Kili: The Final Ascent

It’s 11 o’clock all to quickly and we wake up and get on a few layers of our warmest clothes for the climb to the peak. We are served our tea, coffee hot chocolate and some glucose biscuits and we are off. We have eight people: the four wazungu, our two guides, our assistant guide and James, who turns out to be a cook training to be an assistant guide. Right away, they take backpacks: Fredi takes my mom’s, Innocent takes Karyn’s and Francis takes Patrik’s. Since I have mine on, they don’t take mine. I can carry my own backpack – or I want to try to at least. Besides, that means that I have my water on me at all times.

I realize as we are leaving the camp that I forgot the camera (I have my little camera and an extra battery for both in my pants to keep them warm and functioning, though) and I run back to get it. I am breathing hard when I get back to the group. Running is not recommended at this altitude. And it’s hot so I take off my outer jacket (down and soo warm. Thanks, Dad) and unzip the two underneath that. And we begin walking up the mountain following the trail of lights that can be seen making their way up the mountain. It becomes quickly apparent that my mom can’t keep up. She is suffering the symptoms of altitude sickness, especially the nausea, and she slows down, and Fredi stays with her.

At first, it is easy. We walk at a steady pace, sometimes over a gravel-covered slope, sometimes clambering up a rocky incline and at times walking along a clear ridge. We run into other groups some – are going slower than us while a couple pass us on their way up the mountain. The dry rocky ground slowly starts acquiring a layer of snow or ice and the patches of snow become larger and more frequent. The nearly-full moon lights our path and Karyn and Patrik follow my example and turn off their headlights, which are made unnecessary by the bright moonlight. Stars are clearly visible as they twinkle in the sky, the moon illuminates a few clouds above us but the clouds that had devoured the camp earlier are gone. It is cold, but I am prepared for that and I actually take my outer gloves off for at intervals to cool down. As they had warned us, Karyn and Patrik’s water pipes from the camel pack froze quickly and I keep mine working only by holding it up and allowing the water to drain back into the bag after every drink.

My initial alertness starts to fade as the night wears on and I keep track of the passage of time by the movement of the moon overhead and the progress of one particularly bright star that was on the eastern horizon and twinkled with an astonishing variety of colors when we started but as it moved up in the sky, it lost its bright colors. At some point, Fredi catches back up with us after taking my mom back to the tent – her altitude sickness was just too much. We trudge on up the mountain. Patrik’s smoker’s lungs betray him and he falls slightly behind Karyn and me. We continue on up the mountain. A cold wind picks up and I put on my balaclava to keep my face warm.

It starts getting darker as the moon goes behind the mountain and Karyn lights her headlamp. I am little more than sleep walking at this point. I have gotten into a rhythm with my poles and I keep right behind Fredi, opening my eyes only to make sure that I am still following and am not in danger of falling into any abysses. I notice that the shadow of the mountain cast by the moon on the clouds far below is lengthening toward the horizon and know that morning will come soon. And finally we are at the top.

A strong wind greets us as we crest Gillman’s peak and, afraid the jacket that has been hanging from my backpack strap will blow away as well as to keep warm, I put on the big down jacket. We aren’t quite there: Uhuru peak is up a path to our left. The horizon brightens as we start up the path and I fumble with my gloves and cameras to get a few pictures. By the time we reach the highest point in Africa, the sun is well and truly up and we get a clear view of the crater and our surroundings for a moment before the clouds begin to roll in around us. We get our pictures with the sign proclaiming that we have reached Uhuru peak (5895 meters), we soak in the glory of the moment for a minute and we start heading back down.

Karyn and I are exhausted and we slowly slide through the loose gravel every step as we walk back down the distance that we just spent six hours climbing. We rest plenty and it takes us more than the estimated 2-2.5 hours to get back to base camp. Karyn says that she is more tired than she has ever been – as tired as she is after running a marathon. The clouds have again swallowed the camp by the time we reach the tent and it is hailing/snowing. My mom is awake and congratulates us but we quickly crawl into our sleeping bags and are soon sleeping.