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| The different climbing routes portrayed on this illustration. I choose the Machame Route |
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| With Michael, my guide |
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| An old picture of Mt. Kilimanjaro - By Meader, Mary, 1916-2008 [CC-BY-SA-3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)], via Wikimedia Commons |
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| The porters waiting for weighing |
Of course at that time I never envisioned ever climbing it because just going to Africa seemed a long shot plus climbing mountains was not my preferred leisure activity - it’s just something I have picked up in the last few years. So not surprisingly, it’s taken me close to 5 years to finally have a crack at it.
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| Starting Point |
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| Walking through the montane forest |
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| Packed lunch for the first day |
I first laid my eyes on this mighty mountain over four years ago on my way to Madagascar. I was on a Kenya Airways flight from Nairobi to Johannesburg and the captain announced that we were passing Mt. Kilimanjaro.
As I peered out the window I saw the tip of the mountain sticking out over a blanket of milky white clouds as long as the eye could see. I wondered if I would be standing on that peak someday…a dream it was then, but now I was going to try to turn it into a reality.
At the Kilimanjaro airport I was picked up by a representative of the tour company I was in communication with for my climb up Mt. Kilimanjaro and it was quite nice not having to worry about how to go from the airport to the city. Even the night’s accommodation was included in the total price which was perfect. I have to admit that the cost of climbing Africa’s highest mountain though is not cheap but it still does not deter thousands of climbers from all over the world who come to tackle it.
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| Nearing the Machame Camp |
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| Blue Monkey |
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| The fruit it was eating |
From my personal travel experience I consider the time between arriving in an unknown foreign country and checking into a place to spend the night as the most discomforting part of any travel. It’s what I call the acclimatization time. After a good night’s rest though it all gets better from there on till the end.
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| Machame Camp |
Talking about acclimatization, my biggest fear on taking on Mt. Kilimanjaro (or Kili as it’s called) was altitude sickness because I had never been as high as that let along climbed at that rarefied air. I have had a couple experiences that came close but nothing even remotely as close as Kili which stood at a daunting 5895 meter above sea level.
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| My 3-course meal |
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| First glance at the peak from Machame Hut |
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| A pretty flower |
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| Hiking the steep ridge towards Shira Camp |
My first tryst with high altitude was in 2009 when I visited the alti-plano of Peru and one particular night when I reached Lake Titicaca from a lower altitude I did have nausea and headache but that lasted just one night. The second experience was climbing Mt. Cameroon last year but the peak was only 4095m and we stayed there for just a few minutes so perhaps it was not enough time spent at that altitude for the body to feel any ill-effects of the lower oxygen levels.
Purely from a physical standpoint climbing Mt. Cameroon was relatively easy and I hadn’t even trained for it but for Kili I wanted to make sure I got some physical conditioning.
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| Different view of the hikers and the porters |
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| Moorland vegetation |
My training included a 30 minute run up a hill twice a day followed by core strengthening workouts… I knew I could not control how my body reacted to high altitude but the least I could do was to be physically fit to lessen the effect of altitude sickness if it ever hit me on the mountain.
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| Lobelia |
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| Pointing towards where we started from |
The thing with altitude sickness is that its so unpredictable – a marathon runner could suffer from it while someone who is totally unfit might do just fine because it’s all how the body adjusts to lower oxygen levels. On Kili it was going to be half that of what is found at sea level and that’s where I in Liberia. I just did my part and left the acclimatization to luck hoping it either won’t affect me or atleast affect me after I had summited.
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| Sun breaking through the dark clouds |
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| Waiting for the rain to pass - view from my tent |
I checked in the hotel for the night and retired early as it had been an exhausting journey from Belgaum to Mumbai by road and then from Mumbai to Tanzania via Addis Ababa without a night’s rest.
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| View of Kibo peak from Shira camp |
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| View of plains and mountains on other side of Shira camp |
My itinerary was for 7 days and of the 6 different routes I choose the Machame route. The scenery was supposed to be spectacular on this route and it was also better from an acclimatization standpoint. Some of the other routes were equally better but needed more than 7 days and that was about the maximum I could afford.
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| Starting Day 2 from the Shira camp |
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| Not a bad place for taking a breather |
Day 1:
The following morning I returned back to the tour agency’s office to pack hiking and cold weather gear and then was driven to the Kilimanjaro National Park entrance gate where it took a while for the guide to process the paperwork and the porters to weigh our supplies. To promote fair labor practices each porter is only allowed to carry 20kgs and I believe weighing also helps in preventing hikers and their team dispose off their waste on the mountain. Both the reasons seem just and perfectly acceptable and I only wish it happened in more places.
