Today we celebrated Rolf's birthday in Bahir Dar and hopefully it was memorable. We started off with breakfast at the Ghion Hotel with the Colemans. (Oops...Rolf took the pictures.)
The large outdoor grass roofed circular building overlooked the lake and we heard and saw a number of birds. The service was good and the food was acceptable though we are finding that Bahir Dar restaurants use lots of oil. The kids had French Toast and we had eggs, fresh orange juice and coffee.
Kalia was impressed by the huge cup the orange juice was served in.
Some facts on Lake Tana: Lake Tana is the largest lake in Ethiopia and is the source of the Blue Nile, which flows to Khartoum, Sudan and beyond. There are 37 islands in the lake, and about 20 monasteries from the 16th and 17th century exist on these islands. (We can get a boat ride to several of these islands and monasteries but it takes 1/2 a day so we will save this for next time).
Lake Tana is 84 kilometers long and 66 kilometers wide, with a maximum depth of 15 meters, and an elevation of 1,840 meters.
We went for a brief lakefront walk but found Sunday is not really the best day to do such an activity. It seems Sunday is the men's turn to have baths and do laundry. We didn't have the quiet walk that we hoped to so next time we will choose a different day of the week.
Notice Joel's missing front tooth. He was quite pleased to pull it out a few days ago. The next day, while eating a large cob of maize a very loose bottom tooth also came out.
Kalia (and I) found the coffee trees here at the Ghion quite remarkable. They were full of green and red berries. Apparently you can pick the berries while they are red, open them and dry them in the sun or let them dry on the tree and then pick them. I haven't done much research (just seen the different stages in people's homes).
Poinsetta trees....yes trees not little plants like one buys at Christmas time. I am always amazed at the lush vegetation in Ethiopia. Bahir Dar seems to take pride in the variety of plants grown here.
Coffee berries up close! The picture below shows mostly green berries and the picture above shows the redder ones.
From there, we returned to the Colemans for a few hours and then headed to the Fellows household for a birthday party. Cheryl (stationed in Injebara) has a birthday on Tuesday and Rolf's was today so we had a joined party with 2 other families. We enjoyed a chocolate cake and cheesecake (made from yoghurt instead of cream cheese). Delicious!
Happy Birthday Dad! The children found some chocolate treats at a local store and presented him with handmade cards and chocolates stuck on top.
Tomorrow Rolf will do some shopping - buy some fresh tilapia fish and have them filleted and pick up some vegetables and fruit for us to take back to Gesses with us.
The large outdoor grass roofed circular building overlooked the lake and we heard and saw a number of birds. The service was good and the food was acceptable though we are finding that Bahir Dar restaurants use lots of oil. The kids had French Toast and we had eggs, fresh orange juice and coffee.
Lake Tana is 84 kilometers long and 66 kilometers wide, with a maximum depth of 15 meters, and an elevation of 1,840 meters.
We went for a brief lakefront walk but found Sunday is not really the best day to do such an activity. It seems Sunday is the men's turn to have baths and do laundry. We didn't have the quiet walk that we hoped to so next time we will choose a different day of the week.
Phyllis Coleman....a true grandmother...Nadia seemed to understand and ruffled her hair as only a grandchild is allowed to do:) This picture is for Nadia's grandma and oma.
One of the ladies had organized games for the 10 participating children. Thank you Betsy. Jonathon and Betsy also joined us on our hike to the falls so the children were already familiar with her.
We returned home at 5pm and the Colemans left for Addis. We now have the house to ourselves and had a nice evening of family time. After a hot and humid day, we enjoyed some rain and we should sleep well tonight.
Tomorrow Rolf will do some shopping - buy some fresh tilapia fish and have them filleted and pick up some vegetables and fruit for us to take back to Gesses with us.
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