Where to begin?? Awassa was the best place in Africa! It is like the Florida of Africa. Palm tree lined streets, amazing weather 24/7, sleeping under misquito nets. What else can you ask for?
With us on the trip was Dundee and Ruth, who are all in love and did their own thing for the most part, and then Deanna, me and Lisa. We had some fun times in the back seat of that 4/5 hour drive. On the way there Lisa casually says, "hey look, a camel". Deanna freaked out, looking for her camera and trying to look out the window while saying "where? Camel? WHERE?" I looked, and saw a herd of calels in the distance, and wanting to get Deanna's attention yelled "CAMELS!!!" while pointing out the window. Sadly we did not get any pictures of those camels, as hard as deanna tried. We did all keep our cameras at the ready in case something came up. It didnt.
Once we got to Awassa we were shown to our hotel rooms, and were tolt that we cannot share. What? Deanna and I have not left each others sides from the moment we boarded that airplane. And they want us to sleep seperatly, on the ground floor of a scary hotel with no guard? Nope. We decided that we will just pay for the 2 rooms (since they were 9 USD per night) and only use one. So that what we did. And they had a shower! We showered, changed, and headed off to meet everyone for dinner. Dundee has a friend who lives in Awassa, and he was around too. After dinner we went to his "man house" as he called it, and played some card games. Then went back to the hotel to get some sleep for the best day ever.
THE BEST DAY EVER:
We went to breakfast and got pancakes. YUM. But really it was one GIANT pancake that was way to big for me to eat. Josie (dundees friend) said to get it for take away, and feed it to the monkeys. Yep. Monkeys. Just wait, it's coming.
After breakfast we walked to the fish market (Awassa is righ on lake Awassa) And as we were walking I start to see these HUGE birds. Taller than me. And super ugly. When we get into the market, those birds were everywhere. And there were people gutting fish, and throwing the undndeed parts to the birds. It was not pretty. Also not pretty were the little boys walking around with fish hooked to their fingers. There was no way I wanted to buy a fish, but thanks! Eww.
After the fish market we went to a park of some sort, and saw tons and tons of MONKEYS! It was awesome. Even more awesome tis that they will take food right out of your hand. I was feeding one Momma monkey, who had a cute little baby attached to her front, and was breaking off pieces of pancake for her. I guess she got tired of the little pieces, because she threw the little piece down, came forward and ripped the big piece out of my other hand. I got it on video, and one back in the land of the free, will upload all 1000000 of them. Then a man came and told us to come with him, he had something to show us. So we did. He brought us to a tree where bigger black and with monkeys (I call them skunkeys) were hanging out. He gave us some nuts and we proceded to feed them. Then he asked if we wanted to carry them on our shoulders, and showed us how. I jumped on that. I got to hold a skunky on my shoulders! Legit. Again, caught on video :)
After feeding all of our food to monkeys, we jumped into a boat and went hippo spotting. Lake Awassa is not small, and apparently hippos live on the oppisite side of the lake, so we took a 45 min boat ride. It was very nice, except when lieele droplets of water would land on me, and I was afraid I would get sick. There is only one lake in all of Ethiopia that is safe for swimming, and Awassa is not one of them. When we reached the hippos it was pretty fantastic, and I took lots of pics. But we just kept getting closer and closer. Massai, our boat driver was a professional, and I thought I would trust him, but when the hippos got annoyed with us, and went under water to what I assumed was to tip out boat and kill us, I was not a happy camper. But apparently he was better than I thought, because we came out alive, and not as hippo food. Phew.
We then had lunch at a resort, and all while eating monkeys came and went, doing their thing. Stealing food from tables, and just causing a ruckus. I loved every second. The rest of the evening was pretty uneventful, until after dinner when we went hyena hunting. (we stayed in the car, I have no desire to become hyena food) we drove up and doen one certain road and saw 3 hyenas! But they are fast little buggers, and was not able to get a pic of them. Sad times. By the way, Hyenas are huge. Like a lion!
The ride home was quiet, I think we were all sad to be leaving Awassa. We stopped for dinner at a nice resort, and relaxed for a while, and then continued our drive. I spotted camels, and made Dundee turn the car around so we could take pictures. As we were piling out of the car, Dundee said, you might want to get back in. I looked out of the window and saw a man running (have you ever seen the olympics? Those Ethiopians are FAST!) and he was waving a giant stick at us. Apparently he did not want us to take pictures of his camels. we jumped in the car and drove away very quickly. I am glad I did not find out what he would have done if he caught up with us!
So now we are back in Addis. I am missing America, and Awassa. But only 4 weeks and 5 days until I am home! Woohooo!
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