Hi everyone!
I finally got my adventures on Kilimanjaro all written up. So that you read them in the right order, here are some handy links for you! Hope you enjoy and it is not too full of my insane ramblings 🙂
Kili Climb Day One: It Begins!
Kili Climb Day Two: Above The Clouds
Kili Climb Day Three: First Signs Of Altitude Sickness
Kili Climb Day Four: Double Header
Kili Climb Day Six: Sweet Sweet Oxygen
Added bonus: Safari Day!
Added bonus: A Day in Doha!
Start: 3900m @ Millennium Camp
Finish: 1650m @ Mweka Gate
Distance: Approx 13km
Duration: 4hrs
We were so grateful for spending the night at the earlier camp. It meant less walking and more time for rest. After our epic summit day we were very thankful. Good job Mhina!
Mhina decided to get us going earlier though given we had stopped at an earlier camp. So it was a 6am wake up call to get going. I was awake at 5:30am as usual (although CC would have been happy with some extra sleep) so was good for me. At breakfast we got a group photo with our whole crew which was ace. We also presented them with their tips and a little extra gift from us. They were all amazing. Mhina, Aris, Rashili, Christopher and the rest. We could not have asked for any more. But there was no time for hanging about… by 7am it was back on the trail.
The path from Millennium to Mweka Camp was a very rocky and steep path. We couldn’t imagine having done that at the end of summit day, as it involved a lot of scrambling and thinking about best ways down. But being fresh we smashed it! in just over an hour we were at Mweka Camp.
Leaving early meant we had the good fortune to yet again see our American buds! It was become a joke now, all these farewells. We got to see “Canada” as well (I will miss hearing “Australia!” each time they saw CC and I). Speaking with Tony, he said that this same path took them about 2 hours at the end of yesterday because they were so tired. Win us!
We left our final campsite at about 8:15am for the final 9km out of the national park. This was a fairly straight forward path through the rainforest, with a proper trail and many many steps. Entering the rainforest was a nice change of scenery. As we were walking I heard a rustle in the trees… monkeys! We saw our first wildlife of the hike on the last day! It was a bunch of blue monkeys hanging out, including lots of little ones.So exciting.
And just down the trail we saw our first Colobus monkeys as well. These guys were the best, with their black and white hair, and long hairy tails. I could see why they were called grandpa monkeys.
While this last day was probably easiest in terms of trail difficulty, it was quite relentless downhill that I must admit was quite tiring. My body was probably reaching its limits as well, but the steps kept going down and down and down, making it hard on the knees and ankles.
But at about 11am we reached Mweka Gate. DONE!!! We couldn’t wrap our heads around it. It was quite amazing and surreal and relieving to think we made it. We were also fortunate to finish with Tony and Filipe, Canada and even Ryan. What a great bunch.
There was not much left to do except officially sign out of the park and say our final final farewells. We loaded into the min van with our crew and waved goodbye to Kili. Wow.
Our day didn’t quite end there though. Waiting for us in nearby Moshi was Walter, the head of Galloping Safaris, our great trip coordinator, and trusted friend of CC (and now of mine). He was waiting to shout us lunch to celebrate our achievements which was lovely. We unwound over lunch with Walter, Mhina, Aris and Rashili. Both CC and I were fairly exhausted, managing to eat most of our lunch and just decompress. After an hour we loaded up again and headed to our home for the next few nights, the Iburu Safari Lodge in Arusha.
When we returned Mhina and Aris sat CC and I down and let us know how important it was to have tourists like ourselves there in Tanzania, and supporting a local company. This was great to hear. But then super excitingly he presented both of us with official certificates from the Kili National Park, commemorating our reaching the summit! Woo! It was signed by Mhina as well as park officials and had our official summit time as 7:50am on the 31st June. Now it was indisputable 🙂
Saying goodbye to our amazing guides was a bit sad given how much they had done for us. But we said our farewells and then immediately settled in to our room and crashed. After some emails and internet action (being offline for a week certainly is different!) it was time for sleep. No dinner, just sleep. I think we earned it.
Start: 4673m @ Barafu Camp
Finish: 3900m @ Millennium Camp (max altitude 5895m @ Uhuru Peak)
Distance: Not quite sure… maybe 10km?
Duration: 16hrs (yes, 16hrs)
Summit Day. Oh my.
11pm (yes, pm) was the wake up call. Thankfully I got a few hours sleep. CC was in struggle town a bit so didn’t do so well. We looked like she was doing it tough but boy if she was still ferociously determined (as determined as anyone can be when faced with 6+ hours of hiking in the middle of night in sub zero temperatures).