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| Alpine desert terrain as we go beyond 4000 meters |
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| Towards Lava tower...seen in the distance |
That day we hiked roughly 11kms through moss laden rainforest up to the Machame camp located at an altitude just over 3000m where the cloud forest gave way to moorland. The hike was perfectly negotiable with sneakers and shorts but I would be packing them in for the rest of the trip where the terrain and the weather was going to get more uncompromising.
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| Descending down from Lava Tower |
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| The clouds giving a preview of the stunning peak |
Originally, I was supposed to be tagged along with another bunch of climbers from China but they missed their connecting flight in Nairobi so I had to push through alone (with the guide and the porters of course). Not having anyone in the group to converse with other than Michael, my guide, it felt lonely but it also forced me to interact more with Michael giving me a better understanding of the local culture plus I guess I appreciated the nature better.
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| The alien looking Senecio tree |
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| Walking through the Senecio garden |
One of the porters also acted as the cook although I am not sure it was legal, anyway I got served a full 3-course meal each day. It could have been the cold or the skills of the cook but the food was really delicious with the soups being simply irresistible. With that much food I wondered if I might be packing on a few pounds by the end of the 7-day hike rather than dropping some.
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| Having my soup at the Barranco camp |
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| Lobelia deckenii |
Day 2:
The second day after a hearty breakfast we continued the ascent up a steep rocky ridge for 5kms to reach the Shira Camp just as the cold rains started to pour down. Luckily for me, my porters had got to the camp ahead of time and set up the tent so I had a decent shelter while it got really wet and soggy outside. I was also glad that we started the hike early that morning because there were a few trekkers behind us who got drenched in the downpour and were not too happy about it…I am sure I would be too if all my clothes were wet on just the second day of the hike.
Shira camp was located at a scenic place where we could see the plains below on one side and the snow covered Kibo peak on the other. I was hoping that the rains stayed out for our remaining days on the mountain as that would really mess up the views. With just 5 hours of hiking that day I had plenty of rest for the next day and I needed it because we had a long walk the following day.
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| Valley view from Barranco camp |
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| Scaling the Barranco Wall |
Day 3:
Early in the morning we ascended eastward to a place called as Lava Tower where we had our picnic lunch. At 4650m it was bare, windy and very cold. After a quick lunch we descended back down to the Barranco camp at 3850m for the night for a total hike that day of about 10kms. The idea of climbing up to 4650m and then descending down to camp at 3850m was to get acclimatized. I am not sure if having a massive headache and feeling sick and nauseated is part of getting acclimatized but Michael kept saying I will be ok.
I was barely able to sleep through the night with the sore head and general malaise but by the morning I was feeling marginally better. Over coffee in the morning I learnt that some hikers from another group who had camped beside me felt terrible the previous day as well. Quite funny then that that made me feel slightly better knowing that I was not the only one sore that morning.
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| First it got foggy... |
Day 4:
We left the Barranco camp and continued up a steep ridge up the Barranco Wall, so called because of the angle of ascent which seemed almost vertical. I had read that a lot of hikers struggle at this wall but I felt it to be nothing more than a minor obstacle. After the wall it was a hike down to the Karanga Valley which was around 4000m and was the original place I as supposed to camp that night. Since we had just trekked for 3 hours and I felt a lot better we pushed on with the revised plan to go from the Karanga Valley towards Barafu Camp located at 4700m which was a further 4 hours away.
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| ...then hail... |
Baraf in Hindi means ice or snow and a camp called Barafu so close to the snow line of a mountain certainly meant “icy camp” in the local Swahili dialect. Interestingly Swahili and Hindi both borrow words from Middle Eastern languages so my theory was that it was an Arabic word (I found out later than it is a Persian word in origin). Not surprisingly then that the hike to the Barafu camp was through a mixture of hail, ice and snow which was a little discomforting but hey…can’t expect the weather to be perfect all the time that high on a mountain.
A light form of headache still persisted but there was no time to thing about it. An early dinner and I had to force myself to rest for the next few hours because we were going to attempt the ascent to the summit through the night.
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| ...then snow |
Day 5:
I woke up as planned at 10:30pm and had a cup of tea with biscuits. Michael suggested I stay away from milk as it would make me vomit incase I felt nauseated. I had double-triple layered my clothing just incase the weather would turn out nasty.
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| Baraf at Barafu camp |
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| Pondering on my summit night |
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| A big relief at reaching Stella Point |
All through the hike I had heard the word pole-pole (Swahili for slow-slow) quite often and I reminded myself to follow it diligently that day than any other day of the hike. The first hour or so went by without a problem but thereafter it got progressively tougher…much tougher than what I had anticipated.
