Welcome to Kenya! Samburu Tribe Stay and Samburu National Park, and coming home to Nanyuki

5/13/19

First day in Kenya! We drove to Marsabit to do some shopping for our upcoming camping. On the way we saw some baboons, grant's gazelles, and 3 ostriches. The road went through acacia bush, desert, and past some old volcanic activity. The from Moyale to Archers Post use to be super dangerous with Somali shifta and just really bad road conditions. But the Kenyan government worked hard to get rid of the Somali shifta (part of the reason the Somalis are know to enact terror attacks on Kenya), and they recently re-paved the road to make a smooth and beautiful road, so now the road is as safe as all the rest. In previous years, dragoman had taken two armed military men with them for that road, but it is no longer needed. There were multiple police security checkpoints along the way. At one of them the policeman said, "Who are the Americans?". And I thought there might be some issue with us, or they'd want a bribe from us, but instead he said "You can thank Kenya for Obama!", and he gave us a big handshake.

We stayed the night at a Samburu tribe village. The Samburu still dress in their traditional way, and it is quite similar to what you think of when you think of the Maasai warriors. They welcomed us with some dancing and demonstrated how they start a fire with just a stick and donkey dung. We played some soccer with the kids and also tossed the frisbee around. Some in our dragoman group stayed in huts with the Samburu, but Elisha and I stayed in our tent.

This Samburu village was the village near to Samburu National Park that a Colorado State University reseacher has a wildlife ecology project it. The CSU researchers had taught the Samburu women how to make bead bracelets with the Colorado Flag. I had bought one several years ago when Elisha, Pat, Eric, and I visited while we were working at Mpala Research Centre. It last many years, but recently broke, so I was excited to find these, and I bought a few.

In the evening, the Samburu made a delicious chapati and stew meal, then we all joined in dancing. We learned that the higher you jump in the dance, the more attractive to the ladies you are. They gave us a lecture on their culture. You can have as many wives as you can afford. The dowry is usually 12 cows, but with recent droughts, it is now 8 cows. Both men and women are circumcised around the age of 15. For boys, it's a rite of passage to become a man. They circumcise the women because while the young men are out during their warrior years (20's), they found the women were having lesbian relationships to pleasure themselves while the men were out, so they started cirumcising to lower their libido. At night we sat around the fire and had Tuskers. At sunset we could see Mt. Kenya in the distance.

5/14/19

A beautiful sunrise in the village, especially with Mount Kenya lighting up.

We did a game drive, in Xara, within Samburu National Park. We saw tons of elephants, some giraffes, dik-diks, grevy's zebra, gerenuck, waterbuck, warthogs, gazelles, impala, and ostriches. During the game drive, we got to sit on the roof seats of Xara, which was fun.

We camped at a beautiful campsite along the river, under huge shade trees. During the afternoon rest time, we visited the fancy Samburu Lodge--a short walk along the river from our camp--to relax and read. In the afternoon we went on another game drive, seeing many more elephants and giraffes. Also a lion! In the evening we sat by the fire and made a tasty pasta dish, and then played Fish Bowl. We also watched elephants and giraffes across the river from us. Baboons and vervet monkeys were of course a nuisance around camp--trying to get into the vehicles and steal food.

5/15
Early morning game drive through Buffalo Springs Nature Reserve. There weren't as many animals, but still saw the usual. Quite a lot of Beisa Oryx. There were beautiful and clear views of Mt. Kenya on our way to Nanyuki. Nanyuki is the town near to Mpala Research Centre where we used to go for supplies, so as we were driving towards Nanyuki, it felt like coming home! We stopped to shop at what used to be Nakumat supermarket (where we used to do all our shopping during the Mpala Days), but now called Choppies. After being in Ethiopia, it did feel nice to have a supermarket with some familiar items. We then went to Dormann's coffee shop, a Mpala favorite, for a milkshake.

We camped at Bantu Lodge on the slopes of Mount Kenya. It's a really nice campsite with wood-heated showers. Of course there was the usual bold baboons around. There were also some really cute Syke monkeys (aka Blue Monkeys), which have owl-like faces.

For lunch, I took Elisha for a birthday lunch to Trout Tree restaurant. It's a trout farm with a lovely tree-house restaurant. It's such a cool place, and we got delicious meals. I had a filet steak and Elisha had a steak kebab. It's cheap by American standards, but expensive by Kenyan ($12 USD for the steak). Around the restaurant and the tree-house, cute little black and white colobus monkeys swing around in the trees and joined us for lunch. There were also tree hyraxes around. We then walked the 2km back to our camp.

The camp had a large model of Mountain Kenya, and we went to check it out, and to "climb" it. While we were there, Elisha put a bug in my ear about climbing. Of course I had wanted to, but this made me enquire about it. The price was higher than I wanted, but I was so excited, and did some major bartering. After much rumination, I decided to do it! I had looked at Mount Kenya almost every day from Mpala back during my 6 months there, and had always wanted to climb it. Towards the end of my stay at Mpala, when I might have been able to do it, I tore my MCL, so I wasn't able to go with the group that went. Also Mount Kenya plays a major role in my research because it creates the rain shadow that I used as one of my variables for my Master's Thesis.  Dinner was a yummy beef curry that we cooked. That night we sat around the fire playing games and drinking Tuskers.

Arba Minch, Omo Valley Tribes, and leaving Ethiopia

5/8/19

We drove to Arba Minch (name means 40 springs). On the way we stopped at a traditional Dorze village, which sits atop mountains. We toured the village, which included watching (and joining in) some traditional dancing and touring their really cool bamboo huts (in the shape of an elephant, though elephants have been hunted to extinction locally). We also watched a woman use the false-banana plant to make bread straight from the trunk. She used a wooden tool to get the meat from the trunk, then it ferments underground for greater than 3 months, then it's pounded and shaped, and then cooked over a fire. Quite the process! This species of plant is called a false banana because it looks like a banana tree, but it produces no bananas. After the bread had been cooked over the fire, we ate the fresh bread with fresh honey and very spicy chili sauce. They also gave us a shot of some very potent home-brewed alcohol. (To help you dance better and to keep warm at night in the mountains).

We were invited into one of the elephant-shaped bamboo huts where we learned more about the culture. Three things women need to be in order to attract a mate: 1. Good cook  2. Good weaver  3. good with the hips (dancing and ....)   Three things men need to be in order to attract a mate  1. Good at farming  2. Good at weaving  3. Good with the hips (dancing and ...)

On the steep dirt road down to Arba Minch (with good views of muddy Lake Abaya and blue Lake Chamo), young local kids would do splits in the middle of the road, handsprings, headstands, and dance with the hips. It was pretty funny and entertaining. And since the road had lots of switchbacks, they would run down to the next switchback to meet the truck again.

When we arrived to Arba Minch, we walked around a bit looking for food, but it was hard to find any, and also the power was out. Thus, we had to eat at the fancy Emerald Resort, which was nice.

5/9/19

Norbert, Katya, Elisha, and I went on a hike with Bayoo into Nechisar National Park. At the gate, we picked up an armed scout. It was a really great hike (~6 miles) through the forest. So quiet, peaceful, and shaded. We saw hornbills, a fish eagle, vervet monkeys, baboons, and such cute black and white colobus monkeys. There were such beautiful big trees too. We eventually arrived to the spring (Where Arba Minch gets its name) and went for a very refreshing swim in the pool and also did some jumping off of some trees with the locals there. At the swimming hole, we were surrounded by monkeys and baboons...very Jungle Book like. On our hike in with the scout, we caught a guy smuggling wood out of the national park that he had chopped. The scout scolded him and took his ax.

We had lunch in a shaded restaurant with local food (tibs), beers, and mango juice. On our way home from lunch, as it was very hot, the 4 of us shared a tuk-tuk. Apparently having that many people in a tuk-tuk must be illegal because our driver saw a police traffic stop ahead, and he made Norbert get out and take another tuk-tuk for 200 meters until we were past the police, then Norbert rejoined us.

We spent the afternoon hanging out and doing laundry. In the evening we had a goodbye happy hour and dinnter at the Emerald Lodge as Bayoo, Katay, Kris, and Alex would be leaving the trip here. The lodge has tremendous views over the forest and the 2 lakes as it is built on a cliff. Some of the dragoman passengers brought wine for all of us to share. After dinner we had a fire together.

5/10/19

Elisha and I helped with some truck cleaning in the morning, then walked to the fancy Haile Resort where we paid $3 for access to the pool and spa all day. It too has a great view, so we spent the day poolside, reading and swimming. We had sunset dinner at the nice Emerald Lodge viewpoint.

5/11/19

Everyone had a rough night because of mosquitos. Also, a lot of the dragoman travelers got bed bugs. Elisha and I too got a few bed bug bites, but Maggie had it absolutely terrible. Her whole body covered! Today we drove to Konso, through lush rift valley scenery and lots of cute grass/mud huts.

At Konso, we took a tour of a Konso Tribe village. It was really cool. It was a group of traditional huts within a rock wall. And there were also cute little huts for for goats and chickens. The rock wall surrounding the village was over 1000 village. We learned about their traditions, customs, and how they govern. They are animists and very tribal. Boys 12 and over have to sleep all together in a special hut to prevent pre-marital sex. Moms are in charge, and to symbolize this there is a pot on top of every hut. A hut with a pot (meaning no mom), is untidy, lost, and no good.

Konso is the first tribe in and the gateway to the famous Omo valley. The Omo valley is an area where the tribes are still relatively unchanged and not so affected by modern culture. It is here where there are tribes that have people fully tattooed, tribes with people who burn patterns onto their bodies, and tribes with bones in their ears and huge discs in their lips, and most of these tribes are fully naked except for small loincloths. We didn't visit any of those tribes because Dragoman tries to follow responsible tourisms, both environmentally and with people. The tribe with the discs in their lips, traditionally, once a year would do this thing called the bull run. Women would--I'm told voluntarily--ride on bulls and get whipped by the men. But when they found out that the tourists found this interesting, they started charging for this and doing this ceremony bi-weekly or more instead of every year. Dragoman (and myself) agree that this is painfully exploiting the women, so their tours don't go there. I would have liked to see some of these unique tribes, but not go to and pay for those sorts of things.

From Konso we traveled to a town, Yabello, on the way to the border. Yabello was pretty wild! It's not a place tourists ever stop. It's just a truck type stop on the way to the border. In Yabello, people rarely have seen white people, so they were even more interested in us than normal, and actually some of them were quite scared of us. We all found a place with really cheap beer, and we sat down and watched some of the crazies of the town. There was a weird guy with his shirt off that was the only person who spoke some English, but he kept talking over and over about Nelson Mandela. Then there was another guy fake talking into a fake cell phone, and then just dancing around. He eventually built a sand castle thing in the sand of the road. Quite a crowd came to look at it, then he started drinking from the nasty puddle water in the road!

When Elisha and I went to buy some samosas for the group, some sweet looking old lady was with us, but then she got crazy and even started slapping us, so we tried to job away from her. The owner of the bar we were at had a tough time keeping her away from the bar. Our group was highly entertained and laughing a lot.
In the evening, we somehow managed to find a place to eat. They had 1 item on the menu, but it was super delicious goat tibs served in a clay pot on top of a little charcoal stove thing.

5/12/19

Drove to Moyale, the border with Kenya. Along the way was beautiful acacia woodland, dotted with traditional round, thatched roof huts, and lots of tall, point red termite mounds. The border crossing was pretty straight forward. We walked a bit around the town of Moyale. At the hotel, we ordered lunch, which turned into dinner because we had to wait over 2 hours for them to start cooking b/c of it being ramadan.

Bale Mountains and Ethiopian Wolf Sighting!

5/4/19

Today we drove to the Bale Mountains National Park. On the way we stopped at the town of Shashemene, home to the Rastafarians that Emperor Haile Selassie had given land to. The Jamaicans and original Rastafarians believe that Emperor Haile Selassie is God, and they believe that it is supported by Biblical text. Haile Selassie is believed to be the direct descendent of the child that  Queen Sheba and King Solomon had. The Rastafarians believe that Ethiopia is the homeland and that eventually all black people in the Caribbean will go back to Ethiopia. The name Rastafaria comes from Haile Selassie's pre-regnal title Ras Tafari Makonnen. Haile Selassie is a figure of salvation and it's believed he will redeem blacks form white suppressors, reuniting them with their homeland, Africa. Some more information here if you are interested:
 https://www.bbc.co.uk/religion/religions/rastafari/beliefs/haileselassie.shtml

Upon entering Bale Mountains NP, we saw so many animals: Menelik's Bushbuck, Reedbuck, Mountain Nyala, warthogs, and baboons. We're camping at a really nice spot amongst all the animls, which aren't really that shy. I took a walk out with all the animals in the evening. Really good food was cooked tonight, and we sat around a nice fire.

