| Excerpt from Mefloquine Dreams - copyright 2004 by Chris Farrell Kilimanjaro
We went over all of the clothing and equipment we had, renting heavy jackets, snow pants, heavy gloves and knit caps to go with our –20 degree sleeping bags, decent shoes and multiple pairs of socks. Besides the four trekkers, we would be teamed with two guides, eight porters (who would carry absolutely everything: bags, equipment, food, cooking stuff, water, etc.), and a cook. We were so incredibly high with excitement as we left the office, we felt like we could leave right there and then to conquer the mountain. We ate inside the “Y’s” restaurant, hesitant to venture back out into town, and then spent a couple hours in our room upstairs going through our packs and deciding what to take and what to store at the “Y.” Sitting there on the eve of such a potentially life-changing excursion found us with a consistent stream of intense thoughts running through our heads and bodies. Scared, excited, anxious, curious...and most definitely frightened. It felt like we were living the last day of our old lifeless lives, about to embark on new ones where we’d be totally different people when we returned back here next Tuesday. This was all a little too much to assimilate. We were actually not totally heart-set on making it to the top. We kept reminding ourselves that we had never even thought about attempting to do something like this before, and we shouldn’t let our pride win out over sensibility and safety. Acclimatization can be very dangerous - deadly even, and we both agreed that either one or both of us would stop the second our bodies told us. Still, we were extremely confident, driven and determined to do the best we could do, and if the point of safety was ever compromised, then we would both need to decide if it was necessary for both or just one of us to come down...we weren’t going to decide that right now. I knew as I lay in my sleeping bag on top of my bed that night thinking about the next five days that this event would stay with me and be a crucial, defining moment, an essential turning point in our lives. It was a fantastic feeling. As we waited by the front gate to be picked up, we got the opportunity to meet our trekking partners: Charles and Jo from London. They were our age, taking a mere two-week vacation from work to climb Kili and then spend a week on the island of Zanzibar. Although they’d done some trekking in Nepal (and it was way beyond our comprehension, but we hoped to do the same on this trip too), this was beyond anything they’d ever attempted to do before. Paige and I were just sitting on a bench waiting for everything to come together when this guy, resembling the principal from “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off,” approached us and struck up a conversation. “Heading up the mountain today?” “Yep,” I replied, expecting some extremely hot or cold reaction to this fact. In the few pieces I’d read about Kilimanjaro, it seemed that people either absolute hated the experience and couldn’t understand why they ever undertook it in the first place, or they loved the experience but would never wish it upon anyone else. I expected a full-on speech from this guy straddling one side of the fence or the other, and as expected, we got an entire soliloquy. The guy was actually really nice; he was only in Tanzania briefly, and mainly to climb Kili, having flown in from Vancouver, Canada. He too had no idea what to expect, deciding on a whim to give it a try, and had in fact just returned from the trek the day before. “It was amazing,” he kept repeating throughout everything else he told us. He detailed every step of the climb, and although we still couldn’t picture it, we could at least see what our mindset might be during those stages. He took stock of our equipment - good sleeping bags, don’t need hiking boots - what we had would be more than enough, bring good sunglasses and lots of lotion, especially on top, definitely rent ski poles before you get going because they’ll help you in the steep sections...etc. Needless to say, he was really excited to talk about it. When he finally disclosed that he made it to the top, I realized that I had started to look at him differently. How I wanted to be in his shoes! Done with the insane trek, a conqueror, here to spread his aura of success...I could only envision myself five days from now basking in my own glory, enlightening some other naïve souls. He explained how incredibly hard the final ascent was, “You can only walk about a foot at a time, it’s really, really slow going. And the path up the scree is only wide enough for one person. But it doesn’t really matter, because at that altitude you’d never be able to pass anyone anyway; if you go faster than you body wants you to then you’ll never be able to catch your breath again and you’ll fall way behind and maybe even have to stop. Slow and easy. Really slow. It was easily the hardest thing I’ve ever done in my life.” Suddenly our jeep pulled up and we said quick good-byes to our new friend. “Good luck you two,” he told us as we went our separate ways, us to the hell of the mountain and him to the Y’s pool, “Know your limits, go slow, and you’ll do fine...you’ll definitely make it!” We all piled in the jeep: Paige, Charles, Jo, the driver and me, and headed east along the road until we came to a north fork leading toward Kili. It loomed up ahead of us in the morning clouds that were already obscuring the summit from our fantasies about actually being “up there!” We bounced along the road for a good 30-40 minutes, eventually noticing a slight incline accompanied with a more deeply lush landscape - farmland and jungles. After winding our way along a road spotted with extensive grass huts and deep reddish brown volcanic dirt, we finally passed through a huge gate and pulled into a parking lot at the base of the mountain. We’d be walking from here on in. We crawled out of the jeep, tossing our packs on the gravel as we were told to just hang out while they took care of all the paperwork and permits at the nearby office. This ended up taking a good hour or so while we loitered about, keeping our distance from a group of trekkers that had just made it down (it was too late now to listen to any horror stories), and negotiating with a local entrepreneur who had an armful of ski poles that he was renting for exorbitant prices. We were able to get him way WAY down however, because