Mt. Kilimanjaro

Hi Readers,

Today (December 27, 2012) marks the successful ascent of Uhuru peak on Mt. Kilimanjaro by my friend GS and I. Kilimanjaro is the tallest mountain in Africa, at around 5950m, and located in northern Tanzania.

We first took a bus from Nairobi to Moshi, where many trips to Kilimanjaro depart. On the way, I saw a wild giraffe munching on a tree! GS didn't believe me, but I think he's just jealous. The land border crossing between Kenya and Tanzania was very interesting. The bus first stopped on the Kenyan side, where you lined up to get your passport stamped by Kenya. Then you walk across the border to the Tanzanian side, where you line up to get your passport stamped again, before getting back on the bus. The border looked so porous that I think you could've just walked across without a passport if you wanted. Certainly nothing like the land border between Canada and the US that I had seen before.

Kilimanjaro requires that you hire a guide and maybe porters as well. These aren't cheap; any type of trip up Kilimanjaro is at least a thousand dollars per person. We booked our trip quite cheaply, with a company called Mar tours. The team turned out to be a guide, an assistant guide, a cook, and 6 porters...just to serve the two of us. If there was ever a thing called luxurious mountain climbing, Kilimanjaro would be where you would find it.

As there are many number of routes that climbers can take to ascend Kilimanjaro, we decided to take one of the longest routes, called the Lemosho route, over 7 days. As the longest route had the most amount of time for acclimatization to the tremendous altitude, we figured this would give the highest possibility of a successful summit. As a challenging addition, we decided to take the most difficult and dangerous route for summit day, called the Western Breach route. This route is infamous for a rockfall that killed three American climbers in 2006.

Long story short, the first five days were not very eventful. It involved us traveling from camp to camp, all the while moving higher and higher in elevation. Each day we were served three meals in a mess tent, and an afternoon tea as well. The meals were the best things about the trip. I definitely didn't get tired of the food this time, unlike Pico de Orizaba, when I was ready to throw up the protein bars after 2 days.

By the end of the fifth day, we were at a campsite called Arrow Glacier campsite, at around 4600m. It was directly next to the steep slope that made up the Western Breach, and during that day we had the pleasure/horror of hearing endless rockfalls echoing across the slope. I thought for sure that we were going to die from one of these when it was our turn to go on the slope.

For the final summit climb today, we woke up at 1am and were ready to go by 2am. As we began going up the slope, GS and I both agreed that this is probably the most dangerous climb that we've ever done. The slope was very steep and covered in snow, and everybody lacked crampons (since somehow every guidebook says Kili does not need them). Worse, one of the guides even lacked a hiking pole, so eventually when the going got tough enough, I had to lend him one of mine. The guides also lost the trail numerous times, so we had to scramble over ice-covered boulders right next to hundred-foot cliffs to get back on trail. I was surprisingly calm, despite the fact that a small slip anywhere in the first 2 hours would mean serious injury at the minimum.

I was undeniably relieved when we finally crested the crater rim. Another exhausting zigzag up the crater walls and soon we were taking the obligatory summit pictures (along with hordes of tourists that had come up the easier way). I had brought along 3 flags to pose with: Canada, Taiwan, and the LGBT rainbow flag. I heard audible gasps from the assembled crowd when I pulled out the rainbow flag and posed with it, although I'm not sure of the reason why.

We were supposed to spend an additional day on the mountain after attaining summit. However, because we made such good time down the mountain, and also because the weather was crap (it had rained every single day we we on the mountain), the guides encouraged us to make it all the way to the park gates so we can spend the night in real beds. What followed was a 6 hour non-stop sprint down the mountain from the peak.My legs are currently hurting more than they did after the marathon. But it's all over and we survived!

Tomorrow we are returning to Nairobi. So ends our brief mountainous tryst in Tanzania!

-FCDH