Gede Adventure

On Tuesday we had a great snorkel bleaching survey experience (briefly interrupted when we realized the make-shift anchor had come untied and the boat was drifting steadily away), accompanied by 4 missionary teachers who are working for a year in Korr, northern Kenya. But after 3 hours on the water we thought we deserved a bit of a treat, so after lunch we organized a trip to Gede.

The Gede ruins are what is left over from a very very old city of Arab traders. Most of the walls have crumbled, but much of the old mosque and the palace still remain. It’s funny walking around because the people who discovered them named the rooms for what artifacts they found in each so there are places called “room of the cowries,” “room of the venetian bead,” “room of the Chinese cash,” “room of the cistern,” and my favorite, “tomb of the tombstone.” 

We had a great time walking around, looking down wells, looking through windows and archways, and trying to swing Indiana Jones style on vines. Really the whole thing reminded me of that scene where Indie is camping out in some ruins and has to fight off those horrifying little natives/demons/whatevers. I wouldn’t want to spend the night in Gede. Especially since all of the locals believe that it’s haunted! 

Quite a nice nook for an entertainment center, we thought!

Peek-a-boo!

The men in the men's court of the palace

The women in the (much smaller) women's court.

One of the cool things about the ruins is that ARocha has a tree house there. Well it’s actually for the ASSETS program, which works with local communities to send children through school and encourages them to make careers so that they can give back to the community and work to conserve the forest instead of depending on it for survival. One of my friends here, named Isaac, is an ASSETS graduate who has been working as a guide at the ruins tree house to raise money for the program. It was fun to visit him and get his full speech and tour. And it was a pretty awesome treehouse in a Baobab tree. I would totally stretch a hammock between branches and live quite happily up there…if it wasn’t built in a haunted city of ruins…

Epic Baobab treehouse.

Isaac and I in the treehouse (he has a bit of a crush)

 A great time was had by all and we topped it off with a trip to an Italian ice cream shop, which was absolute heaven. I’m not sure ice cream has ever tasted so good.