The climb - day by day in chronological order

Each day is a link.  After you have read a day, click on the back button on your browser and then choose the next day.

Sept 11 - the climb begins

Sept 12 - the climb to the Shira Plateau

Sept 13 - Hiking across the Shira Plateau and up to Moir Camp

Sept 14 - to Baranco Camp via the Lava Tower

Sept 15 - up the Baranco Wall to Karanga

Sept 16 - Karanga, Decisions and Porters

Sept 17 - the climb to Barafu, base camp

Sept 18 - Summit Day

Sept 19 - the descent to Mweka Camp

Sept 20 - descending to Moshi

Sept 20 - descending to Moshi

We awoke and were pleased with the warm temperatures at this elevation.  It was our final day on the mountain and we broke camp for the last time. 

Before we hit the trail the guides and porters had promised to thank us and say good-bye with some Swahili songs.  Our guides and porters plus the crew that had been supporting the three Americans joined forces and put on a great show.  It was another example of the beauty of Africa.  There were roughly 40 guys on the side of a mountain without so much as a drum to accompany them.  Yet the performance they gave was something that none of us will ever forget.  You can watch the video at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=km5WP7T_XAY

After saying our good-byes to the porters, we started our descent.  It was a comfortable walk on an "African sidewalk", made of packed earth.  The rain forest was lusher and greener on this side of the mountain compared to our first day, since we were on the wet side of the mountain.








We arrived at Mweka Gate after a three hour hike.  We waved good-bye to the porters who climbed onto the truck that would take them down to Moshi.  We posed for our final picture in front of the Tusker vehicle that would return us to our hotel in Moshi for our first shower in 10 days.

Sept 19 - the Descent to Mweka Camp

We all slept really well as a result of our exhaustion from the previous day.  We would be starting our descent at Barafu in the high alpine desert, and descend down to and through the heath and moorland to the edge of the rain forest where Mweka was located.  We were all feeling very good as a result of the good night's sleep plus the extra oxygen that we were beathing with each step.

We had been descending for about 1.5 hours when we saw the evacuation stretcher beside the trail.  It is a stretcher fastened to a mountain bike wheel.  The guides use this to evacuate climbers suffering from severe altitude sickness.  We were all happy not to have had the need to use it!

  

  

As we descended the temperature got warmer and warmer and the trail got dustier and dustier.  We arrived in Mweka after 4 hours on the trail.  We had a hot lunch, cleaned up and enjoyed the afternoon.  We decided to visit Albert, our cook, in his tent as he prepared dinner.  He had done an amazing job of preparing hot delicious meals with very little equipment on the side of a mountain at high elevations.  The photos show the beauty of the African people.  Africa has all of the problems that we read about.  However, Africans as individuals are wonderful people.  We will all miss hearing the early chatter in Swahili, which we heard as we awakened every morning.  Check out these pictures of Albert and his team.  There was no need to ask them to smile.

Our dinner that evening would be our last evening meal with the guides.  We had a great discussion about our climb, all of which was positive.  However, two points were special:

1. Paula and David made it to the summit in spite of never receiving their luggage.  In the experience of our guides, they had NEVER seen this happen.  Usually it is too much of a motivational setback to make it to the summit if your luggage never arrives.  Paula and David did an amazing job of not letting these negative thoughts deter them.
2. We had a climb with three Mamas and they all got along.  In Africa, women are referred to as Mama once they have children.  The guides have seen many climbs with three Mamas.  Usually, the stress of the climb leads to that old saying, "two's company, three's a crowd".  However, our three Mamas got along from the first day until the last. 

Sept 18 - Summit Day

The guides awakened us at 4 AM. Most of us did not need a wake up call. We had gone to bed at 8 PM, were anticipating the excitement of Summit Day and were sleeping at 15,200 ft. This made sleep difficult, but safe to say to say we all got at least a few hours of off and on sleep. After a hot breakfast, we started climbing shortly after 5 30.


At this hour it was still dark so we climbed with our head lamps. When we raised our heads, we could see a line of climbers like a string of faint lights well ahead of us. Many groups start their summit day at midnight, so these people were 5 – 6 hours in front of us. We chose to climb during the daylight.

There were essentially three parts to the climb: a rocky pitch of 1,000 ft that started shortly after Barafu Camp; 2,500 ft up a scree field to Stella Point, the lip of the caldera; and finally, a 600 ft climb to the summit.

