Top Ethiopia Layover Tours

Gashaw and Aspire Ethiopia are the way to go when traveling to Addis and further throughout the country! He’s very friendly, flexible, and knowledgeable, and does the best job at not only allowing you to enjoy the beauty of the country and culture, but also learn about and understand it during your time there. My trip was a life-changing experience, and it wouldn’t have been the same without his guidance throughout it. Can’t recommend Gashaw and Aspire Ethiopia enough!

My family and I had such a great time in Ethiopia thanks to Gashaw. From the start, he made us feel like we were traveling with a close friend rather than a tour guide. He brought such a fun, welcoming, family like energy to the whole trip and knew literally everything about every place we visited. We learned so much, shared plenty of laughs, and genuinely enjoyed every moment with him. By the end of the trip, he felt like part of the family. Couldn’t recommend him enough!

Zele was super knowledgeable and eager to share about Ethiopia. Such value

The Addis day tour covered essential sights to see in Addis. Booking was easy and Teshome immediately reached out to confirm hotel pick up time. Teshome, the tour guide and Teferi, the driver showed up on time for pick up. Teshome was very knowledgeable and covered the key historical facts on all sites we visited and was a great tour guide. While St George church was under renovation, he took us to another church Ba’eta Le Mariam monastery where king Menellik II and his family are buried. Overall, tour was very informative on Ethiopia’s history. Teferi did a wonderful job driving the busy streets and navigating the narrow streets of Merkato. I would highly recommend this tour.

I had an amazing day with our tour guide Teshome. He was very knowledgeable about Ethiopia and I learned more about much more than Addis Ababa. The museums were wonderful and it was a real treat to visit the church. We enjoyed the coffee ceremony and lunch. The driver Teferi guided us through Mercato with ease. I only had one day to tour and this was jam-packed. I highly recommend it.

Super enjoy with my tour guide Zele. I think he is extremely knowledgeable and he teaches me so many things about Ethiopia, Africa. The religion, the geology, the animals, the landscape, the culture, the music and so much more. I especially love the Addis Ababa university and enthnological museum and we learn a lot of things. And thanks Mr Zele to take care of me in this rainy days. Thank you. I will be back to Ethiopia one day again in the future.

Exceptional immersive experience with an extremely knowledgeable guide in Gashaw! It was like being with an old friend who knew how to make us comfortable and treated us like us family. His knowledge of all of Ethiopia was truly remarkable and he made it all so much fun

My friend and I had a great experience on this tour. Teshome was an excellent guide, very knowledgeable and happy to share that knowledge and answer our questions. Teferi, the driver, was also very responsible and pleasant. Unfortunately, we couldn't visit the interiors of the churches, and since it was a Sunday, the Merkato was mostly closed. I recommend this tour to anyone spending a day in the city or on a layover.

We had a great day touring Addis Ababa with Henok. He is a very knowledgeable guide, and was able to teach us a lot about the history of Ethiopia and the city as a whole. The museum was a highlight, and the home cooked meal and coffee was delicious.

Biruk was amazing; kind and knowledgeable. He was flexible and adapted tour to my interests. He was open to talking about Ethiopia but also music, food, life in general. As a solo female traveler having the guide and driver made the day very easy and pleasant. Biruk was also good at taking photos. Highly recommend. Very organized and professional.

