Sunday & Monday, January 25 & 26, 2009
Arguably these days and nights prove to be the best and most challenging days of my life. I said I'd never do it again, but I've since forgotten. Kilimanjaro anyone?
As I transcribe this from my journal I can see signs of altitude issues in my entries, some of which are not making much sense. Our porters packed up camp at 3rd Cave and we all head to Kibo Hut for what will be the longest most challenging day yet.
Sandy, Jen, Tanya and I went up last and slowly, with the exception of Mama Minde who can be seen in the photo at 3rd Cave Camp climbing up. Tanya is not feeling well, but she made it to Kibo Hut to have her photo taken before being sent down the mountain with no hesitation while Alfred our head guide shouted to her guide “Pamoja! Pamoja! Pamoja! (Stay Together!)” This shook some of us up a bit, but we were reassured she was in good hands so we continued on with our day. I felt confident at this time that if we have Acute Mountain Sickness or worse, we would be taken down and taken care of. However, this was extremely scary for Tanya.
Tanya's Story - Opiates or Alcohol:
By opiates, I am referring to religion, the opiate of the masses. I must say I felt more comfortable being guided up the mountain by the bible quoting guides than I did by the guides that smelled of alcohol and were retching on the way up to the summit. Come to think of it I did not see them at the summit. The guides who prayed were a comfort during our most fearful moments on the mountain. Tanya was comforted by her guide who held her tight and prayed with her the whole way down the mountain when she didn’t know if she would survive a scary case of cerebral edema. The way down the mountain is not straight down, there are a few up hills along the way. Each time Tanya had to go uphill she could feel the pressure increase inside her head which is when she and her guide did the most praying and went as quickly as possible. When she arrived at Horombo Hut (the 13,000 foot camp) she had to sign a book to let them know why she was going down the mountain. In the far right column of the book she was to fill in her ‘status’. Just above her status was the status of the previous climber spelled out in big red letters . . . DIED! She asked the administrator at the hut if she was going to die as well and he responded back to her with a blank stare. Fortunately her guide was a man of prayer and that was comforting to her as the pressure went up in her head at the same time as they ran as quickly as possible (to minimize her increasing symptoms) up the small hills that are part of the descent. Tanya made it down the entire mountain in 6 hours. It took our group 12 hours of rapid walking. Happily Tanya made it back home to her family (2young children) safe and sound and is recovering well from her traumatic experience on the mountain. She is grateful to be alive.
We sat to have some well-earned hot drinks after 5 hours of walking at high altitude. Many of us have achy heads and nausea. Dinner is at 4 p.m. after which we will sleep until 10:30 p.m., have some tea and biscuits and begin our ascent to the summit.
Our confidence is tested when a dead body of a Japanese climber is brought through camp in a sleeping bag. Rumor has it he was asked to turn around and go down, but he proceeded to the summit and died on the descent while coughing up blood (sounds like pulmonary edema). The porters and guides usually wear big smiles, but they are looking somber and some of them are holding hands.
At this time I wish I’d taken my massage therapist up on her offer of bringing some sage to burn. It could be a comfort to cleanse the mountain of death and fear before we go up. Prayers were being said by the Mamas in their tents who decided to err on the side of caution and not attempt the summit and the porters were also praying.
I said my nightly prayer of gratitude once again, for all of us and tried to remember the serenity prayer in my fuzzy brain state:
God grant me the serenity
to accept the things I cannot change;
courage to change the things I can;
and wisdom to know the difference.
Living one day at a time;
Enjoying one moment at a time;
Accepting hardships as the pathway to peace;
Taking, as He did, this sinful world
as it is, not as I would have it;
Trusting that He will make all things right
if I surrender to His Will;
That I may be reasonably happy in this life
and supremely happy with Him
Forever in the next.
Amen.
--Reinhold Niebuhr
After tea it began to lightly snow. The Gods of weather were with us the whole way up the mountain and continued to be as the snow creasted a light dust of white that made the climb that much more majestic as it sparkled by the light of our headlamps. Jill and I decided to get up at 10:30 p.m. for tea prepared to summit. Jill has some mild symptoms of altitude sickness (tinnitus) and was taking benadryl for an allergic reaction to what we think is something she is eating. She made a wise decision to err on the side of caution and chose to turn around and go back to camp. Rich, one of the porters who was given an opportunity to work as an assistant guide for the night, took her back to our tent. I continued on with no symptoms of altitude sickness, just fear of death, but I planted my poles firmly into the ground and told myself it was not much different than being at the top of Whistler and put one foot in front of the other. It was pitch black with plenty of stars in the sky, but no moon to light the way, only our headlamps.
Jen is Karen's right hand person and she had been bringing up the rear making sure Tanya was taken down safely and now she did the same thing for Gary as he turned around and went back to his tent. She had a feeling she needed to check on him and sure enough he was experiencing AMS and was taken down to Horombo Hut at 13,000 feet in the night to improve his condition.
