Ethiopia: Kuriftu Resort & Spa

Vacationing with young kids (13 m & 2 1/2 y) is never relaxing. It's a fact. Even with help from family members, leaving your house to go somewhere, anywhere, is never stress free. It's hard, people. Simply going to the local library can be stressful let alone traveling to a foreign country. Unless, unless, you make plans to leave the kids behind completely. That's exactly what we did...with ease. Our aunts, uncles, cousins, grandma, grandpa, and even 80+ year old Great Grandma were pleased to get us out the door and spend quality time with Layla and Faven. 

Joey and I happily left the kids in very good hands, drove 1 1/2 hours to Kuriftu Lake in Debre-Zeit (DZ) and stayed at an authentic Ethiopian resort and spa. Only members are permitted to book a room, but luckily, Roman and Fassil have a membership. Also, Fassil is "boys" with the owner of the resort so we were hooked up with a sweet package! For less than a cocktail dress at Nordstrom, the package included a room with a view (see video below), dinner for two (drinks not included), breakfast buffet for two, kayaking, mani-pedi for two and one hour long massage. We decided last minute to stay for another night and got the same awesome deal.  We also bought an extra massage so that Joey and I could enjoy a couples massage both nights.

Kuriftu Resort and Spa

 

Joey and I slept, drank and ate a lot on this mini vaca. My drink of choice is beer so I was a cheep date, only costing 25 Brr a bottle (about $1.50). Liquor is surprisingly much more expensive in Ethiopia and Joey prefers it.

The food served at the resort was very good. We ate  fish and steak for lunch and dinner and splurged on pancakes, eggs, and tons of pastries. The fruit looked delicious but we knew we would be taking a big risk if we had a bite.  Joey got really sick last time he visited Ethiopia because he  ate a piece of lettuce on a burger by mistake so we learned our lesson. We only ate cooked food and drank bottled beverages during our entire trip. Our doctor even gave us each a prescription in case we got food born illness as a precaution.  Thankfully, we didn't get sick at all in Africa.

The spa, hence the cute wooded sign on the left.

Joey experienced his first spa treatment here at Kuriftu. He wasn't overly impressed with his mani-pedi and frankly I wasn't either. However, the full body massage was the best I've ever had.  I felt badly that Joey would probably never get another massage as good as he did at this place unless we go back several years from now. We plan on it!

You might be getting the idea that JY and I don't get out much. If so, you are correct. So this little feature of the resort was nice, unique and extremely funny at the same time.  They offered a private viewing of  movies in a hut with bed-like stadium seating. Fancy right?! The only non "fancy" aspect of this was the DVD that was projected on a "big screen" was boot legged! I think we even saw people walking across the screen in the movie. I got a kick out of it. We liked the entire experience so much we went back the next night. This time the quality of the movie was so poor that we couldn't see the end of it. The only thing Joey could say was, "Well, that's Ethiopia for ya"! Hilarious!

Dining in by the fire on our balcony.

The resort is expanding! No large machinery were used to build these beautiful huts.

Joey's brother, Mike and Roman picked us up from the resort and we spent the later part of the day in DZ .

The staff at the resort were extremely kind and helpful. Our waiter took hospitality to a whole new level when we asked him to take a picture of us. He took one photo, then two, then three, four, five. He wouldn't stop. We were laughing so hard at this but he didn't even seem to leave character as a professional photographer. He took individual and several group shots of us. We were on the floor laughing so hard. Roman and I were crying laughing. 

 I'll leave you with that....lots of smiles from Ethiopia!