The final day was 1,000m of descent down a steep mud strewed path through tropical rainforest to the Moshi Gate a rather unimpressive end to a classic trek.

I’ve not mentioned the people of this trek. There were no constants as the mountain provided so many routes taking different days to complete, that friendships were hard to strike up. There were no means of talking to fellow Kilimanjaroist (made up word, but you get my drift) after the sun went down, as mess tents became porters sleeping quarters and the nights were too chilly to stand and chat. The tent and the comfort of your warm sleeping bag became the place to retreat once dinner was eaten.

One of the Porters

The main character in this tale is Colin Zee, who I first met in 2007 on the Annapurna Sanctuary trek, a friendship grew during that trek that has endured over the years. Evan though he moved to Singapore with his wife Maury and baby daughter Chloe in 2011. Only after a month there, to join Matthew and me back in Nepal to climb Island Peak. Kilimanjaro was on his ‘Bucket’ list so persuading him to do one more high altitude trek was not difficult. In fact, he booked his flight before I confirmed the dates, which put me into panic mode as it did Ann, at Trek Mountains, who organised the trip.

Colin Painting in the Coolness of the Late Afternoon

Colin is a Chinese Scouser, proud of his roots and heritage. He’s a great front man and charmer, knows what to say and when and had our team eating out of his hand from the start. This could well be our last trip together as he wants to finish each day’s Trek with a shower and a drink, from now on! Something that I don’t think an expedition to Mount Vinson would likely have! Over the week we sorted America, North Korea, and Brexit out, we didn’t need any Hydrogen Bombs, Fake News or blonde wigs and I don’t think we Tweeted once! We discussed democracy and the merits of benign dictatorships, but most of all he’s fun to be with.

The Hero’s – Not us the Porters

Colin aside the other main characters were the team of 18 porters looking after the pair of us! Yep, 18! Imran and Francis being the two guides. Imran took life very seriously and ate with us every meal time and double checked every detail, while Francis was more fun loving knowing that he hadn’t got the final responsibility that Imran had. He was inquisitive about all aspects of our life. Politics was a favourite subject, which normally ended with me dismissing all politicians as liars, cheats and that they were only there for their own gratification and power. I don’t think he understood my total and utter cynicism of all politicians, but I have definitely got overly cynical as I’ve matured, and I think the debacle that are today’s politicians bare me out. Moses was Imran’s right-hand man or I could call him our manservant. He served our meals and generally made sure we had all we needed, from hot water for washing to drinks and food. There were two unsung heroes As always, the porters, but more importantly a man neither Colin or I ever saw. The porters do all the real graft, leaving after us and arriving before us, tents, mess tent and kitchen all set up before we get to camp. The other hero is ‘portaloo’ man, like our tents it was at camp when we left and at camp when we arrived. A job, I believe deserves a medal at the very least.

Now for the other trekkers. On the first day, it was clear that we were the slowest party, taking a snail’s pace of eight days. All the others on that day were to take six or seven days. The first two that stick in my mind were two young lads, one British living in Japan the other Russian. I assumed they were good friends, apparently, though they met only that morning. They both had a zest for the forthcoming adventure, sure of success, and failure was not even contemplated. The other couple that stood out was an Italian man and French woman, married I assume, but lived in Sydney, Australia. They were taking a slightly different route around the north of the mountain. They hoped a quieter route and I’m sure that were right as only they peeled off to the north on day two, all the others carried on to Shira II… except for ourselves who stopped at lunchtime, and didn’t move from Shira I until the following morning!

Kilmanjaro Express

Shira II was full of strangers, it was a melting pot of converging routes and there was no interaction between the groups. Walking past mess tents with laughter and whispers floating out, but there were no hearty welcoming voices making their way to any passerby. It was a shame that there appeared to be no way of socialising. The camps were well organised with a Rangers Cabin, out of bounds to us mere trekkers. A tea room or meeting room would have made all the difference, but instead, we were left after our evening meal to talk among ourselves and then encouraged to retreat to our tents as the porters wanted the mess tent to rest and sleep in.

By now the route was getting busy and the Barranco camp was extremely crowded. Here we did meet a Mother and daughter. The Mother was born in the shadow of Kilimanjaro and her parents owned a farm. After independence enforced repatriation meant losing the farm. She always dreamed of returning and climbing the creator of that shadow she lived under as a child and she summited on the same day we did. I remember seeing her on the summit and her remark was ‘I thought the Barranco Wall was my summit, but now I realise that the summit day push is far harder but more rewarding’. I believe that a few tears were shed with her daughter, that day.

