One of the most evocative of medieval myths was the existence in the land of infidels thriving African kingdom of Prester John. For centuries, the trans-Saharan search of a legendary and rich territory where he lived a Christian prince, half ruler, half priest, was a longing as powerful as it would be after the Dorado in America. The early European explorers of the eleventh to the sixteenth centuries diligently pursued a dream that successive advances were responsible fade geographical. Until the Lusitanian Bartolomeu Dias rounded the Cape of Storms, christened today of Good Hope, and opened the African route to the East Indies. When the Portuguese explored the east coast of the black continent encountered what many had pursued: Empire of the Negus: a Christian king who ruled a nation surrounded by Muslim: Ethiopia.
The only open border between Sudan and Ethiopia today is the Metema / Galabat. In the immigration office check my visa, I make a photo and record my fingerprints with a scanner. Finally, the usual questions: occupation and address in Ethiopia. As never know where I'll stay, use the tactic that I explained in my first book of travels in Africa A million stones. In any hole, it is unclean, there is always a Great Hotel. So answer: Grand Hotel in Addis Ababa.
I go out, although it is not really a street itself but a muddy trail that crosses two doors separating different worlds. The "office" Exchange is a fact filled boards. The clerk is a young man with a large cross around his neck. Many women wear on the forehead tattooed. Religion is ubiquitous in Ethiopia. Christianity came in the fourth century by two Syrian missionaries. It was during the historical period known as the kingdom of Aksum, period of great political and commercial splendor which lasted from the year 400 BC to the seventh century AD, in which Ethiopia was finally isolated in Christendom by the rise of the Arabs as the hegemonic power in the region.
But, Islam posed no real military threat to the Ethiopian emperors, self-proclaimed descendants of Solomon and the Queen of Sheba, until the fifteenth century the Ottoman Empire, successor of the ancient caliphs, set his sights on the fertile highlands of Abyssinia and with the help of Ethiopian Muslim leader Ahmad bin Ibrahim Al Ghazi declared a bloody jihad against Christians. Hundreds of churches were destroyed. Only Portuguese military intervention saved the kingdom of Prester John.
The forex trader opens a padlocked drawer and pulls out the wad of bills and dirty more sobado've ever seen. One dollar equals 17 Birr, one euro 23. I ask you to take me to make an urgent purchase. I appear in a pleasant courtyard where several clients. My companions open a freezer and bottom shines the treasure. Beer Bottles! Fifteen days of abstinence Sudanese Islamic will come to an end. Dashen, the cheapest, slope 10 birr. St George, the most popular, 13. The bottle of water costs also 10 birr. The thing is clear, I take 4 beer bottles and leave the water for another time.
My companions open a freezer and bottom shines the treasure. Beer Bottles! Fifteen days of abstinence Sudanese Islamic will come to an end
Verdísimos mountains around us; are divided into grids of work. Here corn, across barley, onions and peppers beyond. A whole range of green hues that glisten in the sun. This upper area is an orchard. But, all is not gold that glitters. Ethiopia has suffered an appalling deforestation to feed its growing population of more than 75 million. The most common trees are fast growing eucalyptus terrible, give much wood but impoverish the soil.
The road to Gondar is good asphalt but is forced to share with donkeys, cows and goats. Ransacked, through dozens of villages clinging to the hillsides. The houses are built with thatched roof and a wooden frame on which to build mud walls crushes. There are people everywhere. Most cheerful greeting. Children are behind the rider meowing "yuiyuiyui"; yui means foreign. All reach out asking for money. The panhandling becomes suffocating. It is certainly worse than in any other African country that has been. As for the legend that throw stones, true. Some of these beggars are children and there are also skillful slingers to be careful.
The panhandling becomes suffocating. It is certainly worse than in any other African country that has been. As for the legend that throw stones, true
Gondar
Gondar is known as the African Camelot. In typical assault center guides opportunity to visit the castle of Fasilides, who made the city his capital in the seventeenth century. Fasilides son of Susinios, Jesuit friend Emperor Pedro Páez Madrid, my browser forgotten East African. Sent from Goa along with another priest, his journey was not easy. Costumed Armenian merchants, his ship was boarded by pirates Yemeni. Imprisoned, fue obliged to resort to locking the pie queue horse him immense desert of Yemen, where enslaved spent six years before being rescued.
I agree with a group of Spanish. They have visited Tis Isat Falls. Does anyone here has explained who was the first European to see the place? Shrug. Not, nobody has said anything. When I commented that it was a Spanish called Paez become bewildered.
Susinios would provide the opportunity to visit the source of the Blue Nile south of Lake Tana, in the vicinity of Niagara "water that smokes", located at 30 miles down a dirt road in the pleasant lakeside town of Bahir Dar. Event that eventually cause the 21 April 1618 and that he would describe with simple words: "And I confess that I was glad to see what we both wanted to see former King Cyrus and his son Cambyses, Alexander the Great and the famous Julius Caesar. "
Although the stream has diminished greatly due to a nearby hydroelectric power station and is not as spectacular as before, I confess I'm glad to see what he saw Pedro Páez, one of the Spanish with that history has been unfair and that I pay tribute to my trip, without claiming that compared with his, it's been hard and difficult to have done on a bike from Spain dragging penalties, border bureaucracies, storms arena, any risk and rather tired.
