Awaze Tours — Attraction in Addis Ababa

I'm sitting in a lounge at Heathrow Airport, on my way home after a 30 day private tour in Ethiopia, booked with Awaze. I try to sort through all we did and saw to pick my favorite thing, but it's impossible! Almost everyday was spectacular in it's own way - and completely different from the days before. The Erte Alle Volcano and Dallol areas in Danakil, the rock hewn churches in Tigray and Lalibela, the Ibex and Gelada Monkeys in Semian Mountains and the Ethiopian Wolf in Bale Mountain, the Bana boys on stilts on the highway, the tribes in Omo Valley, the old city of Harar and feeding the hyenas there at night are just a few highlights from our month. The scenery driving and flying are unbelievable. The people are so friendly (the smile that appears on their faces when I tried to say "amasagonola" was always worth the effort). Try Kolo and Shiro.

I will say that the accommodations seemed to always have a toilet, running water, power, or hot water issue. We learned to say, "TIE", This is Ethiopia. Do not expect great lodging or food. Every place we stayed had some issue, most did not have much in their restaurant that was listed on their menu, but all had very good, cheap, beer! You must drive around Ethiopia to see it up close - but be ready for rough roads. The vehicles that Awaze lined up were ready for the task.

That brings me to the guides and Awaze people. Every guide & driver that was assigned to us was wonderful. In particular, Tesfay in Tigray, Tadi in Lalibela, Degu in Omo Valley, Assfa in Simien Mountains, Jamal in Bale Mountains were fantastic. And, last but nowhere close to least was Mulugeta Worku our incredibly wonderful driver for half of our journey. "Mule" drove us safely and efficiently every day, made sure we were settled in our rooms and addressed any issues we found, and became a wonderful new friend! We will stay in touch, but miss him.

We saw many other tourists during our trip, both using Awaze, or other companies. I have no qualms recommending Awaze if you want to tour Ethiopia. If you can do a private tour, it allows more flexibility. Regardless, I believe Ethiopia will soon become a travel Hotspot, and you should book a trip there sooner than later. It's definitely in the top 2 or 3 places we have visited...

We have used the service if Awaze Tours for 2 weeks between June 20th until 3rd July 2017. Everything about Awaze Tours was excellent beginning from our initial correspondence with Habte, the Manager. All questions were timely answered and in detail. We were picked up without any problems even though it was past midnight. The vehicle used during tge whole tour was comfortable. All tge drivers were courteous and able to communicate in English abd All the Tour Guides used were excellent, knowledgeable and passionate. You would be lucky if you get Desale if you are in Lalibela as a guide but I would like to say if you go to Harar, Abdul is the best. Abdul might as well be the Mayor as he knows everyone and he goes a long way to give service par excellence. He is a local and a very strong pillar in his community and he believes in providing authentic experiences in Harar and may I say that we visited Addis, Bahir Dar, Simeon Mountains, Gondar, Aksum, Lalibela and Harar ... all was amazing but Harar took the crown ... it was an enchanting place ... but Abdul made it all the difference. Finally accommodation wise, to the western standard it is no less than 4 star ... the locations of hotels were great and all super comfortable .... the cost was Great value for our money and we will be using Awaze Tours again for our future trip to do Danakil Depression and South Ethiopia ...Would like to thank Habte for organising everything and we can certainly recommend anyone to come to Amazing Ethiopia and go with Awaze Tours. Thank you. Casimah Khalik, Janis Paulsen and...

I took a 13D12N tour of North Ethiopia which covered Mekele, Axum, Bahir Dar, Gondar, Lalibela, the Danikil Depression, and Addis Ababa. I had different freelance guides for the various places, they were great and did their best.

Unfortunately Habte, the overall organiser, was shockingly disorganised. There were major changes in the itinerary, like cancelled/delayed flights, hotel changes, even city changes. When such changes happen, I am generally flexible and understanding. But Habte did not think to inform or update me on any of these changes, which caused a lot of disorientation and confusion. It did not help that the driver on the first day only gave me the flight information for 2 out of the 8/9 domestic flights I was scheduled to take.

I was constantly relying on the freelance guides (sometimes even they didn't know what was going on) to call the hotels and airline to make sure I was in the right place. One really big change was that after the Danakil Depression leg, I was originally supposed to fly out from Mekele. At the last minute, it was changed to Semera (7 to 8 hours away) and Habte did not tell me anything! Thank goodness the freelance guides double- and triple-checked so I didn't end up in the wrong location.

Again, I am not upset with the itinerary changes, but with Habte's utter lack of communication. He could have put me (a solo traveller) in a lot of danger by not giving me important updates. I sincerely hope he can...