Rashili made us a light breakfast. All I could really stomach was some porridge and tea. Not that I was feeling sick, rather my body just didn’t know what was going on. At 12pm, it was G2G (good to go). It seemed all the groups took off at the same time… Tony and Filipe, the Canadian gals, Ryan, the Danish couple. There were just nods of “good luck” to everyone we saw.
From minute one it was tough. 4600m. Little to no sleep. A STEEP start clambering up rocks. Oh boy.
I pretty much got into my marathon running mode from the start… just focus on each step and keep moving even when you think you want to stop for a break. Each step was difficult. 99.9% of this push was going to be steep up, and there were going to be over 7 hours of it.
The first hour was the steep clambering up rocks, which used a different kind of energy. After that it was just a relentless switchback path. Even though it was a crystal clear night (no rain! yay!) it was only a quarter moon, meaning we could see bugger all. It was just the headlamps of CC and myself and our amazing guides Mhina and Aris. Even then, all I was really looking at were my shuffling feet.
Mhina and Aris were spot on. They treaded the fine line of pushing us but just as hard as we had to. Rather than stop, they would ask us to get a bit further, wary that we were in for a long haul and that the freezing temperatures (or about -15 degrees celsius) were not conducive to stopping and cooling down any more than we had to. So onward we kept pushing.
This went on for hours. About 6+ hours in fact. As we got closer, the path became a bit more clambering up to a ridge. Just as we were reaching this point we stopped to watch the sun come through the clouds. Wow. We were on the highest peak in Africa watching the sun come up. It was something else and really quite difficult to get the head around, especially since we were cold and tired and still pushing upwards.
As we got up the ridge a little more we saw a sign. Yes! This was for Stella Point, and while that seems exciting it was also somewhat of a kick in the guts. It was approaching 7am, and the sign let us know we were still a good 150m below where we wanted to be. While it doesn’t sound like much, the reality was it meant maybe another hour of hiking. While we would never dream of giving up, it didn’t do much to bolster the spirits. But we didn’t stop, we just dug in and kept going.
By this point we reached two things. The first was fellow hikers starting to make their way down. Canada! Our gals from Quebec made it! That was so great. Two more vibrant and carefree girls you could not hope to meet, and we were super happy for them. But. Must. Keep. Going. The other thing we came across here was snow. In fact we were now surrounded by snow and a huge glacier. We started in rainforest and were now trekking in snow. Mind blown. What was sad to consider though was that in 20 years time, at the rate it is going, there probably will not be any snow or glacier on top. That was a truly sad thought.
Onward we went. The sun was out and it was glorious up there… bright sunshine reflecting off the ice. We were truly lucky to have absolutely perfect weather.
Just on 7:45am we saw it. THE SIGN. The sign to welcome us at the top. As we approached I will admit I could a bit emotional to finally make it.
And at 7:50am we officially made the summit of Mt Kilimanjaro, the highest peak in Africa, and highest free standing mountain in the world. My bud CC and I had made it. Not just made it… CONQUERED IT!
As an extra bonus, who do we meet at the top? Our great American pals Filipe and Tony! That was amazing. Apparently they had struggled a little too, meaning they arrived just 5 minutes before us. Not only was it an honour to be at the top with my amazing bud CC, but to have our two close new mates there too was special. We did a bunch of pics at the top, including with Mhina and Aris. Those two certainly were a major reason for us making the top, and two better guides we could not have wished for. They knew CC and I better than we knew ourselves down the stretch, having the utmost confidence we would make the summit.
So, Uhuru Peak? It is strange to think you spend 5 days to get there and only stay for 10 minutes. As I mentioned, I got a bit emotional having been through that hard slog to get there. But what else do you do when you get there? It is too cold to sit down and soak up the views, not to mention the air is pretty think at 5985m. All you do is take some deep breaths, look out over Africa, revel in your awesomeness, and then start your way down. So we said our goodbyes to the peak of Africa and headed back down.
Down was a different kind of tough. Yes, it was all downhill, meaning we were travelling at about 3x the pace. But it was hard work, as the likelihood of accidents seemed much higher. The path was loose and so we had to concentrate a lot, tough when it is 8am, you are cold and lacking sleep. But we kept at it.
It was strange seeing our path for the first time. I was thinking “really? this is the way we came up?!”. In many respects it was good to do it in the dark, not seeing how far we were from the top. All in all it took about 3hr 15min to get back to base camp at Barafu. A bit longer than expected, but we had a few stops on the way down. But by about 11:30am we were there, having reached the summit.
As we entered the camp we saw a couple just checking into to the camp. They must have come from nearby Karanga Camp. We gave them a howdy and well wish and went back to our cosy tent, which was waiting for us to have a rest.
