THE OLD WALLED CITY OF HARAR

Closed for much of its history to foreigners and reached only by an arduous journey, this walled city is now easily accessible and so successfully combines the ancient and the modern that it is thought to be Ethiopia's tourist centre of the future.

The old medieval walled city of Harar - a city of mosques, minarets, and markets, a centre of Muslim learning, a city which once struck its own local currency, and still has its own unique language - has long been regarded by the outside world as a city of mystery and romance. Situated on a high escarpment overlooking surrounding plains, which extend as far as the eye can reach, it enjoys a balmy climate and a fascinating history - and may well be Ethiopia's tourist centre of the future.

Harar in the old days could be reached only by a long caravan or mule journey of many days, weeks, or months; today, however, the city is little more than an hour's drive from Dire Dawa, a modern Ethiopian railway town, with an international airport and several first-class Government and private hotels.

The well maintained macadamised highway from Dire Dawa to Harar, provides a delightful journey with numerous panoramic views. The traveller, driving up the winding road from the torrid lowlands to the cool Harari highlands, passes through mountain scenery amazing in its variety and charm and is confronted with a succession of wonderful scenes; sheer walls of naked rock, lofty slopes wooded to the summit with acacia, eucalyptus, and various types of cactus, and descents into deep ravines. In many places the mountainsides are terraced for the cultivation of coffee or other crops. Emerging from the precipitous mountains to the broad level plateau the road then proceeds through richly cultivated fields of maize, sorghum, and various other cereals. It then skirts the shores of Lake Adele, where numerous waterfowl may be seen swimming, diving, and splashing their wings, raising bright bursts of spray.

By the wayside the traveller will catch glimpses of traditional round tukuls, or huts with thatched roofs and whitewashed plaster walls, as well as more recently constructed one-storied rectangular, flat-roofed buildings. The brilliant sunshine blazing on the highway then becomes suddenly shadowed by tall eucalyptus trees towering in ranks on either side of the road. Ahead, between the close-set trunks, flashes another sheet of water flanked by reeds and eucalyptus trees - Lake Alamaya.