From Shira 2, the view, and the second highest thing is what I climbed and the highest thing (to the right) is what makes me question whether my peak was really THE peak...
Joel, off the spire, found internets...
Saturday, March 7, 2009
Shira peak
From Shira 2, the view, and the second highest thing is what I climbed and the highest thing (to the right) is what makes me question whether my peak was really THE peak...
Joel, off the spire, found internets...
Me at 4800 meters!
We haven't had good signal lately so I climbed the class 4 lava tower from lava camp to 4800 meters. Highest I've ever been and I feel great!
BTW, during uphill pushes, my heartrate has been (I've been checking) 168-180 for an hour or more at a time. On the flats between, I rest it down to 140-152. Respiratory rate on hard pushes has been 40 full depth, lung filling breathes per minute. I am surpriseed at how i'm maintaining these numbers...
One of the other groups has a pulse oxymeter. Most people are showing blood oxygen saturation of 75-95%, but I'm at 98-99% with a resting heartrate in the 60s in the evenings. Coolio!
Anyway, catch y'all tomorrow, when I'm camped at 4800 meters and should have signal...
Joel, cold in the freezing wind up here...
Friday, March 6, 2009
Sorry 'bout no internets, the drive in to Kili
Hello!
Still no signal, so I'm writing this today before I forget to write, and I'll send it whenever I can.
Lets do this in sections: the drive in, and each of the first 3 days' hikes I'll see if I can send pics from each, but who knows what the data status will be.
The drive in.
We piled gear and people into a LandCruiser. Me and my guide, plus the company owner and driver, and our three porters. The owner and driver were just coming along the drive to see us off. Anyway, the road up was fairly rugged. With good knobbies like I have on the Xterra, I think it would have been fairly doable. But as the rain forest lived up to its name, the torrent came down and turned the road into a river, and... The Toyota was on its original tires fom the 80s, it seemed, and they were balder than racing slicks.
You can guess what happened, trying to drive up a deeply rutted, mud river path, with that quality of tire... So we all piled out and played slip-n-slide in the mud, trying to rotate the truck to get it faced uphill. Shoes didn't really grip better than those tires, so it was pretty funny. And then we did it again. And we pushed it to get through steep sections. And we covered the road with leaves and branches (my suggestion) to get some traction. But then, we got *stuck*. Rolling back, using speed, pushing, covering the road, etc, would not get the truck moving. I was a little frustrated at their level of prep... They didn't even have rope for pulling, not to mention a winch or anything really useful. While we tried a few tricks, another truck came down the hill. As he approached, he got too close, so he went into reverse... Ahahahaha.... I watched the rear wheels rotate in the correct direction, as the fronts went backwards (er rolled towards us). And the noise of big gravel in a tumbler came from the tranny. They were coming down after blowing their transmission.
The decision was made to abandon the truck and let the driver and company owner head down from there. It was only a few miles to the trailhead. And the flood of rain had tapered to a drizzle. So James (guide) and I were off while the porters sorted gear.
Day 3 - Shira 1 to Shira 2
Hello,
Dang, haven't had signal in a while There is very spotty signal here at Shira 2, people say even txt messages are not likely to work. Images certainly won't go out yet. Oh well...
After that picture of Kili, we took off towards Shira 2. On the way, we saw Shira peak off to the side and went for it. It was a rough cross country hike to meet up with a trail and then a rugged hike up to a rocky spire. I'm not certain this is Shira peak - I need to see a map. We capped out at 12.6k ft and then dropped into the valley and back onto Kili proper, finishing the hike to Shira 2 with the detour up Shira peak in 3 hours. We're at 12.6k again. Since we arived by noon and its been a mix of cloudy, windy, cld, hot, and sunny, I did laundry in a bucket and set my bag and bivy to dry. After laundry, I manualy dried the bivy further and then left it out. A few hours later, the bivy was totally dry (woohoo) and the sleeping bag looked quite lofty and felt completely dry (woohoo again!). I set out the solar setup and headed out fo an hour quick hike to see some "caves." Heh. Ooh, ahh, overhangin rock. One of them went 20 feet in, but otherwise, only interesting because 10+ yrs ago, that's what the porters used for shelter.
