Home » Ethiopia » Cycle to the Summit Part 14 - Bahir Dahr to Addis Ababa

A few days of rest and then it was time to do battle with the roads and children of north Ethiopia. Said goodbye to the Blue Nile for the last time. Negotiated bad roads and 1000m gorge. Hit tarmac and rolled into Addis Ababa for some ice-cream!

Cycle to the Summit Part 14 - Bahir Dahr to Addis Ababa

Toby Hammond
2006-06-25 19:56:13

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source: http://www.cycletothesummit.org.uk

Bahir Dar

We had traded the round metal things we push around and around each day for a 15hp outboard motor and gone for a cruise around the very scenic Lake Tana. After wallowing around with the hippos in the mouth of the Blue Nile, we bobbed our way over to an island monastery in search of special paintings. After an hour or so in the monastery the glazed-over look appeared on our faces (the same ones you wear in an art gallery or museum) and we headed back to dry land. However the pelicans had stolen the show over the hippos which, to my surprise, the Europeans of the team had never spotted before and were well impressed by their size and even moreso their ability to fly. A trip to Bahir Dar would not be complete without visiting the Blue Nile Falls. The falls were a great change of scenery and pace as we lumbered over the hills and down to the base of the falls. Toby again risked the Bilharzia dangers and went for a dip. The rest of our time in Bahir Dar was spent haggling four inner tubes from the bike shop, eating copious amounts of fish goulash, drinking draught beer in Jumbo's and forgetting about the slog ahead of us.

On the Road

The slog ahead of us was just that, a slog. The road was awful as the road builders were in the preparation stages of asphalting. Large rocks and very crumbly edges or in some cases a non existant road made the riding difficult, but only in comparison to some of the inhabitants of this region. We had been warned about the Ethiopian children, but nothing had prepared us for what we experienced. A few days after leaving Bahir Dar Ruth had decided to start wearing her helmet again, not for fear of crashing, but rather for protection against the constant barrage of rocks that were thrown at us by children. Ruth was the target of most of these attacks, and to her credit kept in good spirits most of ...