Kilimanjaro

Excerpts from what I can remember and what I've written in my journal about my Kili climb...

Sometime between 10pm Tuesday and sunrise Wednesday, Summit Day

Step, step, step, breathe....step, step, step, breathe....step, step, step, breathe...look up. Look up. Headlamps snaking up the mountain as far as the eye can see. Tilt your head...you can do it..breathe...are those headlamps or are they stars? Where does the darkness of the mountain end and the darkness of the sky begin? Look behind you...breathe...see the lights from Moshi - that's how far you've come. See the headlamps snaking down the mountain...you're in the middle, you can do it. You can do it. Distract yourself. What's everyone at home doing? Working, they're all working. Not a very good distraction. Think about the stars. Remember when you and Gabe used to sleep on the trampoline under the stars in the summer? Waking up so cold and damp from the condensation...cold and damp, I'm definitely cold and damp....follow Ian's footsteps. You can do it. Step, step, step, breathe...step, step, step, breathe...

It alll began Friday, October 4. For someone that doesn't get nervous, I'm scared as hell. This is even scarier than skydiving, but it's been scary for about two months straight, culminating in this moment. I met my climbing partners, Chris and John, last night for dinner - they're from the States, Little Rock and Atlanta respectively. Both mid-30's, both seem very nice. It's just the three of us, our guide Ian, assistant guide Benny, 9 porters, chef Omari, and waiter Ino (as in Innocent). We've just been introduced to our team and are heading from Arusha to the Machame gate. Our van has gotten stuck three times on the drive up - it's rainy and wet and the roads are steep - not good for bald tires and 3 cylinders. Our guide seems to be incredibly well respected by the team in the back of the van. He looks to be mid-30's (36 i found out later) and has dreadlocks halfway down his back. He's quick with a smile and looks genuinely thrilled to be climbing the mountain (he's lost count but thinks this is aroun dhis 250th time).

We finally reach the gate, buy passes, and sign in. I still feel nervous, even after two hours in a van. I also feel nauseus (come to find out this is a constant on the climb) and attribute it to the altitude drugs and malaria meds. As the porters balance our luggage and get it weighed by the porter association, I remember a conversation I had last night with a group of 20-30 somethings that had just come off the mountain. One guy, probably my age or a bit younger, told me that he passed out when he reached the top of the mountain and had to be carried down by his guides. Great. Another group mentioned that only half of them had made it....the other half had turned back during summit day. I know quite a few people, relatively, that have climbed Kili. It's not the most physical mountain in the world - in fact, it's far from it. But it is more of a mental challenge than I think most people are used to - myself included. It's 19,340 feet. Most people in the states haven't been higher than around 14,000 feet (mountains in Colorado) and even at that height you can feel the effects of the altitude. No one knows how your body will react to it until you actually test it - some people die (many have died on Kili), some get sick with headaches or nausea, and some are completely fine, no complications whatsoever except labored breathing. I would venture to guess there are very few people in that last category. My nervousness stems from not knowing if I'll react poorly and not being able to assure myself that I'll be able to muscle my way through this one. I won't know if I'll be successful until I actually get there and try it.

After we ate lunch at the Machame we began hiking. The pace was slow (pole, pole - slowly, slowy in Swahili). The first day is Machame gate to Machame camp...all through rainforest. Not sure how far we hiked, but we hiked for about 5.5 hours. Easy day - about a 4 on a difficulty scale of 1 to 10. It rained on us a bit, but generally the weather was good for a rainforest and the scenery beautiful. We got to camp around 5, were stuffed with food (the team force feeds you as most people lose their appetite at altitude...so I spent most of the week feeling ridiculously full). Our campsite was beautiful that night - it was cloudy so we didn't see many stars, but the weather was mild and I slept well with rain on my tent. I woke up during the night for a while and was violently sick...more than anything I was worried that I would continue to be sick (which I was) and wouldn't be able to finish...but I tried to sleep it off and felt a bit better when I woke up the next day.

Day two...Machame camp to Shira Camp (12,500 feet). We woke up early and were stuffed with porridge, eggs, sausage, fruit, coffee, tea, etc etc etc. We finished with the rainforest and climbed through moorlands. Really interesting terrain...lots of mosses and flowers that I'd see at home in Montana (impatients, begonias, straw flowers). Today's hike was incredibly steep, but once again very doable for me. It was probably a 5 on a scale of 1 to 10. We arrived at camp around 3 I think - about 6 hours of hiking. We're in the clouds now and finally got our first view of Kili late that night. I've upgraded my flulike symptoms to flulike plus cold - stuffy nose and cough. Generally feel pretty miserable and think it has nothing to do with the altitude. Took a nap and woke up to my tent zippers being iced shut. Definitely colder here...making progress on our climb! Better sleep on day two and no vomiting, which is a bonus.

Day three...Shira Camp, up to Lava Tower (15,000 feet) down to Baranco camp (12,500 feet). Up at 6, first daylight glimpse of Kili. Wow. Once again, way too much food...the day can be summed up as follows (apologies for all of the bodily function references, but they really were such an integral part of the trip :) ):

9am-noon: Step, pole, step, pole, try not to vomit. Repeat.
Noon-12:30: Shiver, eat lunch, shiver, try to stay warm, finish lunch, try to make out lava tower through clouds, no luck, shiver, try not to vomit.
12:30pm-3:30: Step, pole, shiver, step, pole, shiver, step, pole, try not to vomit.
3:30-6:30: Nap at camp, try not to vomit.
6:30-8: Dinner
8: Bed, try not to vomit.

