A rickshaw took us back there. Someone yelled ‘Where do you go?’ ‘Toilet’ I said. He looked puzzled. I squatted down like I was taking a crap. ‘Toilet!’. Ah, he realised and led us to a couple of wooden stalls attended by a man. Wendy was given a can of water, stepped inside and put the hook on the door. She was back out in less than 5 minutes. “That was fast” I exclaimed. “I couldn’t go” she replied. “They were the most disgusting toilets I’ve ever seen. There was shit everywhere, blood and the smell…” And all for 2 Birr.

Someone came up and asked our destination “Tog Wajaale” I said. He didn’t understand. I didn’t realise the border town is just called Wajaale. When I said Hargeisa, he understood. We were headed for Somaliland. It was another bus ride and we were sat on the back seat. Wajaale lay 75km further east. The land was dead flat now and seemed to just be desert. It was around noon so it was baking outside around 28’c.

The trip on an excellent sealed road took about an hour. There were a couple of police/army checkpoints to look at ID. The bus finally pulled into an area just down the road from the border. The signs on the buildings had misspellings like “Veternary drags” (drugs?) and “Constraction of Tog Wajale.” We walked past a line of parked trucks waiting to cross over and found a small hut with an Ethiopian flag over it. Passport check, visa stamp, fingerprints taken and photo taken. Why were they taking my fingerprints leaving the country as well? Did they think I had swapped my fingers during the trip? “See you tomorrow” I told them.

A short walk down the road led us to the Somaliland immigration. Visa check, fingerprints and facial recognition photo. We asked about security. Was it safe to Hargeisa? Yes no problem and the capital is safe. Wendy felt relieved. We had picked up a tout during the border crossings who had a taxi to offer. $15? He said. That was an ok price. But we kept walking with him following us.

We found the taxis and were ushered into one by the tout. Once inside it was ‘$50’. You said $15 (he had). No $50. We started getting out. Meanwhile a crowd of angry taxi drivers surrounded the car. They were annoyed because our man had ignored the taxi queue and taken us to his mate. While the driver argued with the others, we started negotiating with the tout. Normally, at borders with only taxis, I tend to sit it out until the price comes down because they realise that you are not in a hurry. But I was concerned that Wendy’s stomach may not survive a long wait! We agreed on $30.

Inevitably as soon as we left the taxi rank, he picked up 4 others who squeezed into the front and back seats. The border town was strewn with litter. It was very poor and very grubby. The partly sealed road soon disappeared and we were following tracks in the dirt just like my Mongolian driving routes. They meandered all over the place with multiple choices going the same direction. Our taxi driver really put his foot down and ploughed through passing trucks on other tracks.

It was roughly a 65km drive to the capital. When we eventually reached the sealed road (after 20km?), there were numerous police/army checks where we had to produce our passports. Approaching the capital, the driver headed for the ‘suburbs’ where large houses all had tall walls around them and shards of glass cemented into the tops of them. He dropped off the others. Then said his tyre was flat and needed air and we stopped at two garages. Then he tried to pull a fast one by saying it would cost an extra $5 to the centre. Wendy gave him a loud lecture on the agreed price and the fact that he had dropped the others where they wanted and that he should take us to a police station so we could report his antics. He changed his mind and 5 minutes later, we were dropped outside the Oriental Hotel as agreed. It was another scam averted.

The Oriental Hotel is the oldest (circa 1950s) hotel in the city and the one that most backpackers choose to stay at. If there are any tourists. It had a lovely covered interior courtyard which was a restaurant. We got a small but decent room. There were only two issues. Firstly, the bed didn’t seem to have a mattress or the mattress was so hard, it had turned into a slab of stone. Secondly, we were located right next to a mosque and when they had the tannoy announcements for the 5 prayer sessions a day, we heard it first at ear-bleeding volume. But we were in a new country if only for two days. Except that it wasn’t a proper country.

