Ethiopian Adventure Oct/Nov 2011

I joined the Focus Travel Club in Denver on October 23 after getting up at 5am to get to the Flag airport for the flight to Phx and then to Denver. I arrived about 2 hours before the group started arriving. We gathered our baggage and checked in to fly to DC. We spent the night there so I got a good night’s rest. My roommate was Harvey Meyer, a retired geologist who has been traveling the world years before I started. He was a great roommate and am looking forward to our next trip, where is my roommate to the Great Migration. We didn’t have to head to the airport for the long flight until about 7pm. We arrived in Addis Abba about 8am on their time. Thanks to Hamdy and HLO tours our adventure began when we landed and met our guide, Melaku Tesfa. He has been a guide for at least four years and as a Coptic was able to share a lot about the religion's beliefs. He was with us the entire trip.

I’m not going to write a day by day experience, but will write about things that I found interesting, fascinating, unusual, or just awesome.

MUSEUMS AND MONESTARIES

In Addis Ababa (Amharic) meaning ‘new flower’ we visited the National Museum where we saw LUCY, the 3.5 million year old remains of the earliest human. So awesome.

The country is a Coptic Orthodox Tewahado Christian [የኢትዮጵያ ኦርቶዶክስ ተዋሕዶ ቤተ ክርስቲያን] nation. The monasteries are one of the centers for education. They believe Jesus Christ as the savior, celebrate mass, and believe in that Jesus died on the cross and was resurrected. Jesus is part of the trinity—but Christmas is not celebrated in the same way other Christians do. Mass is celebrated in the Monastery and locals come for the 3+hr service—where everyone stands or prays…no seating. Coptic art is a very distinctive style that fills the outer area where the chanting and mass take place The priests are standing in the ‘holiest place’ and no lay people are allowed into the ‘holiest place’. Men and women are on opposite sides of the ‘holiest place’ and pray, chant, and receive mass from their place in the church. At one monastery we arrived to the monks practice chanting. We were invited to participate. We were given a staff and a metal instrument to shake. I was surprised that many of the Coptic crosses have a Celtic look…opps many of the Celtic Crosses have a Coptic look since Coptic, I believe, is older. I have to do some more research on that issue.

Underground monasteries…yep, dug from ground level down, with the ceiling intact. These were an amazing architectural feat to say the least. We were told God helped in finding a place that could be safely dug out. They really have to be seen to be believed.

AMHARIC and CALENDAR and TIME

Amharic is a Semitic language—related to Arabic—and is the 2^nd most spoken Semitic language. Addis, the capital, has a metro population of over 5 million. Amharic does not have either ‘th’ sound in their language…so Ethiopia is pronounced EE-TEA-Oh-Pee-ah with the accent on the O.

The Ethiopians operate on two calendars…one for the Western World and the a modified Julian calendar for their religious use. That explained the ’13 months of sunshine’ tourist campaign. For example: Nov.1, 2011 in my calendar was 21 Teqemt 2004 in the Ethiopian calendar.

Then there is the time on the clock thing. Their day starts at sunrise meaning that is when the calendar changes dates. So it’s Monday at 5:59a, in one minute it will be Tuesday. Our guide says it makes much more sense to have the new day start at sunrise than in the middle of the night. Ethiopia is GMT +3 for business and tourists, but is basically 6 hours different than that. So if you meet someone at 9a GMT +3, it is 3a on the Ethiopian clock. Somehow our guide made it all work—he was always on time, the drivers were always on time and so were we. Our guide does a lot of European tour groups and told me: The Swiss invented the clock, the Germans use the clock, and everyone else breaks the clock. He did say we were punctual, like the Germans.

DRIVING

All vehicles are equipped with horns and are used as frequently as in Cairo. Rather than deal with the hassles of stop lights, staying in your lane, turning, or passing one simply toots the horn a number of times and keeps on driving. All drivers in the country seem to honk, pass cars, drive into oncoming traffic, honk, and pull back into the lane.  While climbing a hill everyone simply honks, goes into the oncoming lane, pass, and somehow know that no vehicle is just over the horizon. Most drivers drive between 80-100km/hr—50mph-65mph—on all roads—paved, two lane, four lane, dirt roads, windy dirt roads, and windy mountain paved roads. Honking means survival.

