Advanced Mountain Leadership course (Drakensberg) Sep 2003

I left my car at Rob’s place and we drove in his car. This was my last practical for my Advanced Mountain Leadership Course. The drive down was unspectacular but it started getting interesting when we got onto the paved road. There was thick mist around, the temperature was dropping and eventually it started raining lightly. Soon the rain turned into ice rain and not long after we got onto the dirt road it was snowing. We were very happy and hoped it would get thicker. By the time we got to the Car park it was snowing a fair amount and we agreed to sleep in the hut or in the car. There were only two guys in the hut so we gladly paid the R15 for the night.

Day 1 (6 September): We got up just after 6am and everything outside was white. It was still snowing lightly and we dressed warm. The walking was interesting as everything was covered in snow and parts of the concrete paths were iced over. It did not take us long to get to the gully but in between we took a lot of pictures with the snow and ice. We climbed up a bit in the gully and then we started with some of the practical stuff. I had to put up natural anchors for belaying and then belayed using an HMS knot on a karabiner. We also did some short-roping higher up in the gully. When we got to the top, Rob brewed some tea and took some more pictures. It was approaching 11am when we left for the Tugela bowl. We did some more down-hill short-roping until we got to the Tugela bowl. We chatted a little with another group camped there and then continued past to the hut where we had lunch. We were just finishing up when two Parks Board employees showed up. They invited us in and we sat around the coal stove warming up for a while before we left. We climbed across the hill and descended to Bilanjil river. Soon we found the shelter where we could bivvy and spent the rest of the afternoon doing improvised rescue techniques. It started to clear a little later and we walked over to some of the cracks in the escarpment. We took a lot of photos before eventually returning to our shelter and getting dinner started. It cleared even more as the sun set and it promised to be a very cold night.

Day 2 (7 September): Save a few wisps in the east, it was cloudless when we got up just before 7am. Though still cold, the sun warmed us up nicely. We first walked a bit of the escarpment edge taking more pictures, before finally deciding to go for Mont-aux-Sources. Rob started off very fast and I had trouble keeping up. Eventually however, I found my pace and managed to get ahead a little. We both pretty much followed our own routes and although it was a long climb we got to the top just before 10am. The wind was howling. We stayed on top just long enough for a picture – we could still see snow on Sterkhorn and Cathkin. We climbed down the top and descended via the ridge leading to the chain ladders. The walk to the chain ladders was long but easy and at the top cairn Rob wanted to teach me the classic abseil. To say the least it was uncomfortable but I tried it twice to make sure I would be able to do it again. Then we climbed down the ladders with me belaying Rob on the long one. There were a lot of people on their way up and we were glad that we got off before they got up. As soon as we hit the path we picked up speed and in less than an hour got back to the Car park. We lingered just long enough to get our shoes off and a clean shirt on, then left for home.

Mt Damavand (Iran) Sep 2002

After a sleepless night at Dubai airport I got to Mehrabad airport at 9pm. I waited outside for Jean, slumped over on a hard metal chair with lots of Iranians staring. Jean arrived at 3am and we waited for a sign of dawn to get a taxi and take us to the inner city. We got to our grotty little place at about 7, sharing it with only Pakistanis. We slept until 11 and then went scouting around for fuel, food and maps. We found all three but was quite appalled by the horrific traffic, the lack of any order, the smog, and Tehran as a whole. We got a nice looking, but useless map only after a long struggle to find the Mountaineering Federation which is located next to the Life Saving Federation. Eventually we got back to the "hotel" where we got to speak to Hamid. This is the guy I met over the internet while still in SA. He was quite congenial and terribly helpful, arranging a taxi to take us to the mountain the next day. We went out for a local meal - a foot-long with tomatoes, gherkins and some sausage along with coke (R6!). Surviving the stifling night, our taxi pitched up on time and we started negotiating Tehran traffic. About ten times worse than Kampala we managed to get out of Tehran in about an hour. The drive was comparatively slow but the scenery was splendid. Although we feared for our lives the way our driver overtook seven trucks, three taxis and eleven cars on a blind uphill corner on a single lane, he proved to be competent enough to get us to the mountain just before midday - and that 100km drive in a chartered private taxi cost us 12USD - for both. That's to be expected I suppose with a petrol price of 65c (SA) per liter! He dropped us at the Mountain Guide Service or something like that where we were told that it will cost us another 100 000 rials (12.5USD) to be driven to the overnight shelter and another 20USD each to climb the mountain. Not having expected such heavy fines for mountaineering we protested heavily. Weighed down with a 25kg pack we relented that it's worth to be driven up to 3000m. We were about to pitch the tent on a very, very dusty patch of ground when we were ushered into the shelter by the locals. We were assured we don't need to pay for that luxury so we settled down next to what seemed like a family of four. All four were extremely friendly, hospitable but also curious. Apparently we were the first South Africans they ever saw on the mountain and were amazed that we weren't black! They offered us fruit, bread and tea to share. Later on Jean and I lay down for a snooze and one of the ladies got up and covered us both with their own jackets, thinking that we were cold in our short sleeves. Later that afternoon a young under-equipped Swiss fellow pitched up, with whom we eventually shared two days walking and food/cooking.

