Guided Day Trip to the UNESCO Heritage Site Tiya and Adadi Mariam

You will be picked up from your hotel between 7:30am and 8am. Accompanied by a tour guide and a driver you head toward south-west on the Jimma road, before turning due south on to the Butajira Road. Melka Kunture lies near the Awash River Gorge and is one of the most important Neolithic sites in Ethiopia. Melka Kunture is the site where Hand axes and other tools were excavated and has a museum on the premises where one could take a lovely tour. You then head towards the mystical Rock Hewn Church of Adadi Mariam which is contemporaneous with those of Lalibela – in fact local tradition ascribes it to King Lalibela who is said to have had it built on his visit to Mount Zuqwala in 1106. You will have a lovely picnic lunch near the Awash River Gorge.

At last you will visit Tiya, classified by UNESCO as a World Heritage Site, where we can see the northernmost example of a peculiar type of engraved, standing stellae. These stellae are believed to have been erected between the 12th and 14th centuries and are almost certainly grave markers – recent excavations at Tiya have revealed the remains of young people of both sexes, buried on the site.