Ethiopia data sheet

How to get there

The cheapest way is probably to fly Ethiopian Airlines. The flight is rather short from Europe (circa 6 hours). Local flights are available on small planes (15 seats) making the transportation of the ORWC a real challenge. We had to be very persuasive to succeed in each of the 4 flights we took...
Our second trip to Ethiopia took place in the southern lands, and we prefered hiring a 4WD car which gives a better flexibility than the small planes. The drawback, however, is that it implies long days just beeing sitted and shaken in the car...

What is the best time

Avoid the rain season, from June to September. We choosed January on each of our trips and we got a gorgeous weather. On the northern highlands, as well as in the Bale mountains, the nights were cold (freezing level) and the days were cool. In the very South (Omo valley), the days were extremely warm and in one part far too hot for a quadriplegic.
If you do not fear getting into overcrowded places, you can choose the "Timkat" ceremony, end of January, in the rock hewned churches of Lalibella.

Local contacts

One local contact from the french ambassy provided some assistance with the plane arrangements as well as some hotel reservartions. Local lodging is very cheap (except for the international style hotels), usually quite clean, but very simple (no water available sometimes). 

More information

Two trips have been done, with a group of 5 persons, including 1 quadriplegic
Dates: January 1997 and January 1999
More details: jean-francois.porret@wanadoo.fr

The ORWC rides

We visited 5 main areas:
Lalibella and its rock hewned churches
The Simien mountains
Lake Tana
The Bale mountains
The Omo valley

Most of the routes were done with the assistance of ethiopians, often by tens of enthousiastic kids. A few nice downhill rides were achieved.