Fri 5th Aug '16 - Day 7

Mount Kilimanjaro

Day Five              Barafu Camp 4,673m – Uhuru Peak 5,895m – Barafu – Millennium Camp 3,950m

For the first time I don’t sleep better than everyone else and am awake from 01:00. Early starts don’t break a routine so coffee arrives at 3am and with head torches for light we don our gear.

• 2 x hat, neck buff,
  
• 2 x long sleeve merino under layers, fleece top, windproof top, fleece Gillet, rainproof mac
  
• Merino under gloves, woollen gloves ski gloves
  
• Thermal under trousers, trekking trousers
  
• Sock liners, thick woollen socks, trekking shoes

After some warm porridge and unexpectedly biscuits, we shoulder our bags and set off in a slow single file in the dark through the silent unmoving camp. Off up in the distance we can see a couple of what looks like rows of glow worms, our sense of distance distorted in the dark, of other groups ascending.

It’s tricky to describe because all you watch with the light beam from your head torch is the footsteps of the person in front of you. It was told to us it would take us five and a half hours to get to the top including five brief rest breaks (brief so as not to get cold).

Not long after our second break and as the sun is rising soon after 6am, Demi, who is now leading the trek, stops, shouts at Conni who then approaches David at the back of the group saying – can I see something in your bag? More statement than question. David politely but uncertainly hands it over and it promptly gets swallowed in to Conni’s own large ruck sack who then carries it the rest of the way up the mountain. Jason was also physically suffering, being sick at one of the breaks. Demi now had these two at the front of the line. Myself and Sean also had onset of altitude sickness in headache form.

After four hours and now at least in the warm sun Demi announced Now it gets hard. And true to his word the steepness becomes greater and underfoot its almost sand so each step forward you slide half a step back.

Demi said afterwards that having Jason & David at the front was no mistake – it was supposed to encourage the rest of us forwards knowing how unwell they both were.

After five and a quarter hours we reached Stella Point (5,756m) which is the top of the rim on one side of the now extinct volcano. The actual peak is further round the rim, another 200m away. Having started walking in the dark with six upper layers the sun is now beating down and the extortion of climbing has most of stripping down to just one or two layers. The final 200m takes 40 minutes and even includes one final break. Slowly but surely we all make the top and adrenalin brings everyone to life.

As nearly all climbers had set off several hours before us, we’ve passed them coming down on our way up and whilst their encouragement was welcomed perhaps their chirpiness was not as we struggled up the mountains. The later (unusual) start time for us though from the camp means everyone has been and gone for the day so the 30 minutes we’re on the summit we’re the only people there. Others told takes of having to queue up to get “that” photo in front of the summit marker so we’re certainly grateful to have the top of the mountain and the top of Africa to ourselves.

There are hugs all round including and especially from and to the four guides (John, Demi, Conni, Roman) for getting us up here. It’s at this point that the enormity of what we’ve achieved sinks in. The first few days didn’t really give a fair indication of how hard this last climb would be, both from a leg work perspective and doing it at altitude and with shortness of breath. It’s also great to be able to take the ruck sack off and soak up the surroundings.

Down in to the crater itself is a continuation of the dust bowl we’ve become so accustomed to over the last few days. On one side where the rim has eroded away thick glaciers are visible. There are more pristine white ones below us on the outside of the rim with crystal blue water lakes collecting at the bottom. There is a three or four-inch layer of crusty snow just back from the path we have walked on along the rim. I think we had read stories where we’d be walking through snow and Demi tells us this whole area used to be covered in snow and that the glaciers used to expand further; today’s situation a sad result of global warming.

We stay at the top for around 30 minutes as everyone takes photos of everyone else and we each record a short video for Daniel to remember his 30^th birthday. Daniel had brought some expensive scotch that we’d given him in Sydney with him but the guides seem far more interested than the rest of us, most of whom have underlying unwellness beneath the surface.

Jason has bounced back to life while Sean and I have got worse. I take 2 paracetamol and ibuprofen to help with the headache (only the next day do I realise that I’ve actually just taken cold and flu tablets by mistake). Soon after we start the descent Demi takes my bag off me as he can see I’m struggling. Sean too is relieved of his bag. Demi later says he’s used to carrying up to three peoples’ bags plus his own up the latter stages of the mountain – we joke each day that Demi is looking pretty fit today.

I’m in a bit of haze going back to Barufu letting gravity help me down and concentrating on not being sick and hoping my head doesn’t implode with pain. We pass a few last climbers on their way up, the others in our group wishing them good luck and encouragement whilst Sean and I stay silent (Sean is also sick twice).

It takes a little over two hours to get back down to Barafu camp arriving around 13:00. All the porters come out to give us High Fives and fist bumps and the others had for lunch in the canteen I make a beeline for my tent and collapse. What could be 30 seconds later but is actually two hours later I get woken up and get told we need to carry on down the mountain to Millennium Camp (also called High Camp) where we’ll stop for the night. My head is still pounding so the others pack my bag and trudge down one and three quarter hours to our camp arriving at 17:30. I believe it was a pretty cheerful walk down but I was not a part of that – the others joke the next day it was as if I had shut down.

Ever grateful to the porters who have taken down all the tents at Barafu Camp after we left, carried it down the mountain, overtaking us on the way and then reassembled. That means I’m able to go straight back to sleep at 17:45.

Barring briefly waking up to hear a rendition of Happy Birthday for Daniel (as many porters as possible squeezed in the canteen while the rest stood around the outside) in English and then in Swahili (both to the same tune incidentally) I sleep straight through until 06:00 the next morning.