5/5 Elisha's Birthday. Feliz Cinco de Mayo!
Had a really good breakfast that Will cooked for Elisha's birthday, then we headed out for a 10 mile hike in the national park. It went through a valley, again with all the animals everywhere. The trail also went past a little waterfall.

When we got back to the campsite, we surprised Elisha with balloons, a banner, and cake. Again, I took a walk around the camp, hanging out with the wildlife. My group was in charge of dinner, and we made a mashed potato and vegetable dish and some Ethiopian shiro. At night we sat by the fire and watched a movie (The Lion King) projected onto a tarp and sang along!

5/6/19
First day of Ramadan. We drove up to the Sanetti Plateau (13,000ft). On the way and on the way back, we saw a total of 6 Ethiopian wolves! They are the rarest canine species in the world and the rarest carnivore in Africa, so it was a special site to see. They look more like coyotes or foxes than wolves, but they are indeed wolves. We also some quite a few hares, which I'm sure are wolf food. The Sanetti Plateau is a high desolate area, with no trees, but a couple interesting flowering plants. Also quite a few little tarns scattered about.

A few of us in the group hiked up to the top of Tulu Dimtu (14,400ft), the 3rd highest peak in Ethiopia, despite the sign at the top claiming it to be the 2nd highest peak in Ethiopia. It is the highest peak in Ethiopia outside of the Simien Mountains. The guides said it would take 2 hours to make it to the top, but I made it up in 45 minutes as I didn't feel the altitude at all. Elisha didn't end up attempting the hike because she had been having some weird heart palpitations and felt it unwise, in such a remote place at high altitude to try stressing her body. There were very nice view from the top, including of an approaching hail storm and clouds moving in over the plateau.

After dinner, we sat around the fire and played some games (psychiatrist) and then watched a movie by the fire. Our campsite is so nice! It's clean, green, and fresh. And warthogs and mountain nyala walk all around our camp and tents.

5/7/19

Today we drove to Wendo Genet lodge, which has nice grounds and a hot springs pool. We swam at the pool for awhile. The shower scene was hilarious! There were 6 or so spickets of hot spring water, each shared by 5+ Ethiopians who were simultaneously sudsing up and taking selfies! It was really hard to get a shower. One had to be a bit pushy and aggressive. It was the same scene in the girls shower area. Apparently so much so, that Elisha took her pre-soak shower in the cold waterfall near the the springs.

The Ethiopians definitely liked to watch us Farangi swim, and they weren't shy about taking pictures of us. It was really nice to swim in the hot water after 4 days of camping in the chilly Bale mountains.

When we returned to the truck after our soak, there were a whole bunch of vervet monkeys hanging out at the truck, attempting to sneak into the truck.

From the hot springs, we drove to Awassa. It's a nice city. We enjoyed a juice and then walked to the lake and along the lake walk. At one of the lake viewpoints, there were many Ethiopians wanting to take selfies with us. We had dinner at a nice Italian restaurant, a relic of old Italian occupation.

Awash Falls and Lake Ziway

5/1/19

Drove to Awash Falls National Park. Around 11am, I was hit with diarrhea. It would turn out to be the only time I'd get sick on our entire overland trip, which is pretty amazing! We had a short game drive in the park where we saw some lesser kudu and a giant tortoise. We're camping next to a fancy safari style lodge, overlooking a river and the waterfall. We could see crocodile eye shine at night. The camping area had lots of cool places to sit overlooking the waterfall, so I wished I had been feeling better. The rest of the group ate dinner, but I didn't, and the group also enjoyed a coffee ceremony and a fire. Fell asleep in our tents to the sound of the waterfall.

5/2/19

Bus walk in the a.m. where we saw olive baboons, vervet monkeys, hornbills, and nile crocodiles. Then we did a game drive where we saw beisa oryx and dik-dik. We then drove to the town of Ziway, on the shores of Lake Ziway. We're staying at a cute little hotel with nice flowers, a TV, and a fridge. In the evening I had my first meal in 30 hrs. Feeling much better!

5/3/19

Took a horse buggy into town. I got to drive! Had juice and a traditional breakfast called Ful with avocado. We then took a boat ride on Lake Ziway. We saw some hippos, a monitor lizard, and lots of birds. We stopped at a small island and walked up to the top to a monastery. In the afternoon, we relaxed and then all took horse drawn buggies to the market to shop for our 3 night in the Bale mountains. In Ethiopia it's always a bit frustrating to shop because of all the bargaining and haggling you have to do, no knowing where things are, and very limited items to buy. All we could really find were a few veggies, fruit, eggs, rolls, spices, and that's about it. If you're lucky, peanut butter, honey, tea, and tuna. In the afternoon, Elisha started feeling sick similar to me, with diarrhea.

Harar, walled city and hyena feeding

4/28/19

Easter in Ethiopia! The end of meat/dairy fasting! As we drove through Addis Ababa in the morning, there were incredibly long lines at the butcher shops. And also we drove past random butcherings just happening on the side of the roads.

Today we drove to Harar. The drive took us through some mountainous areas and the great rift valley. We went through some heavy rain at one point that caused some mudslides and made the road interesting.

4/29/19

Today we had a tour of the old and walled city of Old Harar. It's the 4th most important muslim city in the world. There are 5 entrance gates into it and lots of very narrow, winding streets. We toured some of the traditional Harar houses (made with limestone) that have nice little courtyards. We also toured some fancy wooden houses constructed by Indians. We had a meal of fresh-cooked camel for lunch.

We toured the Harar market and also did this activity where we put camel meat on our heads and a hawk swoops down and grabs it off your head. Within Hara, many girls wanted to touch our white skin and several reached out to squeeze my biceps as I walked by. As we walk along, where ever we go, lots of people call out "Farengi" (foreigner), but not in a disparaging way (Harar, though, has traditionally been xenophobic). We stopped by a school where our Harar guide and school director really got into it (she slammed the gate in his face) b/c we would give candy to the kids. Our guide said giving candy is bad for their teeth and that probably it was the school director who was going to eat it, not the kids. haha. We visited a nice courtyard with a curio shop run by "big mama", who was aptly named.

We watched the sunset and read with a coke from the top of our tall hotel, which afforded a nice high perspective of the city below. In the early evening we got some juice and ate a nice Ethiopian meal.

