Gondar

The king's palace complex.

Debre Birhan Selassie, an old Christian church.

King Fasil's bath complex.

Farmers threshing their crops.

John pitches in.

Scaffolding on construction sites.

The main drag of Gondar.

Hanging out.

Tuesday, January 23^rd.

We were off by eight for a tour of the historical sites of Gondar. This used to the capital city of Ethiopia. We visited the palace complex of the kings. This is a World Heritage Site, but we learned that the badly needed restoration has been halted because President Trump has withdrawn funding for the World Heritage Site program, because they recognized Palestine as a country. The first king to build a castle here was King Alem-Seghed Fasil in the 1630’s and he lived in it to 1667. The castle was designed by the Portuguese who were here at the time and influenced the king’s taste. Then his son built another castle on the grounds. There were a series of six castles built here but successive generations each seeking to put their mark on the complex by adding new buildings. The area was on an important trade route, which ultimately came under the control of the Muslims. There were a series of wars between the Muslims and the Christians.

Next, we visited Debre Birhan Selassie, which is the last surviving Christian church, that was not destroyed by the Muslim invaders. It was similar to the other church and interior walls that were painted in the same fashion.

Coming out of the church, John and I had to relieve ourselves and Kaleb gave us two keys to a stone structure that housed the toilets. We had to unlock a padlock to enter and then use the second key to unlock another padlock to get to the toilet, and then it wasn’t particularly clean.

Then we visited King Fasil’s Bath. This looks similar with the Portuguese influenced walls around a large rectangular pool with a building on pillars in the middle. Around the pool there were trees that had overgrown the walls in the same way as Ankar Watt. Apparently, according to the Lonely Planet, this is the best place to see the Timket Festival as after the mass, and the blessing of the water, the masses of people jump into the pool. I can only imagine the chaos.

We had lunch at the Master Chef Restaurant, which Kaleb recommended for its home style cooking. I had a good grilled tilapia meal. Then we met up with three of the group who had gone off on their own for the day and picked up Ellen at the Goha Hotel, as we had left her there as she was not feeling well. Then we drove out of Gondar towards Debark. We drove back out into the country and over a series of hills and valleys. We stopped at one spot where there were a group of farmers threshing lentils using cattle and sheep. We got out and took lots of photos and videos of the process. The cows had their mouths tied shut so that they would not eat the plants. They were driven around in a circle to trample the plants and separate the grain from the shaft. That was an incredible stop.

We continued on for another hour to Debark and our hotel for the night. This used to be a small village, but because of tourists and tours entering the Simien Mountain National Park, it has grown and now the government is planning to make it a city. They have built a university here and there is construction everywhere. John and I went for a short walk along the chaotic main road and just watched the goings on and talked to a few people who approached us. Then back for dinner and bed.