Ethiopia by E-mail
Subject: Awasa, Abiata, & Shala
We are back in Addis after a wonderful trip to visit Awasa. It reminded
us a lot of Michigan in the summer but with different trees. We went to
stay with other IFESH volunteers and see how life is in the countryside.
They live on the campus of Awasa TTC (teacher training college).
They are teaching Ethiopian teachers new ways to teach and get the
students involved in learning.
Awasa is 268 kilometers from Addis and we had a really good driver. It
took about 3 hours to get there. We had lunch with Don & Joan and the
driver. We took a ride to see the Lake and do a little shopping. I
have some new clothes and we bought a new Gabi. At the lake we saw a
lot of beautiful birds and flowers. In Ethiopia they have the most
colorful birds I have every seen. The lake had purple water lilies and
there were people fishing off a pier. We road around Awasa, a city of
about 100,000 people. It has about 3 paved streets and the rest are
dirt roads. The way the people get around is by garry which is an axle
with two wheels and a seat built on top of it which is pulled by a
horse. I did not try riding in one but Don & Joan said they are very
hard to get into and because of the bumpy roads you feel like you are
going to fall out. They have only ridden in them once.
On Saturday we had the driver take us to Wondo Genet which is a hot
spring and there is a forestry college there. We were able to go into
the Arboretum at the college and walk up the side of the mountain. Our
driver was from the area so we had a nice tour. He does not speak much
English but did manage to show us different sites and get us to
understand what he was pointing at. He is very proud of his country and
wanted us to see what they have. The College had all the trees and a
lot of the plants labeled so we could read what they were. We got some
pictures of beautiful flowers and birds and big old trees that have been
there a long time.
There are small villages on the side of the road all the way to Awasa.
So we saw people walking to market, selling there products on the side
of the road and washing their clothes in the streams.
On Sunday we left Don & Joan and started back to Addis. We stopped at
the twin lakes of Lake Shala - Abiata, where we paid to go into the
National Park. They assign you a guide to ride with you in the car and
show you the way to the lakes. Lake Shala has sulphurous springs and
there is an area where they have natural saunas in the side of the
hills. It is very hot to walk around and the water is very warm. The
springs feed into the lake so the farther you get away from the boiling
springs the cooler it is. The Lake is salt water and is the deepest
lake in Africa. They have islands in the lake but we were told no one
lives on them. There are about 2000 people living in the park and they
We hope this note finds everyone doing well. We had a wonderful trip.
Pat Rollin
Date: Mon, 30 May 2005 17:52:47 +0300
From: Pat Rollin 
We went to the hot springs and saw Colobus monkeys and walked up to
the source of the hot springs and pool they have there. We did not go
in because men and women are in separate places and not everyone wanted
to go in. We had some older boys take us up the mountain to see the
boiling water and had to walk on stones to get over the water. After
the tour we stopped for lunch and a little more shopping and then we
went to Don & Joan's and toured the Awasa TTI campus and saw this big
old tree in the picture with Don & Joan. We took a walk up a hill to
see the lake and country side from up high. We were stopped by different
groups of people asking where we were going and why. People in Ethiopia
don't just take walks to see things they have to have a reason to walk
up a big hill or mountain.
Awasa is farm country and they have corn, teff, sugar cane and bananas
growing. The farmers plow the land with a team of cows or oxen and a
wooden plow. The ground is now getting real green from the little rain
we have had. When Jim was there at Christmas in December the ground was
brown and dry.
farm and have domestic animals along with ostrich, a deer-like animal
called a bushbuck and many types of birds especially flamingos. We
walked out to Lake Abiata from the car. It was about 1 kilometer away.
You can not drive too close because the water when it is full is a lot
closer to shore and the ground is a spongy mass to walk on. On one part
you are walking on ground that is wet and you feel like you are walking
on foam rubber. There are little island-like mounds you are walking
on. As I was walking back I saw an island that looked like a map of
Africa so we have included that picture.