We got a real treat when we looked to our right shortly after daybreak. There was Mount Mawenzi, Kilimanjaro’s other peak, not nearly as high at 16,900 ft. The most famous Kilimanjaro peak, Kibo, was the one we were attempting today. The two peaks are linked by a saddleback that was lightly covered in morning mist. It was an awe inspiring sight.

We climbed the first pitch rather quickly and then faced the scree field. The dictionary defines scree as “an accumulation of loose stones or rocky debris lying on a slope or at the base of a cliff”. On Kilmanjaro, the scree contained a lot of dust as well. On some parts of the mountain it was more than a meter deep. When you climb through a scree field the old adage of “two steps forward, one step back” is a very accurate description of the experience. After a short break, we started and quickly realized that the 2,500 ft climb to Stella Point would be the toughest part of the day.

We finally arrived at Stella Point shortly before noon after a long, slow climb. The altitude combined with the dust was taking its toll. Dani was using her puffer to control her asthma. Henry, who was not able to take Diamox because of the side effects, was coughing a lot. Was it a return of childhood asthma after 42 years, dust, or the early stages of pulmonary edema? He asked the guides to test his oxygen level. The result was 77%. Any result over 70% means that you are not in danger, so thankfully it was just dust. We stopped for a lunch break, before the final push to the summit.

We started the final climb to the summit. We were now climbing on the lip of the caldera towards the peak which we could see in the distance. The climbing was actually a lot easier than the scree field. We were looking down on the glaciers, the snows of Kilimanjaro made so famous by Hemingway.

We continued slowly but surely to the summit. The glaciers were on our left. Kombe, our head guide, told us that they were 25% smaller that his first summit 20 years ago. We passed a group of 3 Americans plus their guides and porters, whom we had gotten to know, on the way back down from the summit so we knew we must be close.

We lifted our heads and there it was, the famous sign that every climber dreams of reaching. A few more steps and at 1 PM local time we did it. It was an emotional moment for all of us. Within minutes of reaching the summit, the clouds cleared and allowing the sun to raise the temperature. There were hugs, and photos, and calls to family and friends from Hans’ satellite phone. This is one of those times when a picture is worth a thousand words so please enjoy the summit photos that we’ve uploaded.

We started our descent after about 45 minutes on the summit. We were quickly back at Stella point when a snow storm started. This was the same time that we had to tackle the scree field again, this time on the way down. The best way to descend in a scree field is to “ski”. You don’t really ski continuously like on snow. Each step is 5 – 6 ft and then your heel digs in and you take another step. If you let yourself go and maintain your balance with your trekking poles it’s actually a lot of fun. However, if you don’t have the confidence to let yourself go and fight the scree it can be a long painful descent. Our team were all good “skiers” and the heavy snow added to the “skiing”experience.

We were almost to the bottom of the scree field when we saw Amani climbing towards us.  Amani was our waiter.  He had served us three meals a day for over a week so we had gotten to know him quite well.  He had hiked up the mountain with a large thermos of hot tea.  We went to a sheltered spot and really enjoyed his treat.

We returned to Barafu after another hour.  We had spent almost 11 hours in total and were all very tired.  We cleaned up, had a hot dinner and most of us were sound asleep before 8 PM.

Sept 17 – the Climb to Barafu, base camp

We began our climb at the usual time, 9 AM. It was an easy day and we had already climbed most of the way to Barafu on our acclimatization climb the previous day. The climb was uneventful. We had now passed into another climatic zone, the high alpine desert. Absolutely nothing grew up here at 15,200 ft.

We arrived at Barafu had a hot lunch and a snow storm started as if to welcome the Canadians. We wisely cancelled the acclimatization climb that we had planned for the afternoon. There was no need in getting our gear wet. We would be awakened tomorrow at 4 AM for summit day.

We relaxed for the afternoon, had a warm dinner and got to bed early. It was cold at this altitude as the dinner pictures show.

Sept 16 - Karanga, Decisions & Porters

We planned to spend two nights at Karanga Camp.  It was a pleasure to awaken and just get ready for our acclimatization climb without doing all the packing necessary to break camp.  We were also starting our climb at 10 AM, an hour later than usual. 

