Rosaly, and Lucy, a 3.2 million year old homind skeleton, discovered in
the Afar depression, in the National Museum in Addis.
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Melka Kunture, a site 50km from Addis Ababa, where a 0.8 million year old
'factory' for stone tools, and this butchering area, were discovered.
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These stelae, something between obelisks and gravestones (though
functionally more like the latter) date to ~1200 AD, although no
documentation exists [an irony - this area has the longest human
history, yet almost no written history]
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Lake Langano, one of several lakes in the Main Ethiopian Rift. I even ventured a swim - this lake (unlike many bodies
of standing water in Africa) is free of the bilharzia parasite. Only
about 9m deep, the lake water is usually tea-colored due to suspended
clay.
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The rift valley lakes were deeper and joined into a single lake only
10,000 years ago or so. Beautiful lamellar lake sediments attest to
this, and the presence of snail shells in the sediment indicate that
they were deposited underwater, unlike the widespread ignimbrite
deposits from the volcanic activity in the Rift.
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The Blue Nile Gorge offers a remarkable 1300m sequence from recent lava
flows down to the preCambrian basement: it is in fact about 80% as deep
as the Grand Canyon. Morphologically it was slightly different (more
intermediate slopes, whereas the Grand Canyon seemed more chiseled).
Unfortunately slightly hazy (as was the trip to the Rift - was hard to
appreciate the full scale of it).
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The Blue Nile sequence is capped by lavas - the columnar basalt
seemed striking next to the cactus tree, with faintly similar
morphology. Like Addis Ababa, the altitude here was about 2000m, so
temperatures were comfortable.
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The floor of the valley was much warmer. The river has a gravel bed
(somewhat unlike the Colorado), presumably due to the considerable
(factor of 40) variation in streamflow.
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We also visited the maar volcanic craters that form lakes at Debre Zeit,
close to Addis.
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The ashfall deposits here are very comparable with Kilburne Hole, a maar
in New Mexico.
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The trip to the Danikil began with a 1-hour propeller flight to Mekele,
and a day drive on gravel roads. En route, we encountered the camel
train climbing out of the Danikil.
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We had lunch in the small town of Berhaile - the limestone here makes a
good building material, a solid contrast to the sticks used more
generally. The inverted carcass of an armored personnel carrier (a
Russian-built BTR-60, if I am not mistaken) may be a vestige of the
border conflict with Eritrea (during which Mekele was bombed), but
things have been quiet for several years. (photo:Jani)
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I found the satellite TV dish on the stick shack restaurant rather
amusing. We had lunch in a similar place nearby - I have eaten goat in
restaurants before, but not eaten lunch in restaurants where goats
wander in.....
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Another few hours on gravel brought us down close to sea level and the
vilalge of Hamad Ela, where we stayed a couple of nights, on straw cots
in the open air (even at night it was ~35C). Here is the gang at dinner
- at left is Rosaly and Ken Freund, and a french/german group that was on a
similar itinerary: at right are Irene and Jim Dorsey, Serina and myself
(photo:Jani) |
The drive south from Hamad was cross-country, much of it in this
bone-dry clay, which often reduced visibility to nil. Even out in the
middle of nowhere, there are huts with people eking out a meagre living
with cattle or goats.
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We got stuck, high-centered in deep ruts in the clay. While people dug
out, I flew my little kite camera to keep myself amused.
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A neat little dunefield could be found abutting the Dodom river. I sit
here between the arms of a nice dome-like barchan dune (kitestring in
hand). One of the many volcanos in the area is behind me.
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As we approach Erta Ale, the lava deposits begin. We saw many dust
devils in this area, perhaps enhanced by the thermal contrast between
dust and lava. Volcanic cone in background, looking north towards
Eritrea.
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We had lunch and a rest in a small village at the foot of Erta Ale
before beginning the ~10km hike up, with Afar 'policemen'/guides. No,
those arent water bottles, they're hand grenades. These and the AK47s
seemed to be mostly for show - some of these guys were pretty friendly.
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Nice ropey pahoehoe lava.
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Four hours of hot hiking later (Erta Ale's summit is only about 630m) we
are enticed by the glowing steam emerging from the crater at about
midnight (this picture was actually nearer dawn).
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Another 20 minutes of gingerly scrambling over shelly pahoehoe and we
are greeted with the spectacle of one of the world's few active lava
lakes, about 50m across and 15m deep. One of the most amazing things
I've ever seen. See below for video.
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Every so often a bubble of gas would cause a fountain of lava to burst
out, part of the crater wall even foundered once. We'd have loved to
stay longer, but after an hour the guys with guns wanted us to climb
back up to the rim to go to sleep (there were some small huts to keep
out the wind).
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Serina, me and Jani - after 4 short hours of sleep it was time to hike
back down, sadly. The floor of the crater is visible behind, most of it
covered by a lava flow that formed when the smaller (steaming) lake
crater overflowed a few years ago.
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After spending the day hiking down and driving back (didnt get stuck,
though had to stop to fix stuck brake calipers) we set off across the
salt flats at Dallol. The salt polygons are very reminiscent of Death
Valley (although Dallol is much larger) or the Chott El Djerid in
Tunisia.
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Climbing up a small rise in the salt flats we find these curious salt
textures.
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And then a bit further - this! A riot of sulphurous colour in
hydrothermal deposits (as if Yellowstone national park were embedded in
a big version of Death Valley). The hues were astounding.
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'Gate' (our always-smiling tour guide), myself, and an Ethiopian
soldier.
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Jani, Rosaly (the 'Io gals') and myself.
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Some km to the west, we find this bubbling hydrothermal pool. The water
here was NASTY (unfortunately I ditched the kite in it). Despite the
heat and dry air, this stuff just did not evaporate - must be so laden
with salts and acid.
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Some neat pillars caused by resistant patches in the upper clay layer
preventing solution of the salt.
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Camel trains stretching as far as you can see - staggering. It takes a couple of
days for them to get to Mekele.
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The camels are for hauling salt, hacked out of the ground by hand. Hot,
corrosive work - and probably done much like this for the last 2000
years. Amazing to see - and Adam Smith's division of labor is at work -
some guys roughly break up the salt layer, others hack the blocks into a
nice uniform size for loading onto the camels.
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On the way back, we saw the stone-hewn church at Wukro. Lovely
cross-bedding.
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Video of the Lava Lake (44MB MPEG). Hard to hold
the camera steady as a billow of sulphur dioxide would get us all
coughing...watch for the wave 30 seconds in... and notice the glowing
window in the crater wall at right - we have no idea if there was
similar undermining beneath our feet....
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