At night we went to watch the "hyena men" outside the wall of the city. These men have historically fed the hyenas to keep them placated so that they don't attack people within the city. It's like a truce the humans and hyenas have. Still, the hyenas do go through the walled city at night and pick through the garbage and on occasion have attacked a human, but this is very rare. Tonight, the hyena men were feeding about 20 hyenas, and we were very close, within 10-20 feet of most of them. Us tourists also go to feed them, including "mouth to mouth" (I held a short stick in my mouth and on the other end was camel meat that a hyena came up and grabbed). It was so cool to see the hyenas up close! (spotlighted by the headlights of the tourist vans)

That night Elisha and I had beers on the roof of our hotel with Norbert and Katya to watch the stars and the city below.

4/30
We hiked up some little mountain outside of town, a bit through the bush that had nice views. On the hike, we caught a glimpse of a hyena. We had juice and Doro Wat for lunch.

After lunch, Elisha and I went out to walk the walled city by ourselves as we wanted to get lost within the narrow, winding streets of the walled city. A guy, Abdullah, attached onto us. This is what tends to happen. You have a guy start talking friendly to you, maybe show you a couple of things, then all of a sudden is leading you around and at the end demands a high fee. We usually give them an appropriate tip, but they will act hurt as if it's not enough. We always tell them that they should have made an arrangement beforehand about how much it would cost if they wanted to show us around. We now know to shoe them off; however, this guy, Abdullah, was deaf, so we thought it was a bit different. He was very sweet and showed us around the market.  He had us taste various things in the market, showed us some nice courtyards within the walled city, and also showed us various working areas within the city, such as metal working.

Abdullah could understand English and read our lips! And he could write english words on his black skin with a small stick. He communicated well with his hand, but could only grunt and make incoherent noises. In the end, of course, he asked for a lot of money. We gave him what we thought was fair, but he acted hurt, and it was sad b/c before all of that, we had had such a good time with him.

In the late afternoon we had beers on the hotel roof with Katya, Norbert, and Will. Will flew his drone, and as soon as it was in the air, SO many birds (kites) appeared (hundreds of them), and some tried to attack the drone. It was pretty funny and quite the site to see.

We had post dinner beers on the roof as well. Our hotel had a super cold fridge in the room, so the beers were extra good.

Lake Tana and Addis Ababa

4/22/19
We drove to Bahir Dar, through some nice mountain scenery and past many traditional villages. On the drive we saw some Grivet monkeys.

Elisha and I walked to the lake edge and had a sunset dinner of fresh Tilapia on the shores of lake Tana. Towards the end of the dinner, as darkness descended, millions and millions of flying termites were flying all around, especially next to the lights.

4/23/19

Took a morning boat ride on Lake Tana amongst the local fishermen in their traditional boats made out of papyrus. On the water, we saw a couple hippos. On our excursion, we walked across part of Zeghe island, visiting a couple traditional churches with brightly colored frescos painted on goat hide. On the hike in the forest, we went past a troupe of vervet monkeys. For lunch, the group ate at a nice place on the lake.

In the afternoon, we did a hike to the Blue Nile Falls, which included a bat ride across the Blue Nile. We had tasty guava-mango juice for an afternoon snack.

4/24/19

I got a $7 full body hour-long massage and a juice in the morning before driving to Debre Markos. Our room at this junky hotel was flooded because of the bathroom when we got there. They stopped the leak and mopped it up. That night, however, we saw a pretty big rat running around in the room. In the evening, Elisha and I walked around the town, walked out to their main square and monument and then had a traditional Ethiopian dinner.

4/25/19
We drove to Addis Ababa today. We crossed the Blue Nile gorge by taking a steep and winding road down and then back up. Saw some baboons along this road. That night in Addis Ababa, the capital of Ethiopia, we had a fancy Ethiopian dinner that was very delicious. It was our last meal together for this segment of the trip as many would be departing the trip the next day, and we'd be adding some different people.

On this portion of the trip, Nick (England) and Lou (Wales) were the driver and trip leader. The rest of the passengers were Kris (Australia), Wes (Georgia), Anne (Australia), Anne (England), Louise (Wales), Ian (England), Jodi, Jacks, and Kelly (Australia), Theres and Jon (Ireland), Florian and Gabriela (England), Norbert (Germany), Ferdinand and Leonna (Holland), Terry (Oregon), Fay (UK), Felipe (Canada), and Michael (UK).

4/26/19

Elisha, Wes, Norbert, and I walked to the huge Mercado (one of the largest markets in Africa). It was super crazy. People and things everywhere! Sometimes walking on the street was the only way to move. There were all kinds of wares: spices, fruits, meats, home goods, metalwork, horse stuff, clothing, baskets, etc. A local guy showed us around some of the small passages. It was overwhelming in number of people and items. We had lunch at Addis Ababa's faux In 'N Out burger, which was good but nothing like the real In 'N Out burger.

As the fast is ending in 2 days, there are tons of chickens, goats, and sheep being bartered for and sold on the streets. As someone told us "The streets will run red with blood after the fast". Our room in Addis is pretty nice, so in the afternoon, we cooled off after our long walk under the sun in the city by hanging out in the room where we watched a movie and also did our laundry.

Tonight we met the new members of the group as well as the new driver and trip leader. Nick and Lou were supposed to go with us to Nairobi and do the Uganda loop with us, but because of the tragedy, they were pulled, and we got 2 new leaders. José (Spain/Holland) is the new trip leader and Will (South Africa) is the new driver. The passengers on the next group are Kris (Australia), Norbert (Germany), Alex (UK), Eric (Spain/UK), Katya (Germany), and Maggie (UK). We also have a local Ethiopian guide with us for this part: Bayoo. Jodi and Jacks were supposed to still be with the tour at this point, but they decided to fly back home to Australia due to being close friends with Kelly.

4/27/19

We had a guided tour of Addis Ababa. We visited the National Museum where we saw nice artwork and fossils of some of our early human ancestors found in the area including the famous Lucy. We visited the big cathedral and some other churches. For lunch we ate at Lucy's Cafe.

In the afternoon, Elisha and I walked back to the hotel and relaxed and said goodbye to friends. That evening was a crazy scene on the streets: Goats and chickens for sale all along the street, all night

Rock Hewn Churches of Lalibela

4/18/19

We drove to Lalibela (12 hrs) through some spectacular scenery: lush mountain valleys and hill sides with traditional houses (thatch roof and wood/manure siding) and up onto a high plateau (11,000 ft) with traditional houses that looked like hobbit houses (small and round with rock walls and thatch roof). We then had a steep descent on a dirt road in a very dry area through traditional villages to reach Lalibela. That night we had a delicious buffet dinner at our hotel, which is a pretty nice hotel.

