Rongai Route Revisited - Part 4 : More travelling to our climb start

After the previous day's exersions, we awoke around 7.30am for a good hearty breakfast of fruit, yoghurt, bacon, sausage and eggs! I really pigged out on the banquet, knowing that we wouldn't be eating a hot meal again until the end of the day at least!
By 8.15am we had our bags packed,and water bottles filled. For the next half hour or so we stood and watched as our gear was loaded onto the two white Land Rover Discoveries which would carry us the two hour journey to our starting point for the climb at Rongai Gate.

There was something strangely reassuring about getting into our Land Rovers. One of the iconic British Exports which epitomises quality British design & engineering. As we sped past our third Japanese 4x4 copy on the offroad track taking us to Rongai, it was great to feel we could rely on the Land Rover to plough through the rocks and potholes ahead! Then....disaster....! As we past through what must have been village number 6, our driver suddenly stopped, the fan belt had come off! Typical!

Seizing the opportunity to stretch our legs after the hour long drive, we decided to get out of the vehicle . A small crowd of children had already gathered to see what was going on, so I approached to say hello. Within no time at all we were surrounded by over 200 children. It was one of those cliche moments you see on tv that you believe to be contrived by producers, and yet this was an extraordinarily powerful completely off the cuff encounter. I found myself completely engulfed in children, playing hand games and trying to communicate my name over to them. It was an amazing feeling to be stood in the middle of such obvious poverty and be surrounded by the happiest of all faces! It was a moving and very humbling experience!

All too quickly our fan belt was fixed and we were back on our way. Within an hour we were pulling up at our start gate, and carrying out our last few preparations before heading off up the mountain!