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Published: October 7th 2007
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Hey y’all,
Wassup? Well, we’re back from a super dooper holiday and I have much to write about, so it could be a long one…you’re not obliged to read it all 😉 In fact, I’ll be very impressed if anyone actually does.
I’ll start off with the Beast (also known as Kilimanjaro) which was an amazing experience, but not something I’ll do again in a hurry, as I don’t really like hard work!
After a few days of showing Justin and Whitley around Kilifi (which involved a dhow ride and a very unpleasant bout of seasickness) we flew down to Kilimanjaro. The day before we began our ascent we met our guide, Elia, who gave us a briefing and answered all our questions. He focused specifically on ‘sicking the mountain sickness’ and being aware of the ‘heightitude’. This caused us to joke about altitude sickness for a couple of days until the effects of it began to set it. It then became very unfunny! By the second night, Whitley was suffering from severe headaches and hallucinations, which continued for the rest of the climb. We were convinced that he would have to turn round, but thanks to some
help from the Somali gymnastics team (he hallucinated that they were in his tent, teaching him how to breathe properly), he was able to carry on. Justin, unfortunately, was not as lucky with the altitude sickness, and had to turn round on the fifth day and go back to the bottom, because he was too unwell.
The first five days involved long hours of climbing and trying to adjust to the altitude. One of the best decisions we made before we began was to hire trekking poles, which took a fair amount of pressure of your legs and allowed your arms to do some of the work. The climbing was made much easier in the early stages by the landscape and great views, but after a few days the trees had all disappeared and we were walking amongst rocks and clouds and not much else. After the climbing each day there was a whole lot of card playing, particularly 500, which allowed me to work on my trash-talking skills (haven’t had much opportunity to practice that, since I haven’t played a game of basketball in over a year).
The most noteworthy moment before the summit was climbing the
Barranco Wall, which is described in the Lonely Planet as being ‘notorious amongst porters’ (and for good reason). It takes about 1-1.5 hours to climb the wall which has some very sheer drops, narrow paths and hair-raising moments. We were all very glad to get to the top of it!
Speaking of the porters, I should mention a bit about them, as they made the climb a whole lot easier, because they carry your backpacks (you carry your day-pack) up the mountain. They carry an enormous amount of stuff up: their backpacks, sleeping-bag and mat, our bags,etc., tables (those who carried tables couldn’t see in front of themselves and had to rely on the other porters to know where they were going), chairs, tents, enough food for the week, gas cylinders (I felt very sorry for the guys who had to carry full gas cylinders up on their heads), etc. And a lot of them do it without wearing proper gear: shorts and t-shirts were commonplace in freezing conditions and a lot of the porters wore business shoes! They also did an excellent job on the food, although we got pretty sick of eating the same thing everyday.
So, moving on to the summit day/night, which was the hardest thing I have ever done, both mentally and physically. On the fifth day you reach the final camp and sleep all afternoon in preparation for the summit. We were woken up at 11 o’clock and set out in complete darkness walking up what seemed like a vertical hill in which for every step up you took, you slid down half a step, for 6 and a half hours. For about the first five and a half hours I wanted to turn around and it took a lot of willpower (of which I have very little) to force myself to keep putting one foot in front of the other. I probably didn’t have too much to complain about, considering I experienced no altitude sickness, unlike Simon, who vomited the whole way up the summit, and Whitley, who was delirious: I have absolutely no idea how they made it up (although I won’t praise them too highly, as they are likely to read this). I must say that Katherine and I were very grateful for our genes on this occasion! All we suffered was severe cold. The lack of altitude sickness
was probably helped by the Diamox we were taking to prevent it. It is, however, a diuretic, so there were more piss-stops than on a road trip with Jimdogga!
We reached the summit in time for sunrise, which was spectacular, although none of us were in any real condition to appreciate it too much. We probably spent less than ten minutes at the summit due to the heightitude and hypothermia. On the way down from the summit I had numerous porters telling me they had ‘maximum respect’ for me… probably had something to do with the fact that they all seemed to think I was about 10 years old.
Then, after a very brief rest, it was time for the descent. What took us five and a half days to ascend, took about a day on the way down. The descent was very tough on our knees (wouldn’t recommend it to you, Pownell). It resulted in some very sore feet, toes especially. Katherine got two very sore, black big toenails, one of which has subsequently come off, and the other is likely to soon. Again, the trekking poles took a lot of the pressure off.
Whoops, forgot
to mention the wheelbarrow (see picture). We had heard stories about people having to be brought back down in a wheelbarrow and were joking that it would probably happen to us. On the descent we managed to find an old wheelbarrow for a good picture opportunity. That was all very funny, until we saw someone being rushed down in one.
And that’s about it. We were all tired, filthy and needing to make up for a week’s worth of showers. There were some Kilimanjaro brand beers in celebration, although we very quickly switched over to the far superior Safari brand.
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Michelle
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Maximum respect
Did you inform your porters that in actual fact, you are not ten? Undeserved respect i say!!!