Kilimanjaro Days 4-8
In our debrief the night before, Peter had let us know that Day 4 we would have a pretty big day; we’d be going to Lava Tower, which was well over 15,000’, and that we’d be having lunch there.
Ron had been asking each day since we’d started if we were doing acclimation hikes after getting to camp, and each day Peter said no. This infuriated Ron, as the day-by-day itinerary that we’d been given apparently had acclimatization hikes and he didn’t think we’d be properly prepared without them. Peter kept saying it would be fine, but Ron was argumentative about his need and desire to do extra hiking on top of what we’d been doing.
When he asked that day about an acclimatization hike, Peter let him know that lunch at over 15,000’ was plenty of acclimatization. Plus, Ron was sick and shouldn’t be doing extra hiking anyway if he was trying to make it to summit night on Day 6.
As a full group, we set off on our pole-pole pace toward the Lava Tower and then Baranco Camp, with a sick Rich (who by now had been nicknamed Baba Simba - big lion - for his perseverance through being sick) placed at the front to set the pace. The guides had become increasingly concerned about both him and Ron, but paid special attention to him, as he was not really eating much anymore and was showing signs of getting worse and not better. They made sure he was always right behind a guide and easy to check on. This also meant that we were seemingly moving much slower than would normally be the pace. This was confirmed when we started being passed by group after group, including other Altezza groups.
I began to have a huge internal battle - I was concerned about Rich, who had really grown on me, and didn’t want him to be pushing it and hurting himself in his lack of sure-footedness or making himself more sick by overexerting himself. However, I also was very frustrated that we were once again catering to the slowest person when each person here had paid a large amount of money to have this experience. It felt unfair. I also considered that the slow pace meant we were under the weight of our packs longer, in the sun and weather longer, and on our feet longer. What should be taking us 2-3 hours in most cases was taking 4-5 hours. I stayed quiet while doing all of this thinking and back and forth in brain, going between trying to exercise compassion and empathy and understanding for the situation, being really frustrated by everything feeling like it was catered to “Baba Simba” and ignoring the rest of our needs, feeling like a jerk for having any sort of thought about the situation that wasn’t compassionate, and feeling concerned about the impact extra exposure was having on all of us. It built and built, and next thing I knew I was crying. Embarrassed, but unable to stop or have any control over my emotions, I continued to just walk in silence and cry. Once at our first break, I separated myself from the group to have a good big cry where no one could see or hear and decided I’d just put in headphones, go to the back of the line, and try to work through the exceptionally strong emotions I was having very little control over.
As we started to walk, I assumed my new position and played some music to try to emotionally regulate. The guides had spent 3+ days with me now and were very aware of the fact that I am not a quiet person. It didn’t take long to realize that I was getting some confused and concerned looks from them as I silently trudged along in the back. Within a few minutes, a guide came up along side me and gave me the “ok” signal and a concerned look. I took my headphone out to respond and before I could get words out started to cry so hard I couldn’t speak. Absolutely mortified I turned away and asked for a moment to compose myself, finding that I had almost zero control over my emotions. I know I’m a crier, but this felt really over the top and my complete inability to keep it in was somewhat concerning. I took some big breaths, and then turned to try to explain what was going on in my head and the internal conflict I was going through. I’m not sure how much got through due to my crying and the language barrier, but I think the gist of me being in distressed got across just fine.
Lola, the Russian girl, had been walking in front of me and was witness to the entire thing. She was SO sweet toward me when I was all done explaining my complex thoughts and feelings and encouraged me to cheer up; She expressed how proud she was that I felt my emotions and let them out, and let me know it would all be ok. I apologized profusely for the huge emotional display, absolutely appalled that so many individuals had been witness to it. I felt like such a diva, and wanted so badly for everyone to not think I was high maintenance for crying over our pace and not being more quiet and alright with our circumstances like everyone else appeared to be.
