Category: 60 Before 60

Tips for Kilimanjaro

Tips for climbing Kilimanjaro from a man who’s been up there 10 times already.

I went to the Destinations Travel Show in Manchester today. It’s comprised mostly of stalls run by travel companies advertising their tours. As I tend to avoid tours this isn’t of much interest to me. Even the talks are basically a half hour of advertising blurb. I’ve been to these shows before so I knew what to expect and only went because I had a free ticket and didn’t have anything else planned.

I did find one thing of interest of though.  A talk on climbing Kilimanjaro by a tour leader who’s already been up and down ten times. He works for Exodus, so of course some of the talk was on what Exodus do for you if you go with them (good breakfasts served in a mess tent and the open-sided toilet tent always positioned with a great view), but a lot of what he had to say was more general and included a lot of good tips. Here are some of them:

  • Acclimatisation – each day when you reach your camp for the night, don’t stop there. Have a bit of a rest then climb for about another hour, before coming back down to the tents. This starts getting your body ready for the thinner oxygen, but you’re sleeping at a lower altitude to recover from your first exposure to it.
  • Take plenty of chocolate – healthy food is all well and good, but there are times when only comfort food will do. This will be one of them.
  • Expect pain, lots of it.
  • Headaches aren’t only caused by altitude, but by the intensity of the sun hitting your eyeballs too. Take a really good pair of sunglasses.
  • Wear a hat – don’t fail to summit because you’ve got sunstroke.
  • Take some really good earplugs – you’ll be sleeping in close proximity to a lot of people some of whom will snore. And snoring is amplified at altitude.
  • Don’t panic if you can’t sleep. As long as you are horizontal and resting, you are still doing your body some good. On this note, don’t take a nap when you arrive at camp as this will really throw your sleep patterns out.
  • If you’re hungry you’re doing ok. People who are hungry make it to the top. If you’re not hungry, it doesn’t mean you won’t make it, but it is a sign that you may struggle a bit more.
  • There isn’t a lot of snow at the top and what there is is very compacted and frozen. Normal walking boots are fine, you won’t need crampons.
  • You need to drink a lot of water even if you’re not thirsty. However, water bladders will be frozen when you start heading for the summit at midnight on the final day. Carry your water in an alternative way.
  • There are several reasons why the last day starts at midnight. One is so that you can’t see where you’re going. It’s about 7hrs on a switchback path that would destroy any morale you had left if you could see it.
  • If you use an ipod wrap a heat pad round it otherwise it won’t work.
  • After the first few days, you’ll be above the cloud cover so it won’t matter what the weather’s like – you won’t be in it.
  • The weather is really changeable and no one time of the year is particularly better than any other.
  • The climb starts at around 1600m – spending a few days in the area first will help your acclimatisation.
  • Running, swimming and cycling are the best training. They have to be done to the extent that you really get your heartbeat up and sweat a lot.
  • Walking across ‘The Saddle’ (the strip of land that dips between the lower peak and and the summit) is soul-destroying. It’s a day of walking with nothing ever seeming to get any closer.
  • Don’t expect to do too much talking whilst you’re walking – you’ll be conserving your oxygen for breathing.

Planning

Lots of plans are starting to come together.

Having plans for fun things to do in the holidays or at weekends is what keeps me going through term time. Especially when I work 14 hour days like today. And know that I’ll be late again tomorrow. And even that won’t be enough; I’ll still be behind with everything I need to do. So the plans are really important.

This week my plans have really been coming together for half term. I’ll be going down to London to stay with a friend in Chesham for the first part of the week and then heading round the M25 to Kent to stay with different friends for a few days.

On the Monday I’m going to Wembley to do a tour of the new stadium. We’re then heading into town to have a late lunch at Jamie Oliver’s Fifteen restaurant. To finish off our day we have tickets for a Night of Adventure at the Vue Cinema in Leicester Square. This is a roll call of people who do interesting, adventurous and intrepid things. They each present a slide show of their ‘adventure’ but have only 20 slides and 20 seconds per slide to present it. I’m hoping for inspiration.

We also want to go to the Vertigo 42 bar on the 42nd floor of the Nat West Tower. This is the second tallest building in London and the bar is small and surrounded by windows with amazing views. It’s expensive so we’ll only be having one drink there. I don’t know if we’ll have time to fit it in on Monday between the restaurant and the show so may have to postpone it till another evening.

