Things were a little different when we woke up at Karanga Camp today. It was cloudy below, cloudy above and cloudy most places in between. But after some coffee and breakfast, things began to look better... as they often do. We were walking by 9 AM in any case. it wasn’t particularly cold or unpleasant, we just didn’t have views of the upper mountain as it was cloaked in cloud. Pretty soon we were above any plant life and into the alpine (translation: rock) zone. We made great time and pulled into Barafu Camp, High Camp, in just 2.5 hrs as light snow began to fall. We took shelter in the tents, but the snow didn’t amount to much and the squall passed quickly. Our afternoon was full of resting, relaxing, lunch and a team meeting to discuss the upcoming climb. The clouds finally dropped below us and Kibo was revealed -gloriously- in late afternoon. We ate a big and fine spaghetti dinner which was followed by a surprise birthday cake and several rounds of singing, dancing and clapping in honor of Heather’s big day. She’ll have another one tomorrow, as we all will. We’ve planned an alpine start and so everyone has turned in early this evening. Best Regards, RMI Guide Dave Hahn

On The Map