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After the events of last night I felt drained and was dreading the walking today. It was the first time at health check we didn't all score 10/10 for how we felt. Our feeling of dread for the day was further enhanced when Charles told us one of the porters was sick and so Richard our assistant guide and him had to go back down the mountain. He looked pale, sweaty and generally unwell. We felt helpless away from out western hospitals to help him and so besides antiemetics, painkillers and chocolate we had little else to offer him. Fortunately camp was near a rescue road so he didn't have to go far to be driven down the mountain.
We started walking at 9, we played 20 questions to pass the time and with Charles as pace setter and regular stops for snacks and photo's we began to feel more upbeat. We overtook 4 fit looking Canadians in their early 30's, one of who was already not managing to carry his day sack and with over taking them morale was improved further. As we climbed plants became more and more sparse with the landscape being mainly bare rock now. As we got higher our headaches returned with nausea.
After a slow walk up we eventually reached Lava peak at 4627m where we stopped for lunch. Lunch was made uneasy by large ravens constantly circling us for scraps and small mice running between the rocks grabbing any crumbs we dropped. Also due to the altitude none of us were feeling particularly hungry. Matt felt the worse not being able to eat anything and feeling and looking so miserable that Ruth was bullied into giving him a lot of sympathy and concern.
After a quick lunch we began our decent down to where we would camp, not much higher than where we'd camped the previous night. As we walked down the landscape was stunning, plants reappeared and we followed a stream down with waterfalls appearing now and again. As we walked down we began to feel less nauseous and headaches receded. We were all exhausted by the time we reached camp, especially the 2 of us that had had a bad night previously.
As we sat down for our tea and popcorn our headaches returned hitting us all like sledge hammers and making us all feel miserable. As if the mountain sensed morale had hit an all-time low a comedy moment followed. Jack opened the cow bell (powdered milk) just as Tarryn passed hot water to Tom. The cowbell exploded in Ruth's face covering her in white powder and causing Tom to panic thinking it was the water. I don't think me typing this up can really do the moment justice but we all found it hilarious then and for the rest of the trip.
We all had a nap which helped most people to feel back to a 10/10 at the evening health check. I was still struggling, I had totally lost my appetite and felt continuously nauseous, having to force small amounts of bland food down to keep energy levels up. I was now very constipated after taking Imodium for the previous night and was never headache free for long. The health check revealed all of our saturations have dropped with them all recording in the mid 80's (normal being about 94%).
As we got ready for bed it began to rain- the first of the trip. As the rain cleared we were able to see the lights of Moshi from the campsite- another amazing view before we went to sleep.
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