We watched a YouTube video of Gashaw doing a transit tour of Addis Ababa, and decided that's exactly what we wanted to do during our layover. However, we landed at 2:30pm in the afternoon and that meant it's almost 4pm by the time we got around to clear immigration, took the shuttle bus to the Skylight hotel and got a room. We were not sure how much of the city we could see before it got dark, and then it started raining and that probably meant it's only going to be a driving tour, and the traffic getting out of the hotel was horrific.But Gashaw made good use of every minute, we never imagined we could see and experience so much of the city in the limited time we had. We first drove by an area with lots of Chinese supermarkets and restaurants, we had not realized there were so many Chinese doing business in Ethiopia. Then the rain subsided and Gashaw took us to the Entoto Park up in the mountain, and we marveled at the panoramic view of the huge city below. There were some mushroom-shaped structures, and they look like the supertrees in the Garden By The Bay in Singapore, and Gashaw joked welcome to Singapore. We then took some photos and videos of the "E HIOPIA" sign, and also the Covid-19 memorial monument.We then came back down to the city, and Gashaw pointed to us a lot of the blue and white Soviet manufactured cars we passed by, also known as Blue donkeys. These cars were used as taxis but were also getting phased out with more modern vehicles. We then made a coffee stop at Tomoca Coffee, the oldest coffee shop in Addis Ababa which opened in 1953. We had the signature coffee, Italian expresso made with local Arabica beans and they were so good. We bought two bags of coffee beans to bring back as sovenirs.Then came the most intense part of the tour, a visit to the Addis Merkato, Africa's largest open-air marketplace. The streets around the market were packed with people, goods and cars. We certainly appreciated Gashaw's driving us into the heart of the market, and there's simply no better way to see what everyday lives of the working class are like in Addis. The porters were walking amazingly fast and carrying heavy loads of goods on their heads, but it's the loading of goods onto trucks that would take it to a next level. Heavy and big sacks or boxes were passed from one worker to another onto the trucks and got piled up like building a house, and the trucks would not move till floors high of goods were stacked.We then moved to the modern part of the city and drove by the impressive Tiglachin Monument, a tall pillar monument topped with a red star. The monument honors the Ethiopian and Cuban soldiers who fought for Ethiopia during the Ogaden War between Ethiopia and Somalia. We also saw several new landmarks in the city, including the tallest building in Addis, the Commercial Bank of Ethiopia. It has a glass and steel facade with jagged crystalline angles, which creates a stunning rippling visual effect ! Then there's the giant ring statue at the Ghion Riverside fountain. The urban transformation of the city is simply massive.Our last stop for the evening was the Friendship Park. It's a very nice park in the heart of Addis Ababa, and many couples came here for taking wedding photos. Gashaw took us uphill to a spot in the park with magnificent skyline view. And the Commercial Bank of Ethiopia building really stood out when it's lit up in green, yellow and red, the Ethiopia flag color. Then the water fountain show that combined music and dancing water jets in vibrant lights started, and we took a stroll down to the fountain plaza, joining the many families and tourists there to enjoy the show.We drove through the Bole neighborhood on our return to the hotel, it's a busy, modern and luxurious part of Addis with shopping malls, restaurants, coffee shops, bars, etc. It's such a big contrasts to the hustle and bustle of the market. We had such a blast touring Addis Ababa with Gashaw, and Gashaw scheduled all the stops cleverly to allow us to experience both the daytime and nightime scenery of the city.There are of course a lot more to see in Addis Ababa, and we would certainly want Gashaw to take us to the places we missed in this short layover, as well as other parts of the country on our next trip to Ethiopia.

Thanks so much Mr Teshome We had a really good outing, you have an excellent knowledge of Ethiopia. He was super-helpful, great conversationalist and listens to understand.

The one day tour covered essential sites to see in Addis. Teshome was a great guide and I learned about Ethiopia’s history. The national museum, Menellik II mausoleum and the ethnographic museum were the best part of the tour. I wish tour includes access to Mount Entoto as we did not see the mountain but this was probably due to limited tour duration. I would recommend this tour for people who have limited time. The driver Teferi was also great at navigating the narrow and busy streets in mercato.

My guide Biruk was very knowledgeable, fun, and flexible and had great taste in music! We had a lovely day exploring Addis. It was also great having a driver who could easily drop and pick us up from various points. Would highly recommend. Especially for solo travelers.

I had a great 1-day tour of Addis Ababa with Zele who took me to museums and various sites across the city. He did not just drop me off at the museums - he provided a guided tour of each place tailored to what I was interested in. During the drive I shown various monuments and heard stories of the city and country's history. In the middle of the tour they took me to an authentic coffee ceremony and ethiopian lunch. Near the end they took me to a few boutique shops to find the perfect gifts for my family - and later - I saw that the prices and quality were much better than I could achieve at the airport (or going to the local market). I would highly recommend their tour to both solos, couples, and famillies.

Biruk was an excellent guide for a day tour around Addiss. Very knowledgeable about the city and history of the country. He had planned our day but was very happy to adjust the tour to include things I wanted to do and see. Would highly recommend to anyone visiting Addis Ababa! 5 stars!