we were ready to walk away without them - he finally broke and told us to just meet him here in the parking lot after the trek to return them. Finally we got the word that it was time to go. All the porters suddenly appeared out of nowhere and spent a few heated moments divvying up the gear, after which they placed the packs, huge water jugs, cookware and thick garbage bags laden with bulky crap on top of their heads and immediately took off. Our guide, Stephen, introduced himself with a shy, quiet announcement, explaining that our assistant guide, Genes, would meet us the next day as he had some business to take care of tonight at his house. We didn’t care; we were just itching to get going, and after a brief photo-op at the start of the path with the jungle closing in on all sides around us, we took off after the porters in the shade of the immense trees. The trail started out fairly wide; the day’s trek was supposed to be 7 km and a 700-meter gain in altitude during a 3-4 hour hike. Paige and I took off ahead of Stephen, Charles and Jo - I wasn’t really in a talkative mood as I was extremely interested to see what kind of shape I was in and I kind of wanted to do it in private. As the reddish clay path narrowed, we found ourselves deep in the jungle with the humidity winning out over the heat, and the birds, Blue Monkeys and elephants constantly keeping things interesting. But we both were doing OK, lots of runny, dripping sweat, but otherwise holding up fine. We were constantly passing trekkers, guides and porters coming down from the other direction, and their weathered, scared faces didn’t do much for our excitement level. Our determination level, however, soared. Occasionally one of us would break and ask how it was, and the three most popular answers appeared to be “Hell,” “Why did I ever agree to do this?” and “Great!” At first we tried following this up by asking them if they made it to the top, again the top three answers were, “No,” “No and I’d never wish this upon my worst enemy,” and “Yeah! It was absolutely breathtaking!” We got so confused that we just stopped talking to these people. Besides, the only ones who even gave us a “good luck,” were the successful ones, and they appeared to be in the minority. About an hour and a half into our trek, Stephen told us that there was a picnic table somewhere up around the bend where we could stop and eat lunch. We all plopped down at a table off to the side, happy to rest for a while and drink as much water as our stomachs could handle. As Stephen pulled out our lunches, I had visions of huge, beautiful Corned Beef Sandwiches, a Dill Pickle, a bag of BBQ potato chips, and maybe a chocolate-chocolate chip brownie for dessert. Instead, he tossed us four brown paper bags in which the contents were so obviously greasy that the oil had soaked into the bag itself, making them nearly transparent with greasy goodness. “It’s from Chrisburger in Moshi,” he told us, apparently anticipating a rousing cheer of approval or something. I reached in to find another greasy transparent box inside with the words, “Chrisburger’s Special Trekker’s Lunch” stamped on the top: a greasy hamburger with a fried egg on top, a deep-fried meat won ton, and a pan-fried sausage thing that had then been deep-fried. Deep. Not exactly a Power Bar. After lunch things became a little harder. No surprise there; it wasn’t the trail, it was the oil working its way through our hearts. Soon the lush jungles changed to junipers, firs and hanging moss everywhere, and our bodies were again free-flowing sweat machines. You could have fried an egg with my sweat. We were really happy to make it to the first camp - the Mandara Huts, a group of A-frame cabins set within a grassy meadow in the midst of the thick forest. Very pretty and very relaxing. We would be sharing our A-frame with Jo and Charles, and after we all washed up a bit, we reconvened in the main dining cabin for a big plate of popcorn, cookies and tea that the cook had ready and waiting for us. Other trekking groups came in, both before and after us, and their own cooks would lie out a small tablecloth at their section of the long picnic tables and lay their snacks out for them, claiming the key spots first. We played cards with Charles and Jo for a couple hours until it was dinnertime, and were happy to see that our cook had forgone more Chrisburger food for pasta and potatoes. We scarfed it down with a good 30-40 people around us, all heading upwards. Stephen told us that on our last day when we came down, we’d walk from the next huts all the way to the bottom, not staying a night here, which was why everyone here was on their way up. Once our food was gone, exhaustion hit and by 8pm we were ready for a full night’s sleep. Our cabin was really pretty cozy. Thank God we had our good sleeping bags too, because the second the sun went down the cold crept in fast, and it was icy outside without long pants, shoes and a heavy jacket. Plus, the fog rolled in and you couldn’t even see five feet in front of you. Paige and I slept on the floor beds on either side of the door, while Charles and Jo took the bunks against the opposite wall. They turned out to be a couple of nice, fun people, and we already felt like we’d known each other for a lot longer than half a day. Perhaps we were sensing the need for close bonding with some dangerous and precarious situations coming up soon... Before we were even out of sight of the Mandara Huts, a group of about ten Blue Monkeys with their long beards and bushy tails were jumping and screeching around directly above us in the trees. We watched for a short while, but took off to allow them to go ransack the garbage areas in peace - they’d been waiting for us, the last people, to get the hell out. A truly gorgeous day, and in my opinion, a much nicer hike than the day before because it was now totally wide open, having emerged from the forest, and for most of the day you could literally see for miles over the plains. Don’t get me wrong, it was absolutely exhausting too: the repetitive long, steep inclines really tested our mental and physical strength. Paige was slightly worried about a case of allergies that she had been dealing with for the past two days. They would start first thing in the morning and appear to taper off by noon - runny nose, sneezing, sinus, etc. We’d have to monitor this very closely because it could have a dangerous effect at upper elevations and