through the roof...

Horombo Huts, 3720m / around 12,200 ft
Wednesday 27th January, 9pm

We have made it up to the Horombo Huts, a major overnight stop for both climbers ascending and descending. Today was a longer day’s hike of about 15km - and I am quoting kilometers as that is what is on my map! - and we climbed another 1000m (3300 ft approx) up the mountain. We set out from the Mandara huts around 9am and were soon out of the rain forest, walking through a rolling landscape with giant heathers, shrubs and native wildflowers. Although the path was not particularly steep, it was quite rocky with more of the dreaded drainage ditches. Erica did a great job of navigating over this rough terrain, helped by our porters and one or other of our team.

Lunch was a welcome break and a chance for Erica to get out of her chair for a while. Then we continued on, with more assistance from our porters to help navigate the wheelchair across the increasingly rocky and steeper terrain. We passed some amazing vegetation: increasingly more moreland with creamy white proteas dotting the hillside and bizarre giant groundsel in the gullies. Not sure if I have spelled these correctly, but hopefully you can look them up. The Horombo huts were a welcome sight around 4pm and we were glad to be assigned our two 4-man cabins.

A couple of people started to suffer from an upset stomach today, including Derek and Phil. A few of us got a little too much sun on some exposed legs or necks. And I have a bit of an altitude headache. But apart from these minor issues, we are all in good shape, well fed by our crew and now heading to bed for some much needed, and well deserved sleep!

Penny