Shira 1 Camp to Shira 2 Camp
Hiking distance: 5 miles
Starting elevation: 11,500’
Highest elevation: 12,780'
Ending elevation: 12,780'
Swahili is a blend of dozens of Bantu languages from the continent’s interior, plus a dollop of Arabic imported from the east coast. Not everyone is fluent in Swahili, but it's official language of Tanzania and the lingua franca of East Africa. Nearly everyone from the Sahara to the Kalahari knows enough Swahili to be able to greet each other, engage in small talk, and conduct commerce. If you're ever in a hurry to find a bathroom in East Africa, ask first in Swahili.
Good news: You already know more Swahili than you realize. If you’ve seen The Lion King, for instance, you already know the words for lion (simba), friend (rafiki), and weak-minded (pumba). You also know that hakuna matata means “No worries,” as in “Relax; I got this.” And yes, East Africans really say it. In fact, they say it all the time. “Do you mind if I sit here?” Hakuna matata. “May I have more coffee, please?” Hakuna matata. “I’m so sorry I shattered your priceless family heirloom.” [Through muted tears] Hakuna [sniffle] matata.
In the short time we’ve been in Tanzania, Monica and I have already learned a handful of additional words. Asante means "Thank you." Karibu means "You’re welcome." And mzungu means "Lost white dude." The term we hear most often now that we’re on the trail is pole-pole (pronounced POH-lay POH-lay), which means “Slow down.” Our guides say it every few minutes, which is amusing because I’ve never walked more slowly in all my life.
Thus endeth the Swahili lesson.
Johnny makes one of his brief and rare appearances at the breakfast tent this morning. He pops in just long enough to inform us that Maddi will be leaving today. Whether or not she has AMS is still unknown, but it hardly matters. She’s badly dehydrated and very uncomfortable, so it’s not safe to continue. When Johnny leaves, breakfast is much quieter than before. Maddi isn’t the oldest in our group and she’s not the youngest. She’s not the most fit and she’s not the least fit. The lesson is clear: It could have been any one of us. It might still be.
To everyone’s relief, Monica resuscitates the conversation by asking if anyone else saw the stars last night, which had been spectacular. The group swoons in agreement, revealing that almost everyone had gotten up to piddle at least once. Star-gazing conditions here are exceptional. We’re above the clouds in a place where the only light pollution comes from a crescent moon which selflessly set very early last night. When I got up to pee in (yes, I'll say it) the wee hours, I switched off my headlamp for a few chilly minutes to admire the Milky Way, revealed in rare detail by the thin atmosphere. I noticed, too, that Shira 1 Camp is in a large, shallow depression, ringed completely by low ridges. The surrounding rim, combined with the intensity of the stars, had created the impression that I was standing – and peeing – in the center of a giant planetarium. When my turn comes around to share a star-gazing story at breakfast, I leave that last part out.
We wish her well, adjust our packs, and strike out across the vast Shira Plateau, where we will spend the entire day with very little change in scenery. There's nothing ahead of us this morning but steady, gradual uphill hiking, with Kibo in our crosshairs the whole time. In a few hours the heath zone imperceptibly gives way to the moorland zone, characterized by scattered boulders, knee-high scrub brush, and a dry, unremitting wind. With so little vegetation at this altitude there’s nothing to hold the volcanic ash together, so it rises up in clouds as we hike, coating our clothing and the backs of our throats with dust. It occurs to me that every boulder on this plateau – some as big as dump trucks – was launched nearly half a million years ago out of Kibo’s fiery cannon. Despite weighing tons, they cleared more than five miles to get here. That's some serious hang time.
It’s unusual to be able to see so far in every direction, but there’s a downside to all this visibility: No privacy. There’s nowhere to hide except behind the occasional boulder, and most of them aren’t big enough. We’re carrying trowels and toilet paper in case nature calls between campsites, but we’re not carrying privacy tents and we left all the tree cover behind yesterday morning. Note to self: Poop in camp. Always try to poop in camp.
“Hakuna matata,” I tell him. “At this elevation, pole-pole is about all I can do anyway.”
Even though we were prepared to split into two groups today that never becomes necessary. The plateau, by definition, isn't steep, and it’s the steeps that have been the problem so far. Monica, too, has experienced this. When the trail gets steep enough that we have to raise our knees up high – as when walking up a flight of stairs – she gets winded quickly and becomes fearful that she’s going to start holding us back. As long as the incline remains gradual, however, she hikes just as well as anyone else. Mo’ can easily climb thousands of feet per day provided that they’re spread out over many trail miles. When we hit the steeps, though, she feels conflicted. On the one hand, she's glad that she climbed so many stairs in preparation for this trip; on the other, she's frustrated that all her training didn’t have more of a payoff. Whenever we hit the steeps, then, she gets testy. One might even say cranky.
We arrive at Shira 2 Camp early enough to eat lunch there, albeit a late one. Now it’s my turn to be testy. The wind is really getting me down. It hasn’t stopped snapping at us all day, and it’s creating a plethora of irritations. First, it’s making me inhale a lot of dust, and I’m having enough trouble just getting air. Second, it’s drying me out like a mummy. No matter how much water I drink, my tongue feels like a slab of beef jerky, and I can't muster enough spit to moisten it. Third, the wind keeps stealing my stuff. It tugs at everything I own and tries to throw it all down the mountain. I can’t relax for a second without losing a piece of gear, usually a glove that I've removed so I can take a picture or fish some lip balm out of my pocket.
Yes, the wind is a silly thing to be angry at. I know this. But my patience is frayed at the edges. As you might have guessed by now, I’ve got AMS but don’t yet know it.
