Lake Awassa, Lake Tana, the Gondar castles -- Ethiopia's treasures abound

There were many many highlights in Ethiopia, but Lake Awassa and Lake Tana were definitely among the highest. On Lake Awassa I savoured every moment, until long after sunset and from long before sunrise, watching the plethora of beautiful birds that came right up to my tent, allowing me to watch them without worrying that anything or anyone would chase them from their relaxed environment. The changing light caused all lines to evaporate into the ether -- no horizon, no difference between water and sky. Even the reeds and grasses in the water had no end -- their reflections erasing any dividing lines between the reality and the dream.


On Lake Tana I had the very sad misfortune of having my laptop case stolen -- including all the USB sticks with the photographs of the first five months of my journey through Africa - now forever gone - as well as my mobile phone -- the only place in the world where I had the contact/telephone numbers of every friend and contact in my close network. Again -- forever gone. But, despite this huge loss, Lake Tana crawled into my heart, nestled in and made itself part of my very fabric.

In Ethiopia, Lake Tana is quite important, as it is here that remains of ancient Ethiopian emperors and treasures of the Ethiopian Coptic Church are kept in the isolated island monasteries (including Kebran Gabriel, Ura Kidane Mehret, Narga Selassie, Daga Estifanos, Medhane Alem of Rema, Kota Maryam and Mertola Maryam). On the island of Tana Qirqos, so the legend goes, the Virgin Mary rested her head when on her way from Egypt (to where, you may well ask). It was also here, they say, where the Ark of the Covenant was kept before it was removed and taken to Axum. As in every country - or place wherethe Church got

involved, the myths and legends in this region abound. The monasteries are believed to rest on earlier religious sites and include the fourteenth century Debre Maryam with its exquisite murals, the eighteenth century Narga Selassie and Ura Kidane Mehret, known for its emperors' regalia -- sadly now dusty and tarnished and crumbling, but still guarded by an old man with a gun that must date to a few centuries ago.

Another fascinating discovery was the complex of beautiful castles in Gondar, the last big town in the North of Ethiopia that we travelled through.

Famous though Gondar may be, however, no one knows exactly why Fasilidas chose to establish his headquarters there. Some legends say an archangel prophesied that an Ethiopian capital would be built at a place with a name that began with the letter G. The legend led to a whole series of sixteenth- and seventeenth-century towns - Guzara, Gorgora and finally Gondar. Another legend claims that the city was built in a place chosen by God. Apparently, He pointed it out to Fasilidas who was on a hunting expedition and followed a buffalo to the spot.

Flanked by twin mountain streams at an altitude of more than 2,300 meters Gondar commands spectacular views over farmlands to the gleaming waters of Lake Tana thirty-five kilometers to the south. The city retains an atmosphere of antique charm mingled with an aura of mystery and violence. An extensive compound, near its center contains the hulking ruins of a group of

imposing castles like some African Camelot. The battlements and towers evoke images of chivalrous knights on horseback and of ceremonies laden with pageantry and honor. Other, darker, reverberations recall chilling echoes of Machiavellian plots and intrigues, tortures and poisonings.

The main castle was built in the late 1630s and early 1640s on the orders of Fasilidas. The Emperor, who was greatly interested in architecture - St Marys in Axum was another of his works - was also responsible for seven churches, a number of bridges, and a three-story stone pavilion next to a large, sunken bathing place, rectangular in shape, which is still filled during the Timkat season with water from the nearby Qaha river.

Gondar's rise to prominence under Fasilidas occurred little less than a century after Ethiopian

Christendom had come close to total destruction at the hands of the Islamic warlord, Ahmed Gragn, whose forces swept in from the east in 1528. The fighting only ended in 1543 when the Muslim commander was shot dead by a Portuguese musketeer - one of 400 who had been sent to reinforce the flagging armies of Emperor Galawdewos.

While it remained the capital of Ethiopia until 1855, the city was a vigorous and vital center of religious learning and art. Painting and music, dance and poetry, together with skilled instruction in these and many other disciplines, thrived for more than two hundred years.

Bakaffas successor, Iyasu II, is regarded by most historians as the last of the Gondar Emperors to rule with full authority. During his reign, work began on a whole range of new buildings outside the main palace compound. The monarch also developed the hills north-west of the city center known as Kweskwam - after the home of the Virgin Mary. Most buildings there are in ruins today, including the largest - a square, three-storey castle with a flat roof and crenellated walls embellished with a series of bas-reliefs of various Ethiopian animals.

After Iyasu II in the mid-1700s, the realm sank into increasing chaos with regular coups d'etat and the rise of a rebellious nobility who became dominant in Ethiopian national life.

Narrating Gragn's fate, the British traveler Sir Richard Burton wrote: Thus perished the African hero who dashed to pieces the structure of 2,500 years. It was no exaggeration. Gragn's Jihad was a national catastrophe for Ethiopia. The Christian highlands, from Axum in the north to the shores of Lake Tana in the west, were almost completely overrun for more than a decade and much of the cultural legacy of previous centuries disappeared. In a sustained orgy of vandalism, hundreds of churches - great artistic treasure- houses - were looted and burnt and an immense booty carried away.

Gondar, beautiful from its beginnings, rose from the ashes of this smoldering backdrop of so recent and so traumatic a history. There can be little doubt that Fasilidas and his successors saw their elegant capital as a phoenix and so patronized the arts. They were doing nothing less than rebuilding their national heritage. In the process they built faithfully on the few solid foundations left from the past, rediscovered much that had been thought lost, and established a sense of purpose and a new direction for the future.