2024
Tour itinerary can be seen below.
• Arrive in Ethiopia’s capital, Addis Ababa. Our driver will transfer you to the airport. Spend the day at leisure.
• For those taking our Danakil extension trip, the group will arrive from Semera in the evening and be transferred to the hotel.
• Full-day tour of Addis Ababa. In the morning, we will visit the National Museum to view many other historical relics, including Lucy, the world's oldest humanoid skeleton, dating back over 3 million years. Afterwards, we head to St George's Cathedral before stopping for lunch and sampling some Ethiopian coffee—arguably the best in the world!
• Move on to Holy Trinity Cathedral after lunch to see the tomb of Hailie Selassie before going to the Red Terror Martyrs Museum, a place to hear accounts of the torture and killing carried out by The Derg, the military junta during the late 1970s.
• Evening at leisure.
• 05:30 departure for Dire Dawe by minibus.
• Stop mid-way through the journey at a local roadside restaurant for lunch.
• Arrive in Dire Dawe around 15:30 and check into our hotel.
• Spend the rest of the day at leisure, relaxing in the outdoor swimming pool or going for a stroll around the city.
• Tour the Dire Dawe Railway Museum, a great site which is partly still in use. The station was built over 100 years ago and has barely changed; most of the original French-built machinery is still functional.
• Visit the khat, camel and spice markets. Watch the locals sit in the sun, chewing their khat without a care, and take in the overpowering smells of dried chili being crushed down into a powder.
• Stop for lunch before taking a private minibus to Harar.
• Arrive in Harar and check into the Heritage Plaza Hotel.
• Take the rest of the day at leisure—with an option to feed some hyenas in the evening!
• Tour the UNESCO-listed city of Harar. We'll see the colourfully dressed local women, wild eagles circling the butchers’ shops, fresh coffee being processed, and khat being made into a paste to make tea.
• Visit the tomb of Sheikh Abadir, the Arthur Rimbaud Centre, City Gates, Ras Tafari's House, Ras Makonnen's Palace, Jamia mosque and the Smugglers Market.
• Evening spent at leisure, with the option of going to a local bar and club.
• Off to the unofficial country of Somaliland we go! We’ll take a three-hour journey to the Somaliland border, pass border control, meet our Somali guides, and then drive a further two hours to the capital, Hargeisa.
• Check into our hotel in the centre of Hargeisa before spending the rest of the day at leisure.
• Head to the livestock market after a hearty breakfast. We’ll witness the spectacle of people trading hundreds of camels and other livestock.
• Tour the city centre, where we will see moneychangers with their piles of Somaliland shillings, the bustling bazaar, the Central Mosque, and the MIG Monument before stopping for lunch.
• Visit the Naasa Hasblood, or Virgin Breasts Mountains, in the afternoon. These are twin hills just outside of Hargeisa. There is a chance to see wildlife along the way, such as tortoises, baboons and the rare Beira antelope. We will trek to the top of one of the twin hills to see spectacular views of the Somaliland desert. On our way down, we will cut through a pungent-smelling baboon's nest.
• Return to the hotel and rest of the evening at leisure.
• Depart at 08:00 for the sixty-kilometre journey to the Laas Geel cave paintings—ancient art created between 9000 BC and 3000 BC. They are some of the best-preserved cave paintings in the world and were only discovered by the western world as recently as 2002 by a French archaeological team.
• Continue to the coastal city of Berbera, stopping for lunch en route.
• On arrival in Berbera, we will view some of the English and Russian colonial architecture before heading to the seafront to view the bombed and abandoned ships that remain from the Somalian Civil War.
• Check into our hotel, situated on a deserted beach where dolphins and turtles can regularly be spotted. Evening at leisure.
• Spend the morning however you want. Relax on the beach, swim in the sea, or stroll around Berbera’s centre.
• Go for lunch in the early afternoon at one of Berbera’s fish restaurants before taking a walking tour of the city.
• Head back to Hargeisa in the morning. From here, you can catch a flight back to Addis Ababa—the return flight price is not included, but we are happy to assist you.
*The wild hyenas that roam Harar have been fed by a local family for over 60 years. For a payment of 100 Birr (£3) , you can feed the hyenas along with the 'Hyena Man' who will entice them onto your back or to feed from your mouth! However, although there have been no incidents with feeding these hyenas, you must be aware that they are wild animals and potentially dangerous so if you wish to join in with the feeding you do it entirely at your own risk!