Best of the Omo 2022

Itinerary

Day 1, October 12, 2022

Upon your arrival at the Bole international airport in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, you are met by a member of our ground team and transferred to the Radisson Blu by private vehicle. After your long flight/s you will enjoy a relaxing evening in a modern, luxury, hotel, which is the perfect way to rest up for the amazing journey that lies ahead.

Accommodation: Radison Blu

Day 2, October 13, 2022

You will rise early in the morning to the smell of Ethiopia’s famous Coffee. Meet the group for breakfast and a briefing about your up coming adventure. During the meeting Piper will share her philosophy and ideas on how to create stunning intimate images of the tribes.  The group will then depart to the airport for a short flight to Jinka.

After lunch we will venture into the town and to the cultural museum to learn about the traditions and history of the tribes we will be visiting.

Accommodation: Eco Lodge BLD

Day 3, October 14, 2022

Rise early and head through Mago National park to visit the exotic Mursi tribe. The most distinctive characteristic of the Mursi is the lip plate. At around the age of fifteen, a mother or another woman in the settlement typically cuts the girl’s lower lip, and it is held open by a wooden plug until the wound heals. It is then the girl’s decision how far to stretch the lip, which is done by inserting progressively larger plugs over several months and years. This was originally said to be done to disfigure themselves to scare off the slave traders; over time, it became a sign of beauty. One of their distinct ornamentations is the wearing of the warthogtusk that connects to solid metal rings, which is tied to a rope that hangs over their heads. They are also known for their beautiful scarification and body painting. The Mursi are one of the most dramatic tribes to photograph, but also one of the most challenging.

During midday, we will have time to review images and discuss the challenges from the morning before heading back to another Mursi village to photograph them in the afternoon light.

Accommodation: Eco Lodge BLD

Day 4 & 5, October 15 &16, 2022

After an early breakfast we will continue our journey deep into the Omo Valley to our first mobile tent camp, home to the Daasanach, and near to the boarder of Kenya.

Cousins to the Turkana tribe in Northern Kenya, the Daasanach, are a semi-nomadic tribe numbering approximately 50,000. Their clans stretch across southern Ethiopia, Sudan, and down into Northern Kenya. They are very tall and slender, wearing red and yellow jewelry, leather headpieces lined with bottle caps, and are known for their unique and ornate hair buns.

We will be staying along the Omo River surrounded by many villages. This will allow us to intimately maximize our time with the Daasanach over the next two days

Accommodation: Private Mobile Safari Camp BLD

Day 6 & 7, October 17 & 18, 2021

After one last beautiful sunrise in the village and breakfast we will continue on our journey to the land of the Hamar tribe. The Hamar women are striking, wearing beautiful colorful beaded skins, ornate necklaces, and metal bangles around their wrists and ankles. Famous for their hairstyle — a crown of long dread-lock braids covered in ocher– the Hamer women are the most decorated of the Omo people. During the next two days, if we are lucky, we hope to get word of a bull jumpingceremony, a rite-of-passage tradition whereby a young Hamer man passes from boyhood to adulthood. This is a real ceremony, so there is no guarantee we will be able to see one, but our trip is timed during the season for these ceremonies and parties.

Should the road access be good and time allows, we will visit the Abore tribe.

Accommodation: Buska Lodge BLD

Day 8 – 10, October 19 – 21, 2022
We will have one last beautiful sunrise visit with the Hammer before we head into the territory ofthe Kara tribe. We have set up another mobile tent camp in the forested area along the Omo River near the main village that I have been visiting for more a decade. This will allow you to connect with the people on a deeper level, where you will feel more like a friend and a guest than merely a visitor.

The Kara excel in face and body painting; this is practiced daily in preparation fortheir dances and ceremonies. They pulverize locally found white chalk, yellow mineral rock, red iron ore, and black charcoal in order to decorate their bodies, often mimicking the spotted plumage of a guinea fowl. The men create highly decorated clay hair buns, which can take up to three days to complete. Their ornate body scarring, where a cut is made with a knife and ash is rubbed into the wound to produce a raised welt, is also a known characteristic of the Kara.

Over the next three days, you will spend quality time in the Kara villages; documenting their daily lives, creating beautiful portraits, joining them in song and dance, watching them herd the livestock across the dusty plains, join them for morning coffee, learning about their ancient traditions, and learn about how their world is changing with the pressures of the modern world.