she couldn’t take medication because it might mask the symptoms and cause even more danger. Before leaving the States, I had contacted my doctor about a drug that I had read about that was supposed to help acclimatization: Diamox. Apparently it’s mainly used for Glaucoma, but they found that it had this added unsuspected benefit too. My doctor prescribed about twenty pills, explaining that he didn’t know much about it, but that I should drink more water than I was used to while taking it. Our Lonely Planet trekking book had a whole section on Diamox, outlining the pros and cons. They explained that it did help, but that it could also be very dangerous, masking altitude sickness until it was too late. I had decided that I was going to take a half a pill a day and increase it if I needed it – I wanted all the help I could possibly get. When Charles and Jo found out that I had a stash, they wanted in and I ended up giving them their own supply of the drugs, and they both immediately popped one. Paige, however, didn’t buy into the whole thing, and decided to rely 100% on her body’s natural ability to acclimatize. The only problem was that human beings can’t normally acclimatize to such a high elevation in such a short period of time...we’d just have to wait and see. We passed a bunch more people trekking down from the mountain, basically ignoring them all outside of a quick, “Hello,” as we had become seasoned trekkers after one day and didn’t need to bow down to anyone else who had happened to be on the mountain for a few more days than us. Around noon we all stopped for lunch on a rock-strewn hill looking southwest over the Tanzanian plains. A phenomenal view, but the clouds again were rolling in fast and Stephen explained that you could only count on clear views early in the morning. This was why on the final ascent day we’d be leaving at midnight from 15,500 feet - we had to make it to the top by 8-9 am before the clouds came in and before the sun started melting the snow on top, making a decent very dangerous. What the hell had we gotten ourselves into? The four of us scarfed down butter sandwiches, hard boiled eggs, carrot sticks, wine fruit and water in silence while Stephen and Genes sat off to the side smoking. How they could hike uphill for hours and rest by inhaling lungfulls of smoke was beyond me, but these guys probably made this climb a few times a month, every month. Paige and I both seemed to be doing fine - we were tired and sweaty, but not to any extreme, and our shoes seemed to be holding up fine. We could really use a nice HOT shower, but put the thought out of our minds the second it started to make us salivate. An hour after lunch we topped a hill lined with a few mossy trees and emerged to find ourselves with an unobstructed view of Kili’s peak. We all stood there in awe, wondering if any of us would be standing way up there in a couple short days. It looked really far away, and incredibly high...and horribly cold. It was all we could do to get our feet moving again. A little after 3pm, we came to the edge of a giant ridge and there across the other side, way up on top, was the glorious site of the next camp: Horombo Huts, at 3700 meters. The landscape was pretty sparse out there - spotty bushes, rocks and dirt was about all there was to see, and at this time of day the clouds were moving in so quickly that even our view of Horombo disappeared within a matter of seconds. We climbed down the ridge, nearly tripping and crashing all the way to the bottom, and labored up the other side. It had seemed so damn close, but climbing nearly straight up the ridge to get there ended up taking a good 30 minutes and I was thoroughly spent in my exuberance to arrive, having gone a little faster than I should have. Again we got our assigned A-frame and immediately retired to the huge dining cabin where our cook had already laid out the tiny tablecloth, popcorn, cookies and tea. Horombo appeared to be more than twice the size of Mandara. From what Stephen told us, it was constantly packed because it was where people stayed going up and down. In the busy times of the season, all the cabins are full and many people have to sleep outside in tents. If it ever got any colder than it did the night before, I couldn’t even begin to imagine how people could actually rest in tents up here. Also, by this time many trekkers are experiencing some severe altitude sickness symptoms - vomiting, headache, nausea, lack of appetite, insomnia...but we were happy to report that all four of us appeared to be in good shape. Just a little sore. We sat there drinking ten to twelve cups of tea for hours upon our arrival in an attempt to warm up and relax. Conversation flowed easily with Charles and Jo because we felt like we were going through this ordeal together; we needed to support each other to succeed. We were all wearing a few shirts, heavy jackets, long underwear and long pants, multiple pairs of socks and strong shoes...but we still shivered with the onset of the night weather. We got into a few conversations with other trekkers, desperately trying to stay away from people on their way down, and focusing on people in our situation. When we would overhear a group on its way down talking about the experience, we actively ignored them, talking louder and faster in a vain attempt to blot out their conversations. Still, words like, “Hell,” “Vomiting,” and “Why..?” penetrated our comfort zone. At dusk, our cook loaded us up with fried chicken and vegetables along with even more hot tea, and we all ate and drank hungrily. The second we opened the dining cabin door to head to bed, the icy wind slammed into our face and it was all we could do to make it back to our A-frame without curling up and freezing to death right there on the ground. Surprisingly, the high altitude and all that tea didn’t have a single debilitating effect on any of us; we crashed out within a matter of moments, holding our bladders through the night to avoid any precarious frostbite possibilities outside... Tomorrow we’d be heading to the final camp at the base of the final ascent. This time tomorrow night we’d be waiting out the evening in anticipation of our midnight starting time. I still couldn’t even imagine this situation, but then why did it scare the shit out of me just thinking about it? With this newfound exuberance and appreciation, we packed up our things and headed off to chow down on some steaming hot