Debark to Shire
We arrived at the Debark bus station at 8am. People crowded around us asking for money or where we were going. Some tried to convince us to hitch a ride on the trucks that passed through town. Some tried to sell us tickets back to Gondar. We told them we had sent someone to Gondar for us. They asked if he was reliable.
Buses came from Gondar and turned around. Finally a bus came en route to Shire, but Billiam, the man we had sent, was nowhere to be found. We sat in a cafe and waited. The hours passed. Another bus came from Gondar, then turned around and went back.
A little after noon, a man came and told us that Billiam had called from Gondar. The bus had broken down some 45 minutes outside of Gondar and they were waiting for a replacement. The man told us Billiam said he would not be there for another two days and to look for other ways to Shire. He said we could go to the park office to see about a refund for our tickets. Ed said he'd go. I waited in case the bus arrived.
Soon, the man returned. He pointed to a truck stopped by the side of the road and told me the driver was going to Axum. The man offered to arrange passage for us. I told him I'd wait for Ed. He shrugged and left. Minutes later, he returned to tell me the driver was just about finished with his lunch and would be leaving soon. I thanked him for the information.
Around two o'clock, a bus pulled into the lot. Ed jumped out followed by Billiam. Ed said the bus had come 20 minutes earlier, but had hit a goat as it drove through town. Villagers crowded around as the shepherd argued with the driver over compensation. The man who had given us Billiam's message had got it wrong. Billiam had said the bus would come in two hours and not to buy a ticket for anything else. He had reserved the front two seats for us.
We waited as the shepherd continued to negotiate with the driver. Passengers bought snacks and looked for restrooms. Finally, the shepherd was placated and the driver jumped back into his seat. He gunned the engine and we were off.
We drove quickly past the outskirts of Debark and then began to descend from the mountains, winding our way around a series of switchbacks. From the front of the bus, it looked as if we were about to go over the edge at every turn. The road was the most beautiful we had seen in Ethiopia (some say it is one of the most dramatic in all Africa). Mountains loomed in the distance as we made our way down and then back up over ridges and through passes. In Adi Arkay the bus stopped to drop off passengers, and we could see the peaks of the Simien Mountains rising above the village roofs.
From there we drove down into the foothills and then began a slow climb back up the mountains. The sun was low in the sky, and the bus had become dusty and hot. The Ethiopians refused to open the windows, and dirt from the unsealed road kept collecting inside the bus.
The sun set as we reached the top of a pass. The plains below were strking. The sky glowed orange, and the short peaks that rose from below cast long shadows towards us. The sun gave a last flicker and then disappeared behind a ridge. Soon we were plunged into darkness. We paused at a checkpoint and the driver waited as an official looked over the bus with a flashlight. Dust hovered in the air.
Back on the road, we began making our way down hairpin turns in the dark. A full moon rose, and the landscape took on a ghostly appearance. At one point, we crossed a river, and the silver rays lit up the water. Then we were climbing again and then driving upon a high plateau. We approached the lights of a town and I hoped we had arrived but we continued throught. I was exhausted from waiting and hot and thirsty.
The day before, as we rested by a river in the early afternoon, Ababa turned to us and said that we would be in Axum by that time tomorrow. We pulled into Shire close to 8pm. The buses to Axum had stopped running and so we took a room at a hotel beside the bus station. The manager was an Ethiopian man who long ago had moved to Washington D.C. He had come back for the month to help his family. He and Ed chatted for a bit about their shared home town. I went to the room to take a shower, washing the day's dirt from my face, and turned in. We'd have to make Axum in the morning.