Dinner was, as usual, enough food to feed 3-4 people. I would guess i'm eating 6-8,000 calories a day for a measely 3-5 hours of exercise. Currently, I'm suffering from massive stomach cramps from eating toooooo much. Ok, time to try sending...
Joel
Dang, haven't had signal in a while There is very spotty signal here at Shira 2, people say even txt messages are not likely to work. Images certainly won't go out yet. Oh well...
After that picture of Kili, we took off towards Shira 2. On the way, we saw Shira peak off to the side and went for it. It was a rough cross country hike to meet up with a trail and then a rugged hike up to a rocky spire. I'm not certain this is Shira peak - I need to see a map. We capped out at 12.6k ft and then dropped into the valley and back onto Kili proper, finishing the hike to Shira 2 with the detour up Shira peak in 3 hours. We're at 12.6k again. Since we arived by noon and its been a mix of cloudy, windy, cld, hot, and sunny, I did laundry in a bucket and set my bag and bivy to dry. After laundry, I manualy dried the bivy further and then left it out. A few hours later, the bivy was totally dry (woohoo) and the sleeping bag looked quite lofty and felt completely dry (woohoo again!). I set out the solar setup and headed out fo an hour quick hike to see some "caves." Heh. Ooh, ahh, overhangin rock. One of them went 20 feet in, but otherwise, only interesting because 10+ yrs ago, that's what the porters used for shelter.
Dinner was, as usual, enough food to feed 3-4 people. I would guess i'm eating 6-8,000 calories a day for a measely 3-5 hours of exercise. Currently, I'm suffering from massive stomach cramps from eating toooooo much. Ok, time to try sending...
Joel
Day 2 - Big Tree to Shira One
In the morning, we woke to clear skies, which evetually gave way to sun! Woohoo! Breakfast was oil-fried scrambled eggs, oil fried bread, and oil fried sausage! Ugh! I am sure I will gain weight on this trip... They made me lunch, too, which was deep fried chicken drumsticks and wings, fried corn muffins, thickly buttered toast, and packaged 100% fresh mango juice (containers looked like large caprisuns). Meal-wise, I think Turtle would be in heaven.
As the data will show, I argued with James (guide) about our speed of hiking. He said that the rule for muzungu was "no sweating." I explained that I derived great pleasure from challenging myself physically, and I finally won. We took off and full speed. Uh, I wonder what I asked for. We'd started after one small (6-porter, 1 client) group, and a bunch of porters for the big groups (they need to get to vaious places, build kitchen and mess tents, and prepare warm meals for their clients. The hike is listed as 6-7 hours.
We poured on the speed. I mean holy crap fast. If I stumbled, I had to jog to catch up. And steep! I am curious about the data but haven't reviewed it yet. I feel like this trail was similar in grade to the MR on Whitney, though not sustained - very steep up, very steep down, more steep up, and then rolling flatish for miles. Our tent porter was with us, leading the way - he had his personal gear plus 22.5 kg of team gear (that rediculous propane tank, the tent, etc). I can't understand their physical capability... And he had that 50 lbs in a burlap sack which he alternated from on top of his head to on his neck, head tilted down forced to look at the gound. He led the charge. Our other 2 porters never caught up to us.
I think they were f'ing with me, though, pace-wise, because we passed porters left and right :p. Anyway, we charged up the trail and passed everyone. The lunch city for the 4 Americans was a sight to behold. I heard that they set up a radio to communicate with their base and that the radio was so big that it and the antenna were one porter's complete load. I appologize for not taking pictures. The only thought in my head at the time was 'please don't die or pass out from the effort!' Don't worry, I took in the sights and took some pics. But often, we had thick cloud cover so I couldn't see much. And in the deep forest, visibily was limited to a few feet off the trail. We pulled into camp after a mere 3 hours - that's when I finally ate my fried lunch. Camp was about 11.5k ft. I am taking a half dose of diamox, figuring we're taking it easy, altitude-gain-wise, and so far, I feel great. Tomorrow's plan calls for a muzungu 3-hour hike - should take 1.5 hrs tops. Since it's so short, I'll drop pack and see if I can summit the 3rd peak of Kili, Shira. I think it's 13k ft or so. Hmm, tomorrow will be yesterday by the time I get signal...
