A Different World

We arrived at Paradise lodge late on Tuesday evening.  The drive through the hills and mountains was very scenic and the landscape started to change becoming much less lush and more like Arizona, except more scrubby.  As I pulled back my curtains in the morning I was greeted by a view of Lake Abaya and …

Monday Sept 17th: Addis Ababa to Arba Minch

The adventure has truly begun; today we travelled for 11 hours by 4×4 from Addis Ababa to Arba Minch, the gateway town to Southern Ethiopia.  Normally an eleven-hour car journey would not be high on my list of things to do but there was so much to experience, it felt like a 2-3 hour journey. …

Hello, I’m back in the connected world

Hello everyone, After a couple of weeks in Southern Ethiopia without internet and only occasional phone service for texting, I am back in Addis Ababa waiting to catch my flight to the US tonight.  I was hoping to post for several days while I was on my trip and instead, I am going to post …

Addis Ababa

I arrived to a damp Addis Ababa early this morning and I was immediately struck by how green the landscape is.  Staying at the Hilton in Addis is definitely a luxury; this is a beautiful hotel and very different to how the very large majority of the locals live.  We drove around the city this …

On my way…Ethiopian Airways

The first real mental challenge of my trip was coming to grips with flying on an African airline.  To the experienced traveller I am sure that sounds extremely judgmental and shallow.  For me it was real, I see news reports of plane crashes and it gave me reason to be concerned. After some investigation, I …

Not quite Ethiopia…yet

I arrived at London Heathrow early Thursday to a beautiful sunny day, this after a a very rainy summer (as usual?).  My family live about 100 miles away in city called Bristol where I was born.  Bristol is a very old port city that was badly impacted from the WWII bombing, but fortunately enough of …