Our Final View of the Mountain

The only other group that stood out were a group of youngsters, well in my eyes anyway, who chatted to me on the summit and at the last camp. They were on a charity walk, six days from start to finish. Surprisingly they all summited, although they did look the little worse for wear. When I told them we were on an eight-day trek, they all looked and nodded at each other and said, ‘that’s why you look so fresh’! Of course, it had nothing to do with their fondness for partying! But what a fantastic and friendly bunch and their joy of reaching their goal was spontaneous and genuine and put many miserable looking middle-aged, grumpy old farts to shame.

I know I’m known as the miserable old git, but Colin has enough social and cheek for the both of us, so it seems a real shame that the different groups didn’t intermingle, but I believe this is partly the fault of the system used and insisted upon by the Park Authorities. They appear to be only interested in getting people safely to the summit, with little or no thought that the trekkers are human beings and that interaction would promote the trek and be a better advert than just the success rate of the summiteers!

The dust was the only ever-present and loquacious amoeba on the mountain. Loquacious may seem like a strange metaphor, but believe me, it nagged and frustrated you more than any woman ever could (I’m in trouble now). Amoeba, because it was single-minded in its ability to totally envelop both your body and mind. It was like treading in finely sieved flour, it lay covering the path in a fine layer that puffed into the air when stepped in, only to settle waiting to catch the following person unawares! Dust, of course, is harmless, but like that fine drizzle that temps you not to put on your waterproof, it slowly penetrates to the core, ending up with dirt in clothes and parts of your body not normally exposed to such things. Two showers and two clean towels and clothes that having been washed two or three times and are still not clean, is the result.

Reflections, a beautiful mountain, and superb walk. A walk that I would have never done if it hadn’t been for my cousin Jane. I have a couple of gripes as you would expect… Health and Safety! Walking at altitude is inherently dangerous, in different degrees, depending on the individual. We all have to assess the dangers and decide whether the risk is within our capabilities and if not whether we should take that risk anyway so as to improve and move forward. Failure is a lesson that can create success. We were on this walk wrapped in cotton wool, all decisions made for us, routes planned out not to be deviated from. I understand the thought process, but part of me wants to scream out and say ‘No’ what’s happened to my individuality and relying on my own common sense. Death, of course, is bad for business and the Tanzanian Government rely heavily on the tourist industry and I’m sure Kilimanjaro, with such hefty Park Fees, brings in much needed foreign currency… but there needs to be some risk to the adventure.

On the way to the summit, we passed a number of people who had started a couple of hours before us. The guides were coaxing them up. As I said in the last paragraph, walking at altitude is inherently dangerous if not treated with respect and affects everyone in different ways. It doesn’t care if you are fit or not, or whether you’ve been at altitude before. The people we passed were obviously sick, struggling with every step. I saw one of the strugglers on the summit. What would she remember, did she enjoy the spectacular view and the high of reaching the summit or would she just remember the pain that the beginnings of either HACE or HAPE bring. There’s acceptable risk and there’s stupidity!

I’m used to summit days starting early i.e. 3am, but never Midnight! Sure enough at 11pm Imran shock the tent, a sure indication that he expected us to get up, from the warm and cosy confines of our sleeping bags, on what was a very cold night!

You might not be, but you might be interested, anyway below is what I was wearing:

Trekking shoes (as Colin had my boots)
One pair of thick socks
Thermal leggings (Max Wall variety, just like Uncle Les’s)
Thick winter walking trousers (for any Americans readers, trousers = pants, if you’re not sure, look it up in the Oxford Dictionary!)
String Vest… I can already hear laughter, but I will turn the other cheek. It is the warmest base layer I have ever come across.
Yak wool full sleeved crew.
Mid-layer fleece with hood.
Lightweight down jacket, with hood.
Thermal Bandanna, around my neck. This can also be pulled up over my mouth to warm the air as it passes down the throat. This stops the very dry, cold air from causing coughing fits, affectionately called ‘The Khumbu Cough’.
Suunto Peak watch and heart rate monitor (if it’s that cold that I’m not sure which side of life I’m on then I can check).
Windproof gloves

Backup:

Extra fleece
Down-filled mittens

Not much backup, but you can probably assume that I was expecting it to be cold. And it was.

A midnight start along with 100 or so others. Fortunately, we started with only a few in front and it wasn’t long before we were leading the main groups. It’s a lot easier to be the pacesetter, rather than pace follower. The moon lit the bulk of Kilimanjaro as a snake of single lights wound its way up the mountain. At around 3:30am the moon set and the sky lit up with millions of bright stars. In a place of zero light pollution, the array is magical as stars flicker into life as others die in a timescale that is almost incomprehensible.

