MOZAMBIQUE

It turned out that it was the Mozambiquan money that ended and not the road, so a few metres back we discovered the 2 track dust bowl that served as the highway through northern Mozambique. It was so remote that other than a few straggly huts with even fewer inhabitants (a miracle for Africa!) we didn't pass a single soul for hours as we made our way through the dense dry trees and perpetual red dust. Shaun got ridiculously exited as we spotted some big cat tracks on the road, but time was not on our side and a breakdown would have added about another 2 months onto our trip given the estimated waiting time for another vehicle, so we hastily pushed on South.

Eventually we crawled into Mocimboa De Praia just as the sun was dipping behind the sea in the distance and we headed straight to the only campsite in town where we suddenly discovered that we spoke NO Portugese and that the Mozambiquans spoke no English. Thankfully we found a common language (Swahili)so we managed to get ourselves a camping spot and at least get shown the way to the showers where we enjoyed them cold under a star studded night sky.

From Mocimboa, the road thankfully became a graded dirt road which made our going slightly faster - a life saver given the sheer distances between towns in this very remote part of this very lengthy country. The roads weren't exactly even however and we spent much of our time enjoying the sensation of driving on an indoor cycling track as we tilted either left or right depending on which side of the road had less potholes. Thankfully Shaun decided to glance up at the tent from his side mirror only to find himself glancing at the cloudless sky with the tent nowhere in sight. We screetched to a stop in a dust cloud and clambered out frantically to find that the bolts that held our tent to the roof racks had come loose and the tent, althought thankfully still on the car, was now leening precariously off to the one side and would probably have slid right off on the next tilt. So the toolbox came out and Shaun and I set about trying to fix the situation with the mid afternoon sun beating down on our exposed skin. It didn't take long before a group of Mozambiquan men had appeared out of nowhere and had assembled to assess the situation, chattering seriously amongst themselves and thankfully staying out of our hot and frustrated way. 2 hours later, we determined that there was not much we could do other than to strap the tent on and sort it out when we got to camp, so while Shaun swore and sweated, I turned to the group of assembled men and tried to communicate what had happened with ridiculously over-the-top hand signals. The group had by this time chosen a spokesperson who with a wide toothy grin nodded his head vigourously and using the same ridiculous sign language confirmed that after much deliberation, they had come to the same conclusion. They then wanted cigarettes for their effort of sitting on the side of the road, which we could obviously not give them. After much deliberation, we decided to sacrifice our highly anticipated afternoon biscuits to which we got ungrateful and disgruntled looks, so Shaun hastily whisked me back into the car before I could take my precious biscuits back...





Late that afternoon as we drove along a palm fringed sand track with a cold beer in hand, we were reminded of the sheer untouched beauty of Northern Mozambique and we arrived at the best campsite of our entire trip just as the sun was setting over the returning fishing dows, white sails puffed out by the gentle evening breeze. Praia de Pongane is a tiny fishing village on a spit of land jutting out into the Indian Ocean on the tip of which, a Mozambiquan by the name of Hassim opened a campsite situated on the edge of the gently lapping waves, on soft white sand and shaded only by tall palm trees. As we drove in however, we were greeted by our most favourite sight: a massive overland truck with tents dotted all over the campsite. Thankfully it was an older group of Spanish tourists who were more interested in diving out shells and buying undersized crayfish than partying so we got along alright and when they left 2 nights later, we had the whole place to ourselves. We spent the days lounging in the warm water with cold vodka-tonics, feasting on massive fresh crayfish and generally avoiding falling coconuts - oh, and we spent an entire day trying to fix our tent.


Thinking we still had many such wonders awaiting us in the rest of Mozambique, we packed up after four days and headed south to Pemba. Unfortunately the road got even better and gradually upgraded to tar, which meant that every GP registered beer and boerewors brigade member had either opened a campsite/hotel or was there entering a fishing competition of some sort. We stayed at a really nice campsite on the lagoon side of Pemba but the overwhelming phyto plankton that made swimming through the mangroves feel like electric shock therapy made us pack up after 2 days and head off in search of greener pastures..


