In Two Weeks...

Aaack!! You can imagine that to sound like a mix of an overly excited teenager with a mix of Homer Simpson with the panic of your costume zipper breaking after the three minute call. Two more weeks and I can tick continent 6/7 off the list. 

I "think" I have everything in order. Think in quotations because there is always something that you forget and I am not yet in Africa. Things are looking up, though. I have my passport. Shortly after I uploaded my first story, the Royal Mail central distribution office called to let me know they tracked down my envelope. Two days later it was delivered to my house (and then sent to my local post office to await my signature). So what can I say about the whole visa process? The UK/ Tanzanian High Commission was very helpful and very quick to actually issue the visa. The visa was issued within 48 hours of my passport arriving at their office, and when I needed to get in touch to get the tracking number, they were very helpful on the phone. Pre-paid-postage-special-delivery-blah-de-blah from Royal Mail was the pain in the backside, so if you can avoid the nationalised postal service, then I would recommend it. 

I've spent much of last and this weekend "reviewing". Last week I packed my bag to see that my sleeping bag takes up most of my large back-pack. I have taken many bloggers' comments to pack minimally with your clothes (stick to the kit lists), and am glad I have done a dry run. I have all of my wool and dry-fit and thermal running gear ready to go and my bag is at the appropriate weight. By summit day, I think my bag will be light because I will have all of my clothes on and will probably have eaten all of my snacks. One kit-related piece of advice I will attempt this weekend will be to try all of my clothes on at once. From what I can imagine, this will be a Joey moment from an episode of Friends. I will certainly take pictures.

Base layers (without sock system): windbreakers, thermals, running thermals, wool tights

Top layers: tank tops, t-shirt, longsleeve, thermal running under-armor, fleece, wool poncho, thermal Olympic wear.

Space saver: all rolled up.

I have noticed, however, that I don't have as much space for beach clothes and other-stuff. I was hoping that I would be able to get my holiday clothes in there, as well. I need to be mobile with my backpack + carry-on because I have no sherpas after the climb- and by sherpa I do mean sherpa and/ or husband to share (hog) a bag with on this trip. I have put aside all of this other stuff and need to see if it fits in my Ryanair approved cabin baggage. This bag I have not yet done a trial run with... I am going to have to be ruthless- if it doesn't fit (or I can't wear it on the way), it doesn't come.

What other ends have I tied up this week? Well, I have for the first time ordered drugs online intentionally and not the ones advertising "member enlargement" from my junk-mail folder. I don't know how I get these e-mails as I don't really take medicine and certainly have never ordered any off of the internet until now.

I decided to do this for the first time based on the price of the Malarone I was prescribed at the local chemists. The online prices were consistently 2/3rds the price of the actual shops. Top Tip: pharmacy2u or something similar to order your malaria tablets. I didn't ask the nurse at the clinic for altitude tablets, but from reading other "tips to summit" consistently Diamox is mentioned. This is where Dr. Fox comes to the rescue. An online consultation has given me a prescription and my drugs are "discretely packaged" and in the post. It will be interesting to see if my junk-mail folder will have even more spam from these endorsements or drop off now that I have jumped on the bandwagon.

I have also ascertained my insurance. Insurance quotes, like organised trek costs, malaria tablet costs, flight costs, sleeping bag costs... are massively wide. If you have won the Euromillions and could pay the upper end of every single item for this adventure, you could end up spending £6000 plus. Or if you are sensible and do your homework, you should come in well under half of that (I will post rough costs upon my return). In any case, quotes were from 35 - 135£ for quite similar levels of cover. I've gone with something mid-low range (second best- like the quality of furniture or tools I buy) based on level of cover (very adequate) and what I can afford. I have gone with Globelink International. The cover gets me home, covers hospital, emergency, loss of limb, loss of site and the three most important things: hijacking, mugging, and trekking to 6000m. Mom, don't freak at the two of three. 

So, what's left to do?

-get drugs

-pack bags

-pick up money

-organise all paperwork in one place

-print itinerary

-go on holiday!

And in the meantime, a bit more reading... I still need to figure out the communication situation (telephone) and I am trying to accumulate a list of good (and bad) tour guides local to Moshi. I will try to post once more before I go. Until then... 

Gearing up for a BIG adventure

I've been holding off from blogging about my BIG upcoming adventure, mostly because time is flying so quickly and also because I didn't want to jinx it... but, it's now less than four weeks away, I've done a lot of work to get here, and I have potentially already jinxed it myself! ACK! In any case, the trip is looking very very likely, but the reason why it isn't for sure is that my passport is currently AWOL... I'll get into that later. For those of you that don't know, I am attempting to climb Mount Kilimanjaro.

Why do it? Well, why not? I am certainly not getting younger and my responsibilities are only growing. I haven't had a proper holiday in well over five years, and I (just) have the means to make this happen now. As well, I am celebrating a milestone birthday this year, and what better a way to celebrate than by doing something entirely amazing?! I have been sleepily daydreaming about climbing Kilimanjaro for my 30th for a few years. In fact, I remember sitting with my sister at dinner talking about it around four years ago. Come January, I thought to myself- all right, now is the time to start planning. And how far along am I in the planning process, you ask? Well there are certainly not very many things left on the very long to-do list.

There is so much literature on the Internet to help in the process and I haven't come across a bad piece of advice, yet. Rough costs, expectations on the climb/ experience, what sleeping bags to have, how thick your "layering system" should be... let's just say that part of the reason why I haven't been diligently blogging is because it is difficult to cross compare high-altitude trekking insurance rates and find other interesting tid-bits to tell you about. And I promise to contribute back to the wealth of information with my experiences in blog format when I return.

