3 July 2023, Kilimanjaro Day 2

Today was the first full day of hiking. We got a "knocky-knocky" from the kitchen crew at 6:30 in the morning with a cup of coffee or tea, then an our to pack up our tent. Breakfast was porridge, an egg (mcmuffin style) and a crepe, followed by some fruit. We had pulse ox checks, something like 95 and 92 this morning. We set off around 9:15, hiking pole-pole. We got to our 3 mile mark and had some pound cake and tea. We arrived at Shira 2 camp around 2:00 (5 miles), and had a hot lunch - fried chicken, curry vegetables, noodles, and pumpkin soup. I was adding chili oil to mine for some spice, but after my afternoon bathroom visit, decided to stop that... Jt and I went to set up a time lapse, then we did an acclimatization hike at 16:00. We got to around 13,250', then came back to camp (12,897'). Another med check, an amazing sunset above the clouds, then dinner - butternut squash soup, rice, beef, curry veggies, mango... I had made a conscious choice beforehand that no news was good news and that I wasn't going to be on my phone on this trip, but I did note that all of the locals were gathered on the cliff edge near the outhouses on their phones, so I sent a little proof of life home before bed.