Chocos just north of Ilha de Mozambique had come highly recommended so we headed to the remote village with great anticipation. It was on the dirt road travelling at 50km's per hour however that our luck with animals came to an abrupt halt when a suicidal chicken, clearly fed up with the life of pecking at scraps, decided to make a mad dash from 50m off the side of the road to right under our right back tyre where her run came to an ubrupt halt in a cloud of white feathers that would have made Mardi Gras participants proud. Shaun was at the wheel and still in the process of claiming the point when a pigeon flew into his closed window and dropped dead on the road. And then, just as we turned our attention back on the road after looking at each incredulously, killer Shaun drove over a tortoise which had mistakenly thought it was having a fast day. Needless to say, given our current run of luck, Choccos was a dissapointment as we camped in the middle of nowhere surrounded by dense bush having to listen to the waves in the very far off distance through shells held to our ears


Ilha de Mozambique was a welcome historic interlude to our beach and animal carnage as we spent the day firstly trying to ge our monstrous car over the 2km long ridiculously narrow bridge, then trying to navigate it through the ridiculously narrow streets, and then avoiding the ridiculously abundant touts while taking in the old buildings and streets of what used to be Mozambique's capital way back when the Portugese still had more influence than just the name of the local steak roll.
And then came 2 days of solid driving. 2150km's over 2 days meant that we were up at 4:30am and only stopped 13hrs later. It was on one of these days that I won the points game as a goat decided to Asafa Powell his way to under my front right tyre, prematurely ending his days with a barely discernable thump. Our two hideous days of driving were thankfully broken up by a gem of a find in the form of a new lodge and campsite on the banks of the mighty Zambezi (yes, it was the second time we had crossed it on our travels) and we managed to watch the sun set while washing off the dust and goat guilt in the cool swimming pool.

Right, so Vilankulos was going to be our final Eden before the whole adventure came to an end. That is, until we actually got there. The first campsite we didn't even bother to stop at as we were greeted by 2 massive overland trucks taking up the entire campsite, so we made a turn around the tree and continued right back out of the gate, much to the guard's amusement. Next stop was a campsite owned by South Africans who must obviously not have been at their own place to have noticed that each campsite was on a slope that would have excited snowboarders had there been snow, that the staff could not be bothered to light the donkeys for hot water showers or that half of the toilets didn't even flush. And this being the most expensive campsite we had experienced on our entire trip, of course there would be no toilet paper. But there was an awesome rim-flow pool so we stayed for 2 nights . . .

In utter desperation to end our trip on a high and relaxing note, we headed to the tiny village of Morrungula because our GPS said that there were 3 campsites, so at least we had choice. We drove to each one and eventually headed 7km's out of town to a place which the GPS said was still under construction - desperate times call for desperate measures. When we arrived, we headed to the inviting dive centre with its colourful flags, posters and boats since we were dying to get some dives under our belts before the cold Cape Town water sucked the scuba love right out of us. We got to chatting to the South Africans (But they were from Richard's Bay!!!) who owned the dive shop. It turned out that there was no camping, but Dave quickly got onto the phone to the owner who was in SA and who promptly gave us a chalet for half the price we would have paid for camping at the other resorts. So we stayed for 5 days thinking that we would dive to our heart's content. . .

That was until the South Easter reared its ugly head and made heading out on a boat a definite lunch regurgitator, so each morning we would wake up, walk to the dune to look at the sea, only to find it on it's head and not dive friendly. We still got to enjoy the company of the staff at Bonito Bay Resort over a few braais, and even had the resident dogs camped out on our veranda for our entire stay excluding feeding time. On our second last day, just around lunch, the tide was low and the sea looked like it could welcome a couple of desperate divers, so we hastily got the boat down to the sea, launched it into the pounding surf with the help of a few of the nearby villagers who decided to rather jump onto the boat instead of holding it in the water each time a wave came, and headed out to the dive site with only one working motor. Just as we stopped over the site and I started staring back at the inviting dunes to ward off the queaziness the huge waves were inducing, we all heard a slow hissing sound emanating from somewhere it wasn't supposed to be coming from. It was then that the skipper realised that in his haste to get us out, he had forgotten to put the bungs in place, so we were slowly sinking. Thankfully he got us safely back to shore before we scuba dived on the boat and we were left with only our last day to possibly do a dive.