So far, its been a beautiful day - a bunch of cloud cover kept the temps down but we've only had a few spells of light rain so far. I would guess it's about 55 degrees at 3:40pm now. This is nice!
Hmm, i'm picking up writing this on day 3. LAst night... I went to sleep around 9 to a somewhat brisk breeze. I woke around 10 to the sound of a pack of wild dogs (jackels?) tearing through camp, yipping, looking for food... I soon passed out with my vent fully open. As the night progressed, I got cool (bivy and bag still wet, bag lacking some loft), so I slowly cnched the face opening of the sleeping bag down. When I woke before sun-up, I sat up a little and my face touched something hard... The bivy was rock solid, moisture on the inside and out, completely frozen! My bag was even a little crispy!
I got up and snaped a pic when the sun backlit Kili a little...
Joel
As the data will show, I argued with James (guide) about our speed of hiking. He said that the rule for muzungu was "no sweating." I explained that I derived great pleasure from challenging myself physically, and I finally won. We took off and full speed. Uh, I wonder what I asked for. We'd started after one small (6-porter, 1 client) group, and a bunch of porters for the big groups (they need to get to vaious places, build kitchen and mess tents, and prepare warm meals for their clients. The hike is listed as 6-7 hours.
We poured on the speed. I mean holy crap fast. If I stumbled, I had to jog to catch up. And steep! I am curious about the data but haven't reviewed it yet. I feel like this trail was similar in grade to the MR on Whitney, though not sustained - very steep up, very steep down, more steep up, and then rolling flatish for miles. Our tent porter was with us, leading the way - he had his personal gear plus 22.5 kg of team gear (that rediculous propane tank, the tent, etc). I can't understand their physical capability... And he had that 50 lbs in a burlap sack which he alternated from on top of his head to on his neck, head tilted down forced to look at the gound. He led the charge. Our other 2 porters never caught up to us.
I think they were f'ing with me, though, pace-wise, because we passed porters left and right :p. Anyway, we charged up the trail and passed everyone. The lunch city for the 4 Americans was a sight to behold. I heard that they set up a radio to communicate with their base and that the radio was so big that it and the antenna were one porter's complete load. I appologize for not taking pictures. The only thought in my head at the time was 'please don't die or pass out from the effort!' Don't worry, I took in the sights and took some pics. But often, we had thick cloud cover so I couldn't see much. And in the deep forest, visibily was limited to a few feet off the trail. We pulled into camp after a mere 3 hours - that's when I finally ate my fried lunch. Camp was about 11.5k ft. I am taking a half dose of diamox, figuring we're taking it easy, altitude-gain-wise, and so far, I feel great. Tomorrow's plan calls for a muzungu 3-hour hike - should take 1.5 hrs tops. Since it's so short, I'll drop pack and see if I can summit the 3rd peak of Kili, Shira. I think it's 13k ft or so. Hmm, tomorrow will be yesterday by the time I get signal...
So far, its been a beautiful day - a bunch of cloud cover kept the temps down but we've only had a few spells of light rain so far. I would guess it's about 55 degrees at 3:40pm now. This is nice!
Hmm, i'm picking up writing this on day 3. LAst night... I went to sleep around 9 to a somewhat brisk breeze. I woke around 10 to the sound of a pack of wild dogs (jackels?) tearing through camp, yipping, looking for food... I soon passed out with my vent fully open. As the night progressed, I got cool (bivy and bag still wet, bag lacking some loft), so I slowly cnched the face opening of the sleeping bag down. When I woke before sun-up, I sat up a little and my face touched something hard... The bivy was rock solid, moisture on the inside and out, completely frozen! My bag was even a little crispy!
I got up and snaped a pic when the sun backlit Kili a little...
