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The mysterious Nile was long hidden from western
geographers and explorers. It was not until the expeditions of such
great travelers as Bruce, Burton, and Speke that the secret of these
rand river –which had fascinated, and eluded, even the ancient Romans
and Greeks –was revealed. It was then confirmed that the white Nile
originates in east Africa’s lake Victoria, while the Blue Nile pours
out of Ethiopia’s lake Tana. The two rivers merge in to the Nile
proper at Khartoum, the Sudanese capital .
As it plunges more than 2,000 metres
(6,500 feet) in its 800-kilometre (497-mile) course from Ethiopia
to the Sudanese Plains, the Blue Nile is what embodies the drama
and Mystery of the great river of history –beginning its journey
with a thundering cascade over the exceptional Blue Nile Falls,
thirty kilometers (19 miles) downstream from the point where it
leaves lake Tana. Known
locally as Tis Isat –‘smoke of Fire’ –the blue Nile Falls are the
most dramatic spectacle that the whole Nile system has to offer.
Four hundred metres (1,312 feet) wide when in flood (which normally
occurs in September and October, after the rainy season). And dropping
over a sheer chasm more than forty-five metres (150 feet) deep,
the falls throw up a continuous spray of water droplets which drench
on lookers up to a kilometer away this misty deluge, in turn, produces
rainbows that shift and shimmer across the gorge and a perennial
rain forest of lush green vegetation –much to the delight of the
innumerable monkeys and multi-coloured birds that inhabit the gorge.
It is only a five –minute drive from the lakeside town of Bahar
Dar, across the Blue Nile Bridge, to the spot where the famous river
flows out of lake Tana. But the falls are about thirty-five kilometers
(22 miles) south of the town and are best approached from Tis Isat
Village, a market settlement of the Amhara people who live in this
area farming crops like wheat, sorghum and teff (from which injera,
the national bread, is made). On
leaving the village the footpath menders first beside fertile open
fields, then drops onto a deep basaltic rift spanned by an ancient,
fortified stone bridge built in the seventeenth century by Portuguese
adventurers and still in use. After- amount a thirty –minute walk
a stiff climb up a grassy hillside is then rewarded by a magnificent
view of the falls, breaking tge smooth edge of the rolling river
into a thundering cataract of foaming with water. The
site overlooking the waterfalls has been visited over the years
by many notable visitors, including the late eighteenth-century
Scottish traveler James Bruce, and, in more recent times, Britain’s
Queen Elizabeth II. Although
not so spectacular, the Blue Nile Gorge near the falls –often providing
views reminiscent of merica’s grand Canyon—also has breathtaking
scenery. Other impressive gorges are formed by various tributaries
of the Nile, such as the one near Debre Tsige, which is about sixty-nine
kilometers (43 miles) from Addis Ababa. Thirteen kilmetres (eight
miles) further on, a sheer cliff drops more than 1,000 metres (3,000
feet) in to another awesome gorge, formed by the Zega Wodel river,
on of the Blur Nile tributaries.
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