As the Lonely Person’s Guide says “Where else in the world can you visit a country that doesn’t officially exist?” While the rest of Somalia has been a no go zone for travellers for two decades, the self proclaimed Republic of Somaliland (18/05/1991) has restored law and order within its boundaries. It is about the same size as Greece.

Located on the on the Horn of Africa, the most easterly part of the continent, it was a former British protectorate. A predominantly low-lying and dry region, it is bounded by the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden to the north east. The population, which is estimated between 3 and 4 million mostly subsist on agriculture and pastoralism. Annual income is around 600US (this doesn’t include taxi drivers) and life expectancy is 50 (this doesn’t include taxi drivers). They have their own currency, the Somaliland Shilling and it is completely dominated by the Islamic religion. Most people confuse or include it with its neighbour Somalia which is definitely currently off limits to westerners unless you fancy a spell as a kidnap victim.

I went walkabout in the capital city Hargeisa (350,000) which was a down to earth friendly place. It was both loud and busy but also underwhelming in a second world autonomous republic kind of way. It had a dusty low-rise feel more in line with a remote provincial administrative centre rather than a national capital. There were no international brands represented or even traffic lights. So you’ll see donkeys and carts and 4 wheel drives on the same road. The centre revolves around Independence Street and the market. A tight grid of narrow roads was studded with mosques including the Jama Mosque, the largest in town, stalls, and men sat on the roadside with bricks of paper notes in cages to exchange. I changed £20 and you got around 8000 to the pound but the largest bill was 500. I ended up with a wad of notes.

People were selling samosa snacks on the street which were much cheaper than the stocks in the shops where US Dollars were the currency. The only monument in town seemed to be a weird memorial of a Somali Air force MIG jet fighter which crashed during an aerial bombardment of the city back in the early 1990s. Strangely, all the roads in the centre were dust rather than sealed and during rush hour policemen replaced traffic lights in filtering traffic at intersections. As a Muslim town, there was definitely no place to buy alcohol!

We ate at the Oriental Hotel that night which had good food for minimal US Dollars. Service was slow as usual. Our TV had satellite reception and we could catch up with BBC World News and a movie channel. Luxury. But the bed was hardly luxury. With no real mattress it was like sleeping on the floor. That said. It was a nice hotel to stay in and in the centre of town.

I got up early on Friday December 27th. I’m not sure if it was the bed or the mosque next door but I was up at dawn. I walked a couple of miles to the Livestock Market which lay on the South East outskirts of town. The large dusty area had hundreds of goats, sheep and camels which are bought here every day. One youth introduced himself as a vet and took me around the market explaining the different types of sheep and goats. While watching the camels, someone came up and said ‘What the hell are you doing here?’ Eh? He turned out to be a Somali who had left the country, settled in London but came back to Somaliland once a year. He was shocked to see a tourist here. It was funny to hear him with a London accent. “You see those two hills over there” he asked. “The locals call them ‘woman’s tits’.” He explained that he had come to see the young camels fighting. “That’s why everyone is here. They bring in some young males who battle with each other for supremacy. Whoever wins is worth a lot more. But when they start fighting, make sure you don’t get in the way because they don’t stop for anything.” We watched a couple of male camels tussling by trying to interlock their necks and force the other down and one did indeed force the other to eventually retreat as people scattered. The Vet had told me that many camels were bought for weddings and celebrations. I probably spent over an hour here. It was enjoyable to see some ‘culture’ and some animals.

Walking back to the centre, two men passed me, They were sat on a flat cart pulled by a donkey. They stopped and ushered me on and took me down the road for a kilometre. After I had tipped them, a minivan stopped. I jumped in hoping it would head for the centre and it dropped me two blocks from the Oriental Hotel.

Wendy joined me for breakfast which was included in the respectable $30 room a night. While we ate we talked to an Australian who was planning to explore some of the country. He had enquired about the need of having an armed security guard with the Department of the Interior and the Minister had offered his own personal security to make sure he would be safe. “Imagine a cabinet minister in the UK offering his own personal protection to you.” That was one of the good impressions about Somaliland. The people seemed honoured that you would visit and they would constantly remind you that they, the people, would ensure our safety. More than one person said “We look out for each other. We are not like Somalia. We have created this country ourselves. It is young and it is not perfect but we are improving. We help and look out for each other and we make sure our visitors are also safe.”