Our driver, Jonas was the most experienced driver and spoke very limited English. In our four wheeling times, Jonas led the group. We even picked up an NGO vehicle who had a driver who wasn’t familiar with the area. He later told us he would have turned back hours ago, had Jonas not been a professional driver. If you asked Jonas a question he didn’t understand, he would either just say yes or no. My ESL did come in handy a couple of times when important information was really needed. On our first drive, we asked how long to get to the destination? His answer: 10 minutes. How far? 200km. At that time I knew we wouldn’t be doing a lot of conversing.Jonas did a great job of getting us through some difficult areas and we really enjoyed his driving expertise.

MARKET

We visited the largest market in the country in Addis. As our guide told us, if you can’t find something at this market, it doesn’t exist. There were blocks and blocks of market. Each area sold specific things—spices, coffee, clothing, fresh food, auto parts, and on and on. Everything is laid out on the ground and available for bargaining. The market is not a tourist buying place, more like Sam’s, Costco, and supermarkets all out in the open. Strangely the young kids recognized us as tourists. They would come up to us, practice their English, and after a few minutes of chit chat tell us they needed books or pencils for their schooling. It soon became easy to spot the real students from the scam artists. Two kids in the market asked us to name European countries and they would instantly tell us the capital. I had no problem giving them a few birr for their efforts. At one market we somehow attracted three street urchins who just ran around us and laughed and begged. Even the guide couldn’t deter their game. They followed us until we got back to the bus, then sat in wait for the next bus. Every town we visited had market a couple of days a week. Locals would walk for miles to and from the market. They come to market with their items, and then carry home what is left over and what new things were purchased. Some had donkeys, some had one wheeled wagons, some had four wheeled wagons, and some just carried things on their backs or heads. Most of the rural markets had no pick pockets, but we were warned in Addis to be alert. No one in our group lost anything. Some of the markets were a little muddy but each one was worth the experience.

ON THE ROAD

The country side in the south is very hilly. On all the rural roads there were always people walking with cattle, goats, firewood, big plastic water bottles, or carrying something. This walking traveling was an everyday experience for them. Up in the morning, walk to town, at the end of the day walk back home. Next day, same thing. There were always kids on the side of the road trying various ways to stop tourists. Some would stand in the road holding up something to sell. Some would just stand on the side of the road and wave. More enterprising youth would dance to get our attention. The really innovative would do back flips. Very cute. While there were usually one or two kids dancing, once we stopped to give them pencils and sharpeners, or blown up beach balls suddenly there would be six or more kids around our vehicle. Many would ask if we were from America and then say ‘I like Obama.’ I’m sure they had a similar line for every tourist. Many of the tourists we saw were Germanic or South African. Not a lot of Americans. Many women carried bundles of firewood on their lower back, walking to town to sell it. At one stop, a woman had stopped and placed the bundle on a cement abutment. Hamdy tried to lift it..no luck. A lady in our group offered assistance and the two of them couldn’t lift it. How these women carried the wood day after day is beyond my comprehension.

Our road trip included seeing a small pack of African Wild Dogs which our guide said he had never seen before. We also saw a leopard in the brush beside the road. At several other times we saw monkeys playing around. Several times we saw a family of baboons.

TRIBES

After my pre-adolescent years with my paternal grandmother’s National Geographic, I had some idea of what to expect. Each tribe we visited…Mursi, Dorze, Konso, Tsemay,Karo, Hamer, Bena, had their own language, culture, and traditions. We were greeted at each village and many residents posed for photos…at 2-3birr per person in the picture. I’m convinced that National Geographic started this practice by paying tribal members when they visited these areas in the mid 20^th century. The Mursi tribe, the women have clay plates in their lips, were the most aggressive about photo taking. They would stand in front of you and not move till you took a picture. The time in the villages was exciting and exhausting. At one village we tasted a homemade wine that was very strong. Another village had a dance show with singing. Another village offered us traditional bread, which was very good. While we had been warned that touching us was to be expected, it didn’t really bother me. It kinda reminded me of my early days on the rez, with my hairy arms. I would have gladly spent more time with each tribe except the Muris. Their village was just to hectic. Their only goal seemed to be having their picture taken.  Thanks to Hamdy, who is great with kids..he would help out at every stop by diverting the kids from us with a game or something so we could enjoy the sites and not have too many kids hanging on.

CLOSING COMMENTS

Our trip showed us many sides of Ethiopian culture. I was struck by the amount of mountain walking that takes place every day. Families get up early in the morning, load up their goods for trade or sale, and walk from their small villages to larger towns on dirt roads. They spend most of the day in town then take everything back to their small villages. In the rural areas, there is almost no motorized transportation.

