Kilimanjaro, Tanzania – Writing With My Mouth Full

Hiking Kilimanjaro Day 5: Barafu Hut to Uhuru Peak to Mweka Camp

I just summitted Kilimanjaro. I just summitted Kilimanjaro. I just summitted Kilimanjaro.

I still can’t believe we did it! After five days of hiking from camp to camp we finally made it to Uhuru Peak, the top of Kibo and the highest point in all of Africa at 19,340 feet.

Around 11pm, I heard Peter M call my name right outside my tent. It wasn’t hard to wake up because I spent a sleepless and an uncomfortable night. Barafu was our highest and coldest camp yet. I met Scott and Christopher in the mess tent where we had our usual first meal of hot tea and coffee–it was both too late and too early to be eating porridge. After the porters handed us our water supply for the eight-hour summit, we suited up and started our walk out of Barafu Hut and into pure darkness.

I don’t think I realized at the time what eight hours of hiking in the dark could and would feel like. I felt that I was just along for the ride. After only four hours of sleep, I felt groggy as soon as I started to hear the crunch of gravel under my boots. Unable to see anything except what was being illuminated in front of us by our head lamps, there was nothing to keep us entertained; nothing to keep our minds off the robotic process of climbing Kibo in the middle of the night.

Crunch, crunch, crunch.

It was cold but I don’t remember freezing. I had thick snowboard gloves on over my usual winter gloves. I had a borrowed ski jacket (I stupidly forgot to pack mine!) on top of five layers of winter garb; four layers of pants helped my knees from feeling cold and two pairs of socks supported my feet without being too uncomfortable.

I don’t remember freezing maybe because I was literally sleepwalking the rest of the way. Godibless led the line and he kept turning around to give me a slight push on my shoulder to wake me up. Cia, no sleeping. Cia,don’t sleep. I asked if we could stop and rest several times so I may nod off, but Godibless stopped granting my request after the second one. I turned around a few times too to see if Samuel and the boys were still behind me. I barely heard a peep from them and I began to wonder if I was the only one having difficulty staying awake.

I also don’t remember feeling any pain because of the high altitude. I was just numb. As we gained a total of 4,140 feet, I started hallucinating. In my field of vision, I would see a pair of walking poles leaning against the boulders we were skirting around. I expected to see another group resting in front of us whenever I would look up from the poles, but no one was ever there. This happened twice until I finally realized that there was never anything in front of me except rocks. I started to talk to myself to stay awake and aware of my real surroundings. The funny thing is that I knew enough not to say anything to Samuel or Godibless lest they send me back down because I was going crazy.

Crunch, crunch, crunch.

The sun started to rise on our way to Stella Point which was named after the wife of Kingsley Latham, the South African king, who could only make it this far of the hike in 1925. All of a sudden, everything around us was orange and violet and everything in me was awaken. To my dismay, we still had at least 45 minutes until the summit. I felt like I just couldn’t walk anymore. I needed to lie down, rest and sleep.

We started to see the glaciers people have been talking about all these years. Samuel confirmed that they have indeed receded from his ten-year experience hiking Kibo. Everything was so white that it hurt our eyes to look directly towards them as the morning sun illuminated the sky. The snow towards Uhuru Peak look like merangue puffs because of the wind. A single trail of dirt that cut through the ice led us to the finish line.

I was unable to speak when I finally got close to the infamous wooden sign of Uhuru Peak. (And not just because my face was wrapped in a ski cap and a scarf.) We stood close by waiting for our turn to take photos. The dots of light ahead of us when we were hiking belonged to these early risers–those were not part of my hallucination! We all made it this far and this high up and everyone congratulated each other for surviving; everyone was patient and waited for their turn in the spotlight.

When it was finally our turn to take photos, we posed, jumped, smiled, laughed and celebrated our accomplishment. Hugs and shaking of hands were exchanged and thank yous to Samuel and Godibless were delivered for helping us get up there. (The rest of the porters stayed in camp because they do not have the proper licenses to summit.)