4/20/19

We took a tour of the 11 or so rock-hewn churches in the Lalibela area. They were so amazing! Some call this place the 8th wonder of the world. The churches are carved completely out of rock. They are carved down from a huge rock area. It's hard to imagine someone would be on a huge rock slab and conceive of carving down a huge church. St. George church was probably the most stunning. There were really cool underground passageways and tunnels carved out of rocks as well as little rooms in rock walls and in the passages carved out. Some of the churches have hidden stairways and entrances into the churches. Some of the tunnels were really long and dark, so that you needed to feel your way through in order to walk from one end to the other. Within the rock walls around the churches, there are mummies within the walls. Part of this reminds me of Petra in Jordan.

We had a yummy Ethiopian meal at our hotel. Our hotel has a huge deck, and myself, Norbert, and Kris did an insanity workout, that I led, during a rain sprinkle. The dutch couple, Ferdinand and Leonna left the trip today, due to the tragedy.

4/21/19
In the morning, the whole group went to St. George church to watch the Palm Sunday service (The Coptic Christian calendar is 1 week behind the European calendar, so it was actually Easter back home). While there we had a candlelight vigil (used traditional candles from beeswax) for Kelly.

Elisha was sick with a cold, so Wes and I hiked up a mountain outside of town that had a church built into the cliffs. It was a nice hike with great views of the valleys and mountains. We got invited into a house up on the mountain slopes for fresh injera, curry, and coffee. Super delicious! We even got to watch the lady of the house make the injera. We hiked through a traditional village up on the mountain. We of course had kids following us for most of our hike.

In the afternoon, Elisha and I went back to St. George to walk around. In the evening the group went to this crazy spaceship/Dr. Seuss styled restaurant with a view for Kris' birthday. Had a yummy traditional dish.

Tragedy in the beautiful and otherworldly Danakil Depression and Erta Ale Volcano Climb

4/14/19

Today we drove to Makele. We had a juice in the morning (Can you see that one of the culinary themes of Ethiopia, besides injera bread is the fresh squeezed juices, usually a mango avocado mix). Enroute we stopped at a random town for lunch for tasty juice and local food. Also on the way we visited a rock-hewn church (Wukro Chirkos) in Tigre. The church was completely carved out of rock: no wood or rock added. A cool old priest showed us around, but at the end of our visit there was a little problem with the "guide", trying to scam us. We could hear Lou, our guide, in a heated discussion with him, telling him she was going to call the police. He threatened us and threw rocks at the truck, so we made a quick getaway. Something we all discovered in Ethiopia, is that often you'll get a nice person coming up to talk to you, saying they want to practice English or get to know a foreigner, and they offer to show you around their city, but then at the end, they ask for an exorbitant amount of money for their "guiding" services.

Our hotel in Makele used to be very fancy, but now is very rundown. We had a nice dinner at a pizza/traditional restaurant.

4/15
We broke into groups of 4 and hopped into Land Cruisers for the trip into the famous Danakil Depression. On the steep way down, we stopped for traditional Ethiopian coffee and had a lunch in a small town in a strange cook shack. We then drove down into the depression. It was through rugged mountains on the way down, and then miles upon miles of old lava flows. It started getting HOT! So we rolled up the windows of the land cruisers and by some miracle, they had air conditioning! I didn't know any vehicles in Africa had air-conditioning, let alone in Ethiopia. The temperature, according to the forecasted weather was at least 107F! At one point, we left the main road, and so we were just driving in sand, without a road at all. Our driver, Aqui, stepped on it, and we rallied around the sand, going really fast! We were fish-tailing around in the sand, as if it was snow. "Buckle up" our driver said! All the different land cruisers were speeding around across the landscape as there were no roads. Good fun! We saw a couple of gazelles hiding in the rare shade, but mostly it was lava rock and sand everywhere. Eventually we made it to a very rough 4WD road over lava rock that was to lead us to the Erta Ale Volcano base camp. From camp we could see the smoking cinder cone in front of us.

We had a nice dinner and then left at 7pm to hike up in the dark, in the light of the moon. It was still SUPER hot. Even as we got to the summit, it felt pretty warm. From the crater rim of Erta Ale, we descended into the first crater to peer into the 2nd crater, but all we could see is smoke, not even a glow of red.

Erta Ale is famous because it's one of 5 or so volcanoes that have a permanent lava lake in the crater, meaning you can pretty much be guaranteed to see lava. The other ones are Erebus in Antarctica, 2 different volcanoes in Vanuatu, one in the Congo. While Kilauea volcano in Hawaii is one of the most active, it for example, isn't always erupting or always having a lava lake. Unfortunately for us, in 2018, there was an eruption from the flank of Erta Ale that considerably lowered the lava lake level (by over 100 feet or so). This means that instead of the lake being right at the crater rim, so that you could easily see the lava, the lake is way down at the bottom of the crater, which makes it tough to see it because, there is also quite a lot of steam and smoke at the moment being funneled out of the crater.  If you want to see some cool photos of what it often can look like check out here:
https://www.google.com/search?q=erta+ale+lava+lake&sxsrf=ACYBGNQOsFp4YgVB0Th06AWxovlXBN8GlQ:1567792851671&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjZhYXA47zkAhVNoZ4KHf3DDvAQ_AUIEygC&biw=1276&bih=645

We hiked back up to the crater rim, and descended a few feet to an area where some lava rock had been cleared away. We slept just out in the open air on mats that camels had carried up. It was windy, so little rock windbreaks had been constructed. But it was warm the whole night, and I never once needed a blanket.

4/16

We woke up at 4:30am to hike back up to the rim. Smoke was still billowing out, so again we couldn't see the lava lake far below. We watched the sunrise from the rim, which was nice. When daylight approached, we saw that we were in a crazy lava (relatively recently formed) landscape. The lava was so fresh looking that from higher vantage points, it still almost appeared to be moving. We then had a six mile hike down to the vehicles and breakfast in the rising heat. I have to admit I felt quite a bit of disappointment b/c for many years I have wanted to visit Erta Ale and it's famous lava lake, but it just happened to empty out a considerable volume of its lava before we arrived.