Accommodation: Private Mobile Safari Camp BLD

Day 11 – 14, October 22 –25, 2022
Today we continue our adventurous expedition, crossing over the Omo River and through the bush, to the remote homeland of the extremely beautiful and exotic Suri tribe. In the early morning,we will stop en route to visit a Nyangatom village.The women have layers and layers of beads around their neck,and wear the most strikingly-designed leather skirts.  Although they have their own language, they also speak the Daasanech language.  As we near the town of Kibish,excitement builds when you discover the Suri throughout the landscape in their traditional clothing, going about their daily lives. We will arrive in our private mobile-tented camp along the Kibishriver in the late afternoon. As word gets out about our arrival, they will come down to the river and near our camp for a wonderful first introduction and afternoon shoot along the river. We will have four incredible days atthis location.

The Suritribe is known to be one of the most beautiful and ornate tribes in the world,and is thus one of the most desired to photograph. The elaborate body painting and unique flamboyant headpieces, made from natural materials, truly make them a walking body of art. The women still practice one of the most extreme forms of body adornment in the world- wearing large lip plates. The tribe still practices the art of body scarification, created via acacia thorns and razor blades.

The Suri are pastoralist. The men still go off to live in the cattle camps, which are under constant threat as cattle raids are a relentless part of Suri life. The men live their traditional lifestyles drinking the blood and milk of the cow, covering their naked bodies with ash, and giving thanks for their good fortune in song and dance. We will have an opportunity to visit these traditional cattle camps, and it is always the highlight of the trip for participants.

Accommodations: Private mobile tent camp BLD

Day 15  October 26, 2022

If time allows, we will have one last early morning visit with the Suri before driving to Mizan to catch our private chartered flight back to Addis. This flight is from deep in the southern region where there are no commercial flights available. This will save us from two very long days of driving over some rough roads, and a one-night stay in very local accommodations.Once in Addis, you will be met by our ground team and transported to the RadissonBlu, where you will have a dayroom to rest up and clean up before being transferred to the international airport for your late flights home. Should you prefer to stay overnight in Addis to rest up from your incredible expedition, we will be happy to make these arrangements. Flights should be booked after10:00 PM.Most international flights depart after 10:00 PM.

Accommodations: Day rooms at the Radison Blu BL

 

Is this adventurous trip for you?

This adventurous photographic experience was created for passionate photographers who want to visit and experience some of the most beautiful tribes on the African continent.  The itinerary was designed to give you the best opportunities to produce high-quality images from your own perspective. Therefore, we will rise early in the morning for the best light; a few mornings we be up well before sunrise. We will push hard to maximize every photographic opportunity, which means some long days, but you should go at your own pace. These tribes live in remote areas; there will be driving on dirt roads, but in comfortable air-conditioned 4X4 utility vehicles. If we get lucky, we will be invited to a special event that may require walking; however, a guide can be hired to assist you with your gear.  However, to best enjoy this adventure you should be in good physical contention and be able to carry your own gear to the vehicles.

This photographic experience was created for photographers with a good working knowledge of their equipment, who fully understand the basics of photography, shutter speed, aperture, iso, exposure and how they relate to each other. Having previous experience photographing indigenous cultures will be beneficial, as this can be a more challenging experience. Although, this is NOT a workshop to teach you techniques, there will be a lot of discussion on photography and informal instruction throughout the trip. This trip was designed to give photographers intimate access to the tribes, which will allow them the creative freedom to capture their own unique experience. Piper is always available to assist you with your vision and for any question you may have.

While our trip is designed around producing high-quality images, we believe our visit should be sensitive, respectful, and beneficial to the communities we visit. We build time into our itinerary to interact with the local people that will lead to a richer experience, rather than just racing from location to location and charging in with camera in hand. It is a privilege to visit these unique tribal areas, and we want to make sure it is a positive experience for them. We also believe in empowering the local communities to look after themselves, and we feel the best way to do this is economically. We work with a small successful, fully licensed local operator, and we hire local guides in every area we visit. Our local partners are key to what we do, and these relationships have been built up over many years, many becoming personal friends. Our visit will generate income in the local areas we visit.