What killed me was that we had to hike back down to Barafu Hut for the next four hours. You’d think that walking down a “short-cut” would be easier, but the trail was made up of ground rocks that felt like rough sand. All I kept thinking was, I’ve done what I wanted to do, now get me out of here. I couldn’t believe that I still had to keep working even after accomplishing that feat. Without enough sleep, I was extra crabby and whiny. Every other hiker slid down past me, seemingly enjoying their fast descent, but my left knee was acting up and I just couldn’t get the momentum to slide and go down all the way back to Barafu Hut.

The rest of the group made it down in three hours. Samuel stayed with me and my whimpering for an extra hour until I was able to drag myself from the bottom of Kibo, down some more sharp rocks and back to my tent at the edge of Barafu. It was noon and the sun was out in full force. All I wanted was to take my clothes off and sleep in my tent but then I heard Samuel say, Take an hour nap and then we go. It was a shock to me that even after eleven hours of hiking with only four hours of sleep the night before, we were still expected to hike another four down to our final camp. It made sense that we had to come back down on altitude and also go to a camp with a reliable water source, but not only was I not physically ready to keep on hiking, I was also not emotionally prepared to psyche myself up to continue to the real finish line.

I slept like a log for that hour until Peter M woke me up again to eat lunch. I never felt so beaten. We haven’t washed our hands and faces for a full day and my contacts were so dried up after wearing them continuously during and after summit. Scott and Christopher showed such strong resolve that I knew I just had to shut up and do what we came to do. So more crunch, crunch, crunch until we made it past Millennium Camp and then to our base for the night, Mweka, where we bought the entire group cold bottles of Kilimanjaro beers to celebrate our week together.

Hiking Kilimanjaro Day 4: Barranco Camp to Barafu Hut

We scaled Barranco Wall using mostly our hands to hoist ourselves up. It reminded me of my days bouldering in the city gym on 59th Street: hands getting rough and calloused just to get to the top only to come back down again, all without chalk, harness or someone belaying below. The path was sometimes narrow and dangerous; one misstep would make rocks crumble beneath our feet and remind us how high we’ve gone up in only two hours. But the hike was more challenging than it was difficult and I didn’t feel any more of the tingling sensation in my fingers and toes. I felt like I’ve acclimatized with the high altitude.

At the top of Barranco Wall, we were above the clouds. It was exhilarating to get to the top, not realizing the “top” we were aiming for was still another day away. Unfortunately, we couldn’t stay too long to enjoy the view–Karanga Valley was waiting. For the next three hours, we were on a one-lane trek to our lunch point. Everything ahead of us was flat and desolate. There weren’t any more of the giant trees, only paper-thin everlasting flowers and plants that smelled like thyme. It was very hot and very dry. I could feel the sun beating down on my shoulders and scoring a mark under my tank top. My pants and boots were covered in desert dust even before lunch time.

At Karanga Camp and 12,893 feet later, we took a break and ate watermelon and fries. The sun was even more intense up there where we all laid out our top-layer shirts on rocks to dry them off. Named after the Swahili word for “peanut”, Karanga is also the last water point before the summit. It is so named because the water from the melting glacier atop Kibo runs through the valley and provides for the peanut plantation down below. We saw several porters collect water from the river, hike past us and return to get some more. From this day on, we must conserve water until the next camp. Tonight, there will be no washing of face, hands and feet and we must sleep with the whole day caked on us.

The volcanic gravel turned into shards of sharp rock on the way up to Barafu Hut. There were huge boulder formations where hikers ahead of us stacked up small pieces of rock for good luck. We did our part and hoped for the best. The weather change dramatically, too. It got colder as we moved higher up and an ominous bank of dark clouds covered what we were about to scale and what we left behind.

A total of eight long hours of walking later, we reached 15,200 feet at Barafu Hut where we witnessed a small group of hikers and porters surround a guy who had an oxygen mask on. Though it made me feel secure that someone actually had an oxygen tank this high up in Kilimanjaro, I realized that we could be in the same position by tomorrow morning.

I was anxious during dinner and was even more nervous the rest of the night. I wore everything I packed to bed because it was so cold. In three hours, we will wake up in the middle of the night to start climbing the summit with little time to get ready for what would be the most difficult thing I’ve ever had to do in my life: hike in the dark for another eight hours to finally catch a most breathtaking sunrise on top of Africa’s highest peak.

Hiking Kilimanjaro Day 3: Shira Camp to Barranco Camp

I was inside my tent by 8pm last night and tried to listen to a podcast before going to sleep, but I ended up passing out a few minutes later still wearing my jacket, fleece and head scarf. My sleeping bag is really warm and I usually end up sleeping stripped down when camping, but I guess I underestimated how cold it really was in Barranco Camp that I woke up in the morning still completely dressed.

I ate two portions of porridge for breakfast to try and support the Diamox in my system. I didn’t feel ill at all but the tips of my fingers and toes were definitely tingly. We had a very long hike to Lava Tower and I was definitely catching my breath the first three hours. The landscape was open but everyone trekked in a single file to keep apace and to ensure we weren’t going so fast. No matter how much I reminded myself pole-pole, my lungs felt how thin the air was.

Lava Tower didn’t look much when we were approaching it, but as soon as we rounded a bend it mightily stood over us. For the first time in our hike, we saw a running trail of glacial water coming from Kibo. There was unfortunately more trash on the trail because the route meets with the more popular Marangu Route and the path climbers use to scale Kibo.

We had lunch in the shadow of Lava Tower. The rocks were black and sharp–we would see more of them as we escalate closer to the summit. After eating, we walked downhill and finally depended on our walking poles.

We kept stopping to take photos because the view ahead of us was just incredible. We walked by a waterfall and a beautiful ravine right under Kibo. We could see the porters cutting through another mountain ahead of us. They were like ants in one file with heavy load on top of their heads. I was grateful for their help; I couldn’t have hiked this high if I had to carry more than 3 liters of water and my change of clothes for the day.

Closer to Barranco Camp, the landscape started to look like the moon–barren and eerie with these giant trees that looked like Where the Wild Things Are feet. Samuel told us that the taller ones were at least 150 years old. There were also these succulent plants that were wet and cool to the touch. They turned out to be anti-freeze plants. It was cool to put your hands in between the aloe-like layers and feel the cold sensation in your fingers.

Samuel pointed at the gray wall to our left when we were approaching Barranco Camp. That’s Barranco Wall, he said, and we will climb that tomorrow morning. Through where? I asked, because I couldn’t see a trail that led up to it. He just waved his hand up to say, Just up.

Hiking Kilimanjaro Day 2: Machame Camp to Shira Camp

Our first breakfast in Kilimanjaro consisted of omelets, hot dogs and fresh mango. I drowned myself in instant coffee because I knew my jet lag will kick back in later. Samuel and the crew waited for the three of us to pack which took about two more hours than originally planned. They let us linger then because in the next few days, waking up at 11pm to hike for eight hours will mean waking up, really, at 11pm to hike for eight hours.

From Machame Camp, the path was up, up and up! Godibless walked in front of us to make sure we wouldn’t go any faster. The trek was narrow and filled with everyone who was at camp the night before, so it was difficult to forge ahead even if we wanted to. The porters were also on the same path and we got used to stepping aside whenever we heard Jambo!

As we increased altitude–2,642 feet total–more flowers started to appear and from the top of large boulders, we saw the progress we made in just three hours. The mist let up and Kibo showed herself again with her snow-capped top. Samuel confirmed that there was definitely more snow ten years ago.

