📞 +251-932-371-898 ✉ info@milanethiopiatours.com
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📞 +251-932-371-898 ✉ info@milanethiopiatours.com
Facebook | Instagram | Google | Tripadvisor
Addis Ababa — founded by Emperor Menelik II in 1886 and meaning “New Flower” in Amharic — is one of Africa’s most complex and rapidly changing cities. At 2,355 metres above sea level, it is among the world’s highest capital cities. As the headquarters of the African Union and the UN Economic Commission for Africa, it is the diplomatic capital of the entire African continent. And in the past five years, it has become one of Africa’s most exciting urban tourism destinations.
The National Museum of Ethiopia houses the most important archaeological collection in East Africa, including the skeletal remains of Australopithecus afarensis — the 3.2 million-year-old hominid known worldwide as “Lucy.” Found in the Afar region in 1974 by paleoanthropologist Donald Johanson, Lucy represents one of the most significant discoveries in the history of human evolution research. The museum also houses the largest collection of prehistoric artifacts, royal regalia, and ethnological collections documenting Ethiopia’s extraordinary diversity.
The Beautifying Sheger initiative has transformed the city’s riverside areas into green parks, fountains, and public spaces that have become the most popular gathering places for the city’s six million residents. Entoto Natural Park — on the forested hills above the city — offers panoramic views, forest trails, and the historic Entoto Mariam Church. The Adwa Victory Memorial Museum (opened February 2024) is the newest major attraction — a world-class museum on five hectares commemorating Ethiopia’s 1896 defeat of the Italian colonial army, which attracted over 246,000 visitors in its first year.
Merkato is the largest open-air market in Africa — a city within a city of thousands of vendors trading spices, textiles, electronics, coffee, livestock, and every conceivable commodity. Walking through it with an experienced local guide is one of the most sensory and genuine urban experiences available in Africa.
Ethiopia is the birthplace of coffee — Coffea arabica originated in the forests of Ethiopia’s Kaffa region. The traditional Ethiopian coffee ceremony — roasting green beans over charcoal, grinding them by hand, brewing in a clay pot, and serving three rounds of progressively lighter coffee — is an act of hospitality and community practiced daily in homes and coffee houses across the country. Experiencing it in Addis Ababa, at Tomoca (established 1953, the oldest coffee house in the city), is an essential Ethiopian experience.
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