Mount Kenya Day Two

DAY 2

Unfortunately, that night I wasn’t able to sleep as soundly as I‘d hoped, I knew we had a 25km hike ahead of us so I was less than thrilled to have been woken up at various times thought the night number of reasons. First, Musumba woke me to ask for help getting out of his sleeping bag because he had to use the rest room. After obliging his first request, I was less than enthused to hold the flash light over the stall door for him. This chilly break from my cozy bed was concluded by once again tucking Musumba into his sleeping bag. Ahhhh, back to sleep… but not for long.

“Eric… Eric….. Eric… ERIC!!!” “What?” I replied to Edwin what couldn’t have been an hour after Musumba’s bathroom break. “I need to pee.” Ugh, out of bed I crawled and repeated Musumba’s requests, only this time for the other teacher. After zipping Edwin into his bag, I once again crawled into mine, sure I would be able to sleep peacefully for the rest of the night.

Wrong! Only this time nature was calling me. Returning from my third trip to the bathroom I said a little prayer for a restful remainder of the night. Unfortunately for me, the Big Guy upstairs must have been doing more important things and I was once again awoken by Edwin. “Eric, torch please. I’m stuck in the bag. I can’t move.” Out of bed I crawled yet again to assist Edwin with his issue.

My sleep was interrupted for the last time at 5am when the students, who are used to waking up early, began talking quite loudly in anticipation for the day to come. I again got out of bed after Laurel asked me to talk to them, insisting the students respond better to male teachers. Yeah, sure they do lazy-bones. I went over to the rooms where the boys were sleeping, or rather, not sleeping, and told them we would be sleeping until 6:30. Surprisingly, they kept fairly quiet and I had the most restful hour and a half I had that whole night.
Waking up for me is always rough, and that day was no exception, but I was excited for the day to come, so I was running on adrenaline. We munched on a delicious breakfast prepared by the porters and were once again hiking by 7:30. The scenery on the mountain was quite incredible. It reminded me of the breathtaking scenery in the Lord of The Rings. There were rolling hills all up the side of the mountain, with the majestic peaks in the background, looming over us our entire journey. Then, to turn around and look off the mountain into the vast plains of the Rift Valley was amazing. I’m sure we could see at least a hundred kilometers, through the haze of the warmth below. However, it was still quite cool where we were. I was very excited to see that the evening’s weather had brought frost. As we were hiking from 11,000 feet up to 14,000 feet, we could definitely feel the altitude taking a toll on us. At one point, I was hiking behind Laurel who was walking like a frat boy stumbling out of a bar on St. Patty‘s Day. She was definitely becoming a bit ataxic so I decided this would be a good time to stop and rest to take an Oreo break. (Thanks for sending those Mama Bear!)

As we continued, the students began to ask questions about home. Many of them focused on snow, what it was like, and how we coped with it. We also talked about transportation, languages we spoke, and different laws we had. Bruce wanted to know if most people traveled by matatus in America like they do here. We found that quite funny. I really liked watching the kids play with the frost and the ice sheets from the tiny pools of water as we hiked up. At one of our rest stops, I took some of the ice and much to the students’ amusement, put it down Edwin’s back. This started a trend, and Edwin soon retaliated, much to my dismay. As we continued toward our destination, I was surprised and interested to learn that during the dry season, the elephants in the area come up to where we were to eat the mountain cabbages. It is really amazing to think that an animal so big is able to make the trek at such elevation.

Finally, we made it to our stopping point. It was on top of a beautiful ridge, overlooking a valley with the peaks just beyond. Had we had time to hike another two days, we could’ve been on Point Lenana, the highest one can climb without technical climbing skills, but where we stopped was just fine for this trip. I think what we experienced, the different vegetation as we got higher, and the extremes in temperature and elevation, are things these kids, and I for that matter, won’t soon forget.

- Eric