January - February 08 |
Hot Rock in EthiopiaThis stage has finished. Click on the silk road or arc of asia trips for up-to-date expedition information |
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Following
our drive from the Kenyan Northern Frontiers through the Chalibi desert, we
will enter Ethiopia (the only country in the world with thirteen months of
sun as they have a different calendar.)
We drive via Shashamene and the hot springs at Wondo Genet, where we will relax in the pools (often busy with the local rasta community), and eventually arrive in the sprawling capital of Ethiopia, Addis Ababa.
This
is the perfect place to eat Italian food, or dine at 'Burger Queen', eat ice
cream and drink cappuccino. It is also as good a place as any to try Ethiopian
food, which consists of injera (foam sleeping mat) and wat (paste so full
of chillis you wont be able to move for days.)
Here we will say goodbye to some and hello to others, spend a day or two getting to know each other, before driving to Bahir Dar on the shores of Lake Tana.
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This is the source of the Blue Nile and site of many ancient Coptic Christian monasteries on remote islands. We will camp in the grounds of the excellent government hotel on the shores of the lake, and use this as a base to explore the surrounding area. We’ll we find the Tis-Abay, where the Blue Nile plunges 50m to create a spectacular 300m wide waterfall.
From here we drive to mystical Gonder, known as 'Africa's Camelot'. With a
series of castles and churches it was the old capital controlling the flow
of gold North. We can spend a day or two exploring the town, and planning
our food, water and logistics so that we can make a very memorable ascent
of Wehni: the lost mountain in the hidden valley.
The history of the mountain is impressive. The Governor of Belese and a Scottish
explorer, upon hearing rumour of this mountain visited it over one hundred
years ago with the intention of scaling it to find the treasure on top. Their
expedition report filed in the Royal Geographic Society says:
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Simiens Gallery |
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Wehni gallery |
"From the crest of the ridge the last half of the plateau was finally revealed. The vast natural forces that had thrown up these regular downs had suddenly run wild. In the docile plain there opened a gorge perhaps half a mile wide, leading to a bowl shaped valley. It was the valley of Wehni. From the centre rose the scoriated black thumb that was the mountain. It was in fact twice the height that it first appeared and its sides perfectly sheer to the ground. Once again my stomach contracted in fear.'
Also
known as Mt. Amara, or 'the mountain of three princes', the mountain was used
as a retreat (and prison) for the future kings who lived in complete seclusion
high on the summit. Buildings can still be seen on the top and the only way
up was a precarious ladder fastened to the rock by wooden staves driven into
holes carved out of the rock. 
The mountain was mentioned in the book ‘Kubla Khan’ but until
recently, nobody had ever managed to climb it. A party of British soldiers
once forced a route 300m up the arete but failed to summit, and a helicopter
attempted to land on the top but couldn't. In 2001 on the global challenge
expedition, a Hot Rock team was the first team to succeed in an ascent. This
success spawned articles in the Sunday magazines, a book and a film on The
National Geographic channel (some of which is on the Hot Rock video, contact
me for a copy).
Dave's expedition report takes up the story:
'Where is the lost mountain? Who do we trust? The British army grid reference or a pencil drawn map in a book the lost mountain of Rassales? Of course we went with the sketch map. This was the first time the mountain’s position would change for us, but not the last.
I had been put in touch with a local lad that claimed to know the whereabouts
of the peak from a contact in village further south. An unused road could
get us 5km from the peak but the roads were so bad we needed to get a local
bus/tank to drive us in. That night the bags, along with 30kg of oranges,
150 loaves of bread, 250L of water, 10kg of the smallest onions in the world,
and all the climbing kit we could collect were packed into the "bus".
We left the next morning at 6:00 to the town of Addis Zemman. Our guide
jumped out and spoke to a man. After a heated discussion they both came on
to the bus and informed us the walk started here. The mountain had moved again.
We were informed that it lay 20km that way (direction given by a throw of
an arm). We had to trust this nearly blind old man, and go against the advice
of the trusty contact. This was hard to do, to walk in 20km and find out he
had directed you to his hut for lunch would have been soul destroying. But
we trusted the blind man and packed up the water and food onto the backs of
11 very small donkeys and set off. The word had gone round the village that
white people were here to climb their hills, and a crowd of couple of hundred
kids screaming 'YOUYOUYOU' us escorted us for the first hour of the walk.
The donkeys were useless. We were "walking" (pushing donkeys up hills) at an average speed of 1.5kmph, and with the big pass still to come getting to base camp that night was out of the question. In fact we only managed to get half way. The last 100m to the top of the hill involved us carrying the water for the donkeys. We camped on the outskirts of a small village. We still did not know if the peak we were walking towards was the one we wanted. We left early the next morning, and with their bellies full of straw the donkeys trotted on at a happy pace. The hill top opened out to a flat plateau, rather like Salisbury plain but with monkeys.
There
at the edge of the plateau we received the same view that Thomas Peckenham
had 50 years ago. Did my stomach contract in fear? No. Did I smile like a
kid at Christmas and almost cry with relief and for the joy of the others?
Yes. There it was only a couple of km away. We could make out the ruins on
the summit and the guard house built two thirds the way up the cliff. We made
a base camp under an enormous olive tree and in the shadow of the west face
of Mt Wehni.