When we stepped out of our tents, were we treated to the sight of the rising sun illuminating Kilimanjaro.  The mountain looked a lot smaller and the glaciers looked a lot closer, probably because we had already completed more than 2/3 of our climb.







We had decisions to make that were critical to our climb. The next day we would climb to Barafu Camp, the base camp for our push to the summit.  We had three options:

1. Go from Barafu to the summit and back to Carter Camp for the night.  It shortens the summit day and there is something romantic about sleeping at Crater Camp at 18,700 ft, higher than Everest base camp.
2. Go from Barafu to Crater Camp, sleep there and then make the final push to the summit the following morning.  It divides the push to the summit into two days and we would still get to sleep at Crater Camp.
3. Go from Barafu to the summit and back to Barafu in the same day.  It makes for a long day but climbing to Crater Camp is almost as difficult as the summit.

Decision:  Option 3.  Our rationale was simple.  We wanted to summit and if we had the strength to get to Crater Camp we would almost certainly make it to the summit.  We had also spent enough time on the mountain to understand that sleeping at 18,700 ft could be very unpleasant when you had slept at 15,200 ft the night before.  In fact, the guides told us the many climbers had made it Crater Camp, spent the night, got altitude sickness and not made it to the summit.  Sleeping at Crater Camp sounded great when you were reading the website from the comfort of home, but when you're on the mountain reality tempered the sense of adventure.

The second decision was whether we wanted to ask six of the strongest porters to carry our day packs on summit day.  Although many of us felt strong enough to carry our own packs, we agreed to accept the porters' assistance, in part, due to the fact that we had chosen the tough option for summit day.

We started our acclimatization climb at 10 AM.  It was uneventful and even though we climbed above 14,500 ft everyone felt great, a very good sign that our bodies were adjusting well to the altitude.  We were also getting used to the daily weather pattern.  Kilimanjaro sits on the Serengeti, which has an elevation of about 3,000 ft.  The mountain then rises from the savannah an additional 16,300 ft to a total elevation of 19,300 ft.  When you are on the Serengeti it is very dry and it is hard to believe that there is any humidity in the air.  However, there is.  At lower elevations, 5 - 10,000 ft, there are clouds that encircle the mountain for days at a time.  It is the moisture from these clouds that make the rain forest possible.  There is a second layer of cloud that forms and dissipates on a daily basis.  It is typically clear above 10,000 ft from 3 - 4 PM in the afternoon until 10 - 11 AM.  However, during the late morning the high mountain cloud will form almost every day dramatically lowering the temperature and the visibility.
We climbed high enough to see the outline of Barafu camp in the distance and had a snack.

While stopping for a snack we saw a young porter stop for a rest.  We were shocked at how poorly he was dressed, shorts, T-shirt and slip-on canvas deck shoes with no socks at 14,500 ft!  We had all been shocked to see porters wearing flip-flops and crocs carrying 20 kg plus their own gear.  Thankfully, our outfitter Tusker, was a high end operation and the porters all had decent hiking boots and clothing.  Not so for the discount operators, whose porters often carried more that the maximum 20 kg.  Every year about 20 - 30 people die on Kilimanjaro; about 2/3 of these people are porters and 1/3 climbers.  The climbers usually succumb to severe altitude sickness leading to pulmonary or cerebral edema.  The porters usually die from exposure, when a sustained snow or rain storm leads to hypothermia.

If any of the readers of this blog decide to do this climb, we ask you to use a quality outfitter for your safety and the porters' as well.  The following pictures show a few of the porters that we saw on the mountain.  They are the heroes of any high altitude climb!

Sept 15 - up the Baranco Wall to Karanga

Hans awoke at 9 out of 10 and was feeling much better. The scale out of 10 is a practice of Tusker to monitor the health of their clients during the climb. Twice a day they asked the following questions:

1. On a scale from 1 to 10, with 10 being great, how do you feel?
2. How is your breathing?
3. Have you had a pee in the last 2 hours?
4. Have you had a bowel movement in the last 24 hours?
5. Do you have a head ache?
6. Are you nauseous?
7. How is your appetite?
8. Have you taken your Diamox (for altitude)?
9. Have you taken your Malerone (for malaria)?

There was a group medical check in the evening, usually before dinner and a private medical check in the morning when one of the guides would listen to you breathing with a stethoscope. This protocol, combined with High Altitude First Responder training for the three guides, was very reassuring. David, Chief of Surgery in the biggest hospital in eastern Canada, was very impressed with the process and the guides’ level of knowledge. So Hans being a 9 really meant something to all of us.