Michael was ahead of me and he was setting the pace but I felt that that was much too fast for me. The next few hours I needed a break after every 20-30 steps. I tried in vain to keep constant deep breathing to take in more oxygen and having a steady pace but it just did not work.
Every hour that passed by meant that the summit was that much closer. The total hike for the summit day, I was told, was about 5-7 hours so since we had begun the hike before midnight I was expecting to reach the summit at daybreak or there about. Around 4am or so I asked Michael how much further the peak was and he responded saying it was 3-4 hours more. The moment I heard that my heart sank. I just could not believe what he had just said. All that while I was counting down the hours and as per my calculation I had just a couple hours left but now suddenly I had 4 more hours to go.
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| Sunrise from Stella Point |
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| Uhuru Peak...Africa's highest point |
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| Message for a special someone |
I don’t know if it was the low oxygen and the effect of the sickness hitting me than impaired my thinking but for a moment I completely lost my mind and was absolutely livid with Michael for misleading me by telling me it was only a total of 6 hours of hike time the last day. Perhaps I was also unhappy because he was not very adept at setting a right pace for me. Normally a guide should be able to gauge the condition of his client and set a pace accordingly but I think Michael was totally ignorant of it.
Needless to say, the following few moments were tremendously heartbreaking and demoralizing as I contemplated the fact that I had barely covered half my hike and still had a long way to go.
Then, a group of two other hikers with their guides caught up with us and I used then as my inspiration and just tail gated them with the determination to not let them get out of sight. I felt that that their pace was much better suited and asked Michael to be at the end of the file.
Perhaps it was the determination or the distraction but I put my head down, ignored the time and took everything out of my mind and just focused on keeping up with them one step at a time.
Since the time was not tracked I don't know how long it was but low and behold as soon as the first rays of sun starting glowing on the horizon we had reached Stella Point. I could not believe we had made it because in my mind I thought it would be a couple more hours after Michael’s dim comment...perhaps that was his attempt at reverse psychology…if it was, then I think it worked the wrong way because it certainly got me demoralized rather than anything.
Uhuru Peak and not Stella Point is the actual highest point but it was just a 30-40 minute walk on a not too steep ridge so getting to Stella Point was the key. Unfortunately for me as soon as I reached Stella, I started to feel the effects of the altitude. I could barely stay on my feet let alone walk as I lost my coordination. My brain probably not being able to function properly as it didn't have sufficient oxygen.
The closest analogy I could give of the feeling at that moment was of someone who is absolutely drunk. Somehow I did managed to stumble my way to Uhuru Peak with a little help from Michael. After 5 days of effort and being so close, I was not letting the altitude sickness stop me from making it to Africa’s highest point!
Its generally not recommended to spend a lot of time at the summit due to the adverse effect of the altitude so we just clicked a few pictures and through my sickness managed to glance at the stunning glaciers and crater rim covered in a blanked of snow. Kilimanjaro is a dormant volcano…it could and possibly will erupt someday again.
Descending down back to Barafu camp was a massive challenge since I could barely walk and the snow was slippery. It took Michael to support me by holding me up as I slid, slipped and tumbled my way downwards. Due to my coordination or lack thereof it took a while for me to descend but as soon as we made it below the 5000m mark I felt like a person renewed. With my coordination back I literally ran my way for the rest of the way to the Barafu camp.
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| The volcanic crater |
The descent all the way down to the park gate was over 23kms and our pace was really good initially but as we descended further down my toes and the bottom of my feet started to get really sore so much so that I had to slow down my pace and alternate my walking gait so that I don't end up having blisters. We left Barafu camp around 1pm and got down to the park gates by 5:30pm. Not bad to descend 23kms in 5.5 hours…huh?
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| My team of guide and porters |
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| "If you can't climb it then drink it" |
A vehicle from the tour company picked us up from the park gate and brought us back to the city of Moshi. After tipping the guide and the porters and getting my certificate I was dropped back to the hotel in Moshi where I could celebrate with a large pizza and a local beer called…well…Kilimanjaro.
Mount Kilimanjaro was in the books and I had saved a couple days as well. All I now needed to do was make sure I find a way to get on a tour taking me to Serengeti the next day. Last thing I wanted to do was waste a day trying to find a tour going there when I had struggled so much to save one.
I decided to wake up early the following morning and try my luck in the city of Arusha which is the safari capital in Tanzania because several tour companies are based there.
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