Route:
Barranco Camp (3950m) to Barafu Camp (4600m)

Time:
6 hours

Outfit:
Forget, will remember later.

Woke up on a hill. This explains why everytime I woke up, I was halfway down the tent. You see, there was no perspective when we got to camp yesterday, but after making it out the tent to an amazing view of the clouds and curvature of the earth below, it was easy to see why – we were on a hill.

T and I smartened up and zipped together the sleeping bags last night and boy did that make a difference in warmth.

Breakfast this morning was another dose of toast, crispy fried eggs and potato pancakes. I made a fucking awesome sandwich and demolished it within seconds. We set out amidst a beautiful sunny morning and almost immediately were welcome by very steep and somewhat challenging terrain.

Throughout the day, I would say we encountered the most diverse kinds of terrain so far. This was cool because it separated our trip into segments. As I mentioned the first was steep grade and rocky. We had to put away the poles for this area because it was so steep we had to use our hands for some parts. At points we were right against cliffs. It was really fun knowing that any miscalculation and casplat ya done kid. This area was very rewarding however because at the too, we had an amazing 360 degree view. You could see the summit perfectly along with all the glaciers and behind you were just clouds for days. There were a lot of people resting and hanging out here and t and I met a young lad who just graduated from Indiana U and grew up in Goshen, In – a town of about 3000 where one of my aunts lives. He also is moving out so san Francisco as soon as he gets back so I gave him my card.

The next section felt counter productive at some points. We descended as far as we had just climbed only to have to climb back up again to our lunch spot. Much of the descent was on wet rock which at points was pretty slippery so you had to take the utmost care with every step. This section was rocky, and dusty, and sometimes wet.

Lunch was most of the usual – chicken, watermelon, candy bar, pineapple juice box, and cookies. I continued on with some starburst, some skittles and split a butterfinger with t. All the sugar amped me up later on. The view at lunch was also superb.

The next section was marked by volcanic rock. It was incredible and made me fantasize of when the volcano was actually active and what it must have looked like. Throughout the past few days, all along the trail, you’d see rock piles stacked on top of larger rocks. This area seemed to be the Mecca. I took pictures upon pictures of the different stacks for a book I plan to make called “Rock Stacks of Kilamanjaro.”. It was during this section of the say that I just felt a jolt of energy and just seemed to power ahead of T and Tim. This was good though because I would just stop and take pictures and allow them to catch up.

The final section before the last steep ascent to camp was probably my favorite. It was flat, but the cool part was that there shattered granite EVERYWHERE. This was remnants from the last eruption as well. It was fucking awesome. For most of the day I kept thinking about how much my friend Smith would like climbing Kilamanjaro. Another cool part about doing this type of climb is that you get to meet people from all over the world. We’ve met people from Netherlands, Italy, Toronto, Santa Barbara, New York, you name it.

When I got to camp, I got lost because the area is so rocky. I had went ahead because Temu and T were moving so slowly and I was amped up on friggen candy bars. Whats cool about the rocky part is that we have our own little area.

Update: 5:05pm
Just had pasta bolognese. Friggen amazing at 4600m. Saidi made fun of me because for the past few nights we’ve been bringing back extras. THANKS T. I’ve been eating one and a half meals every day this trip so when I’ve gained weight after hiking 6+ hours for six days straight, I think I’ll know why.

Update: 6:00pm
Temu just came to our tent and informed us wed be woken up at 11:30pm with tea and biscuits to hike to begin our hike to the summit at midnight. WAIT WHAT?! Totally thought that was tomorrow at midnight. In any event. I’m absolutely pumped that I’ll be summiting the highest point of Africa in pitch black environment with only the light from our headlamps just so I can see sunset at the top. Talk to you in a bit. I should get some rest.