First day of hiking is nice and gradual at the start as you make your way up on the country roads and small trails through banana or maize fields. All the vegetation around you is startlingly green. This is a picture of the countryside and the porters following as we took a break before the last village. It´s there that the guides and porters supply themselves with food for the trek and it also marks the spot in which the trail becomes much steeper before reaching "The Wall of Death" where a series of wooden ladders help you wind your way up a 100 meter cliff to the top of the plateau. Once you reach the top, only a few more kilometers of hiking and you´ve reached your first camp in the mountain rainforest. I set up my tent in a drizzle, which soon became a steady rain lasting all night and into the wee hours of the morning. Thankfully, I was dry, but man was it cold at night. Brrrrr!