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Our second day began with
coffee brought to our tents, followed by warm water for
washing. We then sat down for breakfast as the camp was taken
down around us. At some point we realized that we should have
packed our gear before breakfast and were holding things up - slow
on the uptake - and this became the routine in the days to follow:
coffee, pack, wash, breakfast.
The trek continued through
the forest, which changed in character slowly - as we gained
altitude, the variety of trees reduced and soon there were
mainly great cedars hung with moss, and thinner undergrowth.
We saw no more monkeys, but heard a lot of birds. Greg was
feeling a lot better on the trail; Barney had an interesting
discussion with Raymond on the desirable qualities to be sought in a
wife.
The change in climate zone to
heathland seemed to come very quickly - one moment we were still in
forest, albeit of smaller trees, then suddenly all we saw
were giant heather plants, with small flowering plants
beneath. It was misty in places; the climb continued, we
dropped quite a way into a small valley for lunch, and climbed again
to the edge of the Shira Plateau. (A bon mot from
Barney: "You don't climb Kilimanjaro by going downhill!")
There was fairly hard climbing in places
during the afternoon, with fog rolling around us as the vegetation
became smaller and scrubbier. The sun came out a little as we
ascended a couple of long ridges to the edge of the Shira Plateau -
actually, what we were climbing were the sides of a sunken volcanic
crater. As always, Raymond had
us mentally prepared for the next stretch just before we came to it
- in this case, a gentle undulating trail to Shira Camp.
After two days in forest and heath and moorland, we could see the
top of Kilimanjaro from the camp. Actually not all of it -
there were parts shrouded in clouds - but the objective was in
sight. It was strange to think that we still had five and a
half days to go.
There was another party in Shira Camp when we arrived, but it is
a large camp and they were pretty far away. Tea, popcorn and
cookies - looking out from the mess tent, we saw that the summit had
cleared - that's a tall mountain! Dinner of fish and chips -
the guys were incredible, the way they fed us. We played
cards, then turned in around 8pm - it was getting pretty dark,
so we thought we might as well sleep. We were really tired
after 6 1/2 hours of trekking and we slept
well. | 
Horne Kili
Trek 