From our lunch spot, we could see Shira Plateau, the namesake of the next camp and the second peak in Kilimanjaro National Park. To her left was Meru Peak shrouded by pillowy clouds. It was a crazy view to behold while we ate Majengo’s packed lunch for us: fried chicken (God bless him!), a coleslaw sandwich, banana and mango juice.

The remaining two hours of the day’s trek were on smaller rocks but flat land. Along the way, we couldn’t help but pick up garbage other trekkers have left behind. The thought that even Kilimanjaro travelers would even think of throwing garbage on the ground appalled me. Aren’t we more educated and sophisticated travelers than this? Hikers who don’t care for their environment shouldn’t be really allowed to hike any more. For the next few days, I came to hate one particular brand of candy in yellow-blue foil wrapper.

It was cooler up in Shira Camp. It didn’t just feel like we were above the clouds–we were actually above the clouds! The camp was flat and open, and thankfully, the porters picked a spot where our tents were far away from everyone else’s. We later found out that they all know Samuel’s preference when selecting the group’s spot for the night and it’s almost always away from the riff-raff. I liked our main guide even more after I heard this.

While waiting for dinner, the three of us walked around the camp. We had heard about a cave that was used as a sleeping spot until the park rangers officially closed it. It was disappointingly small and did not look like a cave at all, but the walking at least helped us kill time until sunset.

Do people get tired of watching the sun set when they travel? I always expect that I would, but Mother Nature never ceases to amaze me. Shira Camp was blanketed in orange and some deep purples while the clouds moved fast in the valley below us. Yet again another beautiful setting before we had to eat pumpkin soup and pasta with beef tomato sauce. That night, I ended up sleeping for twelve hours, a good night’s rest before the Diamox altitude medication started to kick in.

Day 2: Machame Camp (9,842 feet) to Shira Camp (12,467 feet)
Altitude gain: 2,645 feet
Miles: 6
Time: about 5 hours from ~9:30am to 2pm

Hiking Kilimanjaro Day 1: Machame Gate to Machame Camp

I was anxious, but felt ready.

We said good-bye to the Karama Lodge staff in Arusha where Scott and I have been staying for two nights. Christopher came in the night before during the England-Germany World Cup game and made our hiking trio complete. It took a year to plan this. I invited about ten people, but unfortunately, they dropped off one by one as the date got closer. I couldn’t have asked for more mature travel partners than Scott and Christopher. (I didn’t say old!) For three people to meet in Tanzania and share amenities when they have never traveled together before and still get along afterwards is a stunning feat in itself. Hiking the highest free-standing mountain in Africa (and in the world! Thanks, Scott!) and making it to Kibo’s summit was just icing on the cake. The others missed an unforgettable trip.

We were in a small Tropical Trails bus to Moshi with our main guide, Samuel, and the rest of our wagumu, our porters, or “strong men” in Swahili: Majengo, Peter M, Nicodemus and our assistant guide, Godibless. A second but shorter Peter will meet us at Machame Gate with Anton, Komoyi and Puzizi, making our six-day group a total of twelve. (Every time we met up with the porters during our trek, I cheered Puzizi! I loved saying that name!)

After a two-hour ride with a stop at the butcher for meat, we arrived at the starting point of our route. There were several hiking groups already there, most we’ll recognize and greet throughout our ascent. Locals waited outside the gate for last-minutes shoppers. They sold gaiters, ponchos and hats. Scott managed to get used hiking poles for $15!

We registered with our names and passport numbers and waited for our guides to weigh all our gear. Hiking in Kilimanjaro requires a licensed guide, and everything you carry and weigh in, you must carry and weigh out including garbage. Contrary to popular knowledge, Kilimanjaro is made up of three peaks: Kibo, Meru and Shira, the first being the most popular and thus referred to as the Kilimanjaro. (For the purpose of accuracy, I mention Kibo in all my posts and photo captions when referring to the summit itself and Kilimanjaro for the entire national park.)