We managed to have an hour or so’s sleep before getting up and packing our things. Even though we had done the summit it was no time to hang about! We still had a bit of hiking to do. No ones stays a second night at Barafu as water is scarce and it is best to get down low from the altitude. So after some lunch we saw the US guys and bid them farewell and started heading down.
As mentioned, Mhina suggested that we make another change to our itinerary. Rather than head all the way down to Mweka Camp at 3000m, we could go to closer Millennium Camp, which was at about 3900m. This meant less hiking today, and avoiding a steep and rocky path between those two camps that was not great to do tired. We liked the idea of that and headed off.
What followed was a pretty easy 2hr hike on a nice smooth trail. I liked this! I was expecting something a little more difficult, but this was perfect for tired, weary hikers. On the way we came across a bunch of trolleys used to rescue people from the mountain. They were fascinating, with just one big wheel. Apparently the injured party is strapped in, there is one person on each corner of the trolley and one to control the brake on the wheel. Not sure I would fancy it, but I guess how else do you do it?
At about 3:45pm we arrived at Millennium Camp. Just before then we saw Tony and Filipe who walked the last half hour with us. Sadly they were heading through to Mweka Camp, so we said farewell (yet again) and let them keep going while we checked in to camp and went straight to relaxing.
Neither CC nor I were too social. We were both super thankful to our crew for looking after us, but all we really wanted was a little food and then to get some sleep, which is what we did. As it turned out we had some mobile phone reception (yep!) so I sent some quick messages home to let Kate and family know I was all good, and then it was sleep.
Mission accomplished.
Start:3976 @ Barranco Camp
Finish: 4673m @ Barafu Camp
Distance: Approx 8km
Duration: 8hrs
6:30am again, and another beautiful morning. Cold again, but last night I layered up a bit to keep warm so slept nice and warm. I did wake every hour, but given I was asleep at 7:30pm, it is no surprise that by 5:30am I was ready to go.
Another hearty breakfast of porridge, toast, eggs and fruit. Sadly no coffee though, as the Arfricafe had run out. Aaarrgghh!
Before heading off for the day I caught up with Tony and Filipe to let them know about our change of itinerary to the new double header. Seems as though their itinerary was not as conservative as our original one and that they had always planned to have these two short days joined. Yes! It meant that our new buds would be with us the entire journey.
At 8am CC and I were the first ones out of the camp. Off we headed up the Barranco wall. Damn. This was much different to anything so far… it was very much clambering up rocks, looking for good grips and foot holds. Lucky we did that rock climbing session before we left! There was even a “hug the rock” moment to try and get around one part. Thankfully heights and precarious ledges don’t worry me, so this was actually really fun.
After some clambering up and down for a good hour we got to the top of the wall and soaked it up. It was great to sit up there, looking out across the clouds. What was ace was that every now and then someone would pop up onto the top of the wall… sometimes a porter, sometimes a fellow hiker.
We actually sat up there for a good 30 minutes, greeting all the other hikers as they arrived. That was an absolute joy and a massive highlight of the hike so far.
The rest of the morning was ups and downs, with quite a bit more rock clambering. Just on midday we reached what was originally to be our stop for the day, Karanga Camp, sitting at about 4100m. We could see how under normal circumstances it might be a good idea… slightly higher than the previous day to get our bodies used to it. But CC and I had bounced back from our slight headaches yesterday to be feeling good and happy to keep going.
Rashili hooked us up with another epic lunch… tomoato and ginger soup, “cheese burgers” (variations of) and sausage + pepper calzones. Yep! It was nuts. And delicious! I smashed down all the lunch, being pretty hungry.
At about 1pm it was time to keep moving. We were feeling good, but in reality didn’t quite realise what we were in for. The first hour or so was a very slow climb up. In one hour we covered about 800m. It was pretty rough… pole pole (i.e. slowly slowly) and we made it to the top. We then descended again down and across a flattish path through the valley. no sooner had we zipped through that, we were greeted with another big climb up. Phew. This was part path and part rock clambering.We took this very slowly, especially as CC was starting to feel some minor altitude effects again as we rose over 4500m.
We hit the top of the ridge! Yay! From there though we continued to climb ever so gradually up. What seemed close was in some ways anything but. Bu eventually we reached Barafu Camp just on 4pm. Woot!
This was also our official base camp, as tomorrow would be summit day. Yowsers! CC went off to have some rest while I tried to stay active and get used to the altitude a bit more. I went and said hey to our US friends Tony and Filipe and it seemed we were all knackered.