This was apparent when we went to explore the vast sprawling Central Market near the Oriental Hotel which is an expansive labyrinthine of covered and open stalls. It was an enjoyable place to experience a typical Somali market. Its lanes had everything from perfume to household objects. Stall holders were friendly and not too pushy. “Come inside. Look.” Wendy on the lookout for certain materials had men running around trying to find what she was looking for. There was no hard sell. We had a chat – where are you from etc and then moved on. Wendy eventually found the material she was looking for and the asking price was actually less than what she was expecting to have to negotiate down to.

We spent the morning in the market and finally had to return to the hotel for checkout at midday. The manager was there and we asked him what we should be paying to a taxi get back to the border. “$20 at most.” He said he was driving home and could take us to the taxi rank. He got out and negotiated a price for us “$7 each and $2 for your backpack. Is that ok?” OK? That’s outstanding and offsets some of the extra cost of the taxi ride here. We climbed in. It was a tight squeeze with four in the back and three in the front. But the women enjoyed having Wendy on board and tried to make conversation.

Heading back to the border, we had four security checks by either the police or army. A couple of checkpoints forced us to get out and some luggage was searched. Our passports were checked as well. We were dropped in the scruffy border town and had to follow our noses to find the border checkpoint. We called in at a café for a drink. Outside the area was covered in litter and rubbish just blowing around. It looked like a shit hole. An Immigration officer passed by and led us to the Immigration Hut where we were stamped out of the country.

Two days and one night is hardly enough time to get a feel for a pretend country. The people are friendly. Outside the capital there are some sights to see. But there is no real tourist infrastructure because no-one ever comes here. It felt safe to us. I ticked it off as country 126 with no real ambition to return unless Somalia becomes safe enough to visit and then I could find an excuse to pop in again.

A bus from the border took us back to Jigigu. We wanted to stay at the Hamba Hotel but weren’t sure where it was. A rickshaw took us around a whole series of rugged unsealed lanes and we wondered where we were going. It turned out that the Hamba Hotel was located on a main road which was being sealed and no traffic could head north so everyone had to skirt around the alleys to get further up past the road works. The Hotel, supposedly the best in town was good for Ethiopia with marble halls and walls, hot water and satellite TV. But there was no bar and before dinner, I walked over a mile to find bottles of wine in a bar. We ate at the hotel which was convenient but nothing special. It was closed by 8pm.

Our last day in Ethiopia (Saturday December 28th), began with a proper packing session for the flights home. We then walked out of the hotel and tried to flag down a rickshaw in the dusty alleyways. One took us to where the ‘airport taxis’ supposedly congregated, but there was only one in no hurry to go anywhere and another rickshaw driver offered to take us. The airport lay 14km out of town. Our ride started with some serious off-roading over rutted muddy roads until we finally reached a sealed road which took us towards the airport. It was strange to be pottering so slowly, maybe 20mph with the fresh air in our faces. It gave us a good opportunity to take in the surrounding dry flat landscapes. There was a slight but long hill and the poor rickshaw whined it’s way slowly up to the top. We finally saw the small terminal in the middle of nowhere. A security guard checked our passports at the airport entrance. The rickshaw driver was delighted with his 200 Birr and probably made enough for the day with just one ride. It had been a unique ride to an airport.

To get into the terminal, there was a long convoluted process. Outside the front door, a woman searched the backpack and our hand luggage and looked at passports and tickets. Then inside the door were given a body search and then pointed to a security machine where our bags were x-rayed and we removed our shoes etc to pass through a metal detector frame. A ‘No weapons’ sign was on the wall. The problem was that we then had to come back through the frame with our packs to check in! So there was a line of passengers trying to have their stuff checked while others were trying to get back to the check in desk! What a weird system. Then we checked in. There was no luggage belt. Our backpack was put on a luggage trolley! We had to then go back through the security check again with our bags (even though we had walked maybe 25ft to the check in desk in full view of the security guards) and repeat the security process again. Doh! We were allowed to carry liquids through. There were no shops in the small terminal. Just some toilets.

