Bale Mountains National Park

The Bale Mountains – home to one of the highest incidences of endemic species, not only in Africa, but throughout the world – is located in south-eastern Ethiopia, some 400 kilometres from the capital Addis Ababa. Its protected areas, as constituted by Bale Mountains National Park, are some 2,200 square kilometers large.
With an altitudinal range of 2013 to 4385m, and an annual rainfall of 1134mm, the Bale Mountains is south Ethiopia’s wettest area. Rather therefore than experience – like the rest of the region – a double rainfall dip, the Bale Mountains are pretty much wet right through from March to October. Daytime temperatures at this time average out at around 16°C, while night temperatures hover between 2°C and 4°C, and can plummet to well below zero.

Thus, wet and overall mild, with great variation in altitude, the Bale Mountains makes for an extraordinary habitat. Divided into grasslands, woodlands, Afro-alpine meadowlands, the Erica moorlands and Harenna forest, it is home variously to great welts of juniper tree, wildflower (hagenia, for example) shrubs, and to the iconic Sanetti Plateau; an enormous area of lichen covered rock, periodically punctuated by streams, lakes, and giant lobelia.
Given the climate, the Bale Mountains are home to 20 animals endemic to Ethiopia, of which 5 mammals are found only here – they include the Bale monkey and the giant mole-rat. Crucially, it is home to over half the remaining population of the Ethiopian wolf. Other species of mammal include the Mountain Nyala, the Menelik’s bushbuck, spotted hyena, lion, leopard and African wild dog – all in extremely low numbers. Overall, there is a high incident of rodent species, several of which are keystone features of the food chain – which accounts not only for the presence of the Ethiopian wolf, but also for the area’s large numbers of raptor. Indeed bird-wise, the area is extremely rich, with over 280 species thus far identified.
Ancestral home of the Oromo, the Bale Mountains are home to approximately a population of 1.5 million, most of which are farmers, and for whom the mountains are an important aspect of the traditional annual grazing cycle – meaning that tensions between the local community’s needs and those of a fragile wildlife habitat periodically occur, and require sensitive handling.

Trekking
Trekking in the Bale Mountains can be adapted to meet the requirements and physical abilities of almost any person – from fairly gentle and undemanding trips to more extreme and physically challenging ones. Visitors are free to horseback ride or hike between campsites. Most trekkers make the journey with a mixture of walking and riding as this provides a varied experience in the mountains – plus climbing to an altitude of over 4000 m above sea level can be tiring. All levels of horseback riding experience can be catered for – the local mountain horses come in a variety of personalities from gentle to high-spirited; thus no prior riding experience is required.

Treks can range from a day trip to a two week expedition, from traveling 5 or 10 km per day to 25 km per day. Every night can be spent in a different campsite, or one can choose to explore a particular area for more than a day
When to visit? – Between November and February.

The Sof Omar Cave
Sof Omar is one of the most spectacular and extensive underground cave systems in the world. Formed by the Wabi River as it changed its course in the distant past and carved out a new channel through limestone foothills, the Sof Omar systems is an extraordinary natural phenomenon of breathtaking beauty.
The cave which is now an important Islamic Shrine was named after the saintly Sheikh Sof Omar who took refuge here many centuries ago. The cave has a religious history that predates the arrival of the Muslims in Bale – a history calculated in thousands of years.

Derrie Sheik Hussein
Dine Sheik Hussein is located in the South Eastern part of Ethiopia. It is a 10th century Islamic centre of pilgrimage for people coming from different corners of the country, and Islamic communities of the Horn and the Middle East countries, twice a year. Dirre Sheik Hussein is a site of magnificent groups of buildings, monumental tombs and courts representing early medieval period of Islamic architecture and buildings of significant engineering qualities.
The holy site was founded by the Islamic Saint known as Sheik Nur Hussein. He was one of the Nine Islamic venerated saints who entered Ethiopia (from South Arabia) along the eastern route via the walled city of Harar, which was recently inscribed as the World Heritage site of Ethiopia. Within the compounds and courts of Dine Sheik Hussien there are huge and magnificent mosques, shrines, residential buildings, artificial water ponds and other cultural spaces of Islamic religious processions and diverse ritual practices.
The site is a large rural religious walled settlement still serving the living culture of the past that continuously occupied the Islamic community of this part of the region for nearly 1000 years. It has annual festive events of religious celebrations and cultural practices of thanks giving and blessing. Dirre Sheik Hussein is also considered as a sacred site with a large area of spiritually protected forest landscape. The maintained strong spiritual association and the powerful ritual meaning that are attached to the site have contributed a lot to the preservation of the surrounding environment. The whole setting is evidence of the process of the establishment of this permanent rural enclave religious settlement and the adaptation/introduction of the Islamic cultures to this remote hinterland of the Horn of Africa. Dine Sheik Hussein is a place where people exercise a mixture of Islamic religion and African traditional belief, known as Muda

Thus; the cultural property possesses outstanding universal value as a testimony of a unique cultural tradition representing the way in which human beings coexisted with nature over a long period of time in this specific geo cultural region of our planet.
This Islamic holy site, as a place of pilgrimage, has a spiritual comparison to the Holy city of Mecca, though it is a small rural walled settlement area in terms of size. Derrie Sheik Hussein is considered as the little Mecca for Ethiopian Islamic community, like Lalibela is considered as the Little Jerusalem for Ethiopian Christian community.
From aesthetic points of values the mosques, shrines, groups of buildings and settlement patterns of the walled compound and courts are typical of the walled city of Harar, differing only by the size of the settlement.