Conditions used to be a lot worse. According to guide books, the Park Service has done a magnificent job in recent years getting trekkers to clean up after themselves by regulating the outfitters and by providing more (and better) long-drop toilets in the campsites. Deirdre, too, has noticed a big difference in the two years since her last visit. But outfitters and rangers can’t do much about what goes on between camps, and that’s where we’ve been finding most of the unpleasantness. This is understandable, of course. It is, after all, very difficult to dig cat holes in volcanic rock. In addition, many people can’t even bring themselves to carry out their own toilet paper, much less their own poop. In all likelihood, too, most of this mess was left by porters, who, if you'll pardon the expression, already have enough crap to carry.
When I return to the trail, I find Mo’ sitting on a rock with a sour look on her face. Her daily late-afternoon headache has arrived right on schedule, and she’s as surly as a honey badger. She complains that Deirdre and the guides are purposely understating the amount of time it takes to do things. They had said, for instance, that this was going to be two-hour hike, after which we’d have time to relax in camp. But it took us two hours just to get to the top, and Mo’ thinks they purposely misled us into believing that the one-way time was the round-trip time. I tell her she’s probably right and that I often do the same thing when hiking with kids and other newbies. Saying this out loud is a mistake, of course, but it’s too late to start over. Now I’m one of them, one of the deceivers. Mo' folds her arms petulantly and looks away. I start to wonder if the crankiness is a sign that she’s getting AMS. And then, because my mind wanders easily, I start to wonder if, at this elevation, men sometimes get accused of using AMS the same way they too often use PMS – as a self-serving explanation for somebody else’s bad mood when you know deep down that you are really the cause. Rather than risk poking the bear, I decide to keep this thought to myself. Besides, it's her turn to be cranky now. Mine will come again soon enough.
Despite the length of the hike, we still manage to get back to camp with a little time to spare before dinner. However, we don’t spend that time on R&R. Because of the wind, everything we own is covered with dust, even inside the tent. Pointlessly, we try to clean up. I pat down my sleeping bag – in the tent – and it raises a cloud of dust. When we finally stop coughing Mo' gives me a look that says, "What did you think was going to happen?"
At 12,780’, Shira 2 is higher than Monica and I have ever been outside of a pressurized airplane cabin. This is also the longest either one of us has ever been above timberline. We’ve hiked above timberline on many occasions, but we’ve never camped above timberline, and the continuous exposure is having more of an impact than I would have guessed. Since we left the rainforest yesterday morning, we’ve been unremittingly exposed to the sun and the wind. As an experienced outdoorsman, it’s embarrassing to me that A) I didn’t see this coming, and B) I’m getting seriously ticked off at the wind. This is especially troubling because we’re going to be above timberline for another five days.
“Yes,” I assure her, maybe a little tersely. “People get wind-stressed. They also get bug-stressed, rain-stressed…you name it. I’m just letting you know that I’m feeling really tense, edgy. If the wind takes one of my gloves again I’m going to scream.”
“Okay, okay,” she says. “I can’t always tell when you’re kidding.”
If you’ve never experienced wind stress, try this: Imagine that a bully has been following you around for days on end, deliberately slapping things out of your hand whenever possible and then kicking them away from you. When you reach down to pick them up, he kicks them away again. And again. That would be maddening, right? Infuriating, even. Now imagine that the bully is invisible. And deaf. You want desperately to fly into a rage, but there’s no one to rage at. Emotional pressures start to build. Get the picture?
Backpacking can be frustrating even in the best conditions just because you’ve only got two hands and there’s usually a shortage of clean, flat surfaces on which to set things. The wind multiplies this problem exponentially, and it’s strong enough today that I can’t even put down a heavy water bottle without it blowing over and rolling away. So what chance do my gloves have? Or my bandana? Or the hat I need to take off while I’m changing shirts? Just putting on my jacket requires turning my body at precise angles to wind to prevent either losing it or having it pressed flat against my face, smothering me. What’s more, the wind always seems to blow downhill, meaning that anything I lose my grip on might get carried over a ledge and be lost forever.
After explaining all this to Monica I scoot out of the tent and start getting ready for dinner, only to confront my old nemesis again. When one of my gloves tries to blow away for the fourth time in an hour, I feel myself coming unhinged. To apprehend the glove I have to stomp on it, grinding it into the dust, just like everything else I’ve recaptured today. Then I slap off the dust and cough some more. The wind makes me feel stupid and incompetent. Grrrr!
Another maxim of backpacking is that whatever you need will be at the bottom of your pack whenever you need it. That's a given. At this moment, then, I need to pull a lot of gear out of my pack just to get at a handful of things I’ll need for the rest of the evening. I carefully remove items one at a time and pin each one down with a rock. But the only clean surface I have to work on is the pack itself, so this is still a balancing act. And I'm having trouble focusing. Tent fabric snaps violently all around me. Loose pack straps strike at my hands and face like pit vipers. It's so unfair! I feel like I’m fighting a hydra in a hurricane, and all I want is my headlamp and toothbrush.
Right on cue, a sudden gust of wind topples my whole edifice, scattering clothes – and my toothbrush – into the dust. And – oh yes – when I try to catch it all I lose another glove.
Rage wells up in my chest, expanding like a fireball. I’m going to scream – there’s no stopping it – and it’s going to be ugly. I don’t want to lose control in front of the group, and I certainly don’t want to offend anyone, but something is going to be yelled, and it’s going to be yelled now. No one’s actually looking when I explode, but at least a dozen people are within earshot, so I make a heroic last-ditch effort to keep it clean.
“HAKUNA MATATA!” I shout madly into the gale. And then, almost sobbing, “Hakuna freakin’ matata!”