For the Tuesday and Wednesday I have my tickets for the Hajj exhibition at the British Museum and the floatation tank. I’ll have plenty of time on these days to do other things as well, like visiting some of my favourite shops: Stanford’s, the Algerian Coffee Stores, the bookshops on Charing Cross Road …

As well as plans for this half term, I also have the England game to look forward to in the June half term and Womad in the summer. A few weekends are getting booked up too, with friends coming to stay at the end of the January and a weekend in Nottingham planned so I can go to my first ever ice hockey game with a friend’s daughter (she’s a bit of an expert and so will be able to explain it all to me).

The 14 hour days don’t seem so bad when I think about all of this.

The St Kilda mailboat

I’m surprised to find out that St Kilda mailboats are still sent out today.

St Kilda mailboat
A St Kilda mailboat in the museum in Scalloway, Shetland

St Kilda is an island (actually a small archipelago) out in the Atlantic way west of Scotland. It was abandoned in 1930 when the way of life become unsustainable for the remaining 36 inhabitants. It’s now owned by the National Trust for Scotland and one of the best ways to visit the island (and one of the only ways to spend more than a few hours there) is to take part in one of their work parties. So far it hasn’t been feasible for me to do this, but one day I will.

Until their evacuation, the residents of St Kilda lived in almost complete isolation. The only way they had of communicating with the outside world was with the aid of a St Kilda mailboat. These mailboats were small wooden boxes in which letters and money for a stamp would be placed. They’d be sealed up, an inflated sheep’s bladder would be attached as a float and the mailboat would be launched. They usually landed in Scotland or Scandinavia where the finder would hopefully post the letter inside.

Today I saw an article on the National Trust for Scotland’s website about a mailboat launched by one of last summer’s work parties being found in Norway. Although there are other means of communication now, each work party launches a mailboat as a way of re-enacting the tradition. Until I saw this article I hadn’t realised they did this.

I wonder who’ll find the one I launch when I eventually join a work party there?

Lots going on

I seem to have an awful lot of exciting things going on at the moment.

There seems to be so much happening at the moment. We’re on day 9 of the year and already I feel that this is going to be a good year in which I’m going to achieve lots.

I signed up for the travel writing course with the London School of Journalism on Saturday night and by Sunday I had my first two lessons emailed to me. I really wasn’t expecting it to be that quick! Today I’ve had another email from them with a lot more information. I’ve skimmed through the two lessons to get an idea of what’s expected of me so I can start thinking about them. I’ll wait until the weekend to go through them properly though.

Still on the topic of writing, yesterday I was reading Wanderlust magazine and found a short book review that had been submitted by a reader. This is a regular column where readers can submit a review of a ‘must read book’ that they’ve ‘read on location’. There’s no payment involved, but it seems like a good way to start getting myself into print.

I made a quick study of the style of the already published article and then wrote one in a similar style and emailed it off to the magazine. I also used a few of the tips I’d picked up from my skim-reading of the two writing course lessons I’ve received to make the layout and presentation seem a bit more professional. I’ve already got a reply from ‘Tom’ thanking me and saying he’s looking forward to reading it. Reading what? My review? Or the book itself because he likes my review? Does this mean I’m going to be published? It’s all a bit ambiguous. But if I am published then that’s a good start on my 2012 twelve list.

On a completely different topic, today was my first day back at school and I was already discussing half-term plans with a colleague. We got onto summer holiday plans and she mentioned she has booked to go to Womad with a group of girlfriends. I had no plans to go to Womad over the next few years because it falls in the summer holidays when I’d rather be away somewhere for a month or more. I want to go to Womad, but thought it could wait a while. However, when my colleague mentioned it and then invited me along it seemed like fate. Another example of how keeping a list and focussing on the things I want to achieve helps to make them happen. So I’ve said I’ll go. It should be fun to be with a group of people as well.

I’ve just been online to book a ticket, but it’s all a bit confusing. I need to check with her tomorrow which type of ticket she’s got and for which days, then I can get mine booked. I’ll still have time to go to Scotland afterwards (or Japan if the free tickets thing happens), and I can explore Wiltshire or Somerset for a few days before the festival starts.

