Mount Kibuye

Yup. I decided to climb another mountain this weekend.  Or rather, I decided to go on another hike this weekend - the climbing a mountain part was something I THOUGHT I had done before, but I was completely mistaken.

Sam, our usual taxi driver, has been taking tourism and business development classes, and wanted to try out an "excursion" that he plans to offer in his personal tourism business that will one day be launched.  We were all willing

 victims... Erik, myself, and Omondi, a Kenyan who works for a different Clinton Foundation initiative.

On Friday, Sam sent us all a text message on our phones that said "Be ready at 7am, wear hiking shoes, and don't go out tonight."  We all found it rather endearing, but basically paid little heed to it.  Erik, having done the Inca trail in Peru, was superconfident of his hiking skills.  I, having just completed a nice little hike last week, felt I could handle Rwanda's hills.  We both were puffing up our chests.  Erik was even telling me he didn't want to be annoyed by my silly girly whining and hoped I'd be able to keep up on Saturday.

So, Friday night, when Hannah suggested playing Billiards at Planet around 8pm, Erik and I figured we could afford one drink and a few games.  Since Planet is only walking distance from our house, we set ourselves up for a simple night, with the plans of being home by 10 or 11. 

Well, Erik finally won a table and let Hannah and I play.  Our game took over an hour to complete on game (we sucked that much).  Since we took so long, we felt obliged to buy drinks, and before we knew it, we were each about 8 beers in, dancing up a storm on a packed dance floor, and discovering it was 2:30 in the morning.  Oops.

We went home, slept briefly, attempted to quell the threatening hangover with a glass of water and some coffee, and slumped into Sam's car at 7am the next morning without breakfast and with a festering headache.

Mount Kibuye is about 1.5hrs north of Kigali.  We drove out of the city on the same road we took to Butaro last week.  Eventually we found the turn off, drove a bit into the little village, dumped the car, and started walking.

At first it was a wide path - probably wide enough for a car, if you had the patience for the quality of the road.  The weather was nice, and the air fresh.  Although the road continually wound upwards, it was passable, and only a mild challenge.  Of course, the compulsory gaggle of children quickly collected, as Erik and I were yet again, a sight to be seen.

The path narrowed and turned steeper, our hangovers threatened on the brink of our consciousness, and we kept climbing.  Eventually we come to a stream and hop across on a few rocks that had been strategically placed.  There was a little teeny tiny footpath on the other side.  That's when Sam said "ok, now we start."

WHAT?!  We're only starting NOW?  I had already broken a steady sweat, was filthy from my knees down (dust kicks up a lot) and quite annoyed already by the oogling kids.  Omondi and Sam had made repeated attempts to instruct the kids home, but it made little difference.  Erik was ready to pass out.

But we climbed and climbed.  The path wound left and right across the face of the hillside since going straight up was way too steep.  The kids ran ahead, then ran back, then ran ahead again, making it ever the more obvious we abazungu can't hike to save our lives.

And we kept climbing...

And climbing...

Finally Erik asks Sam how far along we are.  He's ready to stop altogether.  Sam told us that the first group of American's he tried to take up the mountain had finally crapped out about half way up.  Erik wanted to make sure we were at least past half way.  We weren't.  We were about a third.  Oh god.

We passed plot upon plot of cultivated land.  I saw got an extreme close-up view of random crops I've seen growing my whole life, but never actually took the time to SEE before.  I asked Sam a zillion questions about cultivation practices and ripening patterns of random fruits.  I noticed, as well, that the altitude had less to do with the crop being planted than did the actual slope of the earth.  As the slope got steeper and steeper, the only thing left growing as Eucalyptus trees.  Yes - Eucaplyptus trees.  My notion that Eucalyptus trees only grow in Australia was wildly off base.  Oh well... you learn something new every day.

Eventually Erik quit.  He'd had it.  He wanted to sleep anyway.  Sam, Omondi, and I kept going.  Then the trail ended.  Err, rather, Sam directed us off it.  That was it - no more obvious way to go.  Now we just had to head up.  As long as we were going up, we were going in the right direction.

The slope became so steep that we literally pulled ourselves up the mountain using the tree trunks as both arm and foot holds.  Because the ground was mostly loose rock, it was easy to lose your footing, so we scrambled and grabbed and stumbled and reached and inched slowly up and up.

Sam then announces we're going to take a detour because he wants us to see this cave he stumbled upon last time he climbed the mountain.  A cave?!  Oooh!  Coolness.  And so we suddenly cut across the mountainside, holding onto trees as we move.  Then it's up between two rocks, around a few giant shrubs, and voila! a ridonculously giant cave.  We ventured a few "rooms" in before it got so dark we wussed out.  Next time we're bringing flashlights, we decided.  Sam mentioned we might want to be careful of bats and snakes too... so we stood outside and took pictures and made grand plans to come back geared up for a caving adventure.

Detour complete, we continued our way up.  Unfortunately, now that we were in cave country, the mountainside was pretty much loose rock, some grass, and a few weak shrubs.  Our handholds were no where to be seen.  Suddenly my limited rock-climbing skills seemed a giant help.  We were literally on all fours because every time we tried to "stand up" we experienced vertigo and lost our footing.  None of us could look anywhere but at the mountain in front of us.  Looking at the wondrous view was way too freaky.

Anyway, as luck would have it, we did eventually make it to the top of the mountain.  There we found a cute little pond and pine trees.  Yes, pine trees.  We sat on a big bed of pine needles next to the water and ate peanuts and chapati - the only food Sam had brought along.  (Our morning rush had caused both Erik and I to be vastly underprepared in terms of food and water.  Goodness me.)

That's when the rain started.  I should have known that it would rain since it's rained pretty much every single day since I got to Rwanda.  But in some random moment of idiocy, I decided to risk it when leaving the house in the morning.  And so it rained, and I got wet.  And it rained and rained, and I got soaked.  With the new rainfall, we had to start heading back down the mountain... this time jumping from tree to tree and using our arms to stop our momentum so we didn't just roll headlong down the mountainside.  Every time I hit another tree, I was showered with extra-heavy raindrops off the leaves.  Then, of course, I had to slip in the mud and end up with a great big swath of mud smeared across my butt.  Fun fun.  By the time we finally reached Erik (who had passed out on a rock, and woken to rainfall in his face), I was so completely soaked, my bones were wet.  Oh joy.

Well, we still had a good hour of walking to get back to the car.  We lost our gaggle of children, finally, as they all scurried away for cover, but we didn't lose the oogling stares since now we had both adults and children trying to figure out what the hell we were doing walking through the rain like wet rags.

Sam and Omondi ran ahead in a vain attempt to get to the car with at least some part of their bodies still dry.  They failed miserably as the car really was a good hour away.  Erik convinced me into "waiting it out" under a tree... but 15 minutes later the rain still hadn't let up, and I convinced him back into the rain.

The ride home was cold and wet.  Like I said, my total lack of preparedness forced me to sit soaking wet and shivering in the car while we drove for the 1.5 hours back home.  Sam and Omondi, obviously the better-traveled and substantially more experienced two had dry sweatshirts and pants in the car.  Bastards.

Seriously though, the hike was awesome.  When we entered the city limits of Kigali, Erik called ahead to a pizza joint in town and ordered a whole pizza for each of us.  I didn't think for a second that I wouldn't eat it all.

For more photos, go here.