January 14th 2007

Walking Time 5:30 hours / Altitude Difference 3600 - 4600 - 3965 m / Temperature morning 0° C, afternoon 10° C / 5 hours Rain + Fog / Altitude Sickness: I had a very bad headache

...6 am! We got out of our sleeping bags and wanted to get out of the tent – the zipper was frozen for the first time like most of the outer layer of the tent.

But the scenery was again grand. The mountain presented itself in all its glory every evening and every morning and it was a great experience every time. Maybe the comparison fits: if you see something all the time you don’t actually “see it” at all. But every time we got to see our mountain we cherished the sight not only with our eyes but also feeling the true magnificence of it in our hearts. And every time it showed itself it was coming nearer and nearer…

Above the Clouds

The Crew packing up

We again left at 8:45 am in the direction of the Lava Tower, we would be “walking high and sleeping low” today! We started off doing a pretty quick tempo and covered a good distance. The landscape was becoming more barren, almost no vegetation anymore. The ground covered with lava stone.

And then it happened again – the world vanished right before our wary eyes. The clouds had swallowed us and it became sinister, haunted and…very cold!

We met Irmela at the foot of the Lava Tower during lunch. A very nice woman – actually German, who grew up in Namibia and had lived the past 18 years in Switzerland. She wanted to do the ascent with a friend of hers who lived in Arusha. Her friend had cancelled the tour because of the weather forecast. And of course we spoke about the weather. She told us that it hadn’t rained a single drop in January for the last 9 years – oh, what great news! And that the mountain was covered with more snow than in the last 25 years (thinking about our vacations in Scotland and France I just couldn’t stop thinking about this being Tina’s and my fault…).

There was also a camp site at the Lava Tower for other routes. I’m sorry to say that the whole place was full of litter – good thing it was quite foggy…

Lava Tower 4600 m

Our everyday mid-afternoon rain started again only that it poured today. But the weather wasn’t the worst thing for me. Just after arriving at the Lava Tower I had first signs of altitude sickness. I had a very bad headache on its way and I actually started swaying – shit! Deusi our guide looked at me and must have said to himself, „Oh, I guess it’s time to descent to the camp site – quick!“. The wind was blowing quite strong and in it my poncho and I wasn’t able to see my steps all of the time and then it happened… I wanted to hold back a step but the weight of my back pack pushed me forwards so that I slipped and fell onto my knee and hands. F*ckin’ Shit!

We passed Senecien as tall as a (wo)man) and kept on descending – each and every step pounding in my head – finally reaching the Camp Barranco.

Camp Barranco surrounded by mighty Clouds

After our arrival I just wanted to relax. Like everyday I prepared our “bedroom”. I had to take a short rest. Baz also had a headache so that Tina and Martin were the only ones to drink the afternoon tea. Martin can’t speak a word of German and Tina can do so many other things then speak English but somehow they communicated with each other. Martin – the guy without any equipment – had washed his socks and pulled them over a hot bottle so that they could get dry – all you need are ideas! I joined them a little later on and drank tea and then water. Our guide told me that I’d recover with no problem at all – I’d just have to drink plenty of water. I was doing really bad but I still didn’t want to take any aspirin (I didn’t anyway!) Again we held out in our tent and waited for the clouds to pass by which they did with a tremendous speed!

0 sec.

5 sec.

10 sec.

15 sec.

We had a very tasty stew for dinner with tons of meat in it. It was served by our “waiter” Ari. This guy loved his work. He did his job with such a great devotion – every morning, afternoon and evening – daily. First he covered the table with a tablecloth, then he folded our napkins and then he placed fork, knife and spoon accurately beside the plate. We were served like kings -  "Asante, Ari!"

After dinner Deusi came into the tent to speak with us about tomorrow’s route. He looked at me in a slightly depressed fashion and said, “Everything will be fine!” - "Akuna matata?" Yeah, right! No problem! Tina and I went back into our tent and played 20 up again. I drank 3 more liters of water after having drunken 4 liters during the day and all of a sudden my headache just almost vanished. Tina caressed me until I fell asleep. I woke up several times because of the amount of water I had drunken. And although I had made myself a hot water bottle (the water was kept hot until needed in our thermos flask) I still got cold in the morning…

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