breakfasts. Everyone we saw seemed to be in a good mood, and how couldn’t they on a beautiful morning like this? Stephen and Genes came in to give us a briefing on the day’s hike: we’d be going 12 km with a 1050 meter incline to camp at the base of the scree at 15,520 feet. They hoped we’d arrive before it got too late in the day so we could simply relax until 11:30 that night before starting our final ascent. Yi. One of the things that we had inadvertently overheard the night before from a group on their way down was that sleep was impossible at the final huts, and it wasn’t even A-frame cabins, it was a giant dorm room with bunk beds. Besides the fact that the altitude is so thin you wouldn’t be able to sleep anyway, everyone else in the room would be keeping you awake in the icy cold with their own insomnia. And if there were one night when I knew I’d need some good sleep, this would be it. We tried to put it out of our minds as we set off again, but the bleak landscape, lack of any conversation and hypnotic wind always seemed to want to bring it right back to the forefront. Immediately we realized that today’s trek would be the most difficult so far. We were so high up that even when we were walking on fairly level ground, we were gasping for oxygen. But oxygen was few and far between. The first couple hours continued along rocky, boulder-strewn hills dotted with pitiful looking bushes until we reached a final incline and could see the Saddle. The Saddle is the immense area in-between the two peaks of Kilimanjaro. Presently, we were walking around the smaller of the two peaks and would have to walk across the Saddle to the base of the larger of the two - the one we’d be ascending. The Saddle is completely devoid of vegetation with its desert-like landscape, rocks, gravel, dirt and slow incline with a lack of any hills too. Looking out over this expanse of hellacious nothingness, we could see the next set of huts shining off in the distance around a small peak in-between, and couldn’t believe it was supposed to take us another four hours to get there. It looked so close, no problem! We first stopped for lunch, sitting on boulders and bundling up our sweaty, tired bodies against the cold wind. Again we scarfed butter sandwiches, hard-boiled eggs, a banana and wine fruit. Wine Fruit is this really weird shell-like round fruit that you rip open to expose the gelatinous, runny seeds inside which you suck out. Surprisingly, if you can get past the texture and smell, the taste isn’t that bad. Paige, however, thought that it looked like raw exposed brains, and traded hers to Jo for an egg. Stephen surprised us with a thermos of hot tea, and we eagerly drank the hot goodness while mentally preparing ourselves for the next push. “It won’t be easy,” Stephen assured us, “Pole-pole.” (“Slow-slow” in Swahili) We took off on the foot-worn path winding through all that desolation, one step at a time, not hurrying but just continually moving forward. The landscape truly looked like the pictures from the Mars Pathfinder, and the quiet isolation broken only by the howling wind became very unsettling. I was surprised at how well I felt I was doing; I was tired and my legs were aching, but no headache or nausea at all. However, about halfway through the Saddle, Paige started falling behind and I stayed with her to give encouragement. She said she felt OK; it was just difficult for her to catch her breath at the speed we all were going and she needed to set her own pace. Stephen and I stayed behind with Paige while Charles, Jo and Genes continued on their own. About an hour from the huts, Paige was just inching along, really having a hard time. Stephen kept trying to inspire her, explaining that the camp was just up ahead over that last incline and around the 5-story boulder, but Paige had to constantly stop her baby steps for long rests. I was worried, but she kept telling me that she was OK, she was just making sure she wasn’t pushing herself too hard and ruining any chances she might have for succeeding that night. Everything moved in slow motion. The path seemed to sharpen in focus, and I started noticing individual rocks and footprints. Other trekkers had organized stones to spell out things, and I suddenly found myself reading, “USA,” “Dr. Dan,” and the ever inspiring, “Fart!” Finally, when it seemed we would never get there, Kibo Huts appeared about a quarter mile in the distance. Again, it seemed so close that we inadvertently picked up our pace, only to come crashing back to reality with labored, strained breathing and even longer rests to catch our breath. We had to force ourselves to go slow, and it wasn’t easy, although it was the only way we’d ever make it. Kibo is a desolate, depressing place. It sits at the foot of the final peak of Kili, somewhat sheltered from the fierce winds by being positioned in-between this giant boulder and the peak itself. It’s cold, the wind constantly barrels through, it’s desolate, and all you want to do is get the hell out of there. Stephen directed us to the sole trekkers’ cabin: a huge wooden structure with a flat tin roof housing 4-5 immense rooms laden with numerous old bunk beds. The four of us chose a dorm room that was presently empty, until we noticed that there was actually a single lady sleeping in one of the bottom bunks across the room. We collapsed on the beds, already shivering with the cold and depression, unable to warm up whatsoever or relax. Our cook came in almost immediately with popcorn, cookies and tea, and we hungrily downed the steaming water in a vain attempt to warm up. Soon, another guide came in and started shaking the sleeping woman, telling her that they couldn’t wait any longer; they had to leave towards Horombo right now if they wanted to make it before sundown. She slowly and groggily sat up in her sleeping bag, groaning and looking like a train had hit her. As she got her shoes on in slow motion, we started talking with her - she had just made it to the top that morning! She had felt like shit when she arrived yesterday: headache, nausea, tingling in the extremities, and couldn’t sleep at all that night. As midnight approached, she took a turn for the worse; her head was just pounding and she felt like she was going to start barfing and never stop. But she was absolutely determined to make it. At midnight she popped 8 ibuprofen, slipped on all her clothes and equipment and headed out. Three hours up the “horrible, horrible scree,” she started vomiting, and vomited another five times before finally making it to Gilman’s point around 6:30 am. Gilman’s Point is the first part of the crater’s edge that you reach, able to see both down into the volcano’s crater and down the side of the mountain too. But that wasn’t good enough for her, she wanted to go the extra 2 hours along the side of the crater up to Uhuru Peak: the highest point in all of Africa. She had never felt worse in her whole life, but she didn’t care, she just wanted to make it. Halfway to the top, her vomiting turned to blood, but even that didn’t stop her. She did actually make it, took a picture, and immediately headed down, making it back here around 11 am, where she’d been passed out in the bed ever since. She thought she was being inspiring and complementary to her abilities. We thought that we had just met the biggest idiot on the face of the planet. Why risk your life for something so insignificant? Aren’t other things more important? Apparently not to her, but we knew that our limits were going to be much easier to recognize and act upon. After she left, we vowed not to allow pigheadedness win out over safety. Soon afterwards, Paige’s health took a quick dive for the worse. Her head was pounding beyond belief and nausea was setting in hard. She laid down in her sleeping bag, but couldn’t even get warm. We all ended up getting into our sleeping bags - fully clothed - to try to warm up, but it just wasn’t going to happen. We laid there in silence with only the wind’s howl making noise and setting the mood. No sleep, only shivering and pounding heads. At dusk, our cook came in bringing pasta and a sausage/eggplant sauce with garlic bread. Paige had absolutely no appetite, and couldn’t even muster up enough energy to get out of her sleeping bag. She was still incessantly shivering, with her head pounding nails into her brain. Charles, Jo and I sat at the table alone; we were somewhat happy to realize that it appeared we’d be the only people in this huge room tonight, and at the very least this fact might be a good thing when compared to the alternate. My own head was pounding and my appetite was non-existent, but I knew I’d need some food in my stomach for strength if I were going to make it to the top. I slowly chewed plain spaghetti pasta, forcing swallows down and drinking as much hot tea as I could handle. I couldn’t understand how Charles was able to scarf down all that sausage/eggplant sauce - to me it looked and smelled like vomit (although it probably was pretty good at sea level), and I was in awe of his appetite and ability to plow through it. “I feel great,” was how he explained it, but every time I thought of a belly full of sausage/eggplant sauce I gagged. After dinner we crawled back into our sleeping bags to see if sleep could come over the next 5-6 hours. We had all stuck our shoes, batteries, cameras and flashlights inside our bags with us so that they wouldn’t freeze up in the cold. Paige and I zipped our bags together to see if we could generate any extra heat, but we both shivered so much that it didn’t seem to matter one way or another. My head was pounding and I battled waves of nausea, but Paige was really in bad shape. She was in so much pain and discomfort that she couldn’t even open her eyes or speak properly. I don’t know how we got through those hours, but by 10 PM Paige started freaking out because her fingers, hands and feet were tingling so bad that she couldn’t feel them at all. I, of course, freaked out in my own way, trying to calm her and talking her through it, but it only seemed to get worse and worse in the dark with the icy wind howling through the walls, and feeling like we were the only people in the whole world, alone on the planet. We both agreed that the only thing for her to do was to head back down to Horombo with a porter. This seemed to relax her a little, knowing that comfort and health was on the near horizon, and she demanded that I go on ahead without her. “I’m not holding you back, you’ll make it for the both of us, and I’m not going to argue about it.” We again drifted in the surreal darkness until suddenly Stephen came in the room and quietly said, “All right, time to get up, it’s 11:30. Your breakfast will be brought in shortly, get ready and we’ll leave here at midnight.” Yi. My heart, which had been on autopilot in the silent darkness, suddenly started pounding in fear. My head felt like it was being crushed in a vice and every movement brought the pain crashing back into my brain. Paige was nearly comatose in pain and nausea, and I grabbed Stephen and told him that Paige needed to go down immediately. He organized two porters to guide her back down in the darkness, and we all packed up together. I put on every stitch of clothing I had brought: long underwear, boxers, long pants, snow pants, three pairs of socks, shoes, T-shirt, knit shirt, long sleeved shirt, windbreaker, heavy jacket, two pair gloves, baseball cap and knit cap. I was still cold. I popped 1200 mg of Ibuprofen and downed a few cups of steaming hot tea laden with sugar, bypassing any of the food (fruit and biscuits) due to my nausea. I also popped an extra Diamox for the hell of it. As we left the room, I took one look around and thought to myself, “The next time I walk through this door I will be a totally different person, good or bad...” We walked out into the moonlit night with the gravel crunching underneath our feet and the icy wind trying to find a way inside our coats. Paige and I kissed goodbye; she wished me luck and I told her she’d be feeling better sooner than she thought...she needed to because she could barely even stand. I watched as Paige and the two porters trudged off down the path we had come in on, the moonlight pouring on their shoulders. When they walked out of sight, I snapped out of my dreamlike zone and remembered where I was. Charles, Jo, Stephen, Genes and I were all standing there together waiting for the two words we both dreaded and needed to hear. “Let’s go,” Stephen finally offered. The first hour was a slow march up a winding hard gravel path leading from Kibo up to the base of the scree. Once we made it to the scree, a near straight up hill of volcanic ash, gravel, sand, rocks and dirt, our march turned into a horrible slog. I couldn’t take more than one slow step at a time, gasping and begging for air with each tiny baby step. The “path” was really a trodden ledge