May 15-16 Arba Minch

After interviewing the DAs on Friday, we left Sodo around 11 am for Arba Minch. Mike wasn’t kidding when he said that it’s a rough road. There’s a highway being built, but it’s under construction, as the result we had to zigzag around the road, sometimes way into the rural areas. It was so rough, the 80 km took us over 3 hours (with one pee break, with 4 girls peeing in the Acacia thorns with about 35 goats as audiences. The scenery along the way was amazing as usual. On our right, the Rift Mountains was swirling low lying clouds hovering overhead. After about an hour and a half of trail blazing, a huge lake came into view. It was the same shade as the sky, but the lake was a muddy blush color. Behind the lake there were varying degree of the rift mountain view, it was beautiful. We were so glad to get to Arba Minch, our butts sure took a beating. We stayed at the same chain of hotels as Sodo – Bekele Molla Hotels Wolaita. This hotel is much larger and much more scenic, overlooking lakes Abaya and Chamo with Rift Mountains in the background. There are beautiful trees and flowers everywhere and the restaurant patio overlooks the spectacular scenery. We went to a local restaurant for supper and had fried fish and chips. Food safety is not a big concern in Ethiopia, goats and cats can come freely as the patrons.

The next morning after breakfast, this amazing rain shower past over the hill just across from the restaurant patio. The rain was less than 1 km away and we can see and hear it like we’re in a bubble. It came down so hard we thought it was going to miss us, but before we knew it we were in the middle of it. Saturday afternoon, we went to the crocodile market, by the name we expected something more developed, maybe a gift shop, cafe? Nope, after navigating through a busy mucky trail, we pulled up to the swampy, vegetation covered edge of Lake Chamo. There was a path of stones and an overturned boat guiding us to the boat. We didn’t have to go very far to see either the hippos or the crocks: there were hippos submerging themselves and spraying water close to where we dock the boats and directly across the small bay there were about 10 crocks sunbathing themselves on the banks. As we troll close to the crocks, they scrambled into the water to float by us. As we cruise along the lake we got close to a herd of hippos. Our guide who we picked up in town for 1080 birrs, said there’re about 400 hippos and hundreds of crocks in the lake. Hippos can weigh from 600 to 2000 kg as adults. Crocks can be from 5 to 9 meters long. We were out of the lake for over an hour. Besides hippos and crocks, we also saw pelicans, fishing eagles, cranes, and storks. Of course the scenery is fabulous, with a fantastic view of the bridge of God – a strip of land 2 km wide between Lake Abaya and Chamo – and the great rift stretching on either side of us in fading layers. There are also numerous local fishermen floating along in narrow rifts using a log as a pedal, very brave considering all the dangerous animals in the water.

We had an amazing supper at the Arba Minch Tourist Hotel. Most of us had the grilled Nile perch, it was fresh and delicious, a fabulous way to end a fabulous day.

Amanda, Dani, Jenn, Michelle, Melissa, Alexis