After breakfast we drove to Lake Afrera, which is very salty, so it is very easy to float in. And when you'd force your feet down deeper, the cooler water felt so nice! But the water on the surface wasn't very cold. Lake Afrera sits at -335 ft below sea level. We rinsed off in a fresh-water hot springs draining into the lake. It was a quick soak b/c the water was hot, but nice to get the salt off. We had lunch at an Ethiopian truck stop/salt miner place. According to a thermometer, it was 101F in the SHADE! I was definitely feeling the affect of the heat, and didn't feel so great, but it was likely a combo of getting hot in the hot springs and then having a beer instead of a cold soft drink or water with my meal. One of the crazy things was that when I picked up my beer bottle after the meal to put it in the recycling, the beer bottle felt hot. It's a weird sensation, b/c even in the summer where I usually am, an empty beer bottle doesn't feel hot b/c glass tends to have a cool sensation. This beer bottle felt like it'd been in a warming oven. We were in an oven!

We then drove back up through the desolate landscape to Abala town, which is higher up (I think like 4000ft), so it was rather refreshing, and I definitely perked back up. We stayed at a guesthouse there.

*Some notes on Ethiopia that I wrote in my journal:  The power often goes out. Wifi hardly works. In the villages, most houses are thatched roof, made of sticks or mud/manure. Farmers plow their fields with oxen. Donkeys, goats, and camels are all on the road everywhere. Much more than cars, and you have to constantly swerve around them if driving on the road. There are quite a lot of horse-drawn carts. Little coffee shops and shoe cleaning places are everywhere.

They don't use the Gregorian calendar, so it was 2012 while we were there! That means we were 7 years younger!! They speak and write in Ahmeric, which are letters way different than our roman letters. Their liturgical language is Ge'ez. If I'm remembering right, they have 13 months in their calendar.

We were there during lent, which they take very seriously. Everyone is fasting the entire time of lent, which means no meat, milk, butter, and eggs. So we were basically vegan while we were in Ethiopia, except in larger cities where you could find some things like eggs or tuna in a can or fish by lakes. The meat sections of the markets were completely closed during lent, so you couldn't buy any meat. And there is not a single supermarket in the whole country! They do have places called supermarkets, but they are just small little stores, the largest being about the size of the store inside a small gas station and the smallest being about the size of a walk-in ATM stall. You just walked up to the window, say you wanted some cookies and, they'd grab them off the shelf. So yea, not a lot of variety. And as far as cooking, we could obviously buy rice, lentils, beans, and pasta. But in the dry season, vegetables were also limited, so mainly we had potatoes, tomatoes, onions, and peppers to work with. Occasional cabbage and avocados.


4/17/19

We left our guesthouse at 4:30am to drive back down into the Danakil Depression. We drove by some long camel trains carrying salt back up to the mountains, as salt mining is a big industry here. We dipped below sea level and sped along a giant salt flat, reaching speeds of 120 kph. We drove past a huge gathering of camels where local guys were loading bricks of salt they had mined to be carried by the camels up into the mountains (we were supposed to visit this place later in the day, but b/c of events to be discussed later, we did not).

We eventually arrived to the geothermal area of Dallol, known as the "colorful area". We hiked up a hill of old geothermal activity that had unique sulfur and salt formations...a very Martian landscape. We eventually arrived to colorful area, which was absolutely STUNNING! The brightest of yellows and greens that you could hope to see in nature. It almost seemed fake. Little pools of bubbling hot sulfuric acid and tiny bubbling vents. It was so beautiful, and in a rather large area, so we spent a lot of time visiting it, despite the rising temperature of the day. It was hot 100+F. I haven't been to Yellowstone in a long time, but I wonder if this was more beautiful. Definitely more stunning than the beautiful pools in Rotorua, New Zealand.

When we arrived back to the Land Cruisers, the drivers dumped water on us to refresh us and we got into the vehicles and cranked the AC. We were all feeling refreshed and very happy.

The next part is an account copied and pasted from my email (Titled: Events in Ethiopia) to my family after the tragic incident that unfolded next.


Hi Mom, Sue, Bro, and friends following our African overland adventure.

We just returned from a trip to the Danakil depression, the 5th lowest point on the planet, and the supposedly hottest inhabited place on earth: And confirmed today on Wikipedia

Hottest inhabited place

Dallol, Ethiopia (Amharic: ዳሎል), whose annual mean temperature was recorded from 1960 to 1966 as 34.4 °C (93.9 °F).[26] The average daily maximum temperature during the same period was 41.1 °C (106.0 °F).[27]

It is also home to Erta Ale volcano, one of only 5 or so volcanoes with permanent lava lakes (Mount Erebus outside McMurdo being one).

We are now resting comfortably at 7500ft in BY FAR the nicest place we've stayed. 

This email is mostly for the mothers who tend to worry a lot. Feel free to send it on to other family members that you think may be interested. 

We had a mostly great trip to the depression, but tragedy of the worst sort struck our group at the very end: A woman from Australia passed away on our tour to the depression. There is a chance you will see news on the event that happened to our group, and I wanted to let you know that is was a quite preventable tragedy and that Elisha and I are fine and were never in danger. Unsure of how the media may report it, we wanted to let you how the tragedy unfolded. In the recent past, the area had been politically unstable, and in fact, in 2012, a few tourists were killed by rebels, which is why a tragedy involving a tourist may make the news. The area is now deemed quite safe politically, and thus, this is actually one of dragoman's (our overland company) first trips to the afar region.

Yesterday, we left the village we were stay at 430am to drive down once more into the danakil, to a place near dallol, famous for its sulfur hot springs and amazingly colorful thermal activity. It was indeed amazing, and Elisha says it would have been the highlight of her trip, were in not for the tragedy. As one of people on the trip said "Sorry Yellowstone, this puts you to shame" Anyways, after a stop for breakfast, we drove through the giant salt flat and arrived at the little mound of of hot spring activity. According to my watch, we were at about -340 ft and the top of the mound was basically at sea level.

We started our walk with our guides, scouts, and fellow overland travelers at about 8:30 in the morning. It was already hot (probably high 90's). We spent nearly 2 hours really enjoying the "colorful area" as the guide called it, and everyone was having a great time. When we arrived back down to the the landcruisers, our drivers met us with bucket showers to pour over our heads and body. The 4 of us in my landcruiser hopped inside and we all felt good and refreshed. The dragoman tour leader, Lou, came by to ask if we'd seen Kelly. We said not recently, but didn't think much of it b/c she had turned back early and we did have a convoy of 8 or so landcruisers, so she must have been in one.

