Hiking Kasigau By Alta Fairbourne

Python Rock, opposite Mt Kasigau

The morning before the hike

My family and I went to Kasigau to hike Mt. Kasigau. Kasigau is a very small village in Tsavo; Tsavo is a game park where wild African animals live. We left Friday afternoon and it took us 4 hours to get there because there were long lines of monstrous trucks trying to pass each other constantly. We decided to drive on the side of the road where there wasn’t even a road! When we got there we drove up a short, bumpy steep road that lead up to a small mud house. At first we all thought that was where we were staying and I wasn’t so happy, but it turned out we had to walk up a small path to where we stayed. It was a small bungalow with only 5 beds and we were 7 people! It was dark and the stars were beautiful especially when we were sitting around a small campfire. We sat around listening to Everett do stand up comedian shows and it was hilarious. When it was time to bed I realized that my bed was very small and I had to share it with my brother, lets just say that it wasn’t the best night.

Starting on the trail

We woke up at 6 o’clock in the morning and it was cool and breezy, perfect weather for hiking. We ate a small cold breakfast off pop tarts and yogurt. Once we were all ready for the hike we set off.

Hiking through the steep forest

The sun shone really bright and everyone was sweating when we first started to hike. There were a lot of trees around us, but there was no shade. There were rocks of all colors and shapes on the ground as we hiked up the steep mountain. The trail was wide at the time but the higher we hiked the steeper it got. We had two guides that told us about the mountain as we hiked. They said that the Kasigou people used to live up on the mountain and she showed us shallow stone bowls that the woman crushed maize in. Now that we were higher on the mountain there wasn’t any sun we were all shaded by trees, which was very nice. The trail started to get really steep, and many people started to slip and fall. I had to hold on to small trees around me so I wouldn’t go tumbling down the mountain. The long green trees had sun glistening through through their branches and their bark was the color of the dark brown ground. We came to a part of the hike where there wasn’t really even a path anymore it just seemed like we were wondering through the jungle. The top of the mountain was near and we were getting excited to see the so-called amazing view.  As we reached the top of the mountain our eyes had to adjust to the bright sun as we looked off the mountaintop. The foggy sky covered up the view off the mountain so it wasn’t very cool; all we wanted to do was to get back to the shade. There were small green bushes around the border of the mountaintop and the ground was not covered in piles of leafs any more. We only hiked 3 miles up and it took us 2 hours, we were ready for lunch.

The rainforest

Enjoying our lunch

We scurried to the shade and sat down on the dirty floor unpacking the backpack that we brought. We pulled out pringles, chicken nuggets, apples, gummies and everything a small kid would love to have for lunch. After we had enough satisfaction of eating we started down the mountain again. Like I said the mountain was super steep and there was tons of leaves that you could easily slip on. Well I had a great idea, squatted down on my feet and slid down the mountain really fast. I thought I was going got be able to stop, but I wasn’t. I slammed right into a tree and it really hurt. After I started to do it we all started to do it, soon enough we were running, jumping, swinging on trees and it was all really fun. My dad’s new intern, Colby, was with us and we were running right by each other but he was a little in front of me, I saw him trip and right when started to laugh. Boom! I was on the floor right next to him; I was stupid enough to fall for the same trick. We both tripped over a tall tree root and my hand started to bleed and it felt like my big toe was split down the middle. My parents had a hard time traveling down the steep mountainside and we were going so much faster them we lost sight of them.

When we got back to where we were staying everyone was sore and tired. We packed up our stuff and crammed into our big white car. It was a long drive home but it was worth it. The hike was really fun and I can’t wait to go back there.

View from the top, too bad we couldn't see Tanzania!