Climbing Mt. Kilimanjaro is like being forced to eat an entire box of Krispy Kreme donuts. The first few donuts are delicious, enjoyable, and easy to finish. Even the next few are bearable. Then you look down at the box, realize that you still have to eat half of the donuts, get sick to your stomach, but keep eating regardless. By the end, even though you can barely handle the thought of eating yet another donut, the mere sight of one lone donut in that huge box is enough encouragement to get you through it. Against all odds, that last donut is by far the most enjoyable of them all. In fact, you even lick the icing off of your fingers in the end because you conquered that box of donuts—that huge, daunting, iced box of donuts. Yep, in my mind, that is the best analogy for climbing Mt. Kilimanjaro. Spoiler alert: I dominated that box of donuts.
Day 1: Kilimanjaro just sat there waiting for us. I was one of its next eight victims—a young college student eager to conquer the fifth highest mountain the world. Just seven days earlier I had been arranging plans to go to Rwanda instead. Now I was in a dalla-dalla with a backpack full of rented gear and a savings account a quarter emptier than it was before I decided to invest in a 6-day trek to the top of Africa. With my faced pressed up against the window, my eyes remained fixated on Mt. Kilimanjaro. I had seen it several times before, but now that I had the intent to climb it, the snow-peaked ridge seemed noticeably larger and more daunting than ever before. As we got closer and closer to the base, doubt began to creep into my mind about my physical ability to climb such a thing. Who did I think I was? Sure, I had hiked mountains. But a trek? A 6-day trek? That word seemed reserved for professional mountaineers and Bear Grylls. Much to my dismay, I was neither a professional mountaineer nor Bear Grylls.
We arrived at the Machame route gate in the early afternoon and Kilimanjaro didn’t waste any time in throwing obstacles in our path. As if right on cue, the rain began as we took our first few steps on the well-worn path. From that point on, rain was our constant companion.
The five-hour hike was spent in a dense fairytale-esque rainforest and it didn’t take long for our conversations to morph into the fiction world either. If I remember correctly (and I do), a solid hour was spent on the topic of centaurs. Not surprisingly, Lalahe was not familiar with the concept of a half-human half-horse being, so I had the honor of describing a centaur to him. Looking back on it, Lalahe probably thought that we were all just going insane from the altitude.
As dusk fell upon us, the trees slowly began to thin out. By the time we reached our campsite, darkness had enveloped everything, save for a strange glow that towered over us. As if she was reminding us of our reason for enduring the first day of hiking, Kilimanjaro was perfectly illumined by the moon and stars. The snow appeared fluorescent against the night sky. It was both intimidating and encouraging to fall asleep in the shadow of Kilimanjaro. One day down, five more to go.
Day 2: There comes a point on Mt. Kilimanjaro when you devolve from being a human to being a trekker. This happened on Day 2 for me. The rain put the impetus on this ‘devolution’ and I quickly abandoned all sense of personal appearance and (…sorry, Mom) personal hygiene.
There also comes a point on Mt. Kilimanjaro when nothing is rainproof anymore. This happened on Day 2 as well. By lunchtime, our raincoats and rainpants were just wetcoats and wetpants. I had accumulated enough water in my hiking boots to re-fill my water bottle. We each muttered a few curses under our breath toward The North Face, who falsely advertised their waterproof products.
The first thirty minutes proved to be the most difficult part of the day as we scaled a smooth, slippery rock face. Relative to that, the rest of the day seemed easy.
Day 3: One word: Acclimatization.
The trek from Shira Camp to Barranco Camp would have been significantly shorter, easier, and dryer were it not for the acclimatization process. The detour up to Lava Tower is intended to allow your body to adjust better to the altitude since it is at the same elevation as the Summit night campsite. Thanks to the rain, Lava Tower significantly dampened my hopes of reaching the summit.
Back in the day (meaning, not so long ago…), I dreamed of being in J.R. R. Tolkien’s Middle Earth. After trekking up to Lava Tower, I no longer have that desire. I felt like Frodo while he was carrying the burdensome ring to Mordor. Mist rolled over the ridge and the landscape was barren, except for black gravel from lava rocks. A few times during the trek I swear that I saw Gollum creeping behind a boulder. Others claimed it was the altitude, but I saw what I saw.
Despite the rain, cold, and noticeably thinner air, I was ecstatic to reach the top of lava tower. At least until we realized that now we had to go down Lava Tower, which proved to be even more difficult. Per usual, the rain had severely worsened our hiking conditions. The downside of Lava Tower had been transformed into a waterfall, leaving us with no choice but to trek down through the freezing water. I love hiking, I love the outdoors, and I love a challenge… but this experience was straight up miserable. The rain was relentless, but in the end, so were we.
After the demoralizing 8-hour hike, I almost cried in happiness and exhaustion when I saw the campsite. I removed as much of my wet clothing that I could and crawled in my wet sleeping bag in my wet tent. Things were not looking good.
Day 4: The day began with sunshine, which lifted my dampened (pun intended) spirits. I woke up, stepped out of my tent, and saw that we were right at cloud level. I turned to my right and saw a massive wall—the Barranco Wall. We had been warned that this was one of the more challenging parts of the trek. I could see why. A few ambitious hikers had already begun to conquer the wall and I watched as the small white dots slowly moved up the wall. But no need to worry about that at the moment… I knew I had to enjoy the sunshine while it was present.
We still had a perfect view of Kilimanjaro, which, after four days of hiking is slightly disconcerting. From our perspective, it did not look like we had made much progress. We still had a lot of ground to cover.
The imposing wall proved to be much easier than it appeared. Less monotonous walking, more rock climbing. We got into a rhythm of passing our trekking poles to one another, allowing the person tackling the rock to use both hands and both feet to propel him/her to the top. The rain waited two hours until it visited us again. At that point we had already conquered most of the wall.