The audience had grown and the murmur of the crowd had grown to an excited roar. The farangis had come to climb the prison of the princes. There was suddenly a mad cry from the hill overlooking the col on which we camped. A man stripped down naked and started running down towards us. He reached a spot 20m away stopped and started whipping him self while dancing in a style of a religious "stomp" after one had just licked the cane toad. Our guide, Mike, translated his cries and told us that he is upset, because we will steal the arc of the covenant that is on top of the peak.
The
local priests took this seriously. After an hour or two they approached us
and said that before we climb we had to have our bags checked so when we returned
they would know what we had taken from the summit. This gave us a buzz, as
they really had no idea of what was on the summit. 
The route I climbed was easy climbing at about E1 but fairly unprotected up granite expansion flakes. Along the route we would come across very polished rock. This would have been done by the thousands of princes passing up and down the route. About 60m from the summit we passed through the door way of the guard house and from there I could see the rest was just a scramble. We had done it. We had completed the dream of so many explorers and were about to join the vultures in knowing what secrets lay on top.
The top was covered in long grass hiding all the walls and potholes that
we stumbled across. Our aim was to map the summit and photograph everything.
Most is just ruined but the church gave us a bit more interest. With an old
painting on the wall and crosses and Amharic scripture carved into tablets
partly hidden by the cracked plaster walls. We sadly found no gold and all
skeletons were deeply buried ... 
Upon our return to the ground in the morning after a long abseil the priests were the first to greet us. They dipped their heads and kissed my hand. An English speaking man approached us, "We have so much respect for you, such an incredible journey I have never seen" The rest of the day was spent drawing the ruins and the carvings on the back of a box of tea bags, for the chief of the village to keep and show the awaiting crowd.
We celebrated that night with spit-roast sheep which was cooked, eaten and when it was being slowly digested I lay back and looked at the route we had just taken to the summit. Absolutely perfect. The next day I took the last of the 12 members in the team to the summit along a route that we named "beneath the path of princes."
The whole experience is everything I could have hoped for. Rumours of being
beaten to the top, recalcitrant donkeys, porter disputes, crazy locals screaming
out legends of treasure, ruins, fine climbing and every member of the team
getting to the top.'
Another route was also put up to the top by the Hot Rock team, and there are
smaller pinnacles and a few other crags that lie along the walk in that give
potential for new routes. We will have a week for the ascent so there is time
to do some exploring, maybe even find the arc of the covenant in this adventurous
and stunning locale. Anybody interested in this mountain or joining the expedition
for this section should buy the excellent book by Thomas Pakenham 'The Mountains
of Rasselas'.
After
our time on Wehni, we will drive back to Gonder, passing one or two of the
weird cigar-like volcanic plugs that are common in the area. Rising 150m into
the air, they do make stunning climbing objectives and perhaps we’ll
cut our teeth on a roadside one. We will drive to Debra Damus. This is another
prison mountain like Wehni and is now the site of an amazing monastery that
can only be reached via a rope up the sheer rock walls. Thomas Pakenham said
of his ascent:
'While we were preparing for the rigors of the ascent a troop of white robed monks appeared from the valley north of the amba. It was astonishing how easily they climbed the rope, two at a time, swinging from their arms lightly like the angels climbing the ladder in Jacobs dream. Like the debtera they took care to kiss the base of the rock before taking the rope in their strong brown hands.'
We can explore this amazing area and, as well as visiting the monastery, we can look for new routes. Then we’ll drive on, via one of the main attractions in Ethiopia, the ancient stone monoliths at Axum, and the largest single pieces of stone ever cut, dwarfing the obelisks of Egypt. Home of the legendary Queen of Sheba, this humble village was once the capital of a great kingdom and another alleged residing place of the Ark of the Covenant. From here, we drive through Adigrat, to the climbing area called Yeha (pronounced in a wild cowboy style). We will spend a few days bush camping a short walk from the crags, which have one and two pitch pocketed routes, and we’ll repeat routes that Hot Rock has put up previously.
We
will then drive along one of the worlds most impressive roads, rising 3km,
over a 50km distance, into the Simian Mountains and onto the high plateau
that makes up much of verdant Ethiopia. It was written by Homer (not Simpson)
that the Simian Mountains were the playground of the Greek gods who came here
to play chess. The huge ramparts of these mountains certainly make you believe
this when you see them.
Passing the many burnt out tanks and remnants of the war, we can base ourselves
at one of the trailhead villages for a trek into the mountains and a crack
at Mt Ras Dashen, at 4,543m the highest peak in Ethiopia. This trek is rarely
done and passes through true wilderness areas giving stupendous views off
the edge of the escarpment and a possible rare sighting of the Simian fox
or small population of wolves. There is certainly potential for more adventurous
climbing in the area although a bit of gardening may be necessary here and
there. Remember however the Ethiopian proverb: “the foot that is restless,
will tread on a turd" (it is honestly a proverb there). 
We
will also have the option of travelling to Lalibela, the so called 8th wonder
of the world…site of 23 huge churches carved by hand out of the solid
rock and still in use today. Lalibela is unforgettable and worth a few days
of anyone’s time but the road to get there is horrendous so anyone who
wants to, can fly from Bahir Dar.
From here it’s time to press on northwards, following the ancient camel caravan routes from the source of the mighty Nile, through the great desert expanses of the Sudan and eventually into Egypt.
