Wow

Found a new trail/road. Unfortunately my camera battery was dead.

Thomas Holden and John Course came around Saturday morning and we road up from my house, crossing ngaremtoni river, and turned up the West Meru Plateau road. We stopped 1/2 way up for breakfast and I sent Thomas on a small track to see if it looked like it contoured around.

In the past few years I now feel like I am a mzee. So I feel no guilt or loss of pride to send someone else to check something out. why should a mzee with grandchildren work as hard as younger people?

Thomas returned saying it didn't go down. So we tried it. It did go down after 10 minutes but not much so we kept going. Eventually it lead us up onto the plateau on the other side of the forest guard post. So now we know how to by pass the gate if they ever start asking us what we are doing in the forest.

The views were spectacular contouring around the plateau. Then the road goes up a ravine and we climbed into thick fog. We came out on top at a water tank and wondered where we were. Vaguely it looked familiar, and then i figured the big road we had come to could only be one on the plateau, so i figured we were 500 meters beyond the gate. We rolled down to the gate, which was open.

A man was asking why we were passing by without stopping, in English. So we stopped and I was thinking " ok, it is starting. We will now need official permission and permits , etc." He was as friendly and cordial as could be and we chatted a few mintues.

Now we had 15 km and 1.5 km vertical to drop. I couldnt keep up with Thomas and John on their full suspension and younger bodies. It was technical the first part, and the second part was just plain fast. I think it only took over an hour to get home what took 3 hours to climb.