I’ve got the floatation tank booked in London for half-term and today they’ve emailed me to confirm two sessions. I’ve mailed back to correct it to one session! I’ve also got a ticket for the Hajj exhibition at the British Museum over half-term. During the rest of my time in London the friend I’m staying with suggested meeting up at lunch time one day to go to Jamie Oliver’s restaurant Fifteen. If we can’t get in there then we may go to the Ritz for afternoon tea instead. I’d like to go to Jamie’s restaurant, but the afternoon tea at the Ritz would mean another challenge ticked off. Choices, choices …

Whilst I was planning my half-term and thinking about the things I can achieve I thought I might as well check out England fixtures at Wembley. I got excited when I realised England are playing Holland on February 29th, until I realised that this is the week after half-term. I thought about trying to get down for the game, but I really don’t think I’d make it on time. I’ve looked at other fixtures and there’s a Belgium game I could go to in June. It’s on a Saturday, so the travelling time wouldn’t be a problem. I’d rather go to the Holland game, as The Netherlands is a country I go to most years and feel a bit of a connection to. Also, the only other game I’ve ever been to at Wembley was an international schoolboys’ game when I was at school myself. This game was England vs Holland, and so it seemed kind of meant to be that the game I see now should be England vs Holland. Except it’s not meant to be. Oh well, can’t have everything.

To apply for tickets for an England game I need a FAN (FA number). I’ve applied for one and now have it ready for when the tickets for the Belgium game go on sale. I’ll have to keep monitoring the FA’s site to make sure I do get a ticket.

I still have quite a few posts about Iceland in the draft stage as well which I’m trying to get finished, but now I’m getting distracted by all these other things. I’m certainly not complaining about having lots of good things going on in my life though!

Gazing at the Northern Lights

YES! I saw the Northern Lights!

The first three nights I was in Reykjavik there was no tour to the Northern Lights. The two bus companies that run the pretty much identical tours decide at around 5pm each evening whether the tour should go ahead or not. They decide this based on cloud cover, weather reports, and reports on the activity of the aurora causing particles. Each evening I checked with the hostel receptionist, but no luck.

On the fourth night (30/12/11), I asked as usual, fully expecting the answer to be no as there was pretty heavy cloud cover. But the answer was yes. I was a bit sceptical, but the receptionist showed me the cloud cover report on the internet and it was clear to see that from 11pm onwards the cloud was really expected to clear over the Reykjanes Peninsula.

I booked the tour with Reykjavik Excursions as their tour started half an hour later than the one with Iceland Excursions and there didn’t seem any point in hanging around for an extra half hour when it would be too early to see the lights anyway. The tour was 4,900 kronur or about £28.

I got all wrapped up in my layers of thermals and fleeces, made a flask of hot chocolate and packed my tripod. The bus picked me up outside the hostel and then went round a few other hotels and the BSI bus station collecting more people.

Once everyone was on board we headed out on the airport road to the Reykjanes Peninsula. Once we were out of the Reykjavik we began to see the moon and then stars. A good sign as it meant the cloud was clearing. We stopped in a couple of dark places, but had no luck with the lights. We then drove to the end of the peninsula, by the sea and near a small village and a lighthouse. There was quite a big area for parking here and other buses were already parked up, with others arriving after us. Everyone got off the bus and gazed at the sky. There was nothing to see. As it was cold I thought I might as well as wait back on the bus until something happened. I didn’t want the lights to finally appear just as I reached the point of no return with hypothermia and frostbite.

I hadn’t been on the bus for long when I noticed everyone pointing and looking at the same section of sky. I got back off the bus and with difficulty could just make out a patch of sky that was slightly lighter in colour. It could easily have been light from the moon, but the driver assured us it was the beginning of an aurora.

As we watched it began to turn green and spread across the sky. Not the whole sky, just a stripe from horizon to horizon. It would widen and darken, and then fade again. Sometimes fading completely in the middle. It was paler than I imagined it to be, yet on the photos people were taking it looked just as deeply coloured as the photos in magazines and tourist brochures. Maybe the cameras just pick up more light or something.

We watched it for about an hour until it pretty much faded completely. It did do a bit of swirling but mainly stayed as a stripe. So it wasn’t as impressive as I was expecting, but was still pretty cool. I’m glad I’ve seen it anyway and feel quite privileged as I know this is something lots of people dream of seeing for themselves.

As for my photos? They didn’t come out at all. My amazing new camera which has been so good at taking photos so far, including in low light, just wouldn’t pick the aurora up on ‘auto’. I switched to manual but couldn’t get anything to work properly as I couldn’t see the buttons in the dark and I’m not familiar enough with this camera to do everything by feel alone.

Once I realised I wasn’t going to get any good photos I lent my tripod to a couple of South Africans who were sat in front of me on the bus. They got some really good photos which they have said they will email to me. I really hope they do. I don’t know when they’ll be going home to do this, so I may have to wait a while. But whenever it is, I just hope they don’t forget me or lose my email address!

Hot air balloon crash

Sadly, a hot air balloon has been involved in an accident in New Zealand.

