Kilimanjaro Revealed

Africa - Day 7 - Sunday September 29

Even though wake up was at 7 AM, we were all up by 6.  Evan was the first out of the tent and he quickly called us all out to see Kilimanjaro.  For the first time on this trip, we were able to see how beautiful this mountain really is.  There wasn't a cloud in the sky.  Well, at least not a cloud above us. Looking down at the valley was a different story. The clouds formed a solid layer at around 3000 feet (guess).  From our camp we could see the sides of Kilimanjaro slope down below us for 1000s of feet before disappearing in to the clouds.

The night was cold. Evan and Jamie claimed the slept ok.  I slept great despite being cold.  I had to have my entire body in the sleeping bag to stay warm.  In the morning I realized why I was more cold than normal.  Somehow the crew had opened all the vents in my tent,,, I had no idea. I won't let that happen again.  Breakfast was at 7:30.  Papua fruit, followed by porridge, followed by an egg sandwich.  We were on the trail by 8 AM.

The trail from camp went straight up hill.  By 8:30 we were down to our t-shirts.  The sun was shining strong and the views were incredible. By 9 AM the clouds had rolled in and the temperature dropped by about 20 degrees. We quickly put our warm weather gear back on and continued to hike.  We hiked up to 14,500 (camp was 13,200) before reaching another ridge. From that ridge we could see camp but, like the day before, we would have to hike down through a valley and back up the other side. 

The valley wasn't as far down as the day before but it was about a mile long.  On the other side of the valley we started up a steep slope to the ridge that lead to camp.  The valley and the ridge meet at 15,000 feet.  From there we hiked another 300 feet veticle (another 30 minutes) to camp. 

Walking through the other tent setups to our campsite was a bit surreal.  This ridge was much steeper than last night’s camp so everyone was tucked in wherever there was room.  As we were walking towards our camp site we were passing folks who had summited that morning and were back at their tents enjoying breakfast / lunch.  You could tell they were very proud of their accomplishment.

Our camp was at the highest point before the start of the trail to the summit.  We got to camp early, just before 11 AM.  The hike took 2:54, we hiked, 2.35 miles and camp was at 15,357.  Just after arriving at camp we enjoyed lunch and then spent the afternoon hanging out.  Evan and Jamie took naps and I spent sometime on the blog and just walking around the campsite talking to other hikers who were gong to be starting the summit hike that night as well.

A 5 o'clock it was dinnertime.  We were all still full from lunch so we didn't eat much.  After dinner our guide did one final equipment check and cleared us for the summit hike. We were told to sleep until our 11 PM wake up call.  I think I ended up getting 2 hours of sleep.  Evan and Jamie claimed they slept for about an hour.  Our 11 PM wake up call was the start to the finish of a trip we will never forget.