Day one. Breakfast, load truck say goodbye to Brits. Climb in truck us 12. Half of us have never met before. Travel about 1 hour to market for last minute supplies. Unbelievable that a Swedish girl who sounds very Australian, buys beer and cracks one open. It is 9:30am! She is pretty intense, rather loud and needs to have her thoughts heard! Could be interesting! Another 2 1/2 hours on the bus sees us at Londorossi gates where we must individually register. A packed lunch is provided and on our way again for 40 minutes of the most gruelling bush bashing I have ever encountered! I swear the ruts in the track were so deep that we only had 2 wheels on the ground half the time. The track being half a bus width wide meant no windows open otherwise the bushes and branches came and whipped around, snapping off. Us 12 were quick learners and only ended up with minimal African foliage in the bus. We encountered colobus monkeys time and again. Their cheeky faces, black bodies and long shaggy white tails are outstanding. They are a big monkey and are we're happy on the ground scavenging as well as in the trees. Finally we reached the start of the Lemosho route track. Julius, our pacemaker, is excellent. A slow steady pace. Pole! Pole! slow! Slow! Like a tortoise. 3 hours of steady upward, then levelling out then more upward. Surrounded by rain forest with the stark contrast of the reddish brown, very dusty, narrow track. We came across another group stopped, cameras out. Julius our leader explained 'elephant in the tree'! What the! I can't believe this! But he had everyone going. This was the first insight into Julius and his wanton disregard of the truth! He is perfect in his delivery and facial expression and he can really suck people in. We experienced more of this humour during the day and into the evening. No elephant in the trees but many more colobus monkies. By 2690 metres we reached camp Mti Mkubwa, or should I say 'tent city'. It looks like Woodstock or any other music festival you may have seen. Hundreds of tents. I have no idea how many groups are here but a helluva lot. Each group has its own area where the dining tent is set up with our tents encircling. Our toilet is close by, a porta potty arrangement used when camping. We are 6 boys and 6 girls in our group and the boys have been given a hilarious 'stern' talking to about aim and tidiness of the facility. Dinner was good. All the good stuff to get us through tomorrow. It was our first night together as a group and and after dinner we went round the table giving an insight into our lives for everyone. That took around 2 hours, with great hilarity and what a group we are! Friends Deedee and Nicole, aged 40, from Carolina USA, Matt and Andy, aged 30, life long friends from Nottingham (we would endure numerous occasions of them singing in the middle of the night, the ballad of Robin Hood! Ravi and his wife Visa, aged around 30, from India but living in Singapore. Andrew, 32, a scientist born in the states but lives in Canada. A nerdy boffin who is into photography and is appointed team photographer. We asked him about his speech impediment which is not bad at all, and found when he was about 6 he was playing the flute (of course), and somehow his sister caused an accident to happen whereby the end of the flute was rammed up into the roof of his mouth causing some damage, which left him with his 'affliction'. Well that little story and the way he told it totally brought the house down. And so we continued with David, 31, the most gorgeous hunkiest Australian man you could ever set eyes on. But to add to that he was the funniest and most open guy who would prove during this trip that he had strong values and a heart of solid gold. Stuart, a Brit living in the USA for 13 year and high up in Microsoft, is an addicted mountain climber, tri-athlete and all round sportsman, aged 54 - he is pretty amazing and becomes the backbone of our group. Lesley, aged around 35' an American working at the US Embassy in Kuwait is a fitness advocate and keeps up with strong fit men easily. She is very tiny so feels the cold and is dubbed the 'queen of layers'. She has the layering of clothes down to a fine art. Tina, 40, is our intense Swede was born of German parents so she was forgiven almost immediately for her seemingly intense manner. She proves to have a good heart and a caring nature and we get on well. And finally me. Already the Head guide and other guides were calling me 'mama', a term of endearment and respect I am told, and this continued throughout our whole time together. Other women in the older age group were not given this name so this term to me, was very precious and readily accepted. All porters, cooks and guides, 40 in total, called me mama.
This team of 12 had, in the course of one night, created a very strong bond which only grew stronger and stronger as the days passed by.