We were joined the next morning by two guys from yes, you guessed it: JHB, who were on a boys holiday. They were both well travelled and generally pretty awesome guys who actually listened to me without laughing when I talked about the mechanics of our car though, so they were rated pretty highly in my books anyway. The sea was much better so we were in with a chance of finally being able to eat the home made muffins that accompanied divers. We headed off in high spirits and were soon over the dive site putting on our gear. Shaun and I were both pretty nervous as we hadn't dived in a while but before we knew it, Dave was telling us it was time to go under and I was still trying to de-mist my mask! Shaun and I had bragged to Dave about what good buddies we were but by the time I made it to the bottom, Shaun was nowhere to be seen. The visibility was about 1m so I frantically started singing the "Wide open spaces" song and signalled to dave that my buddy was gone. To cut a dramatically long story short, it was a nightmare of a dive as everyone lost each other in the current, the non-existant viz making relocation of lost buddies impossible but which proved to be highly entertaining for the skipper who could clearly see everyone's bubbles barely 2m's away from each other but kept having to drop resurfacing lost divers back on the buoy line. The dive only lasted 30 minutes but at least Shaun and I avoided having to do a refresher course and we were allowed to tuck into the muffins on the ride back in to shore!!


And then it was all over. It ended with a last stop at the same campsite we stopped at on our first Mozambique trip just north of Maputo, a portugese chicken meal from the restaurant, a final chat with fellow travellers and the final boiling of the kettle on our gas stove for our final flask of coffee for the early start the next day. When I had my first fight with the spade on the roof that hot night on the Orage River in Namibia, I was ready to call it quits even before it started. 6 months later I wanted to do it all over again! If I could change anything however, it would be to add a bigger variety of music to my i-pod, because 24 668km's later, even Dire Straights get a bit monotonous.

The Coast of Kenya & Tanzania

We were able to spend an extra day in our favourite country, however our time was spent in the hospitals and crowded doctors' rooms as a result of Shaun suffering from severe chest pains. SO much so that the poor doctor at the hospital had to ignore a patient practically passing out from not having had her penicilin shot to come to the aid of Shaun who thought that he was coming to the end of his very eventful life. 2 hours at the hospital and another 2 at a surprisingly efficient clinic where Shaun was again given priority over the other less urgent sick and deadly cases later, and Shaun was diagnosed with a severe case of hypocondria and given some anti-inflamatories - it was a tight muscle in his neck. Nevertheless, once we emerged into the sunshine from the congregation of human suffering we were welcomed by Tanzanians dining along the side of the road to join them at their restaurant and were treated to possibly one of the best meals we had had for a while - not hard having come fron Kenya!

But far too soon, Kenya called once more and we hobbled along her bad roads to see what the coast had to offer. Once again, our bad perception of Kenya was saved by the hospitality of friends from Seychelles who were there visiting family and invited us to stay. So we experienced Mombassa from the luxury of a family home while enjoying the company of friends! We did force ourselves to leave our sanctuary to take a stroll down the streets of Old Town and fight our way through the school crowds at Fort Jesus but our shameful highlight was an evening at the Go-karting track! Unfortunately my dreams of taking on Mark Webber were shattered as I crawled in second last but no one realised as everyone was somewhat more embarassed about being lapped about 100 times by Natasha's dad!

Malindi a little north of Mombassa was dissapointing in that we once more found ourselves camped on a questionable patch of grass in the middle of nowhere, desperately clutching onto our clothes when braving the shower so as not to drop them in the conglomeration of about 20 years worth of mould and wishing for the re-emergence of platfrom shoes onto the fashion runways so as to avoid the accumulation of toilet matter on the side of the pit toilet that had also never been cleaned! But there is one way to make yourself forget all this, and that is spending money! Lots of money on kokois and sandals and an extravagant lunch and 2 drinks each! We did also take the time to visit the Gedi ruins of an old Arab trading settlement but the 10 year old building donated by the EU that served as an entrance looked more like a ruin.

Kenya did however finally redeem herself when we travelled a little south of Mombassa to the tiny beach village of Tiwi, where we camped amidst lush palm trees practically on top of the beach with working and almost clean showers and toilets that actually flushed! And when we saw a GP registered Land Rover pull in, we wasted little time in going to introduce ourselves and enjoy some different conversation again. As it turns out Kobus (from SA) and his wife Krista (Canadian) live in Dar es Salaam so the four of us soon got to chatting like old friends and we practically didn't leave them, joining them in their camp for sundowners each evening.

The last item on our Kenya itinerary was a snorkel in a reserve on the southern border but when we found out it cost R1000 for the half day trip, we spent our last night on another questionable patch of grass in someone's backyard and made a beeline for the border the next day!

