DAY 1 - Initiation to pole pole!
When the mountain guides tell you to walk slowly slowly, they really mean it. Starting from Machame Gate just below 2000m, we crawled ever upwards through the rainforest - monkeys on the right, moss, lichen, creepers, shrouded views across gullies to the right and left. Endemic flowers in reds and yellows.
We were walking with Bocha, our assistant guide, who was ultimately to become one of our favourite Tanzanians. Halfway through the day, our lead guide, Sarria aka "Reggie", caught up with us after finishing formalities at the gate. Swaying on his feet, sweating heavily, he looked like he was about to have a heart-attack. Then, suddenly, he was roaring with laughter - "I'm fine! Good joke eh!!"
At Machame Camp: we are 3000 metres high. 330 kilometres south of the equator. Heading up the tallest mountain in Africa; the tallest free-standing mountain in the world. We are bound for Uhuru Peak, 5895 metres, 5 days hence, and we are all feeling good! Tea, coffee, popcorn and fried chicken helps!
You would be embarassed at the size of the crew required to get 5 fat mzungus up a hill. 1 guide, 1 assistant guide, 1 chef, 1 waiter/porter, 1 other dude who is doing something or other, and 15 porters. That's 4 to 1.
Greer has zip-off short pants. We have renamed her G-Zip.
When the mountain guides tell you to walk slowly slowly, they really mean it. Starting from Machame Gate just below 2000m, we crawled ever upwards through the rainforest - monkeys on the right, moss, lichen, creepers, shrouded views across gullies to the right and left. Endemic flowers in reds and yellows.
We were walking with Bocha, our assistant guide, who was ultimately to become one of our favourite Tanzanians. Halfway through the day, our lead guide, Sarria aka "Reggie", caught up with us after finishing formalities at the gate. Swaying on his feet, sweating heavily, he looked like he was about to have a heart-attack. Then, suddenly, he was roaring with laughter - "I'm fine! Good joke eh!!"
At Machame Camp: we are 3000 metres high. 330 kilometres south of the equator. Heading up the tallest mountain in Africa; the tallest free-standing mountain in the world. We are bound for Uhuru Peak, 5895 metres, 5 days hence, and we are all feeling good! Tea, coffee, popcorn and fried chicken helps!
You would be embarassed at the size of the crew required to get 5 fat mzungus up a hill. 1 guide, 1 assistant guide, 1 chef, 1 waiter/porter, 1 other dude who is doing something or other, and 15 porters. That's 4 to 1.
Greer has zip-off short pants. We have renamed her G-Zip.
MT KILIMANJARO - TANZANIA
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DAY 2 - Welcome to Mount Faeces
Kilimanjaro National Park needs to do something about its rubbish problem. Even more pressing - almost impressive in its scale - is the toilet problem. This mountain is scattered with scat.
It's still beautiful!
Today was a slow, steep climb, up rock, through heather, cloud, past wild parsnip, dry yellow flowers, alpine desert. Trees vanished yesterday. Pole pole, to Shira Camp, 3800 metres, and hiker's treasures like chicken drumsticks, milo, peanuts and chocolate, watched all the while by black and white musclebirds.
Greer has been rocking the dance whistle. Even the porters now know that when the emergency whistle is blown, it's interpretive dance time.
Kilimanjaro National Park needs to do something about its rubbish problem. Even more pressing - almost impressive in its scale - is the toilet problem. This mountain is scattered with scat.
It's still beautiful!
Today was a slow, steep climb, up rock, through heather, cloud, past wild parsnip, dry yellow flowers, alpine desert. Trees vanished yesterday. Pole pole, to Shira Camp, 3800 metres, and hiker's treasures like chicken drumsticks, milo, peanuts and chocolate, watched all the while by black and white musclebirds.
Greer has been rocking the dance whistle. Even the porters now know that when the emergency whistle is blown, it's interpretive dance time.
General silliness prevails:
DAY 3 - Barenco Camp, 3,950 metres
We breakfasted in the sun as the porters shake ice off our tents in miniature blizzards. It was bitterly cold last night.
This morning was a long, but not particularly steep climb, up a smooth trail surrounded by boulders. On the left, a deep gully. On the right, gently rolling ridges.
Water breaks. Snack breaks. Abulution breaks. But rest breaks aren't required: we continue to power up the mountain with no altitude problems. Are we that rare, blessed group, that doesn't suffer at altitude?
Not entirely. We suffer at the hands of an egotistical Austrian hiker who pauses every now and again to ask why we don't have climbing poles, why are we going so pole pole, why don't you have a lunch table? She is the new Dutch life coach:- despised. We swear that we will smash her on summit day.
We climbed to the Lava Tower, at 4,600 metres, for lunch and some cheeky acclimitization. The clouds rolled in and departed, wind appeared and dissipated, the cold bit hard. At times, the cloud was mercifully thick enough to obscure the Austrian oxygen thief, but we could still hear her complaining loudly about her lunch.
