The account summarizes the botanical field work in Eritrea and Ethiopia since the 1930s, in the period when motor cars have been used for transport of equipment and collections, as opposed to the "heroic" period, when pack animals were used. The use of cars for botanical collecting in Eritrea and Ethiopia has been seriously hampered by the difficult and mountainous terrain, and cars therefore came into use in connection with botanical collecting relatively late in comparison with the situation in many other African countries. The big expeditions during the Italian occupation of Ethiopia and Eritrea are outlined, as well as the big enterprises after the Second World War, e.g. the Kenya-Ethiopia Boundary Commission, the Desert Locust Service, and the achievement of an increasing number of individuals, both Ethiopian and foreign, is reviewed. The Ethiopian Flora Project purchased over the years a number of sturdy wehicles that allowed collecting activity in remote parts of the Flora areas, especially in western, southern and Eastern Ethiopia.