Saturday morning, August 12th. I woke up really early, like around 6 am. Not because I’m such an early bird, but simply because an air mattress isn’t as comfortable as my own bed. It was chilly in the morning, so I wore a few layers to keep warm. I made myself a cup of tea and some breakfast. And the breakfast was horrible. I had to force myself to eat it, because I needed the calories to start the day, but man…yuck! I broke down my tent, packed my backpack, got all sorted and went on my way. The landscape close to the checkpoint was littered with rocks, boulders and tents. Slowly, I left tent city behind me and I hiked on, on my way to checkpoint number two: Singi.
I took a break at this huge rock slab. So many years of being exposed to the elements and erosion carved and cracked the stone. So pretty. At some point, the lighting started to get a little weird. There was this really thick cloud cover yet the sun shone through quite fiercely. It made for some stunning contrasts, which I absolutely loved. The downside was that the cloud cover was the bearer of heaps of rain. I hiked in the rain for a good three hours, if not more. I had my rain pants on and had mud up to my knees! The terrain was getting steep too. In one of the photos at the bottom row below, you can see the climb I had to do and there were a few of those. The terrain started getting a lot more challenging and the rain created mud pools which were a challenge to trudge through.
Alive and Trekking 