There have been a few moments of fuzzy feeling toes, face, fingers, today. We're pretty sure that is the diamox altitude drug, not altitude sickness.
We are cracking out heat packs from The Heat Factory at an alarming rate. These things are gold gold gold. Tonight, we convinced Greer that if she puts them in her sleeping bag, she might suffocate because they suck out all the oxygen.
We breakfasted in the sun as the porters shake ice off our tents in miniature blizzards. It was bitterly cold last night.
This morning was a long, but not particularly steep climb, up a smooth trail surrounded by boulders. On the left, a deep gully. On the right, gently rolling ridges.
Water breaks. Snack breaks. Abulution breaks. But rest breaks aren't required: we continue to power up the mountain with no altitude problems. Are we that rare, blessed group, that doesn't suffer at altitude?
Not entirely. We suffer at the hands of an egotistical Austrian hiker who pauses every now and again to ask why we don't have climbing poles, why are we going so pole pole, why don't you have a lunch table? She is the new Dutch life coach:- despised. We swear that we will smash her on summit day.
We climbed to the Lava Tower, at 4,600 metres, for lunch and some cheeky acclimitization. The clouds rolled in and departed, wind appeared and dissipated, the cold bit hard. At times, the cloud was mercifully thick enough to obscure the Austrian oxygen thief, but we could still hear her complaining loudly about her lunch.
There have been a few moments of fuzzy feeling toes, face, fingers, today. We're pretty sure that is the diamox altitude drug, not altitude sickness.
We are cracking out heat packs from The Heat Factory at an alarming rate. These things are gold gold gold. Tonight, we convinced Greer that if she puts them in her sleeping bag, she might suffocate because they suck out all the oxygen.
This is Barenco Camp. The peak is beginning to look very intimidating:-
DAY 4 - Barafu Camp, 4,600 metres
Slog, slog, slog, forever uphill. Thighs are hurting, calves are burning, and we just keep trudging ever onwards; up to our final pre-summit camp, Barafu. We leave vegetation behind altogether, it's the Kilimanjaro cocktail of rock, gravel, toilet paper and faeces now.
Steve goes for an Action Chinchimminy off a rock, without bothering to check the landing. He eats gravel, splaying out in the alpine desert in an ungraceful splits. What a great idea - the day before summit night. He escapes unbroken, save for a few grazes.
Other climbers have already turned back with altitude sickness today, but we are still laughing our way up the mountain - to quote one disapproving German "you're that group that is always laughing on the steep bits" - and attempting to dack Glenn. We are all feeling in good shape for the summit attempt.
The sun set on the shoulder of the mountain today in a blaze of gold, white cloud, black rock. Next time we see it, we hope to be standing at Uhuru Peak, 1.3 vertical kilometres above, watching dawn break.
From camp, just before sunset, the weather cleared so that we could see parts of the final ascent. It is steep. Very steep. Rocky. And then it disappears into cloud and distance. There is a long way to go.
We eat at 5.30pm and retire at 6.30pm to feign sleep. At 11.30 tonight, it begins. The hours don't seem to add up: we climbed for 7 hours today, we have 5 hours to rest, then we climb another 7 hours overnight to the summit at 5,900 metres (significantly higher than Everest Base Camp), climb down again, rest for 3 hours, then set off for another 19 kilometre descent. We are about to embark on a death march.
Slog, slog, slog, forever uphill. Thighs are hurting, calves are burning, and we just keep trudging ever onwards; up to our final pre-summit camp, Barafu. We leave vegetation behind altogether, it's the Kilimanjaro cocktail of rock, gravel, toilet paper and faeces now.
Steve goes for an Action Chinchimminy off a rock, without bothering to check the landing. He eats gravel, splaying out in the alpine desert in an ungraceful splits. What a great idea - the day before summit night. He escapes unbroken, save for a few grazes.
Other climbers have already turned back with altitude sickness today, but we are still laughing our way up the mountain - to quote one disapproving German "you're that group that is always laughing on the steep bits" - and attempting to dack Glenn. We are all feeling in good shape for the summit attempt.
The sun set on the shoulder of the mountain today in a blaze of gold, white cloud, black rock. Next time we see it, we hope to be standing at Uhuru Peak, 1.3 vertical kilometres above, watching dawn break.
From camp, just before sunset, the weather cleared so that we could see parts of the final ascent. It is steep. Very steep. Rocky. And then it disappears into cloud and distance. There is a long way to go.
We eat at 5.30pm and retire at 6.30pm to feign sleep. At 11.30 tonight, it begins. The hours don't seem to add up: we climbed for 7 hours today, we have 5 hours to rest, then we climb another 7 hours overnight to the summit at 5,900 metres (significantly higher than Everest Base Camp), climb down again, rest for 3 hours, then set off for another 19 kilometre descent. We are about to embark on a death march.
