May 27, 2009

After crawling out of bed, we discovered that not only was there no hot water, there was no water at all. Not a drop. We couldn’t even brush our teeth. So off to the airport we went feeling exhausted, grumpy and grimy.

We were at the airport by 4:15 a.m. as the airline required. Of course, there was not a single airline employee in the entire airport so we couldn’t even check in. Instead we sat around for more than an hour more until a few employees finally showed up.

The flight itself was a bit of a milk run. We stopped in Bahir Dar, Gondar, and Axum before finally arriving in Lalibela at about noon. The airport in Lalibela is about a half hour away from the town so we were met by a guide from the Tukul Village Hotel where we had reservations.

Lalibels is a remote town located high up in the mountains. It is very isolated and it almost feels like a person is going back in time. The people still live in small, thatched huts and plow with oxen. All of the women wear traditional clothes rather than anything Western and there is an almost complete absence of cars other than the hotel vans transporting tourists.

Our hotel is one of the best in town. It is made up of tukuls that look like sturdy, circular huts with thatched roofs. The inside was very impressive. Spacious with beautiful bathrooms, very clean and amazing private balconies. Richard and I got one tukul and the three kids were in the neighbouring one. We were sitting out on our balcony overlooking the valley and several of the ancient churches for which Lalibela is so famous, when one of the kids asked what the date was. Suddenly Richard and I looked at each other and realized at the same moment that this was actually our anniversary. Twenty years! Pretty funny!

The hotel arranged a guide for us and we spent the afternoon touring the first six of the ancient rock-hewn churches. They are close to 1000 years old and are chiselled out of the ground so that the roof is parallel to the surface of the ground and the rest of the structure is below the ground. Amazing! Some of the churches are monolithic, meaning that all four walls are separate from the surrounding rock, while others are attached to the surrounding rock at one end. There was lots of climbing and taking our shoes on and off since no one is allowed to wear shoes in the churches. An added bonus was that as we entered the first church, we were able to witness a service. It was like we had gone back a millennium in time.

Just our luck that our hotel was having a power off day so once more we were in the dark once the sun set. We walked to a neighbouring hotel down a side road that had a restaurant. Karen had suggested that we bring a flashlight for the walk back, but of course we didn’t. As a result, our walk back was in the pitch black. Fortunately, the manager was waiting for us upon our return to guide us to our rooms, and they supplied us with candles, along with the candles and flashlight we had from the previous night!