of silt winding snakelike up the scree; if you teetered off the downward side you could end up sliding down for a long way. We stopped to rest often, it seemed like every fifteen minutes or so, falling on our butts where we were standing and leaning back to rest on our packs, but it still wasn’t enough for me. We could see flashlights up above us and down below, but we never passed or were passed by anyone except when they or we were resting. Even then, no one spoke a word in the darkness; we all were having a hard enough time breathing regularly let alone speaking, or even attempting to formulate something coherent. It seemed like it would never end. Hour after hour after hour of this endless slog, our feet sliding and crunching in the deep scree. It was so cold that soon I lost feeling in my toes and fingers, even with all my protective clothing on. I feared of frostbite, so when we stopped I would try to heat up my frigid fingers and then rub my feet through my shoes. It wasn’t working. It was all a dream, my mind wasn’t working like it normally did and everything seemed to be continuing on under its own direction. After a good five hours of this, we still couldn’t tell how far we’d gone or had to go, but Stephen finally broke the silence by telling us we’d have to cut down on our breaks if we wanted to make it to Gilman’s by sunrise. I was on the verge of giving up and starting back down, but I just couldn’t get the words out of my ice-cold lips - I needed each and every one of these breaks and more! The thought of ending this hell brought a warm glow to my stomach, but I was surprised to watch myself get up and slog forward. Around 5:30 am the scree trail wound into a series of steep, scattered boulders. We changed from slogging upwards in the silty sand to having to scale these immense boulders, balancing precariously from one ledge to the next on a slope. No more trail, and with each extra push my lungs gasped desperately for air which never came. I felt like I was dying, and fell behind Charles, Jo and Stephen; Genes stayed behind to make sure I didn’t collapse. I would lunge for a boulder, gasp, rest, lunge, gasp, rest, over and over again in my own private hell. All of the sudden, after I lunged over a particularly large boulder, I stumbled right into Charles, Jo and Stephen sitting on rocks in a semicircle. “Congratulations!” Charles told me, “You made it!” I couldn’t believe it, but as I looked around gasping for my breath, I realized that I had actually made it to Gilman’s Point. I was shocked into a stunned silence as I looked down into the inside crater filled with snow, and then out across the Saddle way below and the Tanzania heartland far beyond with the sun just starting to come up above the horizon. Unbelievable! I stood that way for maybe thirty seconds taking stock of my physical and mental state. Jo suddenly spoke up, “Chris, let’s hear the bones of the human body.” Paige and I had devised a sure-fire way to tell if we were losing our minds at upper elevations: she would be required to say a tongue twister in Spanish while I would have to recite the bones of the body. Before Paige headed off back towards Horombo, she had asked Jo to conduct the test for me in her absence. “Sternum, clavicle, scapula, humorous, radius, ulna, carpal, metacarpal, phalanges, femur, patella...” I continued on, trying to make my frozen tongue and lips work as fast as I thought my brain was working. When I got to the end, I realized that I was feeling pretty damn good...considering. My headache was completely gone, I didn’t feel nauseous, and reaching Gilman’s had suddenly given me new exuberance. I turned to Stephen and Genes, “Look, if I don’t get going right now towards Uhuru, I’m never going to make it...I don’t want to hang out here anymore, let’s hit it.” Stephen looked at Genes and a silent thought passed visibly between them, “If he had this much trouble getting up here, how will he ever make it to the top?” But since I was feeling OK and wasn’t vomiting blood or anything, they silently agreed. Jo and Charles needed an extra minute to rest, so Genes and I took off while Stephen, Jo and Charles followed about ten minutes behind. Immediately everything had changed. For one thing, it was light now. For another, I was no longer walking on scree; it was now hardened lava flow, rocks and soon icy snow. On one side of the precarious “path” was a fall down into the crater, bouncing along sharp lava rocks and ending up into the hard frozen ice way, way down. On the other side was a sheer slip down the side of the volcano, so far down that I couldn’t even comprehend. Once we passed through the sharp, creviced and hardened lava, we found ourselves on icy snow. But this was no normal snow, instead it was hard ice-packed snow that had melted and refrozen so many times that it now resembled a ridge of three foot ice stalagmites jutting out from the ground every foot or so. We had to balance precariously on each spike, all the time hiking painfully uphill. The sun was incredibly brutal too, making me sweat profusely but not keeping away the freezing wind from my skin. If I thought I had no breath before, that was nothing compared to now. I could only take one step at a time, having to rest for a good minute between each step. I felt like I was going to keel over and pass out with exhaustion and lack of oxygen with each movement. Charles, Jo and Stephen had passed us up long ago, and Genes was visibly antsy up ahead, egging me to “Hurry up!” and stop resting so damn much. Beyond every fiber of my being, I continued step after step, the sun blinding my eyes in its reflection off the ice. Up, up, up, passing an enormous iceberg off to the side and curling around the crater so that we were nearly halfway around from Gilman’s Point. People had been passing me going the other direction since the moment we left Gilman’s point; it was obvious that I was either bringing up the rear or damn close to it. I caught myself at the verge of puking a number of times, but managed to somehow keep it together. Still, I passed many a puke melting in the ice around me, and couldn’t help but notice a particularly reddish one that resembled the sausage/eggplant marinara sauce from the night before...I’d have to ask Charles when I saw him next... I could see people up on Uhuru Peak, about 45 minutes away at the speed I was going. It was agonizing, all I wanted to do was sit down and fall asleep. But I