26 Days in Abyssinia: Rift Valley Lakes

Following the Rift Valley south from Adama are at least 8 lakes on the way to the Kenyan border. The one closest to Adama is artificial - Koka Lake -created by a dam. The other 6 were formed, originally as 2 large lakes, during the last Ice Age.

On our drive from Adama to Awassa last Wednesday, we saw 5 of the 7 natural lakes and probably Koka Lake as well, since all are fairly close to the well-maintained highway running south. Some of the lakes are huge and either support large communities or are situated within parks and support more bird life than human life.

We passed Lake Ziway a ways into our journey. It had a greenish hue from a distance, and was very large with a surface area of 430 km squared. According to the guide book, it apparently has the best bird watching of them all. It supports good populations of tilapia and likely other fish, and the town of Ziway is supposedly known for it's great fish dishes. We made a quick pit-stop here to get water and find some facilities, and then we were off. Unfortunately, we didn't get a chance to stop and take a boat ride to see the hippos, any of the 5 volcanic islands, or the Maryam Tsion church on one of them. A church has been present on this island since at least the 12th century, so this may be the oldest active monastery in Ethiopia. According to local legend, this was the site of the Ark of the Covenant for 70 years, before being returned to Axum where it is said to rest now. How cool would that have been to visit!

Next in the string of lakes are a group of 3 - Langano on the east side of the road and Abiata and Shala on the west. Langano is supposed to be safe for swimming and has thus been turned into a resort-like area with lots of watersports available for the weekend traveler from Addis. Abiata and Shala have been encompassed within a National Park. I read today it was because when the Emperor Selassie saw a nature documentary about some pelicans that lived on an island in Lake Shalla and every day went fishing on Lake Abiata, he went to visit and then declared that the area should be protected. Today, the water levels on Abiata have dropped steadily and the once clear blue waters teeming with fish are now brackish and too saline to support fish. Thus the bird-life on both lakes has changed and supposedly large flocks of flamingos can be seen during certain times of the year on both. When we stopped at the park, it cost us foreigners another 90 birr each and a guide was thrust upon us again (70 birr) - this guide didn't carry a rifle, though. We saw some ostrich right away, and then the guide suggested we get out of the van and walk a bit to see the Grant's gazelle. We then got back in the van and went a tortuous 6 km over terrible dirt roads to the shore of Lake Abiata. A surprising number of people live within the park boundaries, letting their livestock graze within the grounds. There weren't thousands of flamingos at the lake, but we did see several out there in the choppy, shallow water. The van got stuck in the sand and we had to push it out, then we bumped our way back up to a viewpoint where we could see both Lakes Shala and Abiata - they are only separated by 3 km. Lake Shala is supposed to be the deepest in Ethiopia, and hold the most water. It is 266 m deep at the greatest depth. There was an enterprising boy selling local crafts at the viewpoint area, so we all ended up getting something to bring back home. On the way back to the main gate of the park, we saw a family of quail, and then the wart hogs crossed our path almost at the same time.

We passed through the busy cross-roads town of Shashamene where all the buses from north, south, east and west pass through. It's reputedly not a pleasant place for foreigners and is best known for it's Rastafarian community that is nicknamed 'Jamaica'. During the later years of Haile Selassie's reign, a bunch of fans of his from Jamaica relocated here and a little 'Jamaica' has spring up.

Only 25km further south lay our destination of Awassa (Hawassa), on Lake Awassa. The lake is relatively small, contains no outlets but has 'fresh' water, supports at least one hippo family and lots of fish and literally hundreds of birds of all kinds, and is set in an ancient volcanic caldera. The place we are staying is right on the shoreline and is a little slice of heaven. Not dusty, no road noise, no exhaust fumes and hardly even anyone smoking! My lungs are regenerating a bit more every day I stay here... The city of Awassa is the capital of the SNNP (Southern Nations, Nationalities and People) region and is really more like towns back home in terms of being laid out in an organized fashion with wide boulevards and a more modern feel. As you may have read in the Health Care Center blog, we have ventured out from Awassa proper and descriptions of landscape, etc. can be found there. We did take a little boat trip (10 min ride) over to see the hippos - we had to stay so far away, though, we could barely discern them from rocks. The one photo below is zoomed with the 36x lens to actually try to see something. We also ventured to the fish market today - not as gross as I was expecting (didn't even see any fish) - but there were tons of Maribu stork, huge, ugly birds. We met the owner of the hotel we are staying at (see URL under links section of the blog page) and got a photo with the Olympic marathon champ, Haile Gebrselassie.

The other 2 lakes in the string - Lake Abaya and Lake Chamo - are quite a ways from Awassa and we haven't made it that far south. It also looks like one would have to switch to another highway in order to access them. Based on the map in the guide book, there is a small National Park in between the 2 lakes, encompassing shores of both lakes.