Just come across this via twitter. I’d never heard of any accidents involving hot air balloons before. I’m sure there’s always going to be a risk involved: standing in a basket, hundreds of meters in the air with a blazing gas canister certainly doesn’t sound particularly safe, and no doubt the owners or company bosses will make me sign all kinds of liability waivers before I ever get so much as a toe in that basket. But even so, I haven’t any qualms about going up in one and everyone I know who has been in a hot air balloon has loved the experience.


So although this hasn’t put me off, it has given me a few concerns. Maybe I should wear a fire-proof suit with matching parachute when I eventually do this task?

I’m home

I’ve just got back from Iceland and I already have a huge to-do list.

I got home from Iceland this morning. It’s been a really long day as I had to get up at 3.30am for my flight. I have so many different things I want to blog about I don’t know where to start. It’s going to take a while for me to get everything out of my head and on to my computer. I met some amazing people, heard some amazing stories and saw the Northern Lights. Amazing.

I’ve been practising with my new camera and been taking loads of photos every day. I still have to take one for today to keep up with 2012 task of taking at least one photo every day. I ordered a video camera before I went away and it has arrived. I haven’t opened it yet, but learning how to use it will go towards my other 2012 task of learning how to use three new pieces of technology or software.

Over the coming week I need to book the floatation tank for half term and enrol on a writing course. I also need to sort out insurance for the two houses I currently own (my goal is five); sort out some repairs in the house I rent out; put together a fitness programme; return my new backpack as it’s already got a seam coming loose; get to Martin Mere to take a photo that will win me a trip to Antarctica; remember to take a photo each day; download (and upload) all my photos; try to get out on at least one walk; and get my blog updated. I don’t really have time to go back to school on Monday!

Iceland

I’m loving watching the sunrise whilst swimming in steam and snow.

I love my snowboots. My feet have so been so warm and dry in all this snow. the only problem with them is when I sink deeper than my knees. Would it have been possible to get thigh-high snowboots?

I love my new camera too. It takes amazing pictures and makes it all so easy. Even in the dark (which it is most of the time here) I don’t need a tripod – it just focuses and then remembers what the image looks like whilst it does the long exposure thing. So I’m not getting any blurry photos. Wowee.

I haven’t seen the Northern Lights yet, as each evening so far the trip out of the city to see them has been cancelled. It only runs when there’s a good chance of seeing them. But I have plenty of time left yet.

What have I done so far? Well, yesterday morning I went outdoor swimming in the pool next to the hostel. I started by sitting in the first hot pot I came to as my bare feet were freezing fast as I walked over the icy ground the 2 metres to the pool. It was so warm. There was even a floating chess set bobbing about on it, so I suppose people really do spend hours in them.

I stayed in this hot pot until it was infiltrated by young children having a snowball fight. The Icelandic version of water polo perhaps? Then I switched to the main swimming pool which was cooler, but still a good temperature. I couldn’t see how big the pool was because it was dark and the rising steam made it really misty. So visibility was down to about zero. I kept swimming round corners and bends and discovering more and more pool. Or maybe I was just swimming in tight circles and thought I was discovering new bits. At one point I swam under a bridge and discovered an elderly people’s exercise class going on in one of the lanes.

Once I’d had enough of swimming I sat in a different hot pot – one with bends, corners and alcoves and watched the sun beginning to rise through the fir trees. It got slightly above the horizon which is about the best to be hoped for at this time of year. It gets light around 11am and is dark again well before 5pm.

Í’ve also been drinking lots of good coffee whilst I’ve been here. I think Icelandic coffee is second only to Dutch coffee. It’s dark and strong and doesn’t come in a bucket. Last time I was here I discovered a new little coffee shop called Cafe Haiti. It’s run by a woman who is one of only two Haitians in Iceland. She imports the coffee from Haiti and roasts it herself. When I got home I wrote a review of it on Trip Advisor. The first day I was here I saw an advert for Cafe Haiti in one of the free tourist papers. It was quoting a customer who said they’d gone to Cafe Haiti because of a review they’d read on Trip Advisor and it really was as good as the review said. I’ve since seen the same ad in several other places. As far as I’m aware I’m the only person who’s written a review on Trip Advisor so I must be the reviewer the advert is referring to. Does this make me famous? Or at least semi-famous? Even though no-one knows who I am. I’m glad my review (if it is mine – I will have to check when I’m not paying for internet) has done her some good. I’ve been back today and she is now in bigger premises.