What was mind blowing was that there were still climbers coming down from the summit this late in the day. What?! They still had to cover another 1600m of altitude to get to their camp for the night! Hopefully that would not be us tomorrow. I was very thankful not to be feeling any altitude sickness, but I certainly was not counting my chickens just yet… there was still a good 1300m of altitude to deal with to get to the summit. In precaution, both CC and I took a diamox tablet to help with the altitude sickness on the advice of Mhina. While I was doing OK, I trusted his judgement. And better safe than sorry!
Tonight was a tough one, as we had dinner very early so that we could try and get some sleep before the big push to the top. Rashili loaded us up with spaghetti bolognese to get us ready. However neither CC nor I were up for eating too much… rather we just wanted to try and get some rest before our BIG day.
Start: 3837m @ Shira Gate
Finish: 3976 @ Barranco Camp (max altitude 4600 @ Lava Tower)
Distance: Approx 10-12km
Duration: 7hrs
6:30am! Rise and shine! Like yesterday, I was awake from about 5:30am, having slept not too badly. It was noticeably colder overnight, apparently close to zero. Hhhmmm… maybe I would need to sleep in more than boxer shorts.
It was straight into a nice bowl of warm water to freshen up, and then brekky. This morning was millet, toast, eggs, and even pancakes! You read correctly. I was eating pancakes. Plus sweet sweet coffee, Africafe no less (so punny, so good!).
Again, CC and I were feeling remarkably fresh, with little sign of tiredness or any aches and pains. How strange! We expected to be cactus from early on, but our bodies felt good. So by 8:30am we were off again.
The start hike was through an alpine like region. The sun was beaming down on us and it was super warm. We couldn’t believe our luck with the weather. While we were told “the mountain has its own weather” as a means to be prepared for anything, the mountain was certainly looking after us.
Today was challenging off the bat. While it didn’t seem as steep as the start of yesterday, being at almost 4000m meant being breathless from the start. Again it was fairly steady up and up. It was a gravelly and rocky trail.
In what seemed like no time at all (well 3.5 hours), we had reached our lunch spot… Lava Tower! We were now located at about 4600m, our highest point yet. For lunch the team set up our mess tent so we could stay for a couple of hours. Again, this was a feature of Machame route, having the opportunity to get to 4600m and stay for a bit to get our bodies used to the lower oxygen levels.
Lava Tower is a tower of solidified lava (duh) that shoots up about 100m. It certainly made for an ace lunch spot. We certainly had no interest in climbing it (and I’m not sure our guides would have let us anyway) but lo and behold, there was Filipe saying hi from the top. Of course he climbed to the top!
Christopher called us for lunch. You are not going to guess what we had. Quiche. Yep, quiche. How on earth he made an amazing quiche who knows! But it was delicious. We also had a delicious veggie soup to load us full of calories.
It was about now that neither CC nor I was feeling at our best. It was our first time over 4500m so clearly our bodies were telling us that something was up. Both of us were really just a bit tired and headachy, my headache a little worse than CC’s. I had a feeling that it was probably more from trekking 4 hours in the beating sun, but I’m sure the altitude played a part.
We didn’t hurry lunch as Mhina and Aris were happy for us to acclimatise and also the second half of our day was heading downhill believe it or not. So we hung out there for about 2 hours before loading up again and heading toward camp.
As mentioned, we headed downward from Lava Tower. For me, downward wasn’t so easy. It was OK, but I must say I felt I struggled a little more than I had to by this point. CC was a powerhouse whereas I was a bit more cautious. I think it was mostly due to my lack of experience hiking and I also found I had to concentrate a whole lot more. But luckily this was a pretty short session of only about 2 hours. At 3:30pm we had arrived at Barranco Camp. Yes!
We were treated as usual to some hot drinks, popcorn and biscuits. It was sitting down to a snack that Mhina threw us a curveball. He suggested that we could combine our day 4 and 5 into one day. They were originally to be 2 short acclimatisation days of 3-4 hours each. However both Mhina and Aris felt that we were hiking really strongly and that we would not get much benefit from the extra day. Ultimately it meant that we would summit a day earlier than originally planned. Aarrgghh! It was all too real!
After talking it through, CC and I decided to go for it. If Mhina and Aris believed in us, then we could do it! We liked the idea of not having days sitting around, as well as hitting the summit a day earlier. Mhina also suggested if we did that then maybe on summit day we would not come down so far, and stay at an intermediary camp, which sounded OK by us too. It was all coming up CC and Butt!
Excited but tired after our day, we had another great dinner (zucchini soup, beef stew and pasta) and then hit the sleeping bags for rest before our (now) epic two-legged day.