We woke up to no water in the Friberg house, so we availed ourselves of the outhouse. After a hearty breakfast of oatmeal and chai, at 8:00 am we departed for the Ketumbeini mountain trail head. Fortunately, Steve chose to drive the 14 km to the trailhead instead of hiking to it. At 9:25 am, we started our hike at about 6,000 feet. Unfortunately, there are no switchbacks on the steepest parts, as much of it is up a narrow ridge. It was steep going, but fortunately, I wasn’t the slowest one. Steve kept directing us onward beyond what I would have thought was possible for me, but hiking with Steve is known as a challenge by all who have done it.
About midway, we did stop for a lunch with chai. Peanut butter and jelly on a tortilla never tasted so good. But then, Steve kept us pushing onward and upward to the top.
Around here, the shortcut for texting Ketumbeini is K2. While the Ketumbeini mountain is not as high as K2 in Pakistan, the second tallest mountain in the world, it was the tallest I have climbed at 9,000 feet, though we started two-thirds of the way up. With the thin air, I told Anya that I could email her soccer coach stating that she’s doing hypobaric conditioning in preparation for the fall season.
At the top, we stopped for a 30-minute rest, where Steve fell asleep. When he awoke, we stashed our packs and went for a hike around the top of the mountain, which included some descent to look for animals. We did see bushbuck and eland (the world’s largest antelope) in the distance.
After retrieving our packs, we walked through waist-high grass in the caldera of the mountain. It is thick grass, so thick that it sometimes hard to know where the cape buffalo trail goes right in front of you. However, it is 10 times easier to walk in a buffalo trail than try to navigate the tall grass.
Previously, Steve had scouted the mountain and found another ridge for camping on a bit of meadow which has a view of the valley 5,000 feet below. We decided upon a spot that had a clear view of the valley to set up our tents, and we placed the door setting east for the morning sunrise.
Our Mountain Meals dinner of beef stew was amazingly good for a freeze-dried package, which was washed down with hot cocoa.
We were in our tents around 6:00 pm, because as the sun goes down, it gets quite chilly. Steve said that one time they had frost in the morning.
I did get up in the night for a nature call, and with only the minimal light of a new moon, I saw a zillion stars and the milky way. As I crawled into my sleeping bag, Anya said that she had not fallen asleep yet, as she was so cold. I realized that her sleeping bag was a bit thin for this temperature, and camping with Steve means roughing it without a sleeping pad (because supposedly the grass meadow was to serve as a soft layer). So, we adjusted our bags to share both between the two of us and were able to warm up enough to sleep a bit. In retrospect, I would have gladly added the weight of a sleeping pad.
With blessings,
Beth