Day 2 - Intense Sun and Rain - 8 Hours of hik

Date: Friday, September 18, 2009 Time: 8:30pm Tanzania, 1:30pm EDT, 10:30am PDT Location: Kikelewa Camp - Nalemaru (Rongai) Route Altitude: Start: 8500 ft Lunch: Simba Camp Camp: Kikelewa Camp 11,900 ft Hiking Time: 8 hours We don't know if any comments came in about how many ascents our chief guide, Frederick, has made. In fact, in checking on the number there was a fair amount of controversy over the number but we have finalized the results with E&Y auditing the results - and the number is 394 amazing times. Our leader, Dr. Sue Hollenberg, commented on the day, "the team is strong, cohesive and having a lot of laughs. It is important to remember to enjoy yourself on this hike (Rule #4 from Seamus) and not fret too much about the next leg of the journey." Today was the second longest day of the week long ascent - the only longer day is when we hike to the summit at 19,340' from 15,000' then descend to 12,300' for a total of 13 - 15 hours. Tonight we sleep with hats on as it will be close to 0 degrees C. The team today not only had a long day but a varied weather day. For an hour in the morning we had intense equatorial sun that heated everyone up, then in the afternoon we had an hour of medium hard rain and we were wearing three layers of upper body clothing. In only two days we have gone from a shower before we left to very dusty and dirty, it will be interesting to see us after we are finished! Over the next two days we will have a fair amount of free time once we reach our next camp at 14,000'. The purpose is to acclimatize so that we can make the very difficult final route to the summit. We will try to post more pictures as we have some great shots of the team and terrain. This e-mail was delivered via satellite phone using OCENS.Mail software.