So the facts: I'm flying out July 5th into Dar es Salaam and then on to Moshi July 6th with a few friends from work. We are doing this pretty willy-nilly and so far only the flights to Moshi and the first two nights hotel are actually booked. We have reliable advice from other work friends that it is okay to book the trek when you are actually in Moshi. Frustratingly, the information on the Internet to guide those decisions isn't brilliant. I intend to add to this sort of literature on my return. 

I'd love to summit the 5895m on my birthday, but there-abouts due to tour-guide availability will dictate actual timings. We are all in the same camp of we want better chances of summitting, so are happy to do a 7-day trek. After all of this hard work is a treat where we are then travelling to Zanzibar for a sit on my @$$ and soak up the sun and sea break. Aaaaaaahhhhhhh......

What can I tell you so far? If you have ever thought about doing this, then just do it! My first piece of advice is to book now! The main reason is to save on flight costs. I booked my flights in March and the price is nearly double now. This also gives you some of the commitment that you are actually embarking on this adventure. It's not so easy to cancel/ re-route plane tickets. This is really your first stake in the ground.

Next, start accumulating your kit. The list is long for such a small amount of gear that you are actually able to take. From first browse you think, oh yeah- I have all of this stuff, I'm Canadian, I go camping, and I'm relatively active... what more am I going to need to buy? Well, I just spent 60 quid at Boots (like London Drugs) on spf30 and 50% DEET and zinc oxide tape and Imodium and wet wipes and antibacterial wet wipes and... And on the topic of drugs, another 25£ for Malaria tablets, potentially another £25 for altitude sickness tablets. Plus my joy of this last week was that I needed my vaccinations upgraded. Those of you that really know me know that I flake out just thinking about needles. I can confirm this is still the case, but I am now up to date with my dTap and Hep A. On a side note... possible side effects of upgrading your dTap and Hep A include fainting, dizziness, fever, chills, and aches and pain. On another side note, I also decided not to have my glass and a half (of wine) on the day of my vaccinations nor the next day (so maybe my symptoms were of wine withdrawals?! eek!) I will need to test and confirm this theory again before I go to be sure. I will get back to you on the outcome.

Back to the kit list, one thing I am really worried about is my Reynaud's. It's the gloves vs. mitts debacle. What do I do? The "expert" in the climbing and outdoor gear store advised on a 70£ pair of super ski gloves. The outright cost for something that I haven't had success with in the past made me weary, so I opted to stick to what I know. I went back to the Reynaud's forums on the Internet to see what advice I could get, and sufferers all advise on layers with an over mitt... I know this. This is what works. They also advise on gloves and socks with silver threading and/or wool. So, my stellar combination is silver threaded gloves (and socks), merino wool gloves (and socks), sheepskin mitts, and windproof mitts. I have decided I can cover lots of different climates and situations with this combination (which ended up also adding up to £70, but at least there are more than one pair that I can use in the winter in the UK).

More kit purchased today are all little things that add up and up and up: 3L Camelback (all websites and success stories state that water is what will get you through it- minimum 2L per day), gaiters (I thought that they were only pirate boot or mermaid fin styled to go over your skates), headlamp, and a 4-season sleeping bag good for -15C. I'm still missing just a few things from the recommended "kit lists", those being: sweets, choccie bars, a sun hat, and trekking poles. I am opting to rent the last ones as these are something that I don't see myself using in the future.

Other major areas to tick off the list apart from letting your Dr. know that you are going to update your vaccinations: Tanzanian visa & trekking insurance. I have now postponed from purchasing my insurance as I mentioned earlier, my passport is AWOL. My passport is AWOL because I sent it off for my visa. The visa process itself was rapid, and I know this because I sent it away (and back) registered delivery... Only the address on the envelope back was not entirely correct. My fault entirely and an effect from being pressured in a line and doing a visa application on a Friday at 5pm. I thought I would be clever and have my passport sent back to my work because  I am never home in the week so, I filled out the SAE with my work address and home postal code. Oops. 

I'd like to point out, though that this shouldn't be entirely the kerfuffle that it is as I regularly get post with a correct address and incorrect postal code from Royal Mail. They are capable of sorting an address that is 4/5 lines correct. Ugh! Why couldn't they have recognised the business address!! As a result, I am now on their customer care line every second day trying to get an update as the special delivery envelope was last traced to the national distribution centre in Belfast. Except, the last time I spoke to them on the phone to ask about "the process", they told me that because I have put a chase on it (twice now), the status should have been updated within 48-hours. Nope. 

I need to make a decision now on what action to take. Do I: 

A) wait patiently for it to turn up?

B) declare it lost and apply for a new one?

The major down side about option B is that although losing your passport is a hassle, something in my gut is telling me that replacing my Indefinite Leave to Remain permit is going to be an even larger headache. I would also need to get another Tanzanian visa (relatively inexpensive). I have also declared my first passport from my first tour as stolen (because I wanted to keep it with all of the cool stamps and was not convinced that the government would give it back), which means I already have one warning against me (as advised to me by the passport office when I went to pick my new one up). Argh! What to do?! Also my gut is telling me that it's probably time to get a new passport. So I am asking you all to pray to the passport  and mail gods to let me hear positive news this week and I will keep you updated. Wish me luck!