Day 1: Seeing as though the mountain was almost completely devoid of snow, bar a few patches, we left crampons, ice pick, rope, safety gear, gaiters and gloves behind. With more acceptable packs we started on the climb that would take us to 4200m. The path was tramped heavily, very dusty and impossible to miss. We climbed steadily but tried our best to take it slow - partly to adjust to altitude but also because we simply had the whole day. We eventually got to the top shelter (Barga) at about 3pm. The shelter was full of Iranians so we pitched our tent between the rocks for the night. Later that night more Iranians showed up - they have summitted that morning. They were all very curious about us but all of them very friendly, trying to chat in the 6 English words they knew, a lot of Farsi and plenty sign language. One of the guys seemed to be the Iran mountaineering idol - over sixty and very grey he apparently climbes Damavand every weekend. We went to bed without feeling affected by altitude at all.

Day 2: We went on a climb with a dual purpose - acclimatizing and scouting for a campsite that we can use later. Normally the mountain gets summitted from the last shelter in one day. Unfortunately that means a 1400m ascent and descent in a single day, usually starting at around 2am. Neither of us fancied a start that early. We climbed steadily but did not really enjoy it as the slope was quite steep and covered with very loose scree - that of course means one step up, ten steps back. Eventually we found ourselves on a little ridge that was in reality rather a small decrease in the slope's angle. We found a spot close to a big ice patch where we started to hack out a platform for the tent from the scree slope. We were at 4925m. Tobi (the Swiss fellow) wanted to try for the summit the next day and climbed a little higher while Jean and I busied ourselves with the platform. Tobi returned and we ran down the scree back to the shelter. I had a nasty headache from the altitude so I took some aspirin that seemed to do the trick.

Day 3: The wind blew fairly hard during the night and next morning we saw for the first time, major cloud development around the summit. We packed up anyway and saw Tobi already climbing a bit higher up with some Iranians. Just before we left it started to snow heavily but it was over in ten minutes. While we struggled up the slope with heavy packs it cleared further, but the wind remained frighteningly cold. Taking it really slow we got to our platform at about 1pm. I developed quite a bad headache and after we pitched the tent I immediately got inside. Tobi came down from the summit - we congratulated him and wished him well. The headache was bad enough for me not wanting anything to eat that night. We were sorry we left the ice picks behind as it was back-braking work to hack a small hole into which melt-water from the ice could collect. The wind was blowing badly when we settled in the tent just after two. The wind eventually turned to gale force and suddenly we were stuck in a snow blizzard at 4900m. What an experience!! I barely slept that night, taking an aspirin almost every three hours.

