Hungry like the wolf
TJ Strydom rides a white buffalo into Ethiopia’s mountains, in search of lupine life
THE countryside sped by in a green blur. We had only five days to find Africa’s most elusive carnivore — the Ethiopian wolf.
About 500 remain, giving Ethiopia more members of parliament than native wolves. All of them (the wolves, that is) can be found in the highlands — landscapes that look like the Swiss Alps, but with smokey thatched-roof rondavels instead of ski-chalets.
We were rushing to the Bale Mountains in the southeastern part of the country.
There was no stopping for coffee, no lingering in street markets or lazing on the plastic chairs of a run-down café. We’d pull over to take a leak or to smoke. For breakfast, we had packets of crisps. Lunch we’d claw out of tins — sometimes sweetcorn, often the royal mix of tuna, Tabasco and mayonnaise. We would gulp down Pepsi in between and after a long day on the road we’d knock back as many cold ones — St George Beer was the best — as we could find.
Eben, the engineer in our party of four, had to be in Nairobi the next week to catch a flight.
Our bakkie, dubbed the White Buffalo, was what we had to get him there. It was a rugged Toyota Hilux built when the world was still nervous about Y2K. Four was a tight squeeze in the double-cab with the CY plates. And not only was Bellville half a continent away, it also lay somewhere in the future.
The Ethiopians have their own calendar. The rest of the world has it wrong, they say. We entered the country in September 2011, but the clock on the wall at the border post said it was the first month of 2004.
Even so, we wished we had more time. Time to enjoy the green, rolling hills that were so often carpeted with fine yellow flowers. Time to gaze at the baby-blue parts of the cloudy sky. Time to look for the best fried lamb pieces, called tibs, or to savour the sour pancakelike staple injera. Just time.
To do 1 000km a day was hard work in the overloaded White Buffalo. As we approached towns and villages, the road would turn into a river of cattle and people. Every man carried a stick. Every child pointed and shouted “You! You! You! Money! Money! Money!”
Johann, one of the two chartered accountants on the trip, carried most of our cash. He wasn’t about to dole out anything.
Thys, the other chartered accountant, was the safest driver. He traversed the mountain passes with a quiet confidence and never lost his cool when a herd of cattle or a stray goat blocked our way. Sometimes he would stop everything, wind down the window and take a picture of a bird. His beard was thick enough for most any avian to nest in.
It was Thys’s idea to skip Addis Ababa and head to the south. I wasn’t allowed much time behind the wheel since my combination of driving and DJ-ing had apparently caused a flat tyre (which I dispute to this day). We reached the onehorse town of Robe at the foothills of the Bale Mountains with one day to spare.
Next to the main road, we found a motel with none of the usual amenities.
A cold trickle in a dark shower was by now the usual morning ritual. It was a Saturday and the Springboks were playing a World Cup game, but with no time to spare we kicked off in the direction of the peaks. The White Buffalo crawled up the mountain like a wounded animal looking for an appropriate spot to die with dignity.
We eventually pulled into a village called Goba to buy a jerrycan full of petrol on the black market. The local fuel syndicate tried to stiff us, but our two accountants quickly picked up that the volume promised and the volume delivered were not the same. After some finger-wagging, we resumed our trek up the hill. We tried to buy permits for the Bale Mountains National Park at a building that resembled an office, but there was no one home. An impatient guard waved us through the gate.
As the air got thinner, the morning had a sudden bite to it. It was overcast and hazy and the plants had the look of chilled Karoo bossies covered in a layer of asbestos. There were birds and deer and pools of water, but no wolves.
We reached the peak, the highest road in Africa — the GPS claimed the altitude was almost 4 400m — and shared our lunch with a forgotten soldier guarding a radio mast. His English was as good as our Amharic, so we got no information about where to spot which animal.
Coming down the mountain, we took it slow. The White Buffalo grunted in a low gear, but inside it was quiet as a cathedral. We were looking religiously for the shape of an Alsatian or a husky or … something. Nothing. We gave up. And then, between the grey and the green of the Afroalpine habitat, we saw an arrogant, lupine shape. His coat had a fox-like colour — a deep, earthy orange. Not the best camouflage.
He stopped, turned and gave us a smirk. Thys caught him on camera.
And looking at the photo now, the Ethiopian wolf seemed somehow alien to that lunar landscape. Almost like a Bellville bakkie in Ethiopia.