The Curvy Kili Crew
May Update by Christa Singleton
With just 9 months to go until our big trek, the Curvy Kili Crew is ramping up our training for Mount Kilimanjaro. Training for a big event such as this can become overwhelming and the lack of a hiking partner is a huge killer of motivation. It’s important for our group to stay connected as much as possible. That’s why we have a handful of group hiking and camping weekends planned over the summer to help get us ready for the mountain.
The group trips kicked off with a long weekend in the Delaware Water Gap. A handful of women from across the US met up and we started off by descending on the nearest REI to shop for gear. The associates were extremely helpful in showing us how to choose a daypack based on our body types and torso length. The shoe experts taught us a new method of lacing our boots so they were looser across the tops of our feet while staying tight around the ankles where we need the most support.
Our plan for the rest of the weekend was to camp for two nights and complete 2-3 hikes in the area with varying degrees of difficulty. Unfortunately, Mother Nature didn’t quite agree with those plans!
After an amazing night of telling stories around the campfire and laughing in our tents, we woke up to a torrential downpour. It didn’t take long for our campsite to flood so it was time to abort our mission and head to higher ground…in a hotel. As we quickly packed up our cars to go we were faced with our first team building exercise called Push the Car Out of the Mud.
But all was not lost! The sun finally arrived the next day and our group found an alternative trail to hike that hadn’t been damaged by recent storms.
Some may think that this weekend was a lost cause because our plans for extensive hiking fell through. But our team felt that it was a huge success! We were able to test out our sleeping bags and rain gear, we had the opportunity to spend time with our future Kilimanjaro hiking partners and we learned a very important lesson in staying flexible and being prepared for any type of weather.
Our next hike will take place in the mountains of Colorado where we will practice hiking at altitudes above 10,000 feet. Stay tuned for our recap of that trip!