Joel
Day 1 - stuck truck to big trees camp
The hike day 1
The hike started off normally. We walked along the road. Traction was bad, we had to stay single file on the high center of the road - anywhere else was slip and slide hell and I more than once touched the ground with my hands, catching slips and falls. Suddenly, we heard a large rumble. I mean big engine noise, no piddle 2-3 liter toyota. Heck, didn't even sound like a Chevy 3500 diesel. It sounded like... Wait, look back, holy crap, it's a Unimog! And it's fully loaded with porters. This must be a huge party coming up. We jumped into the forest to let it pass. Scary, it wasn't having much traction luck, it was just yawing left and right until a tire would hit the berm or the high center and that would propel it into an opposite yaw, wash, rinse, and repeat.
About 15 minutes later, we found where the Unimog couldn't go any further. I maintain that the Xterra probably could have beaten the Unimog... James says new tires cost at least $500 each, and that's why the Unimog also had crap for tires. Anyway, the porters and their clients had poured out of the truck and were starting to organize gear. 1 English guy (Jamie) and and his wife (Alex) and their guide, assistant guide, and 11 porters! Holy crap! And I felt guilty with my crew of 4...
So skip forward to the trail. They do not do switchbacks here. Many sections of the trail were as steep as any class 2 I've ever been on. Ad in big rocks and practically a natural stairway, and it was a pretty good trail! The rain came down on and off. BTW, my pack, while I was wearing very little clothing (most of it in the pack, with about a liter of water was 14.5 kg (32 lbs) including the world's largest avacado) - forgot to mention that. Once our porters caught us, I urged James to keep up with them. The muzungu (white man) pace was killing me, it was so slow. The guides are trained to encurage muzungu to walk slow and not overexert themselves... But his desire to chat in Swahili with his friends won out, so from then on, we booked. I think I'm pretty fast in general, but wow, it was tough to maintain balance in the mud river we were treking through, at the speed we were moving. Heh.. I asked for it!
But then, the rain forest and the start of monsoon season collaborated to really live up to their names. The rain started coming down to show me what 7 feet of rain in about 4 rainy months looks like. Wow. You know when you're driving and the windshield wipers can't keep up so you have to slow down? Now imagine its coming down so hard that at a walking speed, you can't see the guy right in front of you and it takes concentration to see the ground even! Amazing rain. Later, Jamie (Brit from Unimog) said he'd never seen such rain, and he's from the land of perpetually crappy weather!
And then a realization came over me as I walked.. The bivy is not the best idea for monsoon season. How do you get into what amounts to a sleepingbag cover in a storm like this, especially with a down bag that shouldn't get too wet? And what was I going to do with my sleeping pads which were on my pack, in the rain? Could I put my sleepingbag on the drenched pads? Wouldn't that be bad, too? As if he was reading my mind, my guide asked me why I wasn't using the umbrella I bought. Damn! I was thinking of it as a sun-blocking umbrella, not a rain blocker! Hahha, dummy!
I pulled out the umbrella and the storm became a minor inconvenience. The umbella is the geatest backpacking idea evAr! I was living it large from that point on. Nice! We pulled into camp and I saw a group of 4 whitey, so I ducked under their open mess hall tent and said hello. We started chatting - 2 of them had climbed Whitney as a day-hike recently and they were in their 50s. Cool! The discussion of porters came up, so I had to ask how big their crew was... Wow... So, I guess 2 needing a dozen is nothing! These 4 needed 44! I think I'm doing this wrong! Hahah... They showed me their kitchen (1 standup tent with covered chimney for smoke), mess halls (2 - whitey and porter), bathroom!?!? (a 7-ft tall walk-in restroom tent with a seat and a catch-basin that's cleaned daily for only the 4 of them so it stays clean), and their 4-person mountain hardware tents (3 - the couple shared one), and the various porter tents. OMG. For 4 people! Tent city! Porter city!
I then headed over to our porter/mess/kitchen 4-person tent in which we eat breakfast and dinner and the crew sleeps. I gotta send a pic of our propane tank... It's just like what you use for you gas BBQ grill except the date on it is 1989, it's iron, and it weighs 8.5 kg empty and takes 6 kg of propane, so when we weighed it, it really was 32 lbs... The big teams have many of these. Crazy (but cheap) way to carry cooking power.
