Keren

Two hours' winding descent northwest of Asmara, Keren spreads its Italian-era arcades and mosques across a bowl in the Anseba hills - a crossroads town where highland and lowland Eritrea meet to trade, most famously at the Monday livestock market, when camels, goats and their negotiating owners fill the wadi in a spectacle unchanged for generations. The town's oddest treasure is the Mariam Dearit shrine: a chapel built inside the hollow trunk of a giant baobab, pilgrimage site for Christians and respected by all, standing in a grove outside town. Silversmiths' lanes, the old railway station and hill viewpoints complete the amble.

History

Keren began as a trading settlement on an arid plain between the Anseba and Barka rivers, on the route from Massawa to Sudan: traders from Arkiko dominated its market, carrying grain on the camels of the local Hedareb, and cotton cloth from Sennar and Egypt changed hands with ivory, skins, ostrich feathers and maize from the highlands. In the middle of the 19th century it had about 350 huts and 2,000 inhabitants. The Lazarist missionaries Giuseppe Sapeto and Giovanni Stella toured the area in 1851, and Stella later founded an Italian farming colony here on land granted by Dejazmach Haylu of Hamasien, which fell apart after his death in 1869. Soon after, the Egyptian governor Werner Munzinger took over Keren and built a fort on the hill of Sanhit, the town's old name, and the Lazarists opened a school in 1874; the Egyptians left in 1885, and in December 1889 the Italians took the town, which became part of the colony of Eritrea proclaimed in 1890. Italian rule brought merchants of many origins, Greeks among them, who built a Greek church, and the Italian administration building went up between 1906 and 1916 (Wikipedia, Keren, Eritrea).

What to look for

• The Monday camel market - the wadi filling with livestock and argument.
• Mariam Dearit - the chapel inside the great baobab.
• The Italian-era centre - arcades, cafes and the old station.
• The silversmith lanes - Keren's jewellery-working tradition.

When to go

October to March is the cool, dry window; Mondays are non-negotiable if the market is the aim, and the May festival at Mariam Dearit brings the shrine its great pilgrimage day.

Things to know

Eritrean travel runs on permits for movement beyond Asmara - arrange them in the capital as required, and let local practice guide photography, especially at the market and shrine. Facilities are simple hotels and honest food. The charm is entirely real and entirely unpolished.

Nearby

The Anseba valley, the old rail route toward the coast and Asmara's plateau.

Key facts