Travelling to Arba Minch and Nechisar National Park

Reached Lake Awasa with relative ease where I planned to break up the two day journey, chilled out, had my first Injera (the local dish which is a big silver tray covered with a large rubbery bread/pancake-like thing with spicy veg concoctions in small piles on the top, that you eat with your hands - sounds nasty but nice). The start of a lovely relationship on the food front - in African terms! I’m a big fan of chilli and also like actual flavour in my food so it was a very nice surprise from the familiar beans and rice I know so well. 


The next morning, 5am of course which seems to be the standard for bus departure, I got on a big bus this time and travelled to Arba Minch. This journey was a lot more bumpy, I’d sadly left those comfortable tarmac roads for the rest of my trip south! The 6 hour journey was a long 6 hours and because I was late getting on the bus I had to sit one row from the back - which means extra bumpy. Behind me was a guy with an AK47 gun casually rested behind my head, I had an upright plastic hard seat and in front of me was about 10cm of leg room. Next to me were 3 more people which made 4 on a 3 person seat. Nothing totally abnormal. I started to realise that there weren’t many independent travellers in Ethiopia (well in the south anyway), particularly solo white girls on public transport so while nothing aggressive at all, I definitely had the ugly alien feeling. We passed through various villages and it was good to be out the city and back into rural Africa, mud huts painted with more decor than I normally see. With music in my ears I was quite happy and somehow in my less than very uncomfortable seat and very bumpy road I managed to squeeze in a couple of hours sleep. Nice. 


Got to Arba Minch and found an overly priced tuk-tuk to a hotel I was very excited about reaching because I’d read it was really nice, had great views, a campsite I could afford and couldn’t wait to relax and get my energy back properly. Arrived at the gate, told they’re full… “but not even for a small tent?”…. “No it’s full” I was told sternly. Assuming it was because it was on the posh side and I looked dirty after my journey and had a backpack, I sadly trundled off in my even more expensive tuk-tuk to another place which actually had great views too of the two lakes (Abaya and Chambo) and I got a room there for an ok price, with the obligatory grim bathroom usually with no running water. 

Then keeping the pace, I decided I should go on a quick mission before sunset and blagged a lift down the road with a bored tour operator guide to the tourist office. I explained my project and they gave me the contact for the head of tourism for the region, Sedeka. The next day I organised a meeting with him and introduced Big Beyond. He explained the complex political issues with this particular park because people encroaching it were from another region and the government this side are not allowed to do anything with them, etc etc etc. He suggested that I think about Maze National Park a bit further west which was new, so we called the park manager but he’d gone away and couldn’t meet me for about 5 days. I didn’t really want to hang around wasting time but basically couldn’t do anything except wait and the park manager for Nechisar Park was also busy till then as well. So had a few days in Arba Minch hanging about.

The next day I went to the market for a wander and met an American guy who was cycling from Cairo to Cape Town. Yes, madness. He like quite a few others had quite a hard time in Ethiopia and couldn't wait to leave - rocks thrown at him on his bike and some hairy moments camping in the bush. I thought to myself at this point I’d quickly scan Ethiopia as an option and then more than likely just move on to Malawi sooner rather than later.

As such a big coffee country I couldn't find non-powdered coffee so had to make my own! Buying beans at the market to roast...

I visited the “crocodile market” with 3 people also madly cycling from Cairo to Cape Town in a more organised manner with Tour d’Afrique. This place is in Lake Abaya, and one of the main attractions there which I’d actually seen before seen on TV documentaries, it’s where enormous Nile crocodiles hang out sunning themselves as well as huge hippos. It was an amusing little boat trip but we got scarily close to the large toothed creatures in our little vessel!

The rest of the time was pretty much spent drinking beer with Sedeka, the tourism guy. We formed a good bond, got generally excited about the potential of Big Beyond in Ethiopia and I tried to learn the most complicated language ever, Amharic. Then my meeting with the park manager finally came along, and was cancelled, excellent. I didn’t get the right vibes about Arba Minch as a Big Beyond destination for volunteers and for some reason which I can’t remember, I developed the urge to investigate the South Omo region which was way off my itinerary and somewhere I thought would be too much of a challenge. But hey, I like to follow my gut!