Dinner the first night was deep fried. As in, these guys carried half a gallon of oil and they pour used oil back in to make it last. Speaking of which, they really don't believe in ultralight. They brought glass salt shakers, metal cans (for coffee, for powdered milk, etc), pounds of meat (fresh beef, chicken, fish, etc), etc. Anyway, dinner was deep fried tilapia, potato chips (fries), cucumber soup, sandwhiches, etc. I couldn't come close to eating it all, and then they cooked their own dinner. I told them I really didn't need my own meals, so they said I could have ugali with them. Turns out what they meant was I could eat with them after I finished all the food they made for me! Ugali is a cornmeal based sticky porraige that you eat with stew.
So, night 1. The rain died down enough that I could get into my bivy using my umbella to shield me. Unfortunately, the totally snow proof bivy which is descibed as waterproof, is not 100% monsoon proof. The eVent material allows a little dampness through. My sleeping bag was slightly damp. Damn. Oh well. I went to sleep. And during the night the rain died down and I woke a couple times when big water "clumps" fell from the trees above onto the bivy. And what I discovered was nicht good! My condensation (from my breath, on the single-walled bivy) was making a mess. The whole inside of the bivy was drenched, and the sleeping bag was noticeably less lofty. Argh. When I noticed the rain stopped, I opened the main vent and shoved the sleeping bag down (i was under it, not in it - too warm) and just accepted the big clumps of water in my face from time to time.
Overall, a very interesting day...
The hike started off normally. We walked along the road. Traction was bad, we had to stay single file on the high center of the road - anywhere else was slip and slide hell and I more than once touched the ground with my hands, catching slips and falls. Suddenly, we heard a large rumble. I mean big engine noise, no piddle 2-3 liter toyota. Heck, didn't even sound like a Chevy 3500 diesel. It sounded like... Wait, look back, holy crap, it's a Unimog! And it's fully loaded with porters. This must be a huge party coming up. We jumped into the forest to let it pass. Scary, it wasn't having much traction luck, it was just yawing left and right until a tire would hit the berm or the high center and that would propel it into an opposite yaw, wash, rinse, and repeat.
About 15 minutes later, we found where the Unimog couldn't go any further. I maintain that the Xterra probably could have beaten the Unimog... James says new tires cost at least $500 each, and that's why the Unimog also had crap for tires. Anyway, the porters and their clients had poured out of the truck and were starting to organize gear. 1 English guy (Jamie) and and his wife (Alex) and their guide, assistant guide, and 11 porters! Holy crap! And I felt guilty with my crew of 4...
So skip forward to the trail. They do not do switchbacks here. Many sections of the trail were as steep as any class 2 I've ever been on. Ad in big rocks and practically a natural stairway, and it was a pretty good trail! The rain came down on and off. BTW, my pack, while I was wearing very little clothing (most of it in the pack, with about a liter of water was 14.5 kg (32 lbs) including the world's largest avacado) - forgot to mention that. Once our porters caught us, I urged James to keep up with them. The muzungu (white man) pace was killing me, it was so slow. The guides are trained to encurage muzungu to walk slow and not overexert themselves... But his desire to chat in Swahili with his friends won out, so from then on, we booked. I think I'm pretty fast in general, but wow, it was tough to maintain balance in the mud river we were treking through, at the speed we were moving. Heh.. I asked for it!
But then, the rain forest and the start of monsoon season collaborated to really live up to their names. The rain started coming down to show me what 7 feet of rain in about 4 rainy months looks like. Wow. You know when you're driving and the windshield wipers can't keep up so you have to slow down? Now imagine its coming down so hard that at a walking speed, you can't see the guy right in front of you and it takes concentration to see the ground even! Amazing rain. Later, Jamie (Brit from Unimog) said he'd never seen such rain, and he's from the land of perpetually crappy weather!
And then a realization came over me as I walked.. The bivy is not the best idea for monsoon season. How do you get into what amounts to a sleepingbag cover in a storm like this, especially with a down bag that shouldn't get too wet? And what was I going to do with my sleeping pads which were on my pack, in the rain? Could I put my sleepingbag on the drenched pads? Wouldn't that be bad, too? As if he was reading my mind, my guide asked me why I wasn't using the umbrella I bought. Damn! I was thinking of it as a sun-blocking umbrella, not a rain blocker! Hahha, dummy!