just kept pushing myself, repeating over and over a song that Jim had written for our new album, “...Sometimes acting like I should takes all the strength I have...” Then, up ahead there was Jo, Charles and Stephen coming toward me. When we met, they explained that they had made it and it was beyond words. Congratulations went around, and Charles confirmed that he had, in fact, puked up the sausage/eggplant sauce in the ice, but now he was feeling somewhat better. We didn’t want to waste any time, so we parted as they told me “good luck!” and started climbing again. The last stretch was both the hardest and the most invigorating. It was so close, but I wasn’t going to fall into that same trap and try to go faster than I could, leading to some serious problems. There was no room for mistakes at this height and particularly at my level of climbing non-experience. I concentrated hard, taking one step, resting, breathing frantically, taking another step, resting, breathing frantically, until I unbelievably stepped from the icy snow back onto lava rock where Genes was already waiting. “You made it! You’re here!” he yelled, and I started screaming in joy. I had done it. I conquered this mountain. I conquered myself. It was 7:45 am on Sunday morning, October 11, 1998. In an exhausted, joyful daze, I briefly explored the peak, checking out the Tanzanian flag, the metal box covered in stickers and holding shredded papers inside (which people used to sign upon reaching the peak), and finally picked up the weathered wooden sign proclaiming, “You have reached the highest point in Africa: Uhuru Peak, 5895 meters asl,” and held it in my arms as Genes shot pictures from my camera. I had scrawled a little note, “I LOVE YOU PAIGE!” which I held under the sign - we had actually made it, I just couldn’t even grasp how amazing it was! We were alone, and we really didn’t want to spend more than ten minutes or so on top - we still had a long hard hike back down. But I told Genes that I wanted to write in my journal real quick, which I had brought along for just such an occasion. I tossed him a Power Bar to gnaw on while I wrote, pulled out my nearly frozen pen, and with shaking hands began to write. I stood up and took one final look around. I looked south and could actually see the curvature of the earth. I looked north into Kenya, our next destination. It was still clear, but you could tell that the clouds were just starting to come in; it was time to get going. With one last look around, I told myself to enjoy this exact moment, since I had worked so hard for it and would never again step foot here in my lifetime. I was instantly surprised to see how much energy and lung capacity I had the second we started back down from the peak. I was moving at ten times the speed, and I wasn’t even tiring out, what the hell was going on here? We had to be really careful, because we didn’t want to go so fast that we slipped and fell now that the sun was up and starting to make the icy snow slippery. Genes told me that a few months before a couple was on this exact stretch of the crater when they’d slipped on the ice and slid over the edge of the volcano, falling endlessly down the side of the mountain to their deaths. Not exactly the most inspiring story... We passed the sausage/eggplant barf and nearly bumped into an older gentleman and his guide still coming up the mountain. He was obviously having a difficult time, but asked me how it was. “The most amazing thing ever,” I told him. He smiled and I wished him good luck before we moved on. It was nice to know that we weren’t the last ones... Back at Gilman’s Point, I was surprised to see Charles, Jo and Stephen sitting there. Jo was in bad shape, super nauseous with a pounding headache...she could barely move. Charles wasn’t doing much better, and they were going to hang out there until they felt they could endure the hike down the hellacious scree. I took a quick breather too, realizing that my headache had come roaring back, and popping another 800 milligrams of Ibuprofen to hopefully ease the pain again. I was flabbergasted to see Genes and Stephen relaxing with burning cigarettes - how could they be doing this when I could barely even breathe? Genes and I took off down the scree. I had assumed we’d be following the “path” down, but he told me to start running straight down, landing on my heals the whole way so that I wouldn’t go rolling into oblivion. I tried it and was surprised to find that I could actually run – where did all this energy come from? We bounded down the hill, taking long strides on our heals, sinking into the scree and sending plumes of ash out behind us. After an hour, we stopped for a rest and could see three plumes of ash way up on the hill: Charles, Jo and Stephen with the same tactic. We got going again with ash and gravel in my socks, shoes, clothes, mouth, nose, eyes, ears... but all I wanted to do was get down, and we were descending so fast that I could actually feel my ears pop with the rapid altitude change. I was ecstatic when we rolled into Kibo. Not only had I finished hiking for now, but I had even made it to the top! It all already seemed like a dream, and all I wanted to do was get in my sleeping bag and pass out. Our cook brought me a cold pitcher of Tang-like orange juice, congratulating me on my success. I don’t think I could have felt any better than I did right then. I slowly peeled off my dust-crusted shoes, poured out the ash and gravel, and zipped myself up in my sleeping bag, shivering with cold. Soon Charles and Jo trudged in completely spent and did the same. We all congratulated each other, but were too tired to bask in our warm glow - we passed out almost immediately. The next thing we knew, the cook had brought in soup and tea, and Stephen followed in behind him to tell us that we needed to eat and then head off immediately down the Saddle back to Horombo. We knew this was necessary due to acclimatization problems, but our brief nap had felt so damn good! We were totally sore, totally tired, totally pushed past the brink of everything we had inside of us, but somehow we slowly got out of our sleeping bags, shivering with might, and slurped down the hot soup, instantly feeling better. We packed up our things, gave them to the porters and headed off down the path towards Horombo. I was dying to see Paige. It felt like years since we had last seen each other, although in reality it had only been a little