6/11 - Simien National Park
Bright and sunny as we set off, up into the national park which is another world heritage site, then it is the first of our treks. Difficult to know how to describe this - we were all overcome with words like "awesome" etc etc. The views are just spectacular- no wonder this is called "the roof of Africa" - cannot think anything more to say to give an adequate description. The nearest seems to be "rather like the Grand Canyon" but of course nothing can come anywhere near that. Unfortunately, too much haze for any photographs to do it full justice. Even before we had really started, we had lammergeyers circling below us, full beaked (rather unattractive) ravens at head height - and even sitting alongside us - and white backed vultures wheeling high overhead.
Suddenly at the side of the track, we found a sheep giving birth. Those at the front of the line actually saw the event itself, those like me simply saw mother licking baby clean.
The park is famous for its populations of gelada baboons, and it was fascinating to be just a few feet away from their family groups as they munched happily through the grass. Goodness knows how many photographs we all took, as we met up with family after family.
When we were having our very late lunch, a large raptor of some kind (brown with yellow beak) swept in from nowhere, knocked Ian on the head in his approach and grabbed the bread roll out of my hand, as I dropped my camera into the soup. Took us all (particularly Ian and me) totally by surprise. Fortunately, the camera still seems to work.
Soon the clouds started to roll in, and the temperature dropped, and continued dropping, as we had our evening meal at well over 10,000', sitting around one of Ross's blazing camp fires, feeling colder and colder! We all went to bed early (me with two sleeping bags), trying to persuade ourselves that we are in the tropics.
Beautiful
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