Trek, day 3: 60 km and counting

Today we are walking with a French couple from Grenoble. They joined us last night and are on their honeymoon.

The day begins with a challenging 200 or 300 ft climb on the ubiquitous rocks. We finally level out, but continue with intermittent rocks thru the day. Rachel has dozens of "silly bands" that she gives to many of the groups of children that we pass along the way.



Age from 1 1/2 to about 12, the ones who are of age attend school half a day and tend the animals the remainder of the day. They carry their English workbooks back and forth to school. Most fascinating yesterday was a boy of perhaps six or seven sitting by himself in the dirt in a field studying his English lesson.

Lunch is at another delightful spot, similar to other days, but always a bit different. Guides from our next destination meet us to transfer our gear to their donkeys and send the previous ones back to our village of last night.



We trek for 2-3 more hours after lunch thru groves of eucalyptus trees, rocky ridges of cacti, view our first baboons, and after a total of more than 14 km arrive at our destination. Another set of tikuls perched on the edge of the escarpment. I have two blisters for the first time; the wonder is that Lynn and Rachel have made it with hardly a peep. We watch them split some wood for the fire tonite, clean up and relax. Rachel discovers lovely scarves that have been hand knitted in the village. There are only a handful but one is just the colors she had been searching for in Addis. One of the local elders plays his melodious flute and teaches Rachel how to make one from a stick of bamboo.



In the smoke filled dining tikul, but warmed by the fire we tell stories before dinner. Mine is the tale of meeting Rachel's Great great grandfather, my grandfather, for the first time. I was 13 and we had sailed to France on the Queen Mary, as my grandparents had escaped the communists in Romania earlier that year.

We had another wonderful vegetarian meal, followed by brief time around the fire and then early to bed.

Tomorrow we will be arising early for breakfast and then a brief 2 km walk to the road for our two hour ride to the Lalibela airport and our flight back to Addis.


- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad