What better way to start off the new year than to come back from holiday? Just spent 2.5 weeks in Tanzania hiking Kilimanjaro for 6 days and cruising around the northern game parks for the remainder. What an amazing trip! Definitely up there amongst the best trips I've been on.
Fiona and I landed in Arusha at night (luckily with all our luggage in tow) and headed off for Kilimanjaro the next morning with a crew of 9. Unbelievably, it takes 9 people to get 2 girls up a mountain! We chose the Rongai route bc it was the least populated and also had the most diverse landscape.
So our entourage consisted of James our guide, assistant guide Raymond who doubled as a porter, our chef Nemis, Honda our waiter who doubled as a porter, and the remaining 5 were porters carrying the gas, water, tents, bags, etc. It was a big crew though we never saw any of them until we settled for camp. All the porters would rush on ahead of us during the day in order to set up camp and have some popcorn, tea or snacks waiting for us at the end. This was really the most civilised trek I've ever done. We spent most of the day walking with James, well Fiona did. I spent most of the day trying to tune James out and walking ahead because his evangelical talk and slightly skewed perception of himself got on my nerves.
The first couple of days were fairly easy; the weather was sunny and our gain in altitude was low. We spent our time enjoying the sunshine and drinking as much as we could to counteract altitude sickness...as a by-product of the 3-4liters of water we were drinking, we also had to take copious pee breaks. It's no coincidence that the only words of swahili I remember from my trip was, 'Hello' and 'I need to pee'.
The 3rd day gave us a true taste of the pain in store for us. We hiked from 2400m to 3800m, followed by an acclimatising trek to 4000m. I got a mild altitude headache that felt like my brain was pressing against my eyeballs. That and walking at a snail's pace because any increase in speed made me feel like my heart would jump out of my mouth from beating so hard. That was the 3rd day. Fiona was also suffering from a headache and also a loss in appetite. By the 4th day we were practically force feeding ourselves.
Day 4 was the most hellish day I have ever experienced in my life. We woke up to a freezing morning. As we set off from 3800m, the day turned ugly and it began to rain...and then snow. Onwards we trekked through a bleak landscape littered with stone boulders. The incline stretched horrendously on as we trudged our way up to 4700m. By the time we reached Kibo Hut my brain had turned to mush and my body had gone numb from the cold. As we lined up to sign in at the camp site, I could barely prop myself up. After signing in, I crawled into our tent and promptly fell asleep from exhaustion. I woke up at 3pm for lunch, roamed about the camp site and then went back for another nap. Dinner was at 6pm, Fiona and I could have won zombie impersonations at this point. The altitude caused both a loss in appetite and energy, any quick movement would cause my head to throb or my heart to hammer away. After pushing our food around and making appropriate civilised noises, we retired back to the tent again in order to rest up for our 11.30pm climb at night up to the summit. After a restless few hours in the tent, both Fiona and I woke up early and started assembling all our gear for the long climb to the summit. This day seemed endless.
Our summit climb started in pitch black. We were accompanied by James and Raymond and the slow pace was set. Above us, we could already see torchlights snaking up the trail from people who had started before us. It was freezing that night despite me wearing 4 layers of thermals on top + down jacket + rain jacket. The bottom consisted of 4 layers as well. I was rugged up like the michelin man but my fingers and toes were slowly becoming numb from the cold and our slow pace. The night was long and consisted of tiny shuffling steps and constant assessment of any symptoms of altitude sickness. After a few hours, Fiona started to feel sick so James stayed back with her. Raymond and I had to shuffle on ahead as we couldn't stop too long in the cold. The worse was still in front of us. The entire path up to Gilman's Point was absolutely hellish and endless. There were sections of loose scree where one step forward meant sliding half a step back. I felt like stopping every few steps to get my breath back. Everytime I asked Raymond how far we still needed to go, he would point at some light and say we were nearly there. I stopped asking after a while because we never seemed to get any closer. This was possibly the darkest point of the trek, my fingers were icicles at this point, I was so tired I felt like curling up into a ball and going to sleep on the ground. I had to keep forcing myself to take one step after another and distract myself from the cold and exhaustion. I remember repeating the mantra 'Of course you can', these 4 words over and over again, in time with my steps. I thought of how disappointed I would be coming all this way and not making it to the top. These random thoughts distracted me enough until I made it to Gilman's Point. I thought the worse was over. By all accounts, all we had to do was make it to Stella Point, walk around the crater and get to Uhura Peak. Sounds so simple and in hindsight it really wasn't so bad. Being witness to a beautiful sunrise at 5700m and seeing the glaciers and crater, with Mawenzi peak in the distance...there was no question I would use my last bit of energy to make it to the peak.
It really was a special feeling to finally see the sign at the top of Kilimanjaro. By this time I was delirious with exhaustion and relief. I spent some time taking photos and a video of cringe-worthy commentary that consisted of the words 'I made it, I made it!'. As I was heading back down, I saw Fiona and James coming up, she was only a short while to the summit. It was a relief to know she was ok despite dry heaving and vomiting all the way up.
We scree-skied all the way back down, with me wiping out on my butt once. It made going down so much faster but it was hell on my knees and toes. Still I couldn't wait to get back to the bottom - any pain was worth it at this point. I got down at around 11am, received a round of congratulations from the porters and crawled into my tent to finally get some rest.
The day wasn't over yet. After being up since 7am the previous morning hiking to Kibo Hut and then another 12 hours through the night up and down Kilimanjaro...we had to trek another 9km to our next camp before finally resting for the night.
So, all up, definitely the most painful experience of my life but it was an incredible feeling to make it to the top that made it all worthwhile. Would I do it all over again? Hell no. Once is enough.