As we were getting ready to leave, I watched as a frenchman from another tour collapse about 100m from the vehicles. I grabbed water and pretty immediately jumped out of the vehicle and ran to him. He was still with it (AOx4 in wilderness medicine speak). I gave him water and some guides who had come running poured water on him and prepared to help him to the AC landcruisers. He told me there were 2 other people collapsed up the trail and to go help them. I immediately thought one must be Kelly. I ran up the trail at nearly full spring and came upon and older gentleman who was awake, but completely disoriented. I tried to cool him off and get him to swallow a bit of water before more guides/scouts arrived at the scene. I told them to carry him down to the cars as soon as possible to cool off. He was probably 800 or so meters from the car (on very rough terrain). I continued sprinting up the trail to look for Kelly. By this time, Kelly's good friend Jodie, and Wes (and American from Georgia who Elisha and I have friended) joined me and said Kelley was definitely missing.

Early into the colorful area, Elisha and I had come across Kelly and she said she was turning around b/c she wasn't feeling well due to the sulfur fumes. Elisha and I both remember the interaction because we had both noted how much bright yellow sulfur she had on her shoes from tramping around, and I can even remember checking out that she was wearing Merrel shoes. So I ran to this last place I remember seeing her when she had turned around and began searching. I envisioned she probably had gone off the trail a bit and tripped or fell (it was rugged terrain) or passed out from the heat, or was resting against a rock that would provide minimal shade. I asked other tourists and guides if they had seen her, and they had not. After a quick, at running pace, look, I realized we'd better organize a better search, so I started heading down. I came across the older french gentlemen who was still awake but completely disoriented. The locals were trying to help him walk. I told them to lie him down and carry him flat, using the method they teach in WFR. I also called for salts and someone brought a salt mix that I helped him slowly drink. After a few minutes, with some salt, he revived and knew his name and where he was again. We carried him to a land cruiser, got the ac cranked up, and I stayed with him for a bit, getting him to slowly drink the salt solution.

In the meantime, some folks had organized a search with vehicles to drive around the mound. With the remaining few, who were capable to be in the heat) still at the trailhead, I organized a fanning out search group in the area I thought she was most likely to be, just based off of getting off of the trail while hiking back. It was Elisha, Wes, Lou, another guide Nick, and myself.  Our search covered about a 45degree section of the mound, but guides, scouts, and drivers were search in other areas that amounted to close to a 120 degree section of the 360 degree mound. But most of the backside of the mound, would have been highly unlikely that she would have gone bc she would have had to walk right through the bubbling sulfur area, plus Elisha and I had seen her on the trailhead side of the main tourist areas and no guides or tourists had seen her go back. By this time, I estimate the temperature was about 105-107F as the high for the day was predicted to be 107-109F. Elisha and Lou turned back at one point b/c they started to feel unwell in the heat. I searched and searched and searched, but eventually had to turn back as I feared getting sick up on the mound and being the next patient. During both of my searches I was so sure we'd find her. The terrain was rough but not necessarily many places that a large person would go unnoticed. I had with me water and saline solution and an electrolyte mix. I was preparing in my mind what I had learned in WFR and how to treat, and as time went buy was thinking CPR. 

But when I turned around, I lost a lot of hope. In my mind we had covered so much of the area, often twice with no luck. Where could she be? And at this point time was running out as temperatures soared. We didn't have enough people or resources. I was one of the fittest people in the group, but I was approaching heat exhaustion. Supposedly the army had been called, but they never showed.

I headed back to the land cruisers to cool off and rehydrate myself. At that point Jodie basically called off the search and Nick and Lou (the dragoman leaders) went to look briefly in one other area. At this point, we were definitely at risk of causing other problems, which is why it was called off. Our driver could hardly walk when he came back, and I had to pour water on and feed water to another driver who collapsed upon reaching the trailhead.

Awhile back, Elisha, usually binoculars had noticed what looked like a person way off in the distance in the salt flat direction. Completely opposite of the hot springs mound. She was mostly dismissed at that point b/c how could she have gone way out there. Complete opposite direction and the posse of 4x4s would be easy to spot from the salt flat. Eventually she was able to convince a couple 4x4s to go out there. One came back quickly and reported that it was a post Elisha had seen (it was indeed), but one, for some reason went farther, and came upon Kelly.

It rushed back to get help, leaving Ferdinand and Leonna (from Holland) at the scene to mark it. The landcruiser, when it arrived told us she was dead. I still had hope, knowing the driver likely wouldn't know the difference between passed out and dead. They loaded people up in the 4x4 to rush back to her. I decided not to go b/c in our group we have an elderly woman who is a doctor and 2 ICU nurses in their 50's. None of them had been able to help with the search due to lack of strength in the heat, but they could go by car, and I knew they would know to perform CPR and due what they could.

We waited anxiously at the trailhead for 15 or so minutes before driving out into the salt wasteland. Our drive parked at a far distance, but we saw her body loaded up into the back of the landcruiser. When the bystanders came back, they said she had passed away.

It was a long 4 hour drive back to the city of Makele, but it was good to talk to our friends (Wes and Michael) in the landcruiser. I was definitely struggling with it all. She had just been here, and now she wasn't. It hadn't seemed serious at first (I was sure I'd find her just off the trail) and now she was dead. I felt sad and even cried some, but at the same time, I had other thoughts, like "will the overland trip still go on". She was one of the people on the truck I knew the least, and I had only just learned her name. Yet it still also struck close to home.

I went through what ifs and all that. I got tears everytime (and still have them now), when I think how she told Elisha and I she was feeling bad due to the fumes and was heading back. Later as we continued into the colorful zone, I would find out there were hardly any fumes, she was just feeling bad. Why didn't I ask her if she had water, ask her if she needed help down, or called a scout over? I'm trained to notice that stuff. I can make a lot of excuses (i thought it was the sulfur bothering her, I'm not used to dealing with people as out of shape and obese as she was when I'm out in the wilderness, and I didn't quite know the toll that heat could have), but in the end I should have at least done something at that point. Mainly, both Elisha and I remembered that she was cheery and walking just fine. We had asked her about the route across this one sulfur area and both paid attention to her shoes. She was walking fine and appeared normal at the time.

I thought if she had only tripped in the rugged area and injured herself or knocked herself out, we would have found her quickly. Or if she had sat down when she got off the mound, we would have found her. Instead, for some reason (heat hallucination or whatever), she walked at least 1km in the salt flats away from the mound and 4x4s, no doubt exhausting herself. 

The overland tour is quite hands off. The truck drives us to places and then we can join the local tours or not, but we are pretty much free to be independent. But I was upset the overland tour operators or the local operators hadn't suggested and reminded of the buddy system (I had Elisha in my sights at all times and would have been there if she collapsed or got disoriented). Kelly had 2 good friends she was traveling with. One also turned around early (she said later she had been dry retching), and the other was quite fit and had continued on with the tour. So many things had to go "right" for the tragedy to happen, and they did.