400m below Stella Point and the terrain steepened and our breathing becomes seriously laboured. Every step is hard and the breaks taken every few metres are welcomed with a sense of relief only found when you gulp in a mouth full of air after holding your breath underwater as long as you can. Maybe a little dramatic, so let’s just say breathing was damned hard work. Imran and Francis appeared not to be affected by this lack of oxygen, which was just a tadge annoying and I would have said so, if I could have caught my breath!

We reached Stella Point at 05:50, leaving just enough time to reach P Peak before sunrise at 06:34. A little precise, I know, but the geek that I am, I bought an app that every photographer should have, The Photographers Ephemeris! Shows the time when the ‘golden hour’ is in any location in the world. Stella Point to Uhura Peak was an easy stroll, compared with the path up to Stella Point.

Sunrise

The sunrise was amazing with the shadow of Kilimanjaro touching Meru Peak 20 or 30k away. The massive crater filled with a golden light and the glaciers turned an orangey red, within minutes the golden hue turned to a brilliant yellow as the sun rose rapidly, shedding its now harsh light over the whole mountain.

Kilimanjaro’s Shadow stretching to Meru Peak

We, of course, took the obligatory photographs on the summit, with a queue rapidly building as the hordes of Kilimanjaro summiteers reached the top.

The Obligatory Photograph

The top is a desolate place, with the rapidly shrinking glaciers revealing the barren nature of this once active volcano. The glaciers are different to any I’ve seen before. They appear to be placed on top, sculptured individually, lifeless, dying slowly year by year. A glacier is metaphorically a living entity, moving gracefully down to point where it reveals its next stage, the essence and giver of life… Water. These glaciers seem to have given up, retreating within themselves and giving nothing back, in return.

Down, it was time for Kilimanjaro Skiing! The volcanic dust gives the either brave or stupid a rapid means of descent. In the UK we call it Scree Riding. You run, digging your heels into the dust/scree and let the momentum take you down. Takes a certain amount of confidence, praying that you manage to avoid any solid rocks. The consequence of hitting a solid rock tends to be a fall! What took six hours to get up, took Imran and me only two hours to descend. Colin was not so confident and took the more traditional way of descent, walking down the path. Takes a little longer, but you tend to come away with fewer bruises!

We reached the tent just after 10:00am, brunch was prepared, but neither of us was hungry. Colin, suffered in my boots coming down. As I said in a previous blog they were a size too large and his toes had banged against the front of the boot on the way down, causing some bruising. We still had a further 2,000m of descent to M camp. He decided to walk the next seven kilometres in his sandals! We rested for a further hour, packed and headed to M camp, where the ‘O’s’ would be more numerous. Colin’s progress was slow as North Face were once again, being verbally abused with every step he took.

Francis and I went ahead of Colin and Imran arriving at M camp an hour ahead. The sandals caused blisters where the straps went over the top of his feet, I can feel a compensation claim coming on! However, Summit day was now over after 15 hours and a night sleep lost. Nothing though can dull the memory and delight at summiting the largest free-standing mountain in the world.

Besides summit day this was the day I had been waiting for…. The Barranco Wall. As today was a short day we were allowed a lie in, so instead of spending 10 hours in our tents, we got 12, whoopy doo. The reason, to let the other groups that were going onto base camp rather than stopping at the half way point, Karanga camp, as we were, get a head start. The initial 100m of the Barranca Wall is probably a grade I scramble ( the easiest scrambling grade) and deserves that grade purely for the exposure. The scrambling itself is fairly easy but a mistake in that first 100m could have serious consequences.

I enjoyed every single metre of it. The only thing that was testing was when you had to make a series of sustained moves and the altitude took your breath away, forcing a rest to recover. There was a further 185m of The Wall, but that was just a steep path, with no real difficulties. Once at the top the view was breathtaking, looking down the valley to the plains of Africa that was obscured by low cloud and a dusty haze.

The rest of the walk to Karanga camp was just a few up and downs and then the camp came into sight, wow that was easier than I thought. Was there a sting in the tail… you bloody well bet there was. What wasn’t apparent from where we stood was a valley that was a perfect ‘V’ in shape and steepness, between us and the camp. The way down was on the finest sieved dust I’ve ever come across, it made fine baking flour feel coarse. Treacherous to say the least, it could have been a very quick way down, I believe they call it Kilimanjaro Skiing! I tried very hard not to partake. At the bottom, to Colin my surprise two of the porters had scurried down to take our packs from us, as a near retired OAP I accepted their offer without any guilt, especially when we passed those poor Europeans/Americans struggling up with their own packs on. I can’t think of a better occasion for winding people up and I took the opportunity in both hands, it seems they were all too out of breath to make any snide comments back!