As fate would have it, we crossed the border on the weekend when all of Kenya and Tanzania celebrated the end of Ramadan, so although the border post was open and as efficient as ever, we couldn't get 3rd party insurance anywhere, and of course we would get stopped by the police for only the 2nd time on our trip when we don't have 3rd party insurance! With the football world cup being very much over, there was little we could chat about to distract them, but Shaun's winning smile managed to get us off with a promise that we would get in the next town. With everything being closed however, we skirted along the dirt roads like two kids who had just stolen the last liquorice allsort and ended up staying in a different place closer to town so that we could get insurance once the weekend ended. Run by expats, each campsite had its own boma with electricity, the showers were clean, hot and even had hooks AND a shelf for your clothes, and the toilets actually flushed too! SO we stayed a little longer just in case we would never see such luxuries again! After a brief stop in Bagamoyo just north of Dar to see some more old buildings and carved doors, we headed to the sanctuary of our new friends Kobus and Krista's house where we were staying for the night and leaving our car - our company around the campfire obviously hadn't been THAT bad!

Zanzibar was always going to be a treat but Shaun had obviously had Rockerfeller flakes for breakfast because the hotel I chose with clean bed, en-suite bathroom and flush toilet were aparently not good enough and I was frogmarched further into the narrow alleys of Stone Town to one of the hotels listed in the "Top End" section of our guide book. OK, it was housed in an old palace complete with princess balconies and mosiac pool so I didn't put up much of a fight, and we spent our three days there exploring the maize of alleys with intricately carved wooden doors from the luxury of our air-conditioned hotel room. The evenings were spent rubbing elbows with what must have been every single other tourist on Zanzibar over cocktails at historic Africa House while watching the sun set over dhows and waving palms. We did still manage to keep some of the traveller in us and braved the night market for food each night. African politics however delayed our departure as the larger and more luxurious ferry simply didn't depart as scheduled because it was being kept for some fat government official, so we were all kept sitting on the dock for 3 hours in the raging sun until the official decided he would arrive, and we all pushed our way like animals onto the ferry, everyone fearing that we wouldn't get space. By the time we eventually left, the sea was wild from the wind and not even a bad Sly Stalone movie could keep everyone from reintroducing their breakfast to the world. Shaun had no qualms as he grazed his way through an entire Pringles tube, while I had to stare out at the horizon and block out the wretching noises coming from just about everywhere!

We spent one more night in luxury with Kobus treating us to a good old South African potjie and far too many drinks before we headed south for one more Arab ruin (aparently the most important on the East Coast) at Kilwa Masoko and then hit the road to Mozambique over the newly built Unity Bridge, which replaced the rickety old boat that used to take vehicles and passengers accross the river.

The young border offifials on the Mozam side were far more interested in chatting to their friends than checking our paperwork and before we knew it we were trying to dust the cobwebbs off of our Portugese from South America 3 years ago. As we were still throwing out all of the 3 words we could remember however, the brand new tar road we were so enthusiastically travelling on just stopped and dissapeared into a tangle of bushes . . .

KENYA & KILIMANJARO

There are very few moments when Shaun's command of the English language enables him to describe something perfectly, but Kenya seemed to bring out one of these rare moments when he summed the country up perfectly in one word: dilapidated. The roads were like adolescent teens, pockmarked and rebellious and rendered our progress almost nonexistent! We were caught driving at night as our GPS suddenly jumped 2 hours back thanks mostly to the car engulfing potholes and the maniacal driving of the buses and trucks which meant we were pulling over to avoid death more often than not. After managing to cover all of our clothing in mud on our Mnt Elgon hike, we were in desperate need of a decent campsite with tap so that we could wash all of our belongings and make ourselves feel human again so we headed for a tea plantation on the western side of Kenya. Thankfully we got there well after sunset so the camping facilities could make little impression, however the expensive camping prices and ablution facilities that seemed like they had been forgotten by housekeeping for the last 5 years did make us wonder somewhat.

And then the morning sunshine revealed all. What was once expansive tea plantation was now interspersed with subsistence farming plots and once the pouring afternoon rain set in and wet our 4 loads of washing and we retreated to what we thought would be the luxury of the hotel lounge, the true horror of the place was revealed! The blue floral wallpaper was so old it was pealing itself off the walls in shame and the green velvet chairs seemed to invite a herd of grazing cows more than the reluctant patrons sipping tea and wondering what on earth they were actually doing in a place as ridiculous as this! For some reason however, we managed to spend 3 nights in this set from Al'o Al'o thanks to the fact that our washing had to be timed with the morning sun and not the afternoon showers!

