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Kilimanjaro- mlima mrefu sana

(Kilimanjaro- the highest mountain)

That is the first line of the Mt. Kilimanjaro Song. Kilimanjaro is indeed the highest mountain in East Africa with an elevation of 19,341 ft. I was able to find six friends who were also convinced that a seven day trek on Kilimanjaro during the rainy season was a great idea. Over our two week trip, we tested theories of true friendship e.g., syncing suffering, sharing pain killers over Milo, holding vomit bowls for each other, and of course, trekking up the highest mountain in Africa together in rain, ridiculous amount of rain, hail storm, and sunshine.

Day 0- Tanzania, we are here!

The team flew into Tanzania from different locations- California, Texas, and Sierra Leone. We had been planning and prepping for a few months now. For all of us, this would be the biggest trekking trip of the year. Venturing to high altitude was a different type of adventure as we found out that the hiking was the easier part, being in harsh conditions was quite character building.

We booked with Ahsante Tours and we picked the Machame route as our approach. Ahsante Tours did an excellent job taking care of us and making sure we were safe throughout the trip. I was very impressed with Ahsante Tours’ operations and attention to details. They arranged a 31-person mountain crew to help us up the mountain with tents,  fresh food, supplies, radios, and everything that got us through mountain sickness and tough conditions.

Day 1- Machame Camp, Weird

We met our guides Chunga, Michael, and Carimu bright and early in the morning. Before heading out, they checked our gear and gave us a briefing. Each of us packed our gear into a duffel bag and carried a day pack:

It took about 45 mins from Weru Weru lodge to the trail head, here is Kilimanjaro from afar, taken during our car ride to Machame Gate:

Soon enough, we were at the Machame Gate where we embarked on our journey. Evidently, everyone was in good spirits. The first part of the hike was through the rain forest.

It started raining as we approached camp in late afternoon, we got soaked and some of us never got dry again for the next 7 days. Look at the bright side, popcorn was waiting for us at camp!

Day 2 Shira Camp, Jambo Mambo

We went from Machame Camp to Shira Camp (12,500ft) on our second day:

Camp was misty in the afternoon, followed by rain showers. The mountain weather was predictably unpredictable, most days we would get a few hours of sunshine in the morning and then rain in the afternoon.

Day 3 Lava Tower, Karma 

Day 3 was hell day for me and Geets, we hiked from Shira Camp up to Lava Tower (16,000 ft) and then to Barannco Camp (13,000 ft). The up and down would help us acclimatize, but the process wasn’t a walk in the park. We started off having a great view of the Kibo peak, I missed looking at wispy clouds blowing by Kibo Peak:

I didn’t miss the time when it started pouring though:

As we climbed higher and higher, the altitude started affecting some of us. Geets was throwing up on our way up to Lava Tower, and I eventually threw up at our lunch spot. Not fun!! Arun decided to pose as a reference to show what “not-sick” looked like while chowing down lunch without missing a beat:

The rain intensified into a hail storm after lunch. While being nauseous, we had to hike down icy water falls and paths. Jason took these great photos capturing our moments:

And when we approached camp, the crew greeted us with a surprise 🙂 Singing and dancing took a lot more effort at 13,000 ft.

Day 4 Barranco Wall, Kibo!

Kibo means “Wow” in Swahili which describes our view every morning:

After breakfast, we made our way up the Barranco Wall, at this point we were in Alpine zone. We had some climbing action at the wall which made the day even more interesting.

 

Just to show how strong the mountain crew was, here’s a photo of a porter cruising up the mountain with 20kg of supplies while we were struggling up “pole pole” (slowly slowly)…

We ended up at Karanga Camp (~13,000 feet after ascending to 14,000 ft), unfortunately, both Abril and I started feeling breathless and we were resting in our tent the whole afternoon. I passed out pretty quickly as I was exhausted from altitude sickness.  At dinner time, our camp cook encouraged us with a special dish! He made art out of carrots and watermelon, note that he did all that at altitude, 40F condition while cooking for 40 people.

The turn of events came after Chunga and Carimu briefed us on next day’s schedule, Chunga told us that Abril had to go down the mountain as soon as possible as she had pulmonary edema. She wasn’t able to lie down and breath at the same time. It was the most sad moment of the trip when we found out that she couldn’t continue 🙁 Abril and Michael started hiking down around 10pm and they arrived at the bottom by 5am in the morning.

Day 5- No Pressure

Waking up above clouds was one of my favorite moments, here are some beautiful views from camp:

We made a short hike to our last base camp- Barafu Camp, we were stoked that we made it to base camp!

Day 6- Summit Night 

Finally, we were at the moment which we anticipated for weeks and months. At around 11pm, we emerged from our tents. We hardly got any sleep due to a combination of summit jitters, extreme coldness, altitude sickness, and waking up to pee throughout the night since we had to constantly drink water at high altitude. I remembered putting on layers after layers of clothes and attaching toe warmers between my two layers of socks while I zombie-walked to the mess tent.

There were at least 10 groups heading up to the summit that night, but at altitude, we were all quiet and sluggish, we occasionally passed people and let people passed. We hiked under starlight and by the light from our head lamps. Water was frozen in the camelpak tubes, it was approaching 20F and air got thinner and thinner. The slope was sometimes steep and infrequently flat. At this point, everyone was fighting some sort of inner battle-headaches, upset stomach, dizziness, breathlessness, loss of balance etc.

I slowed down significantly at around 17,000 ft. It wasn’t a good sign that I had developed a cough that got worse over time and I had to stop frequently. At last, I had to turn around as I wasn’t able to breath and showed signs of pulmonary edema. Chunga, our head guide, took me down to base camp as quickly as possible. I felt better immediately as I got down to camp and did the one thing I was always proficient at- sleep anytime anywhere. I was definitely disappointed, but I also understood that things were out of my control and it had been a great adventure regardless. The silver lining was I got to hang out with the mountain crew at camp and shared chocolate while gossiping 🙂

I was also very happy that the rest of the team made it up to the summit, and they had great stories to tell! Here are some amazing pictures they took!

 

Day 7- Ahsante-sana 

We started heading down Day 6 afternoon, going down seemed to be soooo much longer!!!!! Last chance to camp above clouds 🙁

We seemed to become more and more energetic as we come down the mountain. I speculated that the abundance of oxygen and the prospect of hot showers motivated us to race down the mountain.

We made it!!!! Thanks to the mountain crew that got us up and down, without the crew, we wouldn’t have passed day 1 :p