The Ethiopian Coptic Church was present in most of the villages. The churches and monasteries were magnificent. Those that were carved out of the earth were amazing. All the monks and priests we met were friendly and knew how to work with tourists. The art work in the monasteries was easily identified and usually told the story of something from the Bible. I appreciated the different take of stories I learned as a child.

I am not a coffee drinker That sort of changed while I was in Ethiopia. At our first hotel, I sat down to a coffee ceremony in the lobby. The coffee was not bitter, had no after taste, and was very good. I did drink coffee whenever it was offered. A great memory.

It is hard to understand Ethiopia in the short time we were there. Another visit is needed. I had a great trip that was made possible by HLO Tours and Hamdy, Focus Travel and Ellie, the great people in our group, our guide and our drivers, and the many, many people who opened up their lives to us.

I have posted some videos at my YouTube website. I hope everyone enjoys them as much as I do.  Click here to go to my channel.

Grand Canyon River Trip 2011

July, 2011

Bob arrived about 3pm after a mix up with Map Quest. At 6p we went to our mandatory meeting at a nearby hotel. There we got our rather large rubberized dry bags, we were shown how to secure them, and told to return at 6am the next morning. We made it and hopped on a shuttle to Lee’s Ferry. Upon arrival our crew was waiting. There were four inflatable rafts for passengers, one for food and other sundries, and a small wooden boat, the Sandra. This was a ‘non-motorized’ trip, so once we pulled out, there was no turning back.

This was Bob’s xⁿ river trip and I was a river virgin. We quickly learned there were five of us doing the full trip—Lee’s Ferry to Diamond Point, some 230 river miles away. The rest of the group was going to Phantom Ranch and hiking out of the canyon. There we would pick up another group doing the lower river ride after hiking in to Phantom Ranch area.

Our oarsmen and oarswomen were from a variety of backgrounds with at least one thing in common, the love of the river and all it provides. John was our trip leader and the manager of Canyoneers. He was a little officious the first day or two but turned out to be a great guy who came to Flag at 18 and worked on the river almost 20 years. Cliff was a constant reader. Every time we stopped, he would have a book in his hand. He also shared some great readings with us. His dad has written two great books about the Grand Canyon. Kate claimed to be the oldest oarsperson. She had lived in Flag, but moved to Delores CO so she and her boyfriend could pursue a dream of making dory boats. Turns out she is a great published photographer. Amity was with her boyfriend, Omar, for the first half of the trip. He is an avid hiker and climbed out with our first group. Rachel and husband were on the food boat. Finally was Greg, whose grandfather had started the first commercial trips on the river, back in the 30’s. The Sandra was one of his restored boats which was very popular with all of the guests. Isaac and Tom joined us at Phantom ranch to oar the food boat.

As a newcomer, I thought of what ol’ John Wesley Powell must have experienced as his expedition was the first explorer to travel down the Colorado from Wyoming to the end of the canyon. Thankfully our guides knew where all the rapids were, where there were good stops, where there were good hikes over rocks to beautiful waterfalls, ponds, Anasazi ruins, and slot canyons. Powell and his group didn’t have anyone with knowledge like that, except for maps made from the rim.

After a few minutes on the river, we passed under Navajo Bridge[s] and entered Grand Canyon National Park. While still in Marble Canyon we hit our first rapids. The series had drops of 8’ to 2’. The first one was a perceived ‘huge’ rapid but after Lava Falls, they were really not that large. I got wet is ice cold water many times that first day. It was about 100° and that cool water felt good. I still don’t know why I had so many quick drying clothes—I could have stayed cooler and wetter with cotton. We were constantly reminded to drink at least 2 gallons of water every day and to eat the salty snacks. On a couple of really hot days [108°] I added Nutrilite powder—much like Gatorade—to replace nutrients my body was sweating out. On that first day we learned about bailing and hand pumping to get the water out of the boat. We would continue this new skill throughout the trip…even when I heard that several days had been called ‘No Bail Days’. Most of the time I thought the 1” of water was nice to keep me cool, but even that small amount really weighed the boat down and made it hard to row, to control, and did not prepare us for upcoming whitewater.

We soon realized that the only sky we would be seeing on the trip was a wide slit directly above us. This was great because we some shade much of the day. I still don’t know why but the sky was the deepest blue I had ever seen anywhere. I figure it was because the contrast with the canyons. There were also no clouds most of the time in that slit until the end of the trip.

