Schlagwort-Archive: world trip

Ethiopia, World Trip 2018-19

Harar: the Good, the Bad and the Ugly

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From Lalibela, we embarked on a little travel marathon to reach our final destination: Harar. Flights out of Lalibela to anywhere were pretty expensive on short notice, so we decided to take a bus to Bahir Dar and fly from there, via Addis Abeba, to Dire Dawa. Harar doesn’t have an airport, so from Dire Dawa we would take another bus to Harar. Sounds long? Yeps, it was.  

Our bus journey to Bahir Dar was probably the worst we had in Ethiopia: first no seats, then overcharged for our luggage, or they would have kicked us off the bus. In exchange we did get seats, however the bus was too full and a puking women (8 h straight almost!!) sat and puked next to Mathijs on the floor. Not very enjoyable. The flight was the easiest part and went rather smoothly, Dire Dawa a catastrophe stopover with a bad overpriced hotel with unhelpful staff, and the bus ride to Harar longer than expected.

Harar started off badly as well. Lots of homeless people, many druggies trying to talk to you and get something from you etc. Some guys grabbed me, tried to touch me and so on. I shouted at people, slapped one of the guys in the face and people around me were just laughing mostly. What the f…!? Ethiopia so far had been exhausting, but this was just plain bad bad bad. I just didn’t feel safe, something that was not the case anywhere else in Ethiopia.

It turned out though that the town itself is nice and colourful. It’s just not as pretty as we had expected, but there’s lots of picturesque little streets and colourful local markets.

Because it’s a mainly Muslim town, women were all covered, but in a very colourful way that made for good photos. Fortunately, they usually didn’t mind, so Mathijs was one happy street photographer.

I was still not feeling too comfortable, but the photogenic old center made up a bit for the exhausting trip here and the drama with the homeless druggies. A bit. I wouldn’t go back to Harar, and it’s not a must see for me. The effort required to get here is just not worth it – there are easier to reach market towns in this world.

After these last exhausting days, I was also more than happy about our sudden plan change to leave Ethiopia a few days earlier than planned: we had discovered that the visa we had gotten was valid for 29 days instead of the usual 30 days. Our flight out was on day 30. We couldn’t find any easy way to clarify the mistake without paying lots of money and read about people being forced into ridiculous fees or otherwise missing their flight. In short: the easiest way out (literally) seemed to be to change our flight to Windhoek for 2 days earlier – not cheap either, but at least our worries were gone!

Ethiopia, you’ve been very interesting, and very exhausting.

Ethiopia, World Trip 2018-19

Lalibela – Ethiopia’s famous churches

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On public transport, it takes 2 days to get from Mekele to Lalibela. Something we would not look forward to after our recent bus ride from Gondar to Shire/Aksum. Luckily though…we got a private jeep for ourselves to do it in one day instead of two! Haha. One of the main reasons why we booked the Danakil tour with Ethio Travel and Tours was that they included a free transfer to Lalibela – and were the cheapest overall, especially when considering the huge comfort factor of a private transfer! The ride did take most of the day, but it was relaxed and we were able to stop for photos any time we wanted.

We stayed a couple of nights in Lalibela, taking it slower than usual. On our first day, we got a bit organised in the morning and walked around town. In the afternoon, we went to see the Northern cluster of churches, which was really nice. There was a mass going on and we could watch the locals singing and praying.

Later, we went to St. George’s church, the most famous one of Lalibela. If you Google Lalibela, high chance is that this picture will come up:

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The churches don’t all look like this, only this one. It’s by far the most pretty one, so we came back here many times over the next few days in order to take the best pictures.

Next day, we woke up super early and went to the churches at 6am when they open for tourists. We heard chanting and praying from multiple places and kind of chased around to find where the biggest mass was going on (it was in the Southern cluster). Anywhere we went though, there was some praying or chanting happening and it was beautiful to listen and watch. Once again, this felt like travelling back in time… Oh, Ethiopia!

We then took our time to properly see the Southern church cluster, in my opinion much nicer than the Northern one.

On our last day in Lalibela, we decided to visit the big Saturday market. It was massive and really cool to walk around – if a bit stressful since kids were begging all the time and teenagers wanting to be your guide. Oh, Ethiopia! So fascinating one moment, so exhausting the next one.

Next day, we were off to a horror bus trip of 8 h to Bahir Dar, from where we would catch a flight through Addis to Dire Dawa…

Ethiopia, World Trip 2018-19

Touring Danakil Depression

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Our next stop after Tigray was Mekele, the starting point for excursions into the Danakil Depression – one of the most amazing volcanic landscapes on Earth. Unfortunately, we arrived in Mekele on a Sunday which apparently meant that most tour offices were closed and comparing and booking a tour turned out a bit more difficult than we expected. After whatsapping with some agencies and bargaining a lot, we finally decided to go with ETT – Ethio Travel and Tours – who are known for their big groups, but who just offered the best deal, including a transfer to Lalibela afterwards.

So next day, we were off to Danakil, with our first day consisting mainly of driving and stopping at some viewpoints along the way. In the late afternoon, we drove a bit across the big salt lake. On the way, we came across some camel caravans who are transporting salt 400 km further. Hard work for the men and animals!

We then passed by a little pool in the salt lake (which otherwise like Uyuni is solidified on the top so you can drive across it). Some people went in for a dip, but we weren’t keen on being completely salty for the remainder of the tour, so we just walked around a bit and took some pictures.

Our last stop for the day was to see the sunset over the salt lake which was quite pretty, even though the sun set behind some clouds eventually.

The night was spent on wobbly makeshift beds outside. It was nice to sleep under the stars, but I’ve had my fair share of nights under stars, so wouldn’t have minded if they had built a simple hostel like those on the Uyuni tour.

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Next morning, bright and early, we went to see the highlight of the tour: the volcanic landscape of Dallol. At first, when we arrived, I was a bit underwhelmed to be honest. There was some pretty yellow underground, but nothing thaaat amazing. That was before I saw all of this:

W.o.w. I had high expectations towards Dallol, but they were wayyy surpassed! I didn’t know there would be these little terrace pools, and I didn’t expect new crazy views wherever you went.

Only to see Dallol, it was already worth doing this tour – even though it was expensive. After seeing this unreal landscape, there were two more stops we made. One at a bubbling lake (volcanic activity but apparently not hot), and some cool looking rocks that reminded us a bit of Ciudad de Itas in Bolivia, but on a much smaller scale. We also passed a place where locals were cutting salt blocks out of the lake, to transport them onward on the back of their camels. It’s very hard work, that – as so often – pays very little.

After that, it was back to our lunch stop from day 1 and then back to Mekele town. Even without seeing the lava lake at Erta Ale (it’s not visible anymore at the moment), touring the volcanic landscapes of Danakil Depression has been amazing and something we won’t forget too quickly.