Eventually we dragged ourselves away from the cold electrical showers and the flooding toilets with no toilet paper and headed down to the Masai Mara. Now we had seen far too much game by this stage, but you cannot visit Kenya and not go to the Masai Mara. We spent out first night just outside the boundary on the banks of a sandy river overlooking the grazing herds of wildebeest at a fraction of what it would cost to stay inside, but this little money saver also served as our first introduction into Kenyan camping facilities which would make Kericho Tea Hotel look like the Four Seasons. Kenyans insist on pit latrines, which would be fine if they were maintained and cleaned like the Asian ones, but these aren't and induce possibly the most rapid latrine sessions on record! Our entrance into the reserve the next day was also rather chaotic as Shaun decided to not only look at the curios on sale by the Masai women at the gate, but actually ventured as far as asking the price of something, an action when performed amongst a cluster of curio stalls is somewhat like poking a stick into a hornets nest and thrashing it around wildly. I ran to the car for cover and "hapana sante'd" my way from the safety of the car while Shaun was mobbed and had me swearing profusely at him to boot! The wardens at the gate however were far more useful and friendly than their friends at Serengeti and recommended an awesome campsite right on the border with Serengeti on a river. Unfortunately we spent that afternoon watching 3 lion so when we returned to the campsite and found we were utterly by ourselves with the sun having set and the toilet and shower block 100m away through thick lion-cover grass, we hastily built our fire and tried to cook dinner while Shaun repeatedly scanned the surrounding bushes for encroaching wildlife - often more on his exposed side than on mine! That night we were also kept awake by the roar of lion which came far too close than was necessary and had me hatching escape plans into the safety of our car. Fortunately the sun cam up just as I was about to make a run for it and brought with it our usual daylight false sense of security! We spent the rest of the morning being engulfed by herds of wildebeest that stretched as far as the eye could see and truly getting our migration experience!

As though we haven't had enough of lakes either, we decided to make a stop at Lake Naivasha for 2 nights where the Kenyan pit latrines earned an even worse reputation and then headed south on the first decent road into Nairobi. Nairobi turned out to be the best treat and hugely successful as we managed to find all of our missing equipment for our assault on Kilimanjaro (even a size 13 pair of hiking boots for Shaun) while trawling the malls reminiscent of the glossy walkways of Cavendish Square. The best par however was the fact that we were able to stay with friends in a home with walls, a massive clean shower with HOT water and sleep in a clean and comfortable bed with white bed linen! Shaun and I did shower twice before contemplating touching the bed but once we did it was glory! Unfortunately staying with friends meant that we sat talking until the small hours of the morning and ended up drinking far too much red wine and eating mounds of home cooked food - not a good idea a few days before climbing the tallest mountain in Africa! Shaun actually enjoyed himself so much that he purposefully chose not to buy the only pair of gloves that fit him so that he had an excuse to stay an extra night!

Unfortunately we could only procrastinate so much but managed to fit in a one night stop at Amboseli NP which sits on the lower slopes of Klimanjaro, in order to get the picture of elephants walking with Kili in the background which graces the cover of our atlas. It was a rather expensive attempt at a photographic opportunity as Kili maintained her shrouded veil of mist despite the ellies making a good show of it all afternoon. We also realised that this would be our last national park as boredom set in far too early and we entertained ourselves rather illegally by playing the Hyena-call ring tone on our phone to a lone hyena who spent 30 minutes running around our car looking for the source of the call!

And then it was time for the activity which had been occupying our thoughts and actions for the better part of a month, as well as our budget for the better part of a year . . .

KILIMANJARO (OR KILEMACHJARO IN SWAHILI MEANING BIG HILL . . . NO SH*T!)

We decided on doing the 6 day Machame route as opposed to the 5 day "coca cola" Marangu not because we would intentionally chose an extra day on a freezing mountain for fun, but because it gives an extra day for acclimatisation which gives you a better chance of summitting - something rather important when you are paying that much money! Hiking from 1800m to 5895m above sea level was apparently not something to take lightly so our guide came and checked that he as happy with all of our gear before he would take us up the next day. I'm not quite sure if this was reassuring or scared us even more but before we knew it, we were being picked up and riven to the start of the route.

