Advertisement
Published: August 17th 2010
Edit Blog Post
Summit of Kilimanjaro
Anneke and I reached the summit at 07:15. Uhuru peak is afrika's highest at 5895 meters For a long time we were looking forward to our climb of the Kilimanjaro. Since many people suffer from altitide sicknes on the Kilimanjaro we decided to start our trip to Tanzania at Mount Meru.
Kilimanjaro´s little sister would be a good place to acclimatize to the high altitude. Located in Arusha national park we could only climb this mountain with the company of a ranger, since there are many wild animals in the park. We started of climbing with a group of 7 other tourist, on our drive to the park gate we already viewed many zebra's, wildebeasts and buffalo's. While walking through te forest we saw some White Colobus Monkeys, and some Reedbuck. After walking 3 hours we had to stand still, the Ranger pointed with his fingers to the wood and there we saw at 10-15 meters away from us a Leopard. Even the Ranger was exited cause it was very rare to encounter them up close! Awesome!!! Continuing walking we also came close to some Giraffes and after 5 hours we reached our first mountain hut at 2500 meters. Making dinner was terreble because the fuel we locally bought for our stove seemed to contain some water
Mount Meru day 1
Nice and huge tree too. But others were happy to share dinner with us so lucky us again.
Next day we climbed to the hut at 3500 meter, the forest went slowely into bushes and in the end hardly any vegetation would grow on the slopes of this mountain. After resting a bit we went later the afternoon for our climb to Little Meru at 3800m.'
Since we had only 3 days in the park we decided not to go al the way to the summit.(we would save our energy for the Kilimanjaro) Our plan was to watch sunrise at Rhino Point 3800 meters (on a clear day you would see the sun rise behind the Kilimanjaro) At 7 in the morning we started climbing with rain and heavy fog, after 1 hour we reached the viewpoint, headed back and made our way back to the gate. The last part we had some good weather again and nice to walk down with the view of Mount Kilimanjaro on front of us.
Great hike/ climb for 3 days with one day rest in between in Moshi we could make us of for climbing Afrika's higestst peak.
The Kili climb we started with a guy
from Norway and us. For three climbers we would go with 11 Tanzanians in our team. One guide, an assistand guide, a cook and 8 other porters to carry all the stuff that we would need on the mountain.
We started at Machame gate at 1800 meter. Our first day we walked through the rainforest to 3000 meter. All day was a bit cloudy, not great for the views but good temperature fore hiking.
When we arrived at camp they just finished pitching our tents and after half an our we could go the the mesh tent to start with some tea and popcorn. Then after 2 more ours dinner was ready and not long after that is was time to rest and sleep. We were very comfortable in our tents but we wondered how they would sleep with 11 divided in the kichen tent and the mesh tent.
Day 2 we had a nice hike up to 3800 meters, we arrived early afternoon so we had some time to enjoy the good weather, read a book and later the afternoon we went for another short walk. (this time without our backpacks.) In this camp we had our first
Giraffe
It is great to be waking around these animals, so much better than wildlife viewing from inside a jeep. good views on the summit of the Kili, even at night it was still visible because of the moon.
The 3rd day was a heavy and long climb to our lunch place at 4600 meters. We started to feel a bit of a headache but after lunch we descended our 3rd camp at 3900 meters. Untill dawn it is a nice sunny place in the mountains but after sunset, the temperature dropped and it became very cold.
Day 4 we had to start with breakfast hill, a steep 300 meter climb were you will need both feet and hands to climb up the mountain. The we continued decending, climbing and decending and climbing...until our lunch place. Walking the whole morning and we were not even higher than in the morning. After lunch we had to climb another 700 meter to the last camp. Our pace was getting slower and slower...the altitude was getting at us. And at 5 o'clock we finally reached camp.
Eating a good dinner and resting as long as possible.
At 23:00 we woke up after a couple hours sleep. After tea we started slowely with climbing.
Great conditions, full moon, just little wind
Rhino Point
The higest point for us at our acclimatisation mountain.
and we felt good. Our Norwegian friend got a little bit more problems with the altitude. so getting higher and higher we had to stop more frequently.
After climbing a couple hours we made a short stop to drink some hot water......I shouldn't have done it.
It just fell bad, I found a rock and behind it I emptied my stomach.... Ofcourse i didn't want to think of quitting and I didn't even got the time to think of it because our guides put my backpack on my back again and started climbing again.
Scince our pace was still very slow, Anneke and I began thinking of splitting up the group...after a while we saw Styan (our Norwegian fellow climber) falling and having a hard time continuing at a normal pace.
Because our guide did not make any decisions we proposed to split up and so we did.
Anneke and I could now walk a bit faster but also climb without stopping every few minutes. To our surprise only one hour after we reached already Stella Point. Being now at the rim of the vulcanic crater of the Kili we only had to climb another 150 meters up. The sun
Day 3 mount Meru
While walking down we had a great view of the Kilimanjaro rose beautifully and being surrounded by some glaciers it was a special sight. The last 150 meters seemed endlessly because it was still a big distance (horizontally) to cover. The last few meters were great when we saw the sign of the summit of Kilimanjaro's Uhuru Peak at 5895 meters ASML. Some photo's at the cold summit and after 15 minutes we started to decent again.
I think Altitude sicknes comes with a small delay because on my way down I started to feel worse and worse. I ended up walking on a sort of automatic pilot down andI realy felt that I couln't think clear anymore. I felt like wanting to rest and sleep but I couln't and wasn't allowed by Anneke of course.
Coming down to camp was great, One of the porters waited for us with some fresh cold juice and the rest came to us to congratulate us with reaching the summit and hugging us.
It turned out that Styan had to turn around just after we made our descision to split up, he was sort of in a drunken state at that high altitude so it was a good that he came back to camp.
Machame gate
The start gate of mount Kilimanjaro at 1800 meters We rested for almost 2 hours, then had some lunch wich I couldn't hold again so after lunch I felt even worse than walking down the summit. I realy didn't feel like walking anymore but we still had to walk back from our camp at 4600 till a camp at 3000 meter.
The first hour was the hardest and after getting below the 4000 meters the headache started to fade.
It still was an exhousting day and back in camp the only thing I could think of was hitting my camping bed.
Anneke was feeling a lot better and even Styan had his energy back. So Ann bought a beer to celebrate the summit, Styan bought a Kilimanjaro beer too, like the comercial said; 'If you can't climb it, drink it!'
The last day was easy piecy, back in Moshi it was great to take a shower again after 6 days and with dinner I had the best pizza I ever had in my life....at least so felt it. The Kilimanjaro beer tasted great and the evening became even better when we ran into John, a teammate of my footbal team. Together we drank some more Kilimanjaro beer.
It had been 6 great days on the Kili
Advertisement
Tot: 0.127s; Tpl: 0.012s; cc: 19; qc: 71; dbt: 0.0568s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.2mb