Beautiful morning. Fruit, toast, cheese (cheese very dry and white with little fat seems to be the norm here), and "porridge" (cream of wheat). Short day again on way to Barafu Camp.
We went up and over a rugged hill into a more dry part of the mountain. From here the porters make trips with yellow vegetable oil containers full of water from the spring at Karanga, so they're going to be even more frugal with water. But maybe not, since they won't want to carry it all downhill or dump it.
At each of the camps except Karanga we had to fill out a form with the rangers to check in. Here at Barafu we entered the hut and filled it out and they tried to sell us souvenirs and beer. Ahead of us was a "rugby player" as it listed on his profession on the form, who was arguing to continue to the top despite this being his second day on the mountain. Don't know anything about this one, but a typical cause of AMS is given as a young athletic person attacking the mountain and going too fast. That could explain the ranger's concern.
We rested in the hot sunlit tents for a bit, then had lunch. A little rest again, then an acclimatization hike up the first 200 meters of the route to get a feel for it before dark.
We returned for a meal of pasta to load up for the night, then early to bed for 11 PM wakeup. Tonight is the full moon and New Years. Awesome.
The route to Stella Point along the crater rim is along the buttress to right of center.
I love the fact that your days are short and you have plenty of time to recover!
ReplyDelete