The first day was an easy introduction as we hiked through rain forest to our first campsite at 2900m. The hike itself only took 4 hours and it was surprisingly not the 170 other hikers on the route that got in our way. but more the 8 porters which accompanied every 2 hikers who pushed their way passed with their 24kg bundles on their heads and backs. Kili had not yet revealed herself to us as we arrived at our campsite that afternoon so we sat around chatting to other hikers to kill time. At exactly 6pm however, her misty scarf suddenly just evaporated and we were all left gawking at the sheer height and beauty of what we still had to conquer. Conversation died down quickly and we all went to bed!

The following 2 days were also relatively easy as we hiked to 3500m and then to 3900m via a 4600m acclimatisation accent respectively through what is known as heather and moorland but look more like the marshes around Mordor. Morale was high as we were all conned into thinking that this couldn't possibly be THAT bad! . . . Day four tried its best to shatter our illusion as the hike became increasingly steep, but we were all far too arrogant at this stage to listen to what the mountain was trying to tell us. We arrived at camp at 4600m at 4pm, had dinner at 5:30pm and were in bed by 6:30pm in preparation for our assault on the summit at 12am.

We managed intermittent sleep as nerves got the better of us and before we were ready, we received our wake-up call. Getting up at 11am at 4600m is about as fun as swimming naked with a hungry polar bear in the arctic, and about as cold. To make matters worse, our chef who had been turning out meals fit for a king decided it would be funny to mess up our porridge on summit day so we had tea and ginger biscuits instead. We set off at 12am dressed in all the warm clothing I could find on a lunar landscape illuminated by a waning full moon and a crisp black sky dotted with shining stars. The mountain was eerily silent as the line of hikers illuminated only by the odd headlamp concentrated on just putting one step in front of the other and breathing in as much of the thin air as possible on the steep path, constantly aware of the effects of not getting enough air. Unfortunately the ill-effects of the altitude soon got to many of the hikers as they vomitted their breakfast onto the side of the path in loud gut wrenching heaves. Unfortunately one man decided to do exactly this just as I popped a jelly baby into my mouth for energy, and it took a lot of concentration to keep my jelly baby from joining his breakfast! As the path continued and we silently made our way up the slippery scree, the mountain got the better of many and more and more people were taken back down by their guides, filling the rest of us with even more determination not to let the mountain get the better of us when we had come this far! The eerie silence was filled only by the singing of the guides to encourage their hikers to carry on. Each guide however took it upon himself to encourage hikers as they shuffled by with a "Pole Pole" (meaning slowly slowly in Swahili). It got rather annoying after a while because if we went any slower we would have gone backwards and summitted back at camp but just as I was about to shove my "pole pole" down one's "throaty throaty" we reached a rock climbing part so my guide took my pole pole away from me. What made the climb worse was the fact that you couldn't stop to rest because then your body would get too cold in the freezing conditions, so we were forced to plod on, very sorry that we had ever misjudged the power of the mountain! I started singing the Pina Colada song to remind me of the warm beaches that awaited us once we had done this but soon even my mind got too tired and I just focused on where I was putting my feet.

Finally, eventually, just as the sun cast a warm orange glow on the eastern horizon and slowly illuminated the surrounding white glaciers and black shadows turned into volcanic rock, we stepped over the crater rim and glanced around at the white puffy clouds far below the bleak grey volcanic landscape. It was another 500m to the actual summit along the crater rim but the sun was warming us up slowly and life seemed to be a little less painful. Finally, 6.5hrs and a frozen lifetime after we set off, we stepped onto the summit at a freezing yet spectacular 5895m ASL. The mood at the summit was jovial and festive for those of us that made it and we soon forgot about the hardship we had endured to actually get there. None of us were over happy though and Jacqui (an American we had befriended over the 5 days) probably summed everyone's feelings up the best when she turned to her boyfriend after having the customary summit picture taken and said to him "Now get me the hell off this mountain!" (Some expletives have been left out.)

The day and a half spent going back down seemed like a waste of time having made it to the summit and I would strongly recommend that the park authorities use the $100 per day they charge each person to not only install escalators to take hikers back down (it's called mountain CLIMBING!), but to also use the money to clean up some of the trash that litters the landscape or to possibly build more than 7 pit latrines with holes so small a mouse has to squeeze through sideways for the 200 odd hikers plus 8 men teams they allow onto the mountain each day.

I'm sitting here with the one line of the Pina Colada song that I actually know going over and over in my head as we get ready to make our way to sun, surf and sand on the Kenyan coast.