The 8-hour hike was through the alpine desert, but with every step we were closer to being above the clouds and therefore above the rain. We no longer had a clear view of the top of Kilimanjaro, which finally made Summit Day feel like a reality.
We arrived at Barafu Camp, the final camp before summiting, around 6pm. Our tents were pitched precariously on a ridge, making late-night trips to the bathroom treacherous. Finally there was no rain… not because it had stopped, but because we were on top of it. Clouds rested below us, along with all of Tanzania. We had a perfect view of Mt. Meru from our campsite. As the sun slowly dipped behind the ridge, we realized that we had to wake up in 2 hours to begin our summit day hike.
The most important day of the trek would start at 11pm on Monday in an attempt to summit at sunrise. As I lugged my body around the campsite, the reality finally set in that I would be attempting to summit Africa’s highest mountain on 2-hours of sleep. I refused to show any signs of weakness or nervousness. No turning back now.
Summit Day: 11:30pm Wake up, drink Milo energy drink, gear up.
11:45pm: Altitude sickness finally takes its toll on me. Right before leaving the campsite, I throw up the spaghetti I had enjoyed just a few hours earlier.
11:50pm: Leave campsite, begin Summit.
The time period between midnight and 8am is extremely hazy. Like every other night, the moon illuminated the snowcapped peak of Kilimanjaro—only this time it was directly in front of us. One foot in front of the other. Try not to fall asleep. Don’t lose footing. Almost there.
It was beyond frustrating to be the one suffering the most from altitude sickness. On the third hour of the hike, I noticed that I had thrown up all the food that was left in my body. When there was no food to throw up, my stomach began to reject water. When there was no water to throw up, nausea still sunk in.
In a really twisted way, suffering so much from altitude sickness contributed significantly to my successful summit. Whenever I got sick, my competitive nature would kick in and I would feel like I was battling the mountain. The mountain would knock me to my knees, and each time I rose physically weaker but stronger in spirit than the time before. I was playing a game of chicken with the mountain and I refused to back down. Kilimanjaro messed with the wrong person.
It was so easy to become hypnotized by the feet of the person in front of you and completely forget about why you are putting yourself through such an ordeal. The spell was broken at 7am when we stopped for a water break at sunrise. The dark blue sky was gradually engulfed by an orange glow that marked the onset of day. I didn’t want to blink because then I would miss a millisecond of this miracle, and a millisecond wasn’t worth missing. I stood there gaping at the ebb of night into day until our guide ushered us back to the path. What I had just witnessed was definitely worth a quarter of my life’s savings. Getting to the top was just icing on the cake… (or should I say donut…?).
The final stretch up to Stella Point was the steepest I’ve ever climbed. The thinness of the air made each step twice as hard as usual. But then reaching the top of the ridge was twice as rewarding. We posed for a few photographs at Stella Point and gawked at the crater below us. However, Stella Point was not our final destination. Uhuru Peak was still 1.5 hours away. Apparently it is common for people to stop at Stella Point out of exhaustion and desire to take in the breathtaking view. But after 5 days of hiking and everything that I had been through, the thought didn’t even cross my mind to stop at Stella. I was 1.5 hours away from my goal and my adrenaline kicked in so much that I felt like I could sprint to the top.
The ice and snow crunched underneath my feet as I began the final stretch of Kilimanjaro. I looked to my right and saw a massive crater. I looked to my left and saw a huge wall of glaciers. I thanked God for what he made.
The 1.5 hour hike from Stella to Uhuru was the highlight of the entire trek for me. For the first time that day, I went over an hour without getting sick. I could barely take my eyes off of the glaciers and I literally could not stop smiling. With each step I knew that I was about to make my dream a reality. In my eagerness I had broken away from the group and it felt amazingly liberating to be trekking solo to the top. I rounded a corner and saw the sign in the distance. It was still 200 yards away, but I didn’t care. My pace picked up, tears welled up in my eyes, and I lifted my trekking poles in victory, to no one in particular. The sign got bigger and bigger until I could touch it—“ CONGRATULATIONS You Are Now At Uhuru Peak, Tanzania 5895 M. - Africa’s Highest Point - World’s Highest Freestanding Mountain."
As all of our team arrived to the top, I gave them each a hug. Miraculously, each one of us made it-- Karla, Ben, EJ, Elise, Hannah, Lalahe, and myself. We took pictures, ate Twix, congratulated each other, and toasted with a celebratory Kilimanjaro beer that we had brought to the top to share.
We spent about 25 minutes at the top until the thinness of the air began to affect us. A short but sweet time at the top of Africa was the perfect way to spend my last semester in Africa. I caught one last glimpse of the Uhuru Peak sign before I waved goodbye to it forever.
Most of the time it seemed like the mountain wanted us to fail. Kilimanjaro made is clear that making it to the top of her was an honor, and it had to be earned. Blood, sweat, tears weren’t a high enough price to pay. On top of that there was rain, cold, dizziness, sleep deprivation, dehydration, soreness, and, most of all, vomit. However, despite all of these setbacks, Kilimanjaro showed us grace as well, and that is what made each step bearable. That grace was shown in the moments when I could look around and see the beauty of the place where I had the privilege of living for four months. It was when I woke up every morning, stepped out of my wet tent to a clear sky, and could see one of the world’s most beautiful views. It was when the clouds cleared on the eighth hour of a rainy hike and I could raise my head from its stooped position to see Africa on the horizon in every direction. Without those moments, prayers from home, or the incredible team on the mountain with me, I wouldn’t be able to say that I made it to the top of Africa.
