Ok, so maybe this wasn't the most interesting thing about Bahir Dar, but when you've been sleeping on foam for two months (3cm when camping, and about 10cm in hotels) a real mattress is an absolute treat, and led to some excellent nights sleep.
The real draw card of Bahir Dar though is the various monastries which are found on islands on Lake Tana. Everyone in Bahir Dar either seems to have a boat or a minibus and depending which either wants to take you onto the lake or to Gondar. We decided to just go through our hotel and organised a half day on the lake with three girls we had met from Israel. This however doesn't include the entry fee for each monastry and aftre the first couple we began to feel they were a bit similar. You would never guess from the outside that these round mud brick buildings are churches built in the 14th century (although the roof had to be replaced with tin as water was leaking through destroying the paintings). Inside our beautiful paintings depicting various biblical scenes, some of which are definitely unique to Ethiopia. The one where some saint is using a snake to climb a building was certainly interesting.
As after a couple o fthese churches all five of us felt they were remarkably similar we decided to us e the boat to trip to see the start of the nile (the blue nile, the white nile starts in Uganda), which was a very pretty area.
The other nice thing about Bahir Dar was being adventurous with the food, and trying some interesting dishes. Possibly I'm biased because of what came later, but I'm just not that much of a fan of Ethiopian food.
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