ITINERARY

Notes: The NE of the country suffered heavily from drought caused by an extreme El Nino this year. We left the Awash/Alideghi area a bit earlier and spend extra half days both on Melka Ghuba and Mega-Soda.

Download kml file with all gps coordinates

PRACTICALITIES

Transport

As most other fellow 'independent' birders, we choose to hire a 4WD car and driver. Self-driving seems to be quite rare in this country. Apparently, you need to have your international at least a temporal Ethiopian license. Roads are sometimes in bad conditions and there is said to be some red tape...

We contacted several local companies and chose Red Jackal Tour Operators, mainly because of the best rate. There are plenty of other companies to be found on the net. Ethiopian Quadrants could offer a driver / bird guide. Our package included all expences for the car and the driver.

Our driver Girma was a nice guy, who knew his whereabouts and was very helpful arranging (cheap) accomodation and food, access to birding sites and was a smooth and safe driver. However, in the end we look back on the company's services with mixed feelings:

• often we arrived slightly late at the birding spot, even though we specifically asked for it, because our driver refused to drive before dawn, wanted to have breakfast first (for us!), or needed to fix something that could have been done the day before;
• although we had agreed in advance with the company to do some night drives, our driver only agreed once (!) to make one, when we were in company of a ranger/scout. The main reason was that it was unsafe to drive at night because of the bad roads and because of the risk of robbery/theft;
• our driver's English was too basic and this caused many easily avoidable communication problems.

Accommodation

We often stayed in 'local' hotels which were very cheap. We took along our camping gear and at some sites we decided to camp: sometimes because there was no accommodation, sometimes to limit costs. Sometimes 'farangi' prices are asked for - often our driver talked these down. At some places (for e.g. Mega) we were not allowed to sleep with 2 persons of the same gender in one room because of religeous reasons.

Money

In the larger cities ATM's were found fairly easy. Before starting our trip we withdrew some Birr (ETB) at the airport in Addis Ababa, which turned out to be the exact amount we needed for the whole trip. Changing EUR or USD is possible at the airport (not at night) and must be possible in all banks or larger hotels. Credit cards are not widely accepted - at least in the places we visited.

The daily rate for Red Jackal was 140 USD per day and included all expenses for the driver (accommodation, food), all fuel and the mileage. Our own costs were not included, nor entrance fees, etc. In total, we spent less than 400 EUR per person in three weeks. For the currency rate read more here.

Weather

The weather was dry and warm throughout. Only in the lowlands it became quite hot. The highlands of the Bale Mountains are cooler and can be fairly cold at night - especially while camping near Harenna Forest. We only had a bit of rain while driving to Gibe Gorge. In the Afar region the most severe drought since the mid 1980's (Life Aid) turned the landscape into a barren place. Read more at the Bradt travelguide

Health and safety

We encountered no health problems nor safety problems at all. We very often ate out in local restaurants and on the street and didn't suffer any travellers diseases. We only drank bottled water and made sure that we always had enough bottles in the car as the stock declined rapidly due to the hot weather. As Malaria is present (but rare?) in Ethiopia we took prophylaxis for the time spent below 2000m. On beforehand we all made sure to have a valid Yellow Fever vaccination (reference: Institute of Tropical Medicine).

Visa

It is possible to get your tourist visa on beforehand, but it turned out to be very easy and fast upon arrival as well (cost app. 50 EUR). Read more at the Ethiopian Embassy website.

Electricity

Most plugs encountered were type C, which are directly accessible for the standard European plug. Best to bring your travel adapter. Blackouts were encountered regularly, so bring enough rechargeable batteries and a powerbank for smartphone, iPod, etc. Read more at the Worldstandards website.

VISITED SITES

Below is a list of the sites we birded. A lot of information can be found in two excellent site guides:

• "Where to watch birds in Ethiopia" by Spottiswoode et. al. (2010)
• "Birding Ethiopia" by Behrens et. al. (2010)

Sululta Plains

We left the capital a bit late due to a very short night and buying food/drinks. These plateau grasslands are situated just outside Addis and held already the first endemics. We had some short stops here on the way to Debre Libanos. The most productive was at 9.231542, 38.751429.

Highlights: Blue-winged Goose (up to 40 birds near several pools), Wattled Ibis (good numbers all along the way), Abyssinian Longclaw (3 birds), Ethiopian Siskin (our first of many birds were seen here), Red-breasted Wheatear (2 birds).