over twelve hours. I was concerned about her, but also confident that she was OK. I couldn’t wait to share the news that I had made it! Soon after setting out, a guide overtook us and told us that his trekker (the last guy I had seen going up as I was coming down from Uhuru) was in bad shape: water on the lungs, and asked us to find his friends at Horombo to let them know. The severity of the situation reminded us just how much of a risk the climb was and how lucky we were to not only conquer the mountain, but be through with it too. We quickly agreed to help and started off again. Even with that news, Jo, Charles and I were in an animated mood as we practically skipped the 12km back down to Horombo. Jo was initially of the opinion that the whole thing was a waste of time, explaining that it was so difficult, crazy and agonizing, that it just wasn’t worth it all. I heartily disagreed, although I had no intention of trying to change her mind. I felt that I had met the limit of my endurance and crashed right through the barrier, realizing that it had been self-imposed. I was intensely proud of my accomplishment, and explained that it was the most meaningful thing I had ever done, because only I had complete control over the outcome. It was an immensely personal victory. Jo and Charles were silent after that, until she finally said, “Wow, I never looked at it that way...” I kept looking for Paige’s waffle footprint in the dirt on the path, imagining her walking this same way 12 hours earlier. I missed her terribly, and kept convincing myself that I saw her print, thus allowing me to feel connected with her. As we rounded the final hill, I heard her screaming “Woo-hoo!” off in the distance. She was waiting for me with a hug and a kiss, having gotten the word that we were close behind from our porters who had arrived ahead of us. She was ecstatic about our accomplishment, and thankfully feeling 100% better. She had actually began feeling better the moment she left Kibo. The porters were fantastic, constantly checking to make sure she was OK, and then tucking her in her sleeping bag down at Horombo and bringing her breakfast and hot tea in bed. Jo, Charles and I crashed into our beds, sore, dirty and deathly tired, immediately falling asleep for the next 5 hours while Paige set out to find the water-on-the-lung friends to pass along the news from above. Paige finally had to rouse us for dinner, so we groggily bundled up to drive off the cold and headed out to the dining cabin. It was all we could do to keep ourselves awake and warm while we relayed our experiences to Paige over dinner. Charles and I each splurged and bought a Safari Lager (porters actually carried up beer, candy and water for sale at incremental rates at each set of huts), but the 22 oz bottles proved bigger than our egos and exhausted bodies, and we barely made dents in them. It was exhilarating looking around the room at all the people who had just arrived from Mandara; we were now the experts, we’d conquered and returned. It was an incredible feeling. We had a brief lunch in the meadow at the Mandara Huts, but butter sandwiches, hard boiled eggs and wine fruit were no longer making the grade when the promise of a real meal was a scant few hours away. By the time we rounded that final glorious bend, each one of us could barely even move a muscle anymore, let alone stand, because we were in so much pain. Our legs were like jelly and our muscles were useless clumps of tissue. We signed all the appropriate books and forms, and we all got nice certificates for reaching Uhuru: I was #4510 to reach the top in 1998. We still had to lounge about for a good hour waiting for Stephen to complete all of his paperwork for our group before we could pile back in the jeep and take off again. The four of us had a hell of a time trying to decide what kind of tips we should give to everyone. It was no secret that tips were the sole motivation for guides, porters and cooks, and these positions were highly competitive. We had gone round and round on the issue, finally agreeing on separate amounts for Stephen, Genes, the cook and the porters, although we were still nervous about giving it to everyone since we didn’t even know if we were in the ballpark. But in the end, we didn’t get lynched or spat upon, so we must have either been close or really far over. We were pitiful blobs of mushy muscles. After saying a heartfelt “goodbye” to Charles and Jo who were leaving the next morning for Dar and then over to Zanzibar, we grabbed our bags from storage and headed back up to our same room at the Y. It seemed like years and a whole different lifetime since we had seen those stored bags before - it was obvious that we were changed people. We immediately showered, anxious to get five days of dirt, sweat and ash off of us, but knowing there was only cold water to do it in. Who cared? I showered for nearly 45 minutes, using an entire bar of soap and still not being able to get all the dirt, ash and grime off. Afterwards it was all we could do but lie on our beds in complete exhausted pain. We realized that if we didn’t get up to go get something to eat then we wouldn’t be moving until morning, so we ripped ourselves from our beds and agonizingly walked downstairs. We grabbed a taxi to the enticing and elegantly named “Golden Showers” restaurant, and moaned in pain and anticipation as our meals were being prepared. Suddenly, breaking up the quiet solitude of the restaurant where we were the sole customers, Jo, Charles, and another couple we’d met on the mountain burst in and we all sat together in celebration. There was a lot of sympathizing with our respective sore bodies, a lot of talk about the sterling trekking food (especially the whole Chrisburger experience), and a lot of laughing. The food was fantastic; they specialized in Impala (wild game, kind of like a gazelle), and it was truly amazing, but we ended up leaving soon after we finished the food because our taxi ride came back at our predetermined time. This was a good thing because we honestly didn’t have an ounce of energy left, and while it was great having one last laugh with our trekking soul mates, we were going to soon pass out in our plates. Back at the “Y,” we had to nearly drag ourselves up the stairs, screaming in agony with each step, but were rewarded with sleep like petrified logs once our heads hit the pillows. |
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