Day 4: Eventually dawn came but the wind was no better. At least it stopped snowing but a lot of spindrift was blowing against the tent. I was feeling really groggy but I knew it was either up or down and if we went down I probably would not return. So up we went. Jean packed some stuff for the day in his daypack and started climbing. With the layer of snow the scree was even worse. We had barely started when I had to stop to vomit - having not eaten anything all that came out was bile. On the way up I vomited another two times. Due to altitude, lack of energy, the gradient but especially the bad quality of the scree, I could only manage about twenty paces at a time before I slumped to the ground and wheezed the thin air until my pulse slowed to under 200. This went on pretty much the whole day. At 5300m we hit the sulphur vents. At first the smell was tolerable but after it became the only thing you breathed, it was quite bad. The sulphur fumes lasted right to the summit where we took pics quickly and started down at a terrible pace. It took us six hours to get to the top, 31 minutes to get back down to the tent. Still feeling very groggy myself, Jean did most of the packing but soon we started down the slope again to Barga. Clouds accumulated later and it started to snow quite heavily before we got back. Luckily it didn't last and we were able to pitch the tent on dry ground. Back at 4200m I felt better and was able to start eating again. After a smallish dinner we went to bed, feeling quite content.

Day 5: We were very slow in getting up the next day (Tuesday). We took our time to pack up and eventually left for the bottom shelter at 10am. It took less than four hours to get back to 3000m where we once again settled in the shelter. Having climbed over the weekend when we saw more than eighty Iranians and a couple of Swiss on the mountain, everything was now suddenly dead silent. A Turkish guy was on his way to the top and we quickly exchanged contact info as he could be very helpful in gaining info on Mt. Ararat. A local herdsboy invited us to tea at his primitive dwelling and we accepted. He produced some carpet bread and home made goat milk cheese that rather tasted like sour milk but we ate hungrily the first fresh stuff in days. He also invited us to dinner and breakfast but we tried to explain that we HAD to finish our own supplies. He kept on insisting with "no pay, no pay". That night he wandered over while we were preparing dinner and his premeditated intent surfaced when we realized he wanted to have our jackets. Eventually we silenced him with a glimmering new quick-draw from Jean. At least it was cheap.

Day 6: We left fairly early next morning on the dusty track down to civilization. It was only about 5km down to the asphalt road but our feet were aching when we got there. We started walking back towards Reineh, the town where we started from. On the way we managed to hitch a lift on a cement truck. Neither of the occupants spoke a single word of English but with lots of head-nodding, pointing and repetition of the word Tehran, we managed to get on the back. Pale from the cement dust, they dropped us in the town of Polur at what seemed to be a bus stop. Less than a minute later we were picked up by a bus. USD1.2 for the both of us back to Tehran - another 60km! The bus drive was fairly uneventful and back in Tehran we got a taxi with another non-English driver. He didn't understand where the hell we wanted him to take us but in the end he dropped us off about a 100m from our hotel. We slumped back into the beds at the hotel. We were absolutely filthy and smelled almost as bad as the Pakistanis. As our hotel didn't have a shower we went to the public bath house (hamam) which was quite clean. The shower was warm and back at the hotel we felt like humans again. To get rid of more food we cooked on the floor that night.

Next day we went shopping in the Tehran bazaar. What a place!! As big as four rugby fields, under cover, steamy wet, crowded with about 800 000 people... unbelievable. We really wanted to buy something Persian but since Iran is not geared towards tourism AT ALL, the only thing we could find was carpets. Unfortunately the silk stuff that I wanted was so expensive that we had to settle for small saddle bags made by some of the nomads of Iran. That afternoon we had a very filling meal similar to the one we had at the start. We discussed our possibilities for the next day and settled on taking the cable car up Mt. Tochal - the mountain that rises from the northern city limits. Unfortunately I woke up feeling quite sick: groggy, all my joints aching and a slight headache. But I didn't want to spoil the day for Jean too, so we went anyway. From where the taxi dropped us we still had to walk a good 2km to the bottom station. The first section took us up to 2900m and the next to 3700m, but that was another 20 000 rials each and I was feeling pretty bad so we stayed at the intermediate station. Back at the hotel I packed to leave early the next morning. Jean was only going to leave early Monday morning. Next morning I still felt sick when I left for the airport. It was a bit of a struggle finding the right terminal but customs and passport inspections went quickly. Soon I was on the flight to Dubai, and after a long stopover, the flight back home.

Mt Elgon (Uganda) Jul 2002

A 5-day trek up Mt Elgon in eastern Uganda on the border with Kenya. We claimed two summits over 4000m and had a fantastic experience climbing peaks in Africa.