DAY 5 - Diary of a Death March.
11.30 arrives. It's time. It is inhumanly cold (at least to an Aussie).
11.30 arrives. It's time. It is inhumanly cold (at least to an Aussie).
We walk in our familiar rhythm - pole pole - we could go for days at this pace. We already have. But now it's cold, dark, and we are getting very high.
Headlamps are bobbing up the hill like sick little fireflies. We are the last group to leave camp.
Hours later, we pass 5,000 metres. Footstep after footstep, no more than 25cm per stride, we reel in and pass groups that are gasping in the dark. 5 days of pole pole have us in our rhythm. The other teams are far behind us now, fighting uphill.
Suddenly, Mokoro Boy - our favourite porter and one of five in our final support crew - scampers back down the mountain. Omari, Reggie explains, got too sick to continue, and simply sat down in the dark, somewhere behind us. Mokoro Boy will take him back to base camp. The five of us carry on, with Reggie (lead guide), Bocha (assistant guide and head cook) and Ebans (porter) setting the pace.
Somewhere above 5,000 metres, the altitude catches up with Greer: BAM - she goes down suddenly. She is not nauseas, nor headachy, and although we are all a bit light-headed and unbalanced, that is not her heaviest burden. After 5 days of uphill and very little rest, on the hardest slog of the lot, the lungs simply can't provide enough oxygen to keep the legs pumping full time. We stop every 5 minutes or so for a minute, and every time she is back on her feet and ready for more, bravely carrying on.
Glenn begins to talk about sunrise. Steve pulls out the Ipod; in the brief second before the battery seizes up he sees that it is only 4am, but says nothing.
At around 5,500 metres, Steve begins to gas out on the steepest stretched too. We slog upwards.
We place foot after foot after foot. The gradient eases out. We cluster behind some rocks. Bocha produces a thermos of tea. We are, Reggie quietly informs us, at Stella Peak, somewhere around 5,700 metres. The slopes are behind. The hard part is done. We have only 200 vertical metres to go, and it's a relatively flat climb. We have smashed it.
Lungs are forgotten. Legs are reinvigorated. Uhuru Peak is close, and we will be there before dawn.
Glenn and Corrin sprint off with Ebans in hot pursuit. Eventually, the only way he can keep their pace down is to hold both their hands and drag his feet.
Mark sets off after the Yanks.
Steve finishes his tea, and trudges off with Reggie trailing behind.
Greer limps upwards, with Bocha in close support. She loves it.
The sky begins to lighten behind us. The walk is easy now. Remarkably, four out of five of us are feeling relatively close to 100% in terms of lungs, head, stomach, and legs are pumping up the easy gradient.
Our long-devised secret agreement comes into play. 2 months ago, when we first broached the idea of climbing Kili with Glenn and Corrin, Glenn loudly commented "it's gonna be a death march lovey - we can't let the Aussies beat us to the top". It didn't go unnoticed. And Mark dug deep.
50 feet from the top, Mark struggles past Glenn and Corrin in an ungainly half-shamble of a sprint. "Eat my Australian dust" he slurs out. Luckily, they don't hear the challenge, and Australia reaches the summit of Mt Kilimanjaro - triumphant - while America comes second, oblivious.
Steve trickles in 2 minutes later, and kisses the Uhuru sign, before starting to whoop like a banshee. It's 540am, the sun is a hint in the east, the sky is beginning to go dark blue with shades of pink. The glacier below us begins to blush in the dawn light.
Greer arrives with Bocha under one arm. Sick, tired, but the 5th mzungu to stand on the summit of Kili on 30 October 2010. She battled through when others would have turned around. We salute you!
Headlamps are bobbing up the hill like sick little fireflies. We are the last group to leave camp.
Hours later, we pass 5,000 metres. Footstep after footstep, no more than 25cm per stride, we reel in and pass groups that are gasping in the dark. 5 days of pole pole have us in our rhythm. The other teams are far behind us now, fighting uphill.
Suddenly, Mokoro Boy - our favourite porter and one of five in our final support crew - scampers back down the mountain. Omari, Reggie explains, got too sick to continue, and simply sat down in the dark, somewhere behind us. Mokoro Boy will take him back to base camp. The five of us carry on, with Reggie (lead guide), Bocha (assistant guide and head cook) and Ebans (porter) setting the pace.
Somewhere above 5,000 metres, the altitude catches up with Greer: BAM - she goes down suddenly. She is not nauseas, nor headachy, and although we are all a bit light-headed and unbalanced, that is not her heaviest burden. After 5 days of uphill and very little rest, on the hardest slog of the lot, the lungs simply can't provide enough oxygen to keep the legs pumping full time. We stop every 5 minutes or so for a minute, and every time she is back on her feet and ready for more, bravely carrying on.
