Climbing Mt. Kilimanjaro

Hey Guys!

 So just a quick word of warning, this is an absolutely massive blog. Climbing to Africa's highest peak in 8 days simply can't be shown in 20 photos or less. It was an epic experience that deserves a really big old blog. So let's dive right in! 

Like I was saying, Mt. Kilimanjaro (5895 m) is Africa's highest point. It is also the highest free-standing mountain in the world. So if you want to climb it, it is going to take you days, even though the terrain isn't really technical at all (no crampons, pick axes, etc). 

There are a lot of different routes, and people usually climb it in 6-8 days. After my experience in Bolivia, I didn't want to torture myself like that again, so we went for the eight day Lemosho route. This way we would get to acclimatize to the altitude and enjoy some scenery along the way. And I don't know, maybe enjoy ourselves. 

The morning of the climb, I was almost too nervous to look at the mountain from our breakfast spot at the hostel. 

Here we are at the Lemosho gate, 2100 m. The first day was not too bad, which definitely set my mind at ease. Showing up at your campsite with the tent set up and some snacks laid out is definitely a form of luxury I won't soon forget! 

I should explain a little about how they do it here; for Jared and I, we had a team of 11 people! There were 4 porters (each), a cook, and two guides. We had expected to join a group, but we had a private tour, and all of these people were there with the sole purpose to get us up the mountain. No pressure!

Here is a shot of the porters doing their thing. They climb way faster than you, on account of being used to the altitude and just generally made of stronger stuff. 

And here's me with my little day pack! You kind of feel like a chump when the porters are cruising by with huge packs on. I definitely used this as a 'reality check' for myself when I thought I was really working hard or getting tired. 

We saw black-and-white colobus monkeys on the walk up. The hike starts in the rain forest and passes through 5 different vegetation zones. 

Made it to the first camp! Mti Mkubwa (Big Tree camp) is at 2900 m

The next morning we climbed the 'elephant's back' to get to our next camp. We had also transitioned to Heather/moorland vegetation.

Shira 1 is at 3600 m. We had a beautiful sunset.

Next day we headed for Shira 2, via the Shira Cathedral. This was a chance to acclimatize, as we would climb up to 3872 m and then come back down. It's the old climber's adage: climb high, sleep low. 

The Shira Cathedral Point is a remnant of the old Shira peak, which used to be the highest point in Kilimanjaro Natl. Park. It was destroyed by a huge eruption 700,000 years ago that formed Uhuru peak (the one we are heading for!) 

Great views from the top, though Mt. Kili was mostly hidden by clouds. Our guide, Peter, said it is a 'shy mountain.'

Lots of cairns, your fave- Mom. 

Here we are at Shira 2 (3850 m), and look who decided to show herself- the mountain!

We enjoyed the great views while we did our nightly briefing, talking about what we would be encountering the next day. 

Such a beautiful sunrise. 

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This is actually what I was doing while Jared was capturing the sunrise. One of the marvelous things the team did for us was bring me tea in the morning while I was still in the sleeping bag. Such luxury....

Enjoying the flowers along the way. This is a protea flower, which happens to be South Africa's national flower. 

In the moorland, we also saw lots of thistles and other 'hardy' kinds of plants. The vegetation was slowly giving way to sub-alpine. 

The plants are starting to look like life is getting tougher. 

We had some elevation to gain today. We ended up at Lava Tower for lunch (4600 m), and then descended again to Barranco Camp for the night (3900 m). 

We had quite a bit of wind today, which is why the sky looked so clear.

Lava Tower is the big rock behind us to the right. 

Getting closer..........

Made it to Lava Tower! Time for lunch. 

Here we are with Else from Denmark, who is totally my hero. She (74) and her husband Nels (72) are doing the climb with us, and they were such awesome people. I miss them so much already! 

After leaving Lava Tower, we started descending through one of the coolest valleys I have ever been in. There were lots of Senecio (the cactus-looking plants), which are an ectophyte. 

