Mt Kenya

I’m all mif and depressed now... I don’t like living in a different country anymore... its gonna mean I am always saying goodbye to those I love the most.
My sister and her husband have been and gone... we had an awesome holiday of course. With Mandy around, everyone is guaranteed to have fun. But I miss her terribly!

So, what we got up too:
Well, the morning after Mandy and Collin arrived in Nairobi, we headed off for Mt Kenya. We were climbing the Chogoria route, which is apparently the most scenic.

DAY 1: We had lunch and chatted to our guide in chogoria town before making our way to our first campsite which was at about 3000m above sea level. This was the only hiking we did where we actually carried our own bags. We had porters to carry our bags for the rest of the trip.... which we realised afterwards was a bit unnecessary...our bags weren’t that heavy and the hiking was definitely not strenuous. Besides the 5 porters, there were 2 cooks and our guide, plus us 4 = a big group! In retrospect we should have saved ourselves some money by doing the trip with less support. A challenge we would have all been up for. Oh well!
As soon as night fell it became freezing – so we huddled round our fire, me with ALL my clothes on that I’d bought with me. I realised I had misjudged just how cold it gets!DAY 2: The next day we hiked at a leisurely place up to Lake Ellis where the boys both swam, starkers. Crazy things- it was freezing! Then went on to a very pretty waterfall before making our way to a cave where we would spend the night. The porters (who always took the more direct route) had set up our tent and had a good fire going for us on arrival. Although The Cave itself was pretty dismal - definitely the campsite we enjoyed the least.
Our meals were prepared for us by the 2 cooks and were great. We would have pancakes, eggs, sausages(not me obviously) and cereal and fruit for breakfast. Sarmies, nuts and more fruit for lunch, followed by rice or potatoes and veggies and meat for supper. Followed by more fruit. Hot chocolate, tea and coffee would be bought to us regularly and it was much appreciated with the chilly weather. It was great to not have to do any of our own cooking and cleaning... although with all of us being seasoned campers we wouldn’t have minded!

DAY 3: The next day we did another easy paced, non taxing hike to Lake Michaelson which has to be the most amazing spot on the whole mountain. The beautiful glassy lake is surrounded by dramatic cliffs and is fed from water running off the glacier. Another chance the boys couldn’t resist – so again, they swam starkers in the minus 2000 degree icy water!
The scenery that day was just spectacular. And the birdlife, the fauna and the flora all very interesting throughout the trip. Collin and Mandy were great to have around as they really know their birds and plants.
It rained a lot that afternoon so we were forced to huddle in our tent... which was my large family dome tent, a cheapo I bought at Game 8 years ago that has stood me well. It was not waterproof though so things got a little wet. All part of the fun I guess. We had a dry night thank goodness, although very cold....we were at 3900m after all.
DAY 4: The following morning a helicopter came impressively circling and swooping over us and landed 500m away. Several people then got out and did some fly fishing for a couple of hours before flying off again. The whole episode made Collin super envious- he would have done anything to have had his fishing rod with him. But what a spectacular trip those tourists must have had, flying in to remote destinations and fishing in secluded lakes. WOW!
We hung around at the lake the whole morning while our porters and cooks tried unsuccessfully to catch fish. Their attempts were quite comical really.
The hike to the next spot was steep but not long and we did it in the drizzle.
I had to stay at a hut on a lower level (4200m) because of the altitude, so Benedikt, Collin and Mandy hiked with the guide to a higher spot and camped at 4600m that night – in a snow blizzard! The tent was certainly not snow proof either!
DAY 5: In my sisters words: "The Summit was out of this world. We left Wewies at 4000m and the 3 of us slept at the foot of the peak Lenana 4998m. We slept in a snow blizzard, in the funny tent from Game!! Ha ha it was so funny. I had about 20 layers of clothes on and didnt sleep much. The scenery on the way up was just to die for. Photos will tell all. So when we awoke at 4,30am (I was wide eyed and ready to hike all night!) to summit it was pitch black and our tent was 3 inches deep in snow! It was so exciting. As we summited the sun was glowing orange through the clouds. C and I have never been so high and it was rather breathtaking. A wonderful moment I will NEVER forget. You could see for miles. Incredible.
We were down with Wewies for breakfast at 8am. (C and I got quite sick on the way down, massive headcahes and I vomited a little bit! LOSERS!)"
All in all it was a great experience. It is a beautiful mountain and is relatively untouched by humankind. Apparently Kilimanjaro is a bit more touristy. If we had to do it again we would do it on our own, without a guide or porters or anything - which is permitted on Mt Kenya....not like Kili where you have to have a guide. We were not impressed with our guide. At all!
Apparently we went through 7 different biomes on the way up: rain forest, bamboo forest, normal forest, fynbos type vegetation, a rocky cactus layer, bare volcanic rock moonscape type stuff and lastly the scree. Well those are my guesses to the 7 layers anyway.

We had a hectic trip back down the last part of the mountain in the car- it had been raining heavily and the bad dirt road was just a mud bath. The 26kms took us 2 hours to do with all the slipping sliding. Then we got stuck for hours in typical Nairobi traffic – a real eye opener for Collin and Mandy. At one stage, Collin asked Benedikt in a very diplomatic way, ‘So what was it on your pre-trip to Nairobi that made you say yes to the position?’! ha ha ha.... I think Collin and Mandy’s romantic view of a beautiful Out of Africa type Kenya was shattered that day!