Glenn begins to talk about sunrise. Steve pulls out the Ipod; in the brief second before the battery seizes up he sees that it is only 4am, but says nothing.
At around 5,500 metres, Steve begins to gas out on the steepest stretched too. We slog upwards.
We place foot after foot after foot. The gradient eases out. We cluster behind some rocks. Bocha produces a thermos of tea. We are, Reggie quietly informs us, at Stella Peak, somewhere around 5,700 metres. The slopes are behind. The hard part is done. We have only 200 vertical metres to go, and it's a relatively flat climb. We have smashed it.
Lungs are forgotten. Legs are reinvigorated. Uhuru Peak is close, and we will be there before dawn.
Glenn and Corrin sprint off with Ebans in hot pursuit. Eventually, the only way he can keep their pace down is to hold both their hands and drag his feet.
Mark sets off after the Yanks.
Steve finishes his tea, and trudges off with Reggie trailing behind.
Greer limps upwards, with Bocha in close support. She loves it.
The sky begins to lighten behind us. The walk is easy now. Remarkably, four out of five of us are feeling relatively close to 100% in terms of lungs, head, stomach, and legs are pumping up the easy gradient.
Our long-devised secret agreement comes into play. 2 months ago, when we first broached the idea of climbing Kili with Glenn and Corrin, Glenn loudly commented "it's gonna be a death march lovey - we can't let the Aussies beat us to the top". It didn't go unnoticed. And Mark dug deep.
50 feet from the top, Mark struggles past Glenn and Corrin in an ungainly half-shamble of a sprint. "Eat my Australian dust" he slurs out. Luckily, they don't hear the challenge, and Australia reaches the summit of Mt Kilimanjaro - triumphant - while America comes second, oblivious.
Steve trickles in 2 minutes later, and kisses the Uhuru sign, before starting to whoop like a banshee. It's 540am, the sun is a hint in the east, the sky is beginning to go dark blue with shades of pink. The glacier below us begins to blush in the dawn light.
Greer arrives with Bocha under one arm. Sick, tired, but the 5th mzungu to stand on the summit of Kili on 30 October 2010. She battled through when others would have turned around. We salute you!
We are truly privileged - we have the Roof of Africa all to ourselves for at least 10 minutes, before a group appears on the near horizon from the hardcore climb up the Western Breach.
Champagne flows, and unsurprisingly we all start to feel slightly ill.
Champagne flows, and unsurprisingly we all start to feel slightly ill.
DAY 6 - A descent best forgotten
We heard plenty of horror stories about climbing Kili. Vomitting, gastro, blinding headaches, people coughing up blood and bleeding out their ears. We were blessed, and felt none of that. But no-one mentioned the descent.
Black toes, aching knees, foot cramps - it was no fun, and is best forgotten as promptly as possible. So here is the short version:
Having climbed all night, we descended back to camp. We could not believe how far we had climbed. We half skied down the gravel slopes, with a few stacks and some very near misses. 3 hours rest.Then we walked 19 kilometres downhill, and slept the sleep of the dead.
The next morning, we walked another 3 hours downhill, including one bit where we jogged behind a porter so we could listen to Rihanna blasting out his radio.
Our massive thanks go to all those who sponsored us to climb Kili; we are confident that Room to Read will use your donations wisely! If you would still like to contribute, you can do so using the link to our Everyday Hero site on the main page.
Finally, thank-you so much to our team of guides, cooks, and porters, who coddled us up and down the mountain in comfort. Here they are, thanking us, led by Bocha:
We heard plenty of horror stories about climbing Kili. Vomitting, gastro, blinding headaches, people coughing up blood and bleeding out their ears. We were blessed, and felt none of that. But no-one mentioned the descent.
Black toes, aching knees, foot cramps - it was no fun, and is best forgotten as promptly as possible. So here is the short version:
Having climbed all night, we descended back to camp. We could not believe how far we had climbed. We half skied down the gravel slopes, with a few stacks and some very near misses. 3 hours rest.Then we walked 19 kilometres downhill, and slept the sleep of the dead.
The next morning, we walked another 3 hours downhill, including one bit where we jogged behind a porter so we could listen to Rihanna blasting out his radio.
Our massive thanks go to all those who sponsored us to climb Kili; we are confident that Room to Read will use your donations wisely! If you would still like to contribute, you can do so using the link to our Everyday Hero site on the main page.
Finally, thank-you so much to our team of guides, cooks, and porters, who coddled us up and down the mountain in comfort. Here they are, thanking us, led by Bocha:
Kilimanjaro will undoubtedly go down as one of the absolute highlights of the trip, and we couldn't have asked for better friends to do it with. Thanks Greer, Glenn and Corrin!