And so on to Kenya (country 27!)

I arrived in Nairobi in the evening and one day later i left to climb Mount Kenya! The first day all we did was climb to the first hut called moses camp 3300m above sea level - so we were already 3 times higher than the top of Ben Nevis.....!

The tour company I was with had one porter each and one guide for me and another for the Dutch couple I was with. We also had a cook! So it was quite a party of people and staff that we had on out trip!

The first camp was really nice and we arrived in cloud. Walking up through the foothills we saw bush buck and although we didn't see any elephants we saw plenty of evidence of them!

The second day we woke up to freezing temperatures and magnificent views of the summit and of point Lenana - the second highest point where you can trek to without ropes and technical climbing, and that's where we were headed!

The next day was fun, heading up the Sirimon route towards the Shipton hut at 4200m. The flora and fauna began to change a lot at this point and we saw a lot of mountain cabbages - see photos!

Arrival at the Shipton hut was fine (for me). Funnily enough all the people there from Holland began to feel pretty ill!

I felt right as rain and went outside and chatted to the porters and guides and went to see the rock hyraxes and generally had fun!

The next day was acclimatisation and we headed up the actual summit route until we got to the saddle above the hut. The view was breathtaking as the hut sits in a valley and we could see all around us - including 2 of the 3 glaciers on Mt Kenya.

Getting to the saddle took about one hour and still no altitude sickness for me at 4600m!
The next day was possibly the hardest physical thing I have ever done but I am so proud of myself and it was amazing to stand there on the top.
We got up at 2am and left at 3am after some tea and food. Using our torches we climbed very steeply up a very loose and slippery path to the summit. It took 3 hours to get there. I was the first person to touch the top! Myself and an Irish guy called James were the first people on the summit. I was the only Scottish person on the top that day!

Standing on the top of Point Lenana was stunning and breathtaking at 4985m or 16334 ft (approx). We could see the clouds way below us and then at 6.20am the first ray of sun broke over the curve of the earth and above the cloud line. To our left was the summit and the 3rd glacier and to our right was Kilimanjaro.
It was amazing, worth every step.
On the summit I still felt as right as rain, it had been hard work getting to the top and progress was slow at best!

The route we chose down was the Chagoria route as it had been recommended to me and it was a lovely day we had wandering down. We went pretty slowly as by then none of us had any appetite and our heads were very painful. We also had pretty bad sunburn despite all precautions taken when we started at 2am!
The last camp we stayed in was lovely as we had real beds and hot showers and log fires and buffalo wandering around outside at night!

The last day was a walk out to where we were picked up by land rover and then Matatu to Nairobi (in Kenya they are called Matatus, In Tanzania they are called dallah dallahs) and they are minibuses that came out of the ark and they are designed to fit 15 people so they squash around 30 in them and drive at breakneck place in order to get to the next village to get the first pick of the people needing transport! Its pretty scary actually. Sometimes it was worse than India - and that's saying something!

I was so glad to have climbed Mt Kenya and it was one of the things I really wanted to do on this trip.
The last blog will be the last days of my trip that I spent in or around Nairobi.

HIPPOPOTAMUS AMPHIBIOUS

African musings

African villages that flash by in a blur of bright colour of yellow bananas and bright clothing and vibrant orange paintings for sale.

Long white arms among the black ones reaching out of the bus windows and instantly the crowd gathers at the white arms to sell you nuts, pineapples, oranges, wood carvings, corn, cakes and anything else that can fit through a bus window.

An African bus ride
12 hours next to a woman from Arusha and her 4 year old daughter called Happy, who at first would only make shy eye contact with me. Then after 2 hours i bought oranges from the bus window and she accepted half of one. After this she played happily with Nicci (my toy monkey) and for the rest of the journey she slept on my lap or sat on her mothers knee and would just reach out and put her tiny little black hand on my comparatively white arm as i was reading which would make me loose concentration on my book and look at her and smile which she would return. She would put her hand on my arm constantly throughout the journey - almost just to reassure herself i was still there and still liked her. She would leave her hand resting on my arm for hours.

Many goats and cows in Tanzania - the Masai still herding them in the fields and at the roadside. I saw one farmer resting at the roadside - an old man with bare feet, Masai are very tall and carry spears and are ornate with earrings and necklaces - especially in the high part of their ears and round their ankles. The man was wrapped in blankets at the side of the road watching his flock. As a bus approached he struggles to his feet and runs down into the field to avoid the inevitable dust cloud (or Tanzanian snow as its sometimes called) that follows the vehicle. He is an old man and he stumbles down the field coughing in the dust while the safari land rover thunders past at a furious rate and his heard is scattered.
thew bus that follows the safari land rover is full to bursting with people - which is the norm and the roof is laden with baskets, bags, cases and anything else u can imagine, all held down with strips of rubber cut from inner tubes they sell at the markets to the bus drivers and also to fishermen who use it for their nets.

Black children will wave at white people as waving is a very white thing to do. African people do not really wave as a parting or greeting gesture.
Dusty red road climbs from a village way up high into the hills and as our land rover puts into second gear and moves slowly up the hill we pass old men pushing bicycles and its hot and they are tired and their bicycles are loaded with huge amounts of stuff and they are often barefoot, as we pass them they smile and wave and shout Mambo
The African spirit.