Tomorrow will see rolfe heading off to N Africa for time out with his rock shoes whilst Raj is in the the Australian desert playing about in 4x4s!!
See below for Rolfe's account of the latest mission.. Mt Kenya. Photos will be posted soon.
Kenyan Trilogy is complete...
Considered to be the gem of African climbing Mt. Kenya is without a doubt a most worthwhile objective in itself.... However on our way out to the mountain as we began flipping through the guidebook we found that there was much more alpine fun to be had. The plans grew proportionally more ambitious as the courtesy drinks bar of BA airline drained lower and lower..
Finally we settled on attempting the non technical Lenana peak (4985m) as a good way to acclimatise, then to attempt the 8 pitch grade D “Italian climb” on Pt John (4880m) and finally to have a bash at the 18 pitch grade D “Shipton route” of Mount Kenya (5200m).
For our trek in we chose the spectacular Chogoria approach descending via the speedy Naru Moru route.
This being an alpine climbing trip our support was minimal. The only concession to Alpine purity was Morris our porter who brought up a food bag full of unbelievably delicious food (thanks Si!) and Ken bringing up a few ropes to high camp.
All the rest of the gear, tents and equipment was up to us..The only niggling doubt as to whether we were going to carry out this plan was that the beginning of the wet season was catching us up and that conditions would be to severe to climb in. In fact every day on the approach we were slammed by fierce electrical storms and a lot of snow. But there seemed to be a distinct pattern in the weather in that it started to turn bad after 2 o’clock so we adjusted our plans to really early starts and getting to the summits before it was “show time”!
The Climbing was great especially on Pt John where the rock was dry and we managed to chew up the pitches in a good time. Mt Kenya itself (to Nelion Peak) was a different story as for half the route there was lots of snow and the crux pitches were totally iced up. Never fun when you are only wearing rock shoes! Still we summited in good time and managed to beat the worst of the snow storm down. I can’t rave enough about what a superb climbing these range of peaks provide.
A fantastic expedition made all the more special by having a superb climbing partner along!
Fantastic effort Simon and with all these great successes behind us the future looks positively scary!
looking forward to Aconcagua and the karakoram next year. BRING IT ON...
Rolfe Oostra
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