Our climb would begin with the Baranco Wall, the closest we would come to technical climbing on this expedition. The wall is 600 vertical feet and, if you include the slopes at the base and summit, it’s 800 feet in total. Would the entire team be able to scale this wall without succumbing to acrophobia? 

One of the amazing things about climbing is that when you're in an exposed position your world contracts to the space that's 3 - 15 away from you.  You think about the the next hand hold or foot placement, not the fact that if you look down it's 500 ft to the valley floor.  So, not only did the group scale the wall in a bit over an hour, they had fun doing it.  In fact, many people said that it was one of the most enjoyable parts of the trip.

 
 
 
 
 

After scaling the wall, we had a short hike to Karanga Camp, or so we thought.  We could see Karanga and and Kombe, our head guide gave the guys a quick test.  How far to Karanga?  Our answers ranged from 7 - 20 minutes.  Wrong! There was a ravine of 500 vertical ft between us and the camp, so the correct answer was 1.5 hours.  We arrived in Karanga after 5 hours and 15 minutes of climbing. 
 

We would have cell phone coverage again, so many of us touched base with home.  We would also be staying two nights in Karanga.  The next day we would do an acclimatization climb, almost to Barafu, our next camp and return to Karanga for sleeping.  Climb high, sleep low.  This was always our plan and it is why we choose the longest route to get to the summit.
 
 
 
 
 
 
We enjoyed a hot lunch and then had the afternoon free.  The clouds cleared and the sun came out.  We had been on the mountain for 5 days and the ladies deserved a bit of pampering so they set up the beauty salon at 13,200 ft.

Sept 14 – to Baranco Camp via the Lava Tower

We spent a difficult night at Moir Camp. It was cold and even though it is in a gorge the wind was just the right direction to funnel down through the gorge and blow hard all night. The fabric on the tents was flapping loudly and sleep was difficult. As usual, it warmed up when the sun came up. We went about our morning clean up and preparation and got ready to start climbing.

We climbed to almost 15,000 ft at the Lava Tower. Everyone is feeling the effects of altitude now, but the girls seem to tolerate it better than the guys. They’re chatting away as we climb, but the guys are strangely quiet. We’re now well above the cloud tops near the Lava Tower.

We stop for another hot lunch just below the Lava Tower. The guys are hurting, but seem to recover when they see the food.

The rest of the day is mainly down hill to Baranco camp at 13,200 feet. As we descend, we see more and more Senecios, a large cactus like plant that is unique to Kilimanjaro. Their green leafy crowns open during the day and close at night to protect against the extremes of mountain weather.

We arrive at Baranco Camp after 8 hours of climbing.

We’re looking forward to Baranco. We can look down on the lights of Moshi so we’ll have cell phone coverage for the first time in days. As we descend into Baranco, everyone starts to feel better than they felt at the Lava Tower, except Hans whose condition continues to deteriorate. By dinner time he is too tired to leave his tent and is suffering from headaches and nausea. The guides spring into action and administer oxygen twice. They also check his lungs and temperature, both of which are normal. They reassure us that this happens and that he’ll probably be OK in the morning.  David agrees with their assessment. We go to our tents worried but hopeful.

Sept 13 – Hiking across the Shira Plateau & up to Moir Camp

We awoke to a very cold morning at Shira 1. We are in an alpine desert. There is very little water to act as a heat sink during the night. It can be -20 Celcius at 6 PM, then the sun comes up at 6:30 and by 9 AM it can be + 20. We begin our day at 9 AM with a hike across the Plateau. It is flat and dusty.

The heather become smaller and smaller and by noon we have crossed the plateau. We climb a rocky pitch and we find the mess tent set up ready at Fisher Camp to serve us a hot lunch. Our appetites are always better when we’re exercising outdoors. That’s certainly the case at this lunch, which also means that we’re adapting well to the altitude.

We continued to climb up to Moir camp, tucked away at the end of a huge gorge, at the foot of a giant lava flow. There is less vegetation all the time and the terrain becomes rockier. At this stage, Hans was just horsing around.

We arrive at Moir Camp at 13,650 ft, our highest camp thus far. We have hiked and climbed for 7 hr 15 min.