I pulled out the umbrella and the storm became a minor inconvenience. The umbella is the geatest backpacking idea evAr! I was living it large from that point on. Nice! We pulled into camp and I saw a group of 4 whitey, so I ducked under their open mess hall tent and said hello. We started chatting - 2 of them had climbed Whitney as a day-hike recently and they were in their 50s. Cool! The discussion of porters came up, so I had to ask how big their crew was... Wow... So, I guess 2 needing a dozen is nothing! These 4 needed 44! I think I'm doing this wrong! Hahah... They showed me their kitchen (1 standup tent with covered chimney for smoke), mess halls (2 - whitey and porter), bathroom!?!? (a 7-ft tall walk-in restroom tent with a seat and a catch-basin that's cleaned daily for only the 4 of them so it stays clean), and their 4-person mountain hardware tents (3 - the couple shared one), and the various porter tents. OMG. For 4 people! Tent city! Porter city!
I then headed over to our porter/mess/kitchen 4-person tent in which we eat breakfast and dinner and the crew sleeps. I gotta send a pic of our propane tank... It's just like what you use for you gas BBQ grill except the date on it is 1989, it's iron, and it weighs 8.5 kg empty and takes 6 kg of propane, so when we weighed it, it really was 32 lbs... The big teams have many of these. Crazy (but cheap) way to carry cooking power.
Dinner the first night was deep fried. As in, these guys carried half a gallon of oil and they pour used oil back in to make it last. Speaking of which, they really don't believe in ultralight. They brought glass salt shakers, metal cans (for coffee, for powdered milk, etc), pounds of meat (fresh beef, chicken, fish, etc), etc. Anyway, dinner was deep fried tilapia, potato chips (fries), cucumber soup, sandwhiches, etc. I couldn't come close to eating it all, and then they cooked their own dinner. I told them I really didn't need my own meals, so they said I could have ugali with them. Turns out what they meant was I could eat with them after I finished all the food they made for me! Ugali is a cornmeal based sticky porraige that you eat with stew.
So, night 1. The rain died down enough that I could get into my bivy using my umbella to shield me. Unfortunately, the totally snow proof bivy which is descibed as waterproof, is not 100% monsoon proof. The eVent material allows a little dampness through. My sleeping bag was slightly damp. Damn. Oh well. I went to sleep. And during the night the rain died down and I woke a couple times when big water "clumps" fell from the trees above onto the bivy. And what I discovered was nicht good! My condensation (from my breath, on the single-walled bivy) was making a mess. The whole inside of the bivy was drenched, and the sleeping bag was noticeably less lofty. Argh. When I noticed the rain stopped, I opened the main vent and shoved the sleeping bag down (i was under it, not in it - too warm) and just accepted the big clumps of water in my face from time to time.
Overall, a very interesting day...
Tuesday, March 3, 2009
Hmm, Kili hidden...
I'm on the way to the start of the climb. A long dirt road... Along the way, lots of cows, basically, and not much else. The low clouds obscure most views.
I'm surprised by how many people there are. Every "town" of 10 buildings has hundreds of people walking around. I am told all the land is farms and each family owns a very small piece.
Hmm. I should send out a pic of houses here. They are quite tiny... I'll try.
Another comment: the LandCruiser driver drives it like an auto. With its tiny little engine, he puts it in gear, dives 50, gets to an obstacle, slows to 5mph, same gear, and then takes about forever to get back to speed...
Joel
BTW, see me on google latitude
Hello,
I think I never mentioned this, but if you're on google latitude, you can see my current location. It's battery-intense so I'll probably only turn it on once a day. And Hussein thinks I probably won't have reception while we're in the jungle... Speaking of whom, I'll post up a pic of the crew tomorrow.
Joel
I think I never mentioned this, but if you're on google latitude, you can see my current location. It's battery-intense so I'll probably only turn it on once a day. And Hussein thinks I probably won't have reception while we're in the jungle... Speaking of whom, I'll post up a pic of the crew tomorrow.
