March 2, 2005

There are nine of us hiking. From my NGO, there are Emma, Georg, and Akhil. Emma’s friend Kim is here and her roommate Lisa who’s a Canadian OB/GYN. From Peace Corps, we have Jason from the new group and Danny, Debbie, and I from mine.

We left Nanyuki around noon on rented matatus and drove an hour to the Sirimoni Gate. I haven’t been able to count how many porters we have. Grace is cooking for us again along with a guy named John, and there is one other female porter.

After lunch at the gate, we walked 9 km to the first hut, Old Moses, where I stayed with Dad and Karen in August. The elevation change was 900m, and we’re at 3300m now (11,000 ft). The path to the hut is straightforward so we all went at our own pace. It took Deb and me 2 hours and 40 minutes.

It’s chilly up here tonight, and we are all bundled. Most people have gone to bed already, though it’s only 9:30. After toting 2 bags of marshmallows up here, we were too lazy to toast them and ate them raw. That’s 2 less things to carry tomorrow!

Dinner was excellent tonight – fillet steak, peas, carrots, cabbage, and mashed potatoes. The porters even carried up a bottle of wine for us!

We get up in the morning for a 6:30 breakfast, then start our hike right away. It’s 15km, but not as steep.

March 3, 2005

It’s about 4 in the afternoon. All the other hikers are sleeping after a long day’s haul. We rose around 6 and started hiking about 7:30. The view today was beautiful. Tonight, we’re sleeping at 13800 feet (4200 meters) in Shipton’s Camp. Like last night, it’s just a basic wood structure with bunk beds and toilets.

After everyone went to nap, I took a walk up the mountain. We’re only three km from the peak here, but still have 800m to climb. By peak, I mean point Lenana, which is the highest you can go without technical climbing and ropes. But the highest peak Batiyan is only 216m higher.

I walked for 20 minutes or so up a steep mountainside. It’s all gravel and very slippery. I took a short rest maybe 100 meters above the camp. It’s a perfect day – not too hot, not too cold. But the clouds have covered the peaks and look pretty foreboding.

The vegetation is so unreal – like nothing I’ve ever seen. It’s straight out of sci-fi as you’ll see when I post pictures.

The altitude has had little effect on me so far. Danny has been getting dizzy, there are a few people with headaches, and Akhil had a nosebleed.

Tomorrow is the big day. We set off at 2 or 3am to meet sunrise on the peak. I think porters will be taking all but our essentials to the next spot. We’ll have breakfast there and continue hiking. Robert says we’ll do 23 km tomorrow, but we’ll be staying in a lodge with hot showers instead of tenting it as originally planned.

I’m determined to fight off the nap so I can go to bed early, but there’s no one to talk to!

March 4, 2004

My scheme to go to bed early failed miserably. Just before dinner, I had a major allergy attack. I tried Zyrtec and Benadryl, but nothing worked. I laid down at 8:00, but couldn’t breathe well and had an attack of cotton mouth brought on by the sunburn I’d unknowingly sustained during the day. By the time we got up at 2:00, I’d gone through a liter of water and woke to swollen eyes and a beet-red face.

We left for the summit at 3am. Since it was dark and steep, we walked single file led by Robert and followed by two other guides. Emma and Georg set the pace, slow and steady, slow enough to keep us from sweating. This helped us avoid chills in the freezing temperatures.

I wore a pair of long johns, sweats, khakis, thermal shirt plus three others, fleece, raincoat, gloves, hat, and scarf. Debbie strapped on an extra layer of good raingear and found herself sweating inside of it.

She, Jason, and I were the only ones that didn’t seem to suffer from any altitude sickness. I did feel a little light-headed on the climb, but felt good at the summit and kept a hearty appetite throughout.