We walked slowly up steep rocky switchbacks throughout the night. As I was bringing up the rear with a few other women I found Zoe sitting by herself on a rock crying by the edge of the trail. She reassured me she was feeling well, but needed water and didn’t know where her pack was and she has become separated from her guide and Kashini. A guide, who was helping me out and smelled of alcohol and was retching on the way up wanted to continue upwards, but I asked him to wait while we found Kashini, Zoe’s pack and another guide to bring up the rear. While we waited we found Melissa and Hillary. I put the retching alcohol smelling guide in front, us girls in between and another guide behind us and we tried to stick together. “Pamoja! Pamoja! Pamoja! We need to stick together” I told the guides. At this point I had run out of water since I was sharing my water supply with the guides who had no water. Kash & Melissa were both too nauseous to drink anything, so I gratefully took their water bottles and continued to share with the guides. I felt it was the only thing keeping me for developing altitude sickness and it was keeping a headache at bay.
Zoe only told me later that she was hallucinating – she was seeing hands by the side of the trail and poking her poles in them only to find they were not real. I think I would have sent her down if she told me that on the mountain. She seemed to have her wits about her though as she asked when the sun would be coming up. I checked my watch at that time and it was about 5:30 a.m. The sun began to rise in the distance and the sky was starting to brighten. Shortly after we were at Gilman’s Point on the crater ridge. From there we could see inside the crater and the ridge all around it. We were up above the clouds standing on the roof of Africa. It was unbelievably challenging to get to this point and Penina and Steve, who were there, chose to go down. Hillary and I were also talking about going down from here when along came Alfred, our head guide, with his usual chattering at a rapid clip telling us to get going up to the summit quickly quickly. No more time for pictures, time to get going. He reassured us it was not far, but once we got on the trail and saw the light in the distance and met others returning back from the summit we realized it was yet another 2 hours of slow gradual uphill walking. Two more hours seemed almost impossible, but Alfred kept us going with his seemingly endless amount of energy (did he have an oxygen tank in his pocket?). Nothing was alive except the humans on the crater rim and it was -22 C. It was colder with the wind and oxygen levels were 40% of normal. We could all feel it. Kash was stoically pushing forward and not looking back , focused only on making it to the summit no matter what.
At the summit we fumbled around for our cameras and Rich appeared with a Canadian flag for photos. I am amazed he got back up after taking Jill down. He had no gloves with him so I gave him my fleece gloves that I was wearing inside my down mittens. I was grateful for Alfred’s presence to help everyone get down. I made my way with Rich along the crater rim to Gilman’s point and was completely astonished at the number of steep switchbacks ahead of us that we had only come up a few hours before in the dark. I asked if there was a faster way down, but no, we had to go slowly through the switchbacks. Later, we came to some scree and I happily sat back on my heels, leaned into the mountain and slid down the scree. I came down from the summit in 1.5 hours and it took 8 hours to go up!
Rich offered to give me back my fleece gloves, but I told him to keep them and was inspired at that point to give all of my gear away since the porters seemed poorly outfitted for the climb, some of them wearing sweatshirts for warmth and flip flops on their feet. Luckily I waited ‘til we got to the bottom of the mountain since it was cold and wet on our way down. Once we got down I gave all my gear to Abbas to give to the porter’s association. I also gave Rich my water bottle (since he didn’t have one) with $20.00 US stuffed in the lid. I also stuffed a $20.00 bill in the porter’s pocket who carried my back pack + another 20 kg. on his head up the mountain in flip flops. I also gave my poles to a guide when he put his hands on them and asked for them and gave another porter a deck of cards with $20.00 stuffed into them. When we got down to the base of the mountain we went to a hotel with the guides and porters to celebrate. The porters stayed on one side of the room while we were on the other and we were discouraged from interacting with them. We could all sense the desperation in the room while Karen carefully counted out $6000.00 worth of tips for the porters and handed all the money out individually with a thank you and a hug to ensure that they all received their fare share. It seems few are above corruption and this is the only way to ensure fair pay.
When we arrived at the back at Kibo Hut after the summit, I decided I would never do anything like that again. It was extremely grueling and I’d rather give birth to 3 children in a row than do that again, however, I have since forgotten and I’d be game for another climb!
14 of us did not make it to the summit for a variety of reasons, but 19 of us did. They say fully 60% of people who attempt Kili do not summit so our stats beat the average.
Mama Minde made it to Kibo Hut. Her guide brought her down to Horombo Hut at 13,000 feet, but the rest of the trail is so bumpy that a group of porters decided to carry her down in a stretcher the rest of the way.
The first person to summit was Nini, our 62 year old retired nurse volunteer from Ottawa! She is pictured with Kash and Zoe on our descent with Kili in the background.
All of the HIV+ women made it to Kibo Hut which is a grueling climb in and of itself – congratulations to them all. They are role models for all of the women in Tanzania, particularly those who find themselves testing positive for HIV. This shows that an HIV positive test is not a death sentence, but it can even open doors to new opportunities. I don’t think any of the women ever dreamed they would be climbing Kilimanjaro and have their stories told on film.
In total 130 of us were on the mountain for 7 days.
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