The travel journal of our nomadic journey in Portugal: doing work-exchange on farms, mostly with horses, living and learning first-hand, land based regenerative life-styles.
Inspired from Regenerative Farming, which is giving back to the land more than we take, Regenerative Living is giving more than we consume.
Join us on our adventure…
And may you be inspired to live your own riches of regeneration.
Bale Mountains National Park mainly sits on a high altitude plateau, which includes the second highest peak in Ethiopia, Tulu Dimtu at 4,377m (14,360 ft). The park is over 2,000 km2 (over 800 sq mi), and is home to a variety of endemic species, including the Abyssinian Wolf, or the Ethiopian Wolf, a small light-red wolf with white markings that resembles a large fox. As well as the many other animals who share their home, we hoped to be lucky enough to see one.
We have a thing for wolves. We both remember lives as wolves, and we know what wonderful, social creatures they are, a beautiful combination of wisdom, strength and love. When we learned we could visit the Abyssinian wolf, endemic to Ethiopoia, in a grand high altitude national park, we knew we wanted to go.
We wanted to go to Bale Mountains National Park, and discovered that we couldn’t rent a car to get there (more on that in the next blog), so we took a fairly stress filled bus ride to get to Awassa, a near by town in the Rift Valley Lake District. The bus ride itself was ok, getting to the bus terminal was challenging, even for our taxi driver, who had to call several people, including the bus driver, to figure it out, and we were late. Luckily, in this kind of culture, they’re ok to wait for you. Shew.
Then when we arrived, we no sooner got off the bus than one tuk tuk driver grabbed Benoit’s bag and walked off in one direction and another took mine and walked off in the opposite. What?!
We didn’t even have time to discuss what to do, I just took off after my guy and Benoit after his.
Honestly, I don’t even remember what I did. Bali and China can be a huge hassle like this, so usually I don’t even look at taxi drivers in this situation, I just hold my bag, ignore the questions, and plow through the throng. I know I don’t want a ride from anyone who does this, and there’re alway more chilled out drivers hanging out not far away. What I do remember is that I in about 30 seconds I had my bag and was walking back towards Benoit who was being much more polite than I had been. He saw me coming, got his and we walked away to regroup. Ok. Welcome to the Lake District. Luckily, the rest of our stay in Awassa (also spelled Hawassa and Awasa) was polite, friendly and very nice. We even made a friend here that we still keep in touch with. You’ll meet him later.
Hearing that we were going to Ethiopia, a childhood family friend of Benoit’s, who volunteers for a French charity, asked if we’d like to take clothes and school supplies to give away. Héléne’s charity, Association Solidarité-Partage, receives donations of clothing and household items to give to those in need, including sending them with travelers when they visit poorer countries. This felt like a great idea. It would help others and give us yet another way to get to know the Ethiopian people.
Ethiopia… The Cradle of Humanity.
The most heart connected place I’ve ever been in the world.
Incredibly poor, thanks to the continued modern raping of it’s resources by the Western World. Yay, humanity. This is one of those countries that suffers so that the rest of us can be comfortable, like many other places I’ve been such as Thailand, Laos, & Vietnam. This one was somehow a bit more heartbreaking…
So, why Ethiopia? It’s not the top of most people’s travel list, and it wasn’t even on mine.
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We never really know what life’s going to bring us, what we’re going to co-create, do we? How about 42 hectares housing 13 horses, 7 dogs, 7 pastures, 1 flock of chickens, 1 field of vervain, a hotel, a spa, olive orchards, an orange grove, an organic garden, a pool, a cozy restaurant, (pant, pant) the biggest compost pile I’ve ever seen on private lands, a luxurious yoga room, miles and miles of fencing, fields of hay, bays and barns, sheds and workshops… (pant, pant, pant) Oh! and riding rings and trails. This was a big farm.
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Special thanks to Stefan Kieselbach for his beautiful photos, used with his permission for this blog.
In between working on farms, I went to a horse training clinic at Sundance Ranch in southern Portugal taught by a beautiful soul named Elsa Sinclair. Her method, called Freedom Based Training, is very unique. Instead of asking the horse to respond to us, which is what all other training is based on (I ask the horse to walk in this direction, to accept a halter, etc.) – she has us respond to the horse.
This is revolutionary.
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Before we walk over the hill to the next farm, let’s make a brief sojourn to the sea and the mountains.
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After finishing the 10 fun filled days of mornings at Natura Horses and afternoons on the beaches with my new friends, I settled down into spending my days in Cercal. Along with my hosts Maike and Kai, there were 3 horses, 1 super sweet dog, a few cats who only came in to eat and 2 volunteers, Suzanna and I.
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