Ethiopia part II – Tim and Kim’s Village

The moment I met Tim and Kim Otte I felt right at home. They are a Dutch couple a few years younger than me who have done a lot of traveling including a trip to Lake Tana about eight years ago. They fell in love with the place and decided that they wanted move there to build a lodge that would cater to travelers like themselves…and me, low maintenance. They are halfway through a very impressive project that started with them creating a foundation back in Holland, finding board members to volunteer their time to run the foundation and then raising a substantial amount of money to fund the project. They removed themselves from the board of directors and moved to Ethiopia a year and a half ago to start the construction of the lodge. They worked a deal through both the Dutch and Ethiopian governments that provided them with about 8free acres of prime land right on the waters of the lake, found a reliable contractor and went to work. When it is all done it will consist of 8 fully contained cottages, 4 thatched campsites with stone patios, a place for overlanders to stay, and a full kitchen and dining area. When I showed up Tim stopped what he was doing and gave me a tour of the whole place for about an hour and then Kim made me pancakes for lunch. I met Tim’s parents who were visiting for two month helping out and they invited me back for a traditional Dutch dinner later that night and since the place I was staying at was pretty much crap, I was more than happy to come back. When, a few hours later, I found myself eating imported Dutch sausage with sauerkraut, mashed potatoes and gravy, while listening to Metallica blasting on their solar powered ipod, I knew where I was going to stay for the next four days.



This place was amazing. The sun rises right out of the lake and the weather was Mexico hot everyday, but would cool enough at night to even make it a bit chilly. I was the only customer because the lodge is not even half done so they treated me like one of the family the whole time. We ate and hiked and Tim and I would go swimming in the lake every afternoon to cool off and “shower”. I also paddled papyrus canoes, read books, and sometimes just chilled in the sun. The only bummer was knowing that this would have been Lynn’s dream spot and that she could not be there to enjoy it with me.



Tim and Kim have a remarkable work ethic that is seldom seen. They are also very in tune with the community of Gorgora. They are well educated, seasoned travelers who understand the difference between a beneficial development project and outright exploitation therefore they have gone to great lengths to involve the community in their project, for example, learning the local dialect. They buy all the materials they possibly can from the surrounding area including the islands. They employ villagers and are training the locals to eventually manage the place for them while they scout other beautiful places in the world to expand. I probably should have explored a few other places in Ethiopia, but Lake Tana was just too perfect and Tim and Kim and his parents were just too hospitable for me to leave. They even gave me a ride back to Gondar so I wouldn’t have to endure the TB express again.


Lynn and I met back in Addis after a week and were able to get a couple of more days of vacation together before heading back to Uganda. The trip was better than we even imagined and although Lynn missed out on the part of the trip she was most excited about, she was very happy to be able to see her family.