We left the gate and started our hike at 12:30pm through Machame’s lush rain forest. Godibless hiked with us while Samuel stayed behind to make sure the porters had everything in order. For the next six days, we’d either hike with Samuel or Godibless, or both would flank the three of us on the trail. I imagine it was for a case when someone has to descent–the other guide can stay with whoever still feels good about continuing to the summit. This way, if one got sick, the rest of the group may continue.

Vegetation gradually changed as we ascended and because we were exerting effort, we had peeled our layers off down to a shirt. It would get cool again whenever we stopped for a break and a long-sleeved left around my neck would go back on. We took one long stop to eat the lunch that Majengo, our cook, had packed for us. We learned our first useful Swahili word: pole-pole, pronounced poh-lay poh-lay, which means “slow down”. Every few hours, Godibless reminded us to pole-pole; to conserve our energy and take our time.

He also cheered us on and complimented us on our progress. We later learned that he was basically assessing if we will make the summit five days later. To keep our minds off the hike itself, he taught us what other guides teach their tour group: the Jambo song. We never memorized it completely and by the end of our trip, Scott and I were making up the lyrics. But it went a little something like this:

Jambo
Jambo, Bwana
Habara Gani
Mzuri Sana
Wageni, Mwakaribishwa
Kilimanjaro
Hakuna Matata

which roughly translated to:

Hello, how are you?
Very fine
You’re all welcome here
You can climb Kilimanjaro
There are no worries

and I was told that “you” referred to the white people, or in today’s parlance, the foreigners.

As we gained 4,954 feet in altitude, our surroundings turned to Tim Burton-inspired trees covered in moss, hardier ferns and yellow flowers. I was out of breath during the higher hills, but I was amazed how strong my legs felt: the past year I spent swimming alone and working out with a trainer has paid off.

We checked in Machame Camp at 5pm after eleven miles of hiking just in time for Holland to score the first goal of three against Slovakia. Our tents were not yet set up because the porters got held up at the gate. It was the coldest I would feel throughout the entire trek because all my warm clothing was still inside my bigger backpack with the porters. We tried to stay warm inside the park ranger’s cabin while we entertained ourselves by checking out the log book for the youngest (13 years) to the oldest (71 years) hiker in the same camp.

We were given a small basin of hot water each to wash up. They would end up brightening my day for the rest of the week because after several hours of hiking–and then several days without showering–washing our hands and faces was a big thing to look forward to. When the mess tent was set up, we sat inside to eat our first tea and popcorn of the week. I would never think of the combination and I rarely eat popcorn, but they always warmed us up before dinner. Our first meal was cucumber soup with some spring onions, boiled potatoes and a mix of vegetables in tomato sauce, plus battered and fried tilapia. Carrots, cauliflowers and bell peppers would appear on our plates every night that I started referring to them as quasi-mirepoix just to give the repetitiveness some class. Majengo tried to be very creative and I did not look forward to anything else but his meals at lunch and at the end of each day.

I lost my sense of time while I was in Kilimanjaro. We would retreat to our tents (Scott and Christopher shared, while I had my own!) as soon as it got dark which was probably 8 or 8:30pm. For the first couple of days, because of jet lag, I would wake up in the middle of the night to relieve myself thinking it was almost dawn. (I am now an expert in peeing in the woods because it was too much effort to walk to the outhouse.) There were times when the moon was so bright that I would think it was already morning, only to step out of my tent completely dressed up for breakfast that I would realize the stars were still out. How much longer until 7am? I caught my first glimpse of Kibo’s snow-capped peak the first night. I remember thinking, I should ask which mountain that is because I couldn’t believe that it was already visible from our first camp. Those were my solitude hours when I wrote in my journal and reflected on the day that just past. It was just me, my pen and my headlamp; they were also the loneliest hours of the trip.

Day 1: Machame Gate (4,888 feet) to Machame Camp (9,842 feet)
Altitude gain: 4,954 feet
Miles: 11
Time: about 5 hours from ~12pm to 5pm