sourcing malarial prophylaxis, we
were finally rolling down the very
challenging traffic from the capital
into the countryside. The first day on
the road is always magical. After years
of dreams and planning, shipping,
airline flights, hotels, visas, inocula-
tions, and an uncertain future on the
road, it was finally happening! There
is nothing more exhilarating than
that first day and the freedom on the
road! We stopped several times and
visited, without a common language,
the many shepherd boys on the road
watching the animals. A theme that
would repeat itself is that people did
not know what to make of us – being
solo on a motorcycle – we were defi-
nitely not the common tourists!
We headed toward the Eritrea and
Djibouti border to be in the town of
Harar that was famous for the abil-
ity to feed the wild hyenas, by hand,
at night. The pictures, videos, and
my love of wild animals was making
this one of the top experiences on the
Ethiopia list. The ‘team’ was not really
excited about this, but I thought it to
be a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity,
right?!
Much to my dismay, we were turned
around by armed militia the first after-
noon. Due to the language barrier, it
was hard to tell if this was a guard for
TRAVERSE 64
a factory or an official military check-
point. Being driven to experience the
hyenas as well as a bit stubborn, we
spent the night in the small village and
tried again in the morning. We were
told that we needed a machine-gun es-
cort ‘in our vehicle’ in order to pass.
My guess was that the military per-
sonnel was not used to solo motorcy-
clists in the very remote areas of this
country. I finally conceded that it was
a no-go, with armed militia waving
their Kalashnikovs, that the feeding of
the hyenas will need to wait until the
next time. During my travels, I always
leave something ‘for the next time’ to
not be driven to see and do everything