The 3km hike took about 3 ½ hours, and we reached the peak just as the sun rose. Temperatures were slightly below freezing at the top, and we had views of Batiyan, the highest peak, and a glacier field below. Had the day been clear, we would have seen much more. Apparently, some people have seen the ocean, Mt. Elgon in the West and Mt. Kilimanjaro in the south when the conditions were right.

We stayed at the summit about 10 minutes – long enough to take plenty of pictures. Then we began our descent.

The climb down was steep and agonizing for our tired joints. After beginning the morning with an 800m climb over 3km, we dropped 700m in the next 4km on the east side of the mountain.

We stopped for breakfast at 9am then descended another 1000m over the next 9 km. Weak and exhausted, it took Debbie and I three hours. We stopped there for a quick lunch then proceeded to our lodge 7km away and another 300m drop. All in all, we ascended over 800m today, dropped about 2000m, and covered 23km in 12 hours. It was grueling.

Originally, we were supposed to camp in tents tonight, but for an extra 500/= a piece, Robert arranged our stay at a lodge. It’s nothing stellar. Triple rooms in wooden cabins with kitchens, indoor plumbing, and a fireplace. I’m sitting by a warm fire now and got a hot shower when we arrived.

Everyone else went to bed right after dinner. I’ll be joining them soon. We have 32 final km to walk tomorrow. It’s been really amazing. I can’t imagine having done it without the porters and cooks – around 17 people preparing our meals and lugging our crap around!

I’ve been rethinking Kilimanjaro. I know it would be a great experience, but it’s also about 5 times the price of climbing Mt. Kenya, around $750. I can think of better things to do with that money – like a weekend in Seychelles!

March 6, 2004

The final day of hiking began at 8am yesterday. I don’t think Robert expected to begin at all. This is the scam – drive people hard for 12 grueling hours up and down the summit, then bring them to a place with hot showers and cold beers. When their decision-making skills are properly worn down, offer them a way out – a four wheel drive vehicle for the low, low price of 4000/= ($50). Robert mentioned the jeep on day 1 and continued to play it up to anyone who would listen. Akhil took the bait and spent the summit day trying to convince everyone else to take it. We didn’t bite.

Unfortunately, Robert must have thought it was a done deal because the porters all believed they were finished walking and there were only bananas and hard-boiled eggs left for lunch. Bad planning!

We chose to walk anyway, and our hired staff was not happy about it.

The day was excruciating. I can only think of one worse day in all my experience – a section of the AT called the “Roller Coaster” north of Front Royal, VA. Bear and Peace will recall it as they picked up my broken pieces at the end of the day and took me out for beers!

At least yesterday’s walk was relatively level after the first 10km, where we dropped another 1100 meters. We dropped 1400 overall during the day. At about 25km, we approached the park gate and signed out. From there, we snaked our way on dirt roads down to the town of Chogoria. Robert was far behind with the last group, so we had to ask townspeople where to go.

The views were beautiful. We started out in bamboo forest with elephant prints and dung everywhere. Outside the park were hills and teafields. The land is so fertile here with so much water – we even saw a sprinkler system on one of the fields!

After 6 ½ hours of intense pain, Lisa, Debbie, and I finally stumbled into town, and I had to call Robert to find out where to meet. We trudged into the Cool Inn Hotel and found Akhil and most of our porters sipping on beers. He’d gotten a ride from the park gate. We were not the least bit amused by this. Maybe if he’d had our beers chilled for us while he was sitting there all afternoon, we would have been more understanding.

Georg, Emma, and Kimberly came a few minutes later. They’d accepted a ride about 1-2 km from town. Not long after that, Danny and Jason stumbled in looking beaten and broken. Jason had been the fastest hiker going up, but the downhill killed him and he had to lean on a big stick for the last several miles.

After a beer and some pictures, Danny, Jason, Debbie, and I headed north and the rest took a speed taxi to Nairobi. Jason got off at his town 30 minutes north, and we headed to Meru, 3km from Makutano where Danny lives. He’d never taken a taxi from there before, but we did this time!