New year, new challenges

Setting myself 12 challenges to work towards next year.

I don’t usually make New Year’s resolutions. And anyway, I think more in academic years than calendar ones, so January is a third of the way in for me. I’m thinking of changing that this year though, and setting myself a few challenges. Not resolutions as such, but things to achieve during 2012. Since I’ve started keeping my list of 60 things and regularly writing about them (very tenuously sometimes, I know) I’ve realised how much more focussed I am and how I tune into things that may help me achieve my challenges. So maybe I should try a yearly list too. It might help me get more done and make me more ‘micro-focussed’. In a book ‘Getting Things Done’, I read earlier this year it was recommended that tasks are broken down into minute stages to make them more achievable. So by creating a yearly list I’m on my way to setting step-by-step target stages for my overall challenges. I’m still at the thinking stage, but my ideas so far include:

  1. Floating in a floatation tank (I’m hoping to do this in London during the February half term)
  2. Reading at least 10 books from the BBC Big Read list (if I read 10 a year, I’ll have the whole 200 knocked off in the next 12-13 years!)
  3. Taking at least one photo every day of the year (this will improve my photography skills, be a photo-diary of ‘year in my life’, and help me to learn to use my new camera)
  4. Coming up with a fitness plan and sticking to it (the start of my training for Kilimanjaro, though I may not actually climb it for several years yet)
  5. Leading at least 4 of my own walks (good practice for my walking group leader’s qualification)
  6. Buying another house (need to get my finances in order first)
  7. Learning to use at least 3 new pieces of technology or computer programmes (not counting my new camera)
  8. Doing a writing course (depends on the length of the couse whether I’d complete it in the year or not)
  9. Getting at least one piece of writing published (paid or unpaid, as long as someone else makes the decision to publish it and it’s not self-published)
  10. Making a start on sorting out my photos (putting the prints that are currently still stuffed in packets into albums and getting all my photos scanned into the computer – no way will this be completed in a year, but I’ll feel good even if I get started on it)
  11. Buying a car/van that I can sleep in (and doing any necessary conversions/adaptations)
  12. Getting into cycling (even if it’s just short cycles along decent paths)



That’s twelve. The equivalent of one a month, which seems a good number for a yearly list.

Getting ready for Iceland

There’s so much still to do before I go to Iceland.

I’m so busy at school at the moment I feel like I still have so much to do to prepare for Iceland and I’m not getting time to do it. It’s a week today that I go. I keep thinking about clothes. It’s going to be cold – even if the temperature hovers around zero the wind could make it feel a lot colder. And it’s going to rain. Vertically, horizontally, diagonally, it’s going to rain. I’d thought about getting a really good winter jacket such as a down jacket, but it seems the jackets that are made for warmth aren’t particularly waterproof. Down in particular, is really not recommended for wet weather, though it’s the warmest thing out there. So I’m just going to have to layer up underneath my waterproof jacket. The problem with that is that there’s only so much I can fit underneath it whilst still being able to move. I’ve just invested in some new thermal leggings and vests and I tried them out yesterday. They are very thin, but kept me really snug, so that’s a partial solution.


I’ve just reproofed my jacket. Last weekend the rain soaked right through so I knew it had to be done. I could have done with some rain this weekend to test it now it’s been reproofed, but I’ll just have to settle for spraying water on it. If the reproofing hasn’t worked then I’m going to have to find the time and money to get a new one before I go.


I’ve also reproofed my walking boots and bought some snow boots. I’m thinking about getting a new backpack before I go too. My current one has been held together with duct tape since the Great Glen Way, so I do need one. But I was going to wait until Easter when I go to Germany and then check out Deuter packs. As it’s a German brand there’s so much more choice there.


I’ve played a bit with my new camera and tripod, but not nearly enough. I didn’t take it out yesterday as I thought I would be walking with the group and so didn’t want to be faffing about. As it happened I could have got some great practice in.


I’ve bought the Rough Guide to Iceland and had a quick look through it, but I don’t think it’s as good as the Lonely Planet I used 2½ years ago. So maybe I’ll take both. I still have to decide on reading material. I’m envisaging spending a lot of time sitting in Reykjavik’s wonderful coffee shops, relaxing and reading.


The hostel has emailed me to inform me of their reception’s Christmas opening hours and to ask what time I’m expecting to arrive. As I should arrive during their opening hours that’s straightforward. At some point this week I need to renew my travel insurance and book the Northern Lights tour. Then of course I need to pack. And do the million and one other things that need to be done with my house, work and Christmas before I can actually go on holiday.