Well this is it, the first day of the climb. It still feels a little unreal to me that I'm about to spend six days trying to reach the top of the highest peak in Africa. So we left the Keys hotel around 8:45 this morning and headed out to the Macheme gate where we will start the climb at 5600ft. So I've been hanging around Moshi (the closest town to the mtn.) for about a week now and the weather has been great. Talked to a bunch of people coming of the mtn. and everyone said that they had great weather. So of course an hour or two into the hike it starts raining, a pretty good down pour for about 2 hours. (Bring a poncho) So the guides try and take it really pole pole (Swahili for slow) but I just couldn't handle it. I hate having to hike right on someone’s heels, so I had to leave everyone behind and hike on alone. It was a great hike today up through the jungle/forest lots of birds and insects to inspect (Cath you'd love it). So I arrived at the Macheme hut at 3:45 having left the gate at around 9:45. The elevation here is 9500ft all the porters hike up ahead of the group and setup camp. Which is quite nice they have the tents up and bring you a bowl of hot water to clean up. They also setup a dining tent for everyone to eat in, all of this was unexpected by me I thought it would be a lot rougher. Not that I'm complaining. They fixed us a great curry dinner with soup and mango pineapple desert. Heading to bed now its 9:15 the sky has cleared up and we can see the mtn. the stars up here are amazing reminds me of Tajumulco in Guat.