We pulled into camp about 4p to end our first day on the river. First item was to find a place to put the kitchen, then individual campsites, and then assist in unloading the boats. It was easy to find a kitchen spot—as close to the boats as possible. Campsites were fairly easy too for the first few days. Then all this became routine and not always ‘exciting’. Bob and I slept very well with each having one night that was a struggle. We laid out our pads, and the sleeping bag. I opened my sleeping bag, laid on one half and covered myself with a light sheet. Each night about 4a, I would awaken and cover myself with the other half of the sleeping bag for the last 90 minutes of sleep. I was never cold…never kept awake by bugs. On our first night the full moon awakened all of us and most of us thought the sun was coming up. The canyon rocks were dark, the sky was dark, and there was just this huge ball of white light.

We were told to pee in the river and crap in the ‘Duke’…much easier for men than women. The Duke was a self contained solid waste disposal bucket with chemicals and a nice seat. Actually there were about 8 Dukes for the whole trip. My grandfather had taught me, after a few swats that you never, ever pee in the river. I’m sure he was turning over in his grave every time I got rid of the 2+ gallons of water I was drinking every day. As an old-er guy, it was hard to get up in the middle of the night, walk to the river and pee. Fortunately, it was not a nightly occurrence. At home the call is usually around 5:30 or 6am that I get up, so since we were up by then, no problemo.

Some of our guides were mostly river people—enjoying just being on the river. Others were mostly canyon people—enjoying the geology of the canyon. Others were archeologist people—enjoying the ruins and the story they told. I was a river person. I really liked being on the river, both the rapids and the quiet portions. I have hiked to many ruins in my life—including two great trips to Keet Seel, taking visitors to Walnut Canyon, and many other places on the Rez. I did take some hikes to ruins on this trip, but they were easy walks. With bifocals and prisms, my eyes had a hard time focusing on the rocks I was walking over and seeing the beauty of the canyon on the walks. Even though I took several hikes, I did not take the ones that included ‘jumping’ or ‘holding the wall’ so as not to fall 100’ down. I left those to the younger folk, and to those who have never seen the beauty of Northern Arizona. It did not distract from the trip and it gave me some time to ‘become part of the canyon’ in a peaceful way.

One thing that struck me on this journey was that all the rapids, all the major rock formations, all the incoming creeks, everything was named by non-Natives. There was a story of how major rapids were named. There were stories of early explorer’s adventures near a spot. At times I wished we had a Native on board to tell us the Native story of this great canyon. While most people have heard of John Wesley Powell’s expedition I learned that it was actually J C Sumner—another Civil War Vet—who was responsible for making the expedition a success. He pulled Powell out of the water at least twice and was responsible for saving the boats numerous times. JC was not into publicity and fame, so he let Powell tell the stories and get the fame. Then there was Georgie White Clark who ran large commercial trips on the river throughout the 1950’s. She was quite a character who was known for her ‘leather skin’ her leopard pattern leotards and her no nonsense—don’t mess with me—attitude. She hated inflatable rafts and always took her trips in dories—sometimes lashing them together for better stability. On one trip several dories flipped, sending gear and passengers into the river. As she looked around at the devastation her only comment was ‘They don’t make passengers like they used to.’ Norm Neville took his first commercial trip down the river in 1938 in ‘new’ boats that seem to attack the rapids backwards—with the wide part of the boat going in first. He and his wife continued the trips until they were killed in a plane crash in 1949. Their company, now owned by Gaylord Stavely, is now called Canyoneers.

Our first wildlife sighting was three Condors around Navajo Bridge. They are magnificent in flight. While they circled above us, I could only hope that they were not thinking we would soon be dinner. Throughout the trip we saw a couple more. We had a great view of a red-tailed hawk on a shelf above us. It went into flight, just as we passed. Several times we saw blue heron on the shore line, standing on rocks right at the river. We saw big horn sheep of all ages. They were on cliffs, they were eating in a small meadow, they were drinking at the river, or they were simply meandering along the river bank. Cliff says he saw a fox, but he was the only one to see it and it was really hot—so it might have been a hallucination? Most campsites had deer tracks, sheep tracks, and one had a paw print that might have been a bobcat. I saw a very fast snake on the rocks during one hike—non-poisonous, and at the end of the hike others were greeted by a 5’ rattler, who felt they were a little close so coiled and rattled. Ravens were at all campsites—looking for food. Our trip leader John was very strict about leaving the camp cleaner than when we arrived. He made sure that no one dropped even crumbs and that we left nothing behind. At first it was a pain, but soon became routine. Seeing the number of visitors on the river, all of his ‘rules’ make a lot of sense. We were not the first, nor the last visitors. This is the least the canyon deserves.

