admin Ethiopia overflows with experiences you just can’t find anywhere else, from rare wildlife in the mountains to the churches of Lalibela, hewn from single chunks of rock.
Because Ethiopia is so vast, an escorted tour makes sense, especially for first-time visitors. Several operators including Saga, who I travelled with, offer small-group trips led by local guides, exploring the country’s cultural and natural highlights.
From mountain peaks and plateaus to cloud forests, lakes and fields of wheat and teff (a grain used to make the ubiquitous injera flatbreads), Ethiopia’s varied landscape makes it difficult to pin down.
This dramatic natural beauty is a big draw for many visitors, who come to comb the landscape and spy native birds and wildlife.
Yet, compared with popular safari destinations, most parts of the country are still relatively quiet, especially outside the busy winter season. I frequently spotted the same faces as I travelled, bumping into one couple at three locations, several hundred miles apart.
In the north, the rugged Simien Mountains are roamed by curved-horned walia ibex, an endangered wild goat you won’t find anywhere else, and about 150 miles south of the capital, Addis Ababa, Bale Mountains National Park is the best place to see Ethiopian wolves – the world’s rarest canid, with fewer than 500 in the wild.
They look like elegant foxes, with vivid copper coats, long, narrow jaws and tails tipped in black. While some stalk the Simiens, most live on the Sanetti Plateau, whose open, stark landscape increases the chances of spotting them.
This part of the country is like something from a fairy tale. The Harenna Forest clings to the lower slopes of the mountains, thick with giant fig trees coated in velvety moss and dripping with lichen.
Most visitors arrive in Ethiopia via Addis Ababa, and the capital has plenty to occupy them for a few days.
Suggest starting at the National Museum of Ethiopia, surrounded by lilac-flowered jacaranda trees, for an overview of the country’s history. Among the archaeological treasures is ‘Lucy’, the 3.2-million-year-old fossil of an early human ancestor. It’s locked away for preservation purposes, but visitors can view a cast.
For a more modern dose of culture, the sprawling open-air Merkato is a hectic hodgepodge of stalls selling leather goods, fruit and veg, honey and mattresses.
Many people come to Ethiopia for its palaces and religious sites, including some of the world’s oldest Christian churches. Gondar’s Royal Enclosure houses several grand emperors’ palaces, and visitors can wander around the well-preserved remains of banquet halls, libraries and ceremonial sites.
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