Summit day is calling. Tomorrow we move onto Barafu and prepare for the midnight start to the summit.

Day five, finished at 10:30am. A very easy walk up to Barafu @ 4,692m, so now it’s just a waiting game until Midnight. Sleep, eat and unwind for the next 12 hours… then upward bound.

All the people that summited early this morning are arriving down for brunch, rest, pack up and head on down to Mweka Camp @ 2,750m and at last a decent amount of ‘O’s. and then there are the people arriving, like us ready to make their once in a lifetime attempt on the summit of Kilimanjaro. Just to put that in perspective our guide, Imran, has summited 11 times, this season!

You could see the end of day three from our camp at Shira I, which was the end of day two. I have to admit I find that a little disconcerting as it never turns out to be that simple and this would turn out to be no exception. Basically, we were walking on the floor of the caldera hemmed in on all sides by its steep walls. We were heading in a straight line towards tonight’s camp at Shira II, when for some inexplicable reason we diverted off the main path onto a side track. This track did not appear to head towards our next camp and low and behold I was right, it didn’t. It headed instead towards Cathedral Point on the rim of the crater.

What a detour. The clouds stretched out below us, with its tentacles probing into each fold of land, pushing and testing to see whether it could spill over the top of the caldera. Turn 180 degrees and the enormity of the caldera was spread out before us. It was then just a shortish walk to Shira II camp site.

Day four was an 800m climb to Lava Tower, then a 600m descent to Barranco camp site. I’ve ascended far more than 800m in a day on many accusations, but we were now at an altitude of 3,850m going up to 4,650m. Oxygen is taken for granted by most people and in a day to day situation, they don’t give it much thought. But once you get above 3,000m it then becomes just a little more important. The simple act of breathing and moving at the same time becomes somewhat harder and as an oxygen breathing mammal, I find that disturbing. It’s not only disturbing but more importantly, it is debilitating, this is when you realise that the phrase ‘ Pole Pole’ (slowly slowly) isn’t so stupid after all. And it is the main reason I chose this route, an eight day route gaining height slowly so Colin and I could acclimatise.

The 10km walk took us six hours and 45 minutes including an hours lunch break. So a breakneck pace of 1.5km per hour! The walk was through a lava strewn wasteland, with little or no vegetation, with the exception of three plants. One that appeared to be clumps of daisies, one that looked like a pineapple and a tree that grew with anything from one to five branches, each branch taking 20 years to grow. I was told the name of all of these plants but surprise, surprise I can’t remember any of them!

We finished the day at Barranca camp and when the cloud clears at sunset the full extent of the climb up The Barranca wall became apparent.

I think it’d be fair to say that Colin does not suffer fools gladly and he’s not afraid to tell people if he thinks they are wrong. Forgetting work, these two traits are not obvious and are performed in such away as normally not to cause offense.

This is only true up to a point. The manufacturer of his boots, I think has driven him beyond that we’ll mannered, gentlemanly like person that he is.

Although the boots are about two years old, I think I’m right in saying that they were until July, in pristine condition. In July this year, while he was in Spain, he broke them in, ready for the trip to Kilimanjaro. They are a popular boot, I assume designed for such terrain that Kilimanjaro will throw at them by a manufacturer that has been synonymous with the outdoor industry for many years.

On day two I noticed that, while following Colin the heal was starting to come away from the sole of his left boot. Colin didn’t appear overly worried as he was convinced that the guides would be able to fix it. I wasn’t quite so optimistic and by the time we got into Shira I camp the whole soul had come away. Colin was still optimistic about a repair, but by this time was cursing the manufacturer uphill and down dale. I have to say I 100% agreed. ‘Not fit for purpose’ sprang to mind. The terrain in no way has been difficult.

Day three saw the situation get worse. One boot was sole less and the sole on the other boot started to come away. By this, his normal gentleman like behaviour had slipped into of torrid of abuse and he was planning his letter to the CEO of the manufacturer, he was going to find out where he lived his personal email address and his personal phone number. I’m not sure these details could be obtained legally! This continued on and off all the time we were walking.

Then the boot with no sole started to split at the toe… this CEO is in for some letter from Colin, most of which I can’t print! Imran was only walking in a pair of trainers and had his boots in his rucksack, so lent Colin, just the one boot that was split. He was able to make Shira II camp in reasonable comfort with odd boots! Fortunately, I took a pair of boots for summit day and a pair of trail shoes for the rest of the trek. My boots are a little bit big but nothing an extra pair of socks hasn’t cured. Colin has worn my boots all day today, which has been the longest and hardest day so far, hopefully, all is well with them

The manufacturer of Colin’s boots…..NORTH FACE