Our flight was supposed to leave at 10.15am. We had arrived around 9am. The sole departure gate had nothing but seats. We sat there and waited. And waited. 10.15am came and went. There was nothing happening on the runway. A small plane landed and was refuelled on the runway. Surely that couldn’t be our flight. The airport fire engine did a spin around the runway. But no plane arrived. I think it turned up after 11.30 which was when we were supposed to land and didn’t take off until midday. A series of luggage trolleys were wheeled out to the plane.

Arriving at Addis Ababa Airport after an hour’s flight, we walked out of the airport towards the main road. A minivan driver picked us up and took us down Bole Rd and dropped us near the Selam Pension where we had stayed before. Since our flight was not leaving until 2am on the Sunday, it made sense to get a cheap room but only use it until midnight.

We dumped our bags and caught a minivan to the main Market (Merkato) just west of the centre. Mid Saturday afternoon, it was still a bustling place. Most vendors had permanent tin shacks in which to house their wares and the mass of stalls were organised into different sections. Wendy attempted, and succeeded in finding more fabric. There were some lovely colourful baskets, which would have made a nice souvenir, but we had limited US Dollars left and no-one seemed interested in haggling. In the end, we couldn’t be bothered. It was overpriced and we didn’t need one that bad. There was people attempting to lead us to their shops and some elements of the market were apparently unsafe. One local woman warned us not to go into a section with narrow alleyways.

The heat, noise and crush of people wore us down. We waited for a bus to take us back to Bole Rd and had to stand in the crush of passengers that boarded. No banks were open. Short of local currency, a local man took me to a shop to change $15 near the hotel. As before, we ate at the pizza restaurant next door. Charlie Chaplin movies had been replaced by an English Premiership football game.

The hotel had organised a taxi to take us to the airport. It rolled up around 11pm and we were back at the airport in 15 minutes. It was then a matter of checking in, waiting an incredable 45 mins to see immigration and hanging around for the 2am flight to Istanbul. Only a couple of the airport shops were open. The souvenir shop was over priced ($7 for a fridge magnet?).

With nothing to buy, not even a beer, I thought I’d change my remaining money. I went to the ‘bank’ on the first floor. No, he didn’t change money (well what did he do?). I was pointed downstairs. To get downstairs, I had to use a lift and then walk back out of airside to where passengers were checking in. When I got to the currency exchange, they said it was a minimum of 1000 Birr! (£30). I then had to sneak back up the lift to airside again. Addis Ababa airport at 1am on a Sunday night was my final impression of Ethiopia. They could keep it. It was topped off by the fact that we were leaving from Gate 3 which was closed. we had to walk to the other end of the terminal, enter another gate and double back to Gate 3. Doh!Leaving at 2am, the flight to Istanbul had a connecting flight to Birmingham arriving around 10am on Sunday morning where my mate Trevor picked us up.

I had mixed emotions about Ethiopia. We had found many of the people very friendly, welcoming and interested in us. The inevitable hustlers, beggars, scam artists and potential tainted this for thieves. You had to ask the price of everything before you committed. It is a very scenic country with some stunning historical and natural sights. It is also a unique country with its own religion and customs. We had only dipped our toe in it. The transport system was efficient but slow and limited to daylight hours. A trip to Ethiopia is very affordable as long as you avoid internal flights. Rather like Cuba, where I had my daypack stolen (passport, money, camera), I felt that I should go back in the future to see the rest of it, but I was in no rush. The country had been tainted. I have a good idea of what Ethiopia is like. I think I’d wait until I can do the surrounding countries and pop in again.

Travel - £497.63 (includes £254 internal flights)
Accommodation - £336.37
Food - £118.37
Other - £147.67 (Admission fees etc)
Total - £1100.04