I woke up in the middle of the night to rain on my tent, again...it rained on us every day. Not that big of a deal, but it's hard to put on wet clothes on a cold morning - nothing dries in a tent when the temperature's below freezing outside. I had to get out of the tent to go to the bathroom and realized that, although incredibly miserable to leave the comfort of my sleeping bag, the summit is now within reach. I could actually see it in the moonlight. There were also more stars than I'd ever seen in my life - it was spectacular. The highlight of an incredibly miserable day.

Day 4: Baranco to Barafu (Approx 15,000 feet), nap, then begin Barafu to summit. Day 4 turned out to be the best day yet. The days were progressively more difficult - day 4 being a 6 on a scale of 1-10. We started the day by free climbing the Baranco wall. It was amazing - I can't wait to upload pictures to send around so you can see the beauty of the wall. It's actually incredibly dangerous - people die each year being careless and not ensuring sure footing. Almost every trip porters fall and break legs - they carry these huge bundles on their heads and try to climb faster than all of the climbers - which means they take dangerous routes and generally scramble up as fast as they can, regardless of safety. I didn't see any casualties that morning which was a bonus.

We hiked until about 4:30 - total of around 8 hours of hiking. The end of the day was incredibly step - I could reach out and touch the hill in front of me as I hiked. My climbing partners had trouble on day 4, but I stayed up with Benny our assistant guide and kept pace, trying to push myself as I knew it would only get harder and harder that night when we summited. We had an early dinner (5pm) and tried to sleep for a couple of hours. Didn't work for me - I drifted in and out, but generally coughed and shivered the whole nap. I have so many warm clothes and an increidbe sleeping bag, but as I was sick I just couldn't seem to get warm. The wind howled around my tent and when I did catch 10-15 minutes of sleep, all I did was dream about the summit beginning at 10pm.

Summit night - 10pm. Ino woke me from fitful sleep with warm tea and biscuits. He prayed with me over the food - I don't speak Swahili but I'm sure it was a prayer for strength and safety. He's only 25, but for some reason was such a calming effect on me the whole trip. He woke me every morning with a 'Jambo Dada' (hello sister)...he prayed with us every night over our food...he greeted us with a smile as we reached camp each day...amazing how such a seemingly insignificant role on the team can help my confidence so much. I don't think he'll know how much he affected my climb!!

Anyway, I was feeling scared. It was dark, I was to undertake 10 hours of climbing to reach the summit when I'd just spent 8 hours climbing with about an hour of sleep in between. I was sick, nauseus, had a headache and generally couldn't have felt more ill prepared to take on a ~5,000 vertical foot climb. So...I popped in my iPod and listened to Toto. That's right, Seattle family, Toto got me through. By the time I'd finished Africa - I was ready to go. I got out of my tent wearing almost everything I had: hat, neck gaiter, bandana, three undershirts, two long sleeve shirts, a North Face vest, a winter weight fleece, a huge down jacket, three pairs of long underwear, fleece pants, ski pants, two pairs of socks, and gloves. I had another jacket and more shirts in my bag, along with a camelbak of water (that froze halfway up), my camera batteries tucked in my first layer, and a few Cliff bars to get me through.

Long story short, that night was the most difficult and miserable night of my life. We climbed in the dark from 11pm until 6am when the sunrose. I literally had to fight not to fall asleep climbing - I felt like the Bedouin on Mt Sinaii. We could only stop for a few minutes at a time to rest becuase it was so cold - it was way below zero with wind chill. We saw several people being led down. I heard a woman screaming in a pain and saw her collapse to the ground - summit day was no joke. Not only were we climbing at high altitude, but we were climbing a hill that was mostly scree - so it was two steps forward, one step back. I had to push myself just to put five steps together - most of the time it was three with a breathing break. I can't describe how ill prepared I was for just how difficult a mental task that night was.

But...I MADE IT!! :) I honestly had my doubts during the night. I asked Ian if we were close and he said - you're strong Genny (everyone called me Genny), you can do this. Looking back on that conversation, I felt almost completely exhausted at that point - and still climbed for five more hours. It was 3:30 when I asked him if we were almost there.

We finally saw the sunrise and I could see just how far we'd come and how far we had to go. I pushed myself as hard as I could for the last 20 minutes or so - and reached Stella Point (200M from the top) about 5 mintues before the rest of the team. I sat down on a rock, cried for about 30 seconds (joy, exhaustion, excitement, relief, craziness - you name the emotion, I felt it), and promptly fell asleep. I awoke to another hour of hiking to reach the summit. The distance between Stella Point and Uhuru peak is nominal - at normal elevation I could run it and not even been out of breath. But, amazingly, it took everything I had to reach that point. Everything. I couldn't even enjoy being at the summit because it was so incredibly hard to breathe and my body was completely tapped out. We took and few pictures...and started the hike down.

The rest of the trip was amazing. I'm walking like a 90 year old woman today - the down hill was much harder on my body than the up hill. After we summited, we spent three hours hiking back down to camp, slept for one hour, then spent 6 hours hiking down to the Mweka camp (we descended a different way than we ascended). Yesterday we finished our day, hiking from the Mweka Camp to the Mweka gate, and transported back to Arusha.

I can't stress enough just how difficult that week for me. It wasn't the physical part that was so intimidating - it was pushing myself mentally WAY past my limits and still being able to push even more that took it's toll. I feel such a sense of accomplishment. The interesting part of the climb is that I think some of my most physically fit friends wouldn't be able to do it. Others that are less in shape physically, but strong mentally would have more luck. I strongly encourage anyone who's even thought about attempting it to follow through - the requirements are a strong mind, a strong body, and a little bit of crazy.

That's all for now. Thanks for your emails over the last week - it was great to come back and see that all of you were thinking about me! I've received many mails to which I haven't had time to respond - hopefully this tides you over for a while until my next update.

Only a week and a half left! Hopefully more diving and some time in S Africa before I come home...can't wait to see you all. XOXO

Cheers - G