Peter is our guide with the orange cap on. We also had Adam, further down the trail. 

Everlasting flower. If you want to grow up here, you have to be tough. 

Lobelia. The next picture shows a close-up of it in flower. 

Another day done! Today we walked about 6 hours. 

As you can see, there isn't really much of anything left for vegetation. Now we are in the moorland. 

The next morning we climbed the Barranco Wall to get over the other side and on towards our next camp. If you look closely, you can see a steady stream of people already on the trail. 

Now we have made it to Karanga! (3995 m) The vegetation zone is now alpine desert. 

Walking to Barafu, our final camp before we make our summit attempt! I hadn't really slept the night  before at Karanga, so I was going pole-pole (Swahili for slowly). Jared was a machine, though- just ripping up the track. 

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Now it's starting to get real. We are at 4673 m, and tonight we will get up at midnight to make our summit attempt. Bear in mind, at this point we have been hiking for six days without showering. I was pretty ready to just do this thing. Hoping like heck I have the strength to do it! 

Oh, and we also had these for toilets.....super glamorous. 

However, all of that pales in comparison when I think back on the experience that we had. We got up at midnight (we hadn't really been sleeping anyways, just resting). We put on all our warm clothes  and away we went! 

It was pretty steep going, but it was actually pretty do-able. Kili is intense, but not impossible. We had been taking Diamox (acetazolamide) all along for prevention of altitude sickness, and by summit morning I actually felt pretty good. It was literally night and day compared to climbing Huayna Potosi. It's almost like I learned from my mistakes or something....

Anyways, we climbed for about 5 hours in the dark (by head lamp-light). We reached Stella Point (5756 m) and it was still too dark to take a picture! So we went really pole pole for the last hour as we approached Uhuru peak. We really didn't want to get there in the dark, as our guides didn't want us to spend much time up there waiting- in case we got too cold standing around. However, we had an unseasonably warm peak that day (it was only about -5C), and we joked that this is the weather most moms kick their kids outside for in Canada. This seemed to shock our Tanzanian guides! 

We made it just as it was starting to get light. Such an amazing experience to see the summit take shape as it got more light. 

Here we are with our guides, Adam and Peter (L to R). 

Doing a birthday shot of scotch! It was the only thing we could find in the supermarket that wasn't really gross (i.e. Jack Daniels, bourbon, etc). Jared also sang Happy Birthday to me. 

Here we are with our Austrian friends, Cornelia and Leo. They made it up just after us, it was so great to share the summit with new friends. 

We actually got our Stella Point picture on the way down, as it was now light enough to see. The wind was also picking up, so we were glad to be descending already. 

This was the descent route. It was a bit of sliding down, as the ground underneath the snow was loose gravel. You definitely had to get a rhythm down. It took about 2 hours. 

This was what the tent looked like when we got back! It reminded me of home. We got to sleep for about an hour before we packed up and headed further down the mountain. 

We walked another 4 hours down to Mweka camp. If you have been counting, we have been walking/hiking for about 12 hours so far today. Happy Birthday to me! 

The transitions seemed to happen a lot faster on the way down, especially since you descend all the way down into the rain forest in a single day (something that took us six days to do on the way up).

At times it was a bit of a goat trail on the way down. 

To say we were tired by the time we made it to camp would be an understatement. But we did it!

A group photo with our crew. Kosmas, our cook, is to my right. 

Looking back at the mountain that night was a very surreal experience. It didn't feel real that I had been on top of it less than 12 hours ago. 

The walk out the next day was very lush, and I enjoyed being in the rain forest once again. 

Everlasting flower. 

Impatiens kilimanjarica. This one is endemic to Mt. Kilimanjaro NP, and is only found here.

We managed to snag a pic with Else and Nels on the trail. Such cool people.

Our final sign! We covered 75 km and climbed to 5895 m. What an amazing experience. How can I even really do it justice with words? We were so grateful to our awesome team of people that helped us get it done. This is an amazing place. 

Until Next Time!