Joel
Why would they do that?
Checked in my hotel in Arusha so we can go over gear, etc tonight. Now, why on Earth would they make the bed sideways? It's hard to see perspective but the bed is set up for two 3-ft tall people instead one 6-footer...
Joel
Monday, March 2, 2009
Hmm, how to trick system to get outgoing mail to work?
Not so yay data plan!
I give up. After 2 days of working on this with Zain customer
service, I have come to the conclusion, which thy do not understand,
that upload != download, and when they say unlimited, they intended it
to mean download. No matter how I try it, http, ftp, bin, attachment,
etc, zain's network times out on files larger than about 50k.
service, I have come to the conclusion, which thy do not understand,
that upload != download, and when they say unlimited, they intended it
to mean download. No matter how I try it, http, ftp, bin, attachment,
etc, zain's network times out on files larger than about 50k.
So my plan of moving my 8GB microSD between my phone and my camera (i
have 2 8GB cards, so was swapping them fo xfers only) so I could
upload pics is a failure. Ahh well. I'll set the camera phone to min
resolution and use the onboard editing software to reduce the file
size even further...
My original yay! Email follows:
Hello!
I am sure you've noticed that my R key is flaky... sorry about that!
Anyway, my data plan is in action now, so I can start adding pics. So
this message is to do just that (and see how well that works).
Two pics, dunno what order they'll arrive in, but one is a pic of my
first room, at the Kili Backpacker Hotel. The room was far from
clean, full of mosquitoes, etc. I'm standing in the hall, shooting
towards my bed. I was so disgusted with how it looked (bugs cawling
on eveything), that I set my bivy out on the bed and just pretended I
was sleeping on the jungle floor... My guide dropped me off there and
he was so surprised at how crappy it was, he told me not to unpack
(his partner had arranged the place, sight unseen).
My current place looks like an average US hotel, with running water, a
shower, and a toilet, all in an attached bathroom. OH and my current
place has AC, unlike the backpacker place. How much more does it
cost? I dunno, my guide was so shocked about the backpacker place
that he paid the difference in cost! I think its $20 v $7 per night.
Second photo: today is the first time I got a longer-than-10-seconds
glimpse of the mountain. There it is, above the clouds! Holycrap,
that's freaking tall consideing its more tha 50 miles fom here!
Ok, now that this is woking, time to start taking some pics, eh?
Joel
--
Joel
Sunday, March 1, 2009
Heh, I sure hope Kili is easier than THIS marathon
No excuses, I suck. How bad? I walked the last 16 miles. Say
what?!?! Yeah... 5:36 is my first maathon time. I should have
trained harder and considering the huge altitude gain in this run, I
should have done far more hill training. I sucked wind on the massive
10+ mile uphill.
what?!?! Yeah... 5:36 is my first maathon time. I should have
trained harder and considering the huge altitude gain in this run, I
should have done far more hill training. I sucked wind on the massive
10+ mile uphill.
OK, now the excuses. I didn't train right. If I'm ever dumb enough
to do this again, I'll move the treadmill into the garage, bring a
heater with me, park the car in there, remove the catalytic conveter,
and then run the car, set the heater for 90 degrees, and then do my
training runs!
Compared to Moshi/Tanzania, Los Angeles in the 70s and 80s (when it
was much worse than it is now), is like puified bottled oxygen. And
every time a truck or bus drove by, we got a good 10 mins of pue crap
to breath... and they drove by regularly.
But I can't blame it all on the air... my calves for the first time in
my memory, completely spasmed at about mile 10 (i'll look at the data
later to verify). From that point on, any running imediately locked
and spasmed my calves (painful!). So I had to walk. And later you'll
be able to see the data - my walking speed was pretty much
spasm-speed-minus-0.1-mph. D'oh!
Anyway, I'm writing this under a tent in the now well over 90 degree
heat while I'm stil suffering calve-spasms. I'm sure I'll be more
positive later, but now i'm frustrated by my stupid calves!
Joel
--
Joel
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