We had a meeting at the hotel last night. The nurses said they can't confirm the cause of death until the autopsy, but we all of course suspect heat stroke and dehydration. The day before we had done the volcano hike, which would have been really exhausting for someone in Kelly's physical fitness. She was probably still recovering from that, maybe had diarrhea like others in the group that would speed of dehydration. who knows?

At the meeting, her friend Jodie, spoke very eloquently that everyone did the best they could and gave all they had and she was so thankful as were Kelly's family and friends back home. Jodie said we shouldn't think about what-ifs and that Kelly's favorite place was Africa, so it is proper her spirit is here. We learned she is an artist and some of her best paintings ($10,000 a piece) were of Africa. We were told her body was being taken to the Australian embassy in Addis Ababa and then she was going to be repatriated back to Australia.

Lou and Nick told us Dragoman would fully reimburse us and send us home if we wanted (most on the trip are only traveling the ethiopian portion). Dragonman and the Australian embassy offered us professional counselors if we should want them. The group all went out for a group dinner last night, and it appears as though everyone is going to continue, even Kelly's 2 close friends. They said it is what Kelly would want. We are staying an extra day in Makele to process and recover. Everyone is exhausted from the heat, dehydration (despite drinking probably 5 liters of water yesterday, only peed once after breakfast), lack of food during the search, and mental exhaustion. So we will head to Lalibela tomorrow and will make up a day sometime later.

Anyways, for the moms, Elisha and I are fine. We stay together and take care of each other and are sure to let each other and others know if we're not feeling well. We also try our best to stay hydrated and eat well. I know you worry about us being in a far-off place, but a tragedy like this could have easily (and probably does) occur in Santa Catalinas outside of Tucson.

Love, 

T&E 

Of course, after we had found the body and Kelly was determined to be dead, we had a long somber drive back up to Makele. The group of us in our Land Cruiser (Me, Elisha, Mike, and Wes) tried to process what had happened. While it was a great tragedy, we weren't as affected emotionally as others, since we did not know her well. Yet, I still felt very connected b/c I was involved in the search, and I went through a lot of "what-ifs" in my mind.

Back in Makele, we stayed at a super fancy place. We got juice as a snack, then we had a group meeting about the tragedy, and then we went as a group to a very delicious local buffet.


4/18/19

We were supposed to be leaving today for Lalibela, but the group voted to not move on and instead have an emotional recovery day in Makele. This wasn't such a bad idea as our hotel was very nice, and we were all mentally and physically exhausted. Elisha and I hung around in the nice room for a while. Internet was even pretty quick, so I got to listen to a few songs from Josh Ritter's new album "Fever Breaks". The group went out to a burger place (Makele is a bigger city, so you could find meat) for lunch. After lunch, Elisha and I walked to a palace, had a juice, and walked to the post office. For dinner, we went out with some friends to a really nice traditional restaurant, and we ordered a huge plate of injera with many different dishes on it.

Playing Indiana Jones in Axum (Aksum), Ethiopia

 4/12/19

We had an 8 hour drive to Axum (Aksum). It was a beautiful drive full of mountain scenery. The road was pretty incredible, going over passes and down into valleys. The road was crazy steep, and there were long drop-offs on the winding and snaking road. Something really cool is that every kid, and most adults, wave and smile as you go by, whether they are in the middle of nowhere, or in a town. Smiles and waves everywhere! Also, you pass quite a lot of guys carrying AK-47s, but they too are smiling and waving.

The scenery is beautiful, but the the areas we drove through are so incredibly poor. Dwellings are mud/dung or stone houses with thatched roofs. It's dry as a bone (we're here in the dry season), and big part of daily life is walking miles and miles to get to a well or water source and then waiting in line for your turn. Life here is very medieval like. Everything is done by hand or using donkey/mule/ox. For example, throughout Ethiopia, we never once saw a tractor, all fields are plowed by ox and plow.

We're staying in a junky hotel in Axum. Upon arrive to town, we took a tuk-tuk to the market and bough a plastic bucket in the market to do laundry (one of our best purchases). In Ethiopia, we mostly stayed in hotels b/c they lack camping infrastructure. Most of the hotels were pretty bad, but some weren't too bad. But a common theme was that the power often went out, the internet didn't really work (unless you were up at 12am when no one else was (Ethiopian internet made Antarctic internet seem like lightning speed), the water often didn't work, or was just a dribble in the shower. The showers usually weren't too warm, but some were. Luckily it was usually pretty warm where we were staying, so cool or luke-warm showers were just fine. A lot of the hotels had mosquitos, but only had holy, or non existent mosquito nets (we did bring our own mosquito nets for these purposes). Sometimes the rooms smelled, and in one we definitely saw big rats running around.

For dinner we went to a place with yummy traditional food and also had traditional dancing.

4/13/19
Today we did a city tour of historical axum. It used to be the capital of the power Auxumite empire (aka Aksumite Empire or Kingdom of Axum), 100-940 AD. On the tour, we visited the stelae (obelisk) garden, which has the tallest standing obelisk in the world. We also went down into some cool tombs (Egypt style). One had a sarcophagus that archaeologists can tell is hollow, but it appears to be one solid piece of rock. So how did they get the body in? Magic!? On the grounds of the stelae, we visited a nice museum with ancient pottery, glass, coins and other things. The Auxumite empire was the first sub-saharan African group to invent a writing system, and they also used coins. They were quite advanced and rich.

We also visited the cool underground tombs of King Kaleb and Bebre Mestel. Additionally, we stopped by a very colorful basket market, under a sycamore tree. For lunch we enjoyed yummy mango-avocado smoothies, and then walked through the city market.

In the afternoon, we had a tour of the of the Church of St. Mary of Zion. This church is where the ark of the covenant is supposedly housed according to the Ethiopian church. They believe that the son of Sheba and Solomon (Menelik) brought the ark to Ethiopia. For a much more detailed look into the ark of the covenant in Ethiopia, this is a good article: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/travel/keepers-of-the-lost-ark-179998820/

Only one high priest person is able to be inside the church where the ark is held, so we were not allowed to go into it, but we could gaze upon the church, which was a very non-descript church.

On this tour, we also visited some churches with very colorful paintings. We spent the evening getting another mango-avocado smoothies, visiting a good ole internet cafe and sharing a traditional ethiopian meal and a pizza.

I really enjoyed today! Cool history and mystery; like Egypt. Or as our guide said "The mystery of the history". It felt like being Indiana Jones today!