I spent two days on the Sandra. The first day I was on the front, the second day in the back. We did some great rapids on both days. Sitting on the front of the boat has you right at river level. When I approached a rapid, I was told to ‘fish-eye’. That means lying on my stomach with my head right at the front edge of the boat. Your head, your body, and the boat go down into a small hole, then you hit the rapid and so up out of the water pretty high, then crash down into the next hole, ready for the next wave. You get really wet, slammed fairly hard, and keep the boat upright. The fish-eye-er has to use body weight to keep the boat from overturning and to bring the boat back down in the wave so it doesn’t do a back flip. Sitting in the back means bailing, getting very wet, and using body weight to keep the boat from overturning. Both days were a totally awesome experience.

‘High siding’ was essential to the larger rapids as was ‘scouting’. ‘Scouting’ simply meant that we pulled off the river, climbed up on the rocks and observed the rapids. I only did it the first time. The oarsmen and women would get up there, adrenalin would be running high, they would watch, then point, then wave their hands in various directions, and discuss how to attack the rapid. They used river vocabulary and this was not the time for a vocabulary lesson. I certainly got the importance of this exercise; I just had a hard time understanding the final decision. ‘High siding’ takes place in rapids. As the boat rises, you move your weight to the high side of the boat—to prevent flipping. Many times gravity is pushing you into the low side of the boat. Omar did several body slams high siding at the front of our boat in Taner Rapid.  I was never that adventurous, but did get pretty good, according to the guides, at high siding.

There was never a dull moment the entire 13 days. No matter what boat I was on, there were always stories about the canyon. I had heard the many sides to Glen Canyon Dam when I first came to AZ back in 1971, while the river was forming Lake Powell. The Natives were happy for the jobs and saddened by the loss of the beauty and history of Glen Canyon. The Dept of Reclamation was busy making movies and a very accessible dam to let the public know that so many more visitors would be able to see parts of Glen Canyon. The environmentalists were talking about the ruin of the canyon and the eventual silt build up that would make the dam inoperable. What I didn’t know was the Reclamation plan to put a series on dams IN the Grand Canyon. We stopped at the Marble Canyon Dam site, where work began on the dam before it was stopped. There are still remnants of the plan, including the holds for the proposed tram and a huge cave that goes several hundred yards into the canyon. That cave was drilled to help anchor the dam. Some of us walked back into the cave which was about 10’ wide and 12’ high. It went back for what seemed like forever. We only walked a hundred yards before turning back. Thanks to everyone who had the foresight to stop the building of that dam and several others in the canyon.

Lava Falls as one of the highlights. Bob and I went through them with Cliff. There was the mandatory scouting. Everyone was always serious after a scouting trip. When we got back on the raft, Cliff looked at us and said to get ready. Then in the most serious tone he had ever used, he told us that we were to stay in the boat, watch the boat behind us, and if anyone fell out to keep our eye on them—no matter what, and to yell and point to the person in the river. “Don’t take your eyes off the person, no matter what.” I usually a pretty good multi-tasker but this seemed like more than I could do. My goal was to simply stay in the boat. The rapids did not take any of us. The ride was thrilling, better than any e-ticket at Disneyland. We were tossed and turned, raised and lowered, and our raft was filled with water. We all survived and I was ready for a re-ride. I asked Cliff to do it again. He looked at me, shook his head, and said ‘on your next trip’. I am ready.

On the last night it looked like rain and we all pitched tents. No sooner had we gotten things set up than the rain started. It cooled things off quickly and was really pleasant as long as we were in the tent. Neither Bob nor I expected a dinner in the downpour. They simply put up umbrellas and cooked a very nice enchilada meal. We stood under the umbrellas and ate. Linda Lou and I had helped with dinner a couple of nights before, but neither of us was out there working in the rain. It rained most of the night, but by dawn, it was another great day. We worked our way down to Diamond Point where we would be picked up. We had to wait about an hour on a great beach as the Hualapai control the exit point and they had motorized day boats to launch. This is where we saw a rather large rattler, who felt being coiled and rattling was a good choice. We moved on. The ride out of the canyon was about 23 miles of dirt to get to Peach Springs. The road had suffered from the previous day’s storm and there was a grader on the road, doing what he could to make it easier. We had to drop off some people at the South Rim then on to Flagstaff. Our adventure had come to an end.

Grand Canyon Trip Pictures Click Here