The guide I’d emotionally unraveled on and Khatib, who had heard the whole thing, relayed what happened to Peter and at our tea stop Peter told me I’d be getting my own guide and could go my own pace for the rest of the journey to Lava Tower. I told him that wasn’t necessary and that I could figure it out, and he insisted. So after tea, Khatib and I left the group behind and forged ahead at a pace that felt much more comfortable. I did a bit of processing about what had transpired, a little concerned with my complete lack of emotional control, and then spent the rest of the time having really deep and fun conversations with Khatib about family, ways of being, government, and the traditions of Tanzania. During one of our conversations about Khatib’s marriage and how he only plans to have one wife, a guide from another group passed and chimed in that he has four wives and 16 children. Khatib and I agreed when he got out of earshot that that is too many wives and definitely too many children. I cannot even imagine how expensive that must be…
Things definitely got harder toward the end of our walk, and pole pole was the name of the game. Walking at 15,000’ is no joke…
We made it to Lava Tower and many of the groups had already had their lunch, set off, and their porters were finishing packing up their mess tents. That made it extra obvious just how slow we’d been walking. I rested outside the mess tent and had some tea to kill the hour before the rest of Team Rhino showed up for lunch. They asked if I wanted to eat because lunch was ready already, but I told them that Team Rhino always eats together. I think walking at our own pace is so everyone gets what they need is acceptable, but meals happen together always; Keeping the family we’d built together for meals was essential.
Everyone arrived, exhausted, we tried to eat but all struggled at that altitude; It really kills your appetite. Then we did med checks and everyone reported feeling remarkably drowsy, overheated, and having headaches. This was 4,000’ lower than the summit and had a few of us worried. How were we going to feel in 2 days when we tried to summit?
To descend to Baranco Camp they allowed us to be grouped by desired pace. They acknowledged that downhill paces vary greatly based on comfort, athleticism, and body; Channing had bad knees and a slightly twisted ankle and they had already watched Baba Simba struggle profusely with his footing on downhills.
The downhill was beautiful, with large cliff faces, weird trees called giant groundsels. They had a skinny trunk, and 2-8 thick “branches” that came out and up from the trunk and looked somewhat like aloe plants. Our group consisted of Lola, Pavol, Hyland, Sergei, Sam, and myself. Hyland and Sam and I had continued to chat on all our walks together, Lola and Pavol often kept to themselves in their adorable, lovestruck dynamic, though sometimes they included Sergei who for the most part seemed happy to do his own thing. On this walk, Sergei started to commit to a bit of sorts, almost in gest of the chant the guides were constantly having us do. He would occasionally just say “good job, good job” and then go silent again for a long period of time. It was sweet and unexpected motivation.
Our little group of six made it down pretty quickly and settled into Baranco camp (13,444’) for the evening. That dinner, I started to try to get to know Sergei more, as he’d been sitting on my left every single meal. We’d had some interactions about hot chocolate or the soup, which he seemed to really enjoy, but overall he was quiet and quite reserved. Every question I asked him he’d answer with one or two word answers, and I eventually pointed it out, poking a little fun at him. Sweetly enough, he really tried to change it in order to bond. He’d answer with one word, pause for a second, and then awkwardly add a sentence to give more detail or context. Our awkward interactions became one of my favorite parts of meals.
That night we had a close, clear, stunning view of the mountain and in the morning an equally as stunning view of the river that was between us and where we needed to go.
That morning we got hyped for what is the most exciting day of the trek, aside from summiting: The Baranco Wall. There are tons of internet stories about how hellish the Baranco Wall is, with its traffic jams, scary traverses, the “kissing rock” where you’re smashed against the rock face as you walk across a small ledge, and big rock climbing moves and squeezes. Sam and I were stoked; we’d literally trained for this (unintentionally) in all our activities at home. We were told to wear gloves that day, not because the rock was sharp or because it would be cold, but because the porters are known for spitting and blowing their nose straight onto the rock and we were going to be touching any and all rocks that day. GROSS.
When we began our ascent, majority of the other camps had left it felt like. We could already see a steady flow of traffic and a few traffic jams up along the wall that stood in front of us. Pole pole was the name of the game again, especially because this was very different terrain from the dirt we’d become accustomed to, but also because the path was single track and was clogged up sooner than we’d expected.
We traversed the side of the wall for a few minutes, and then came upon the first feature of the mountain, which was only obvious because of the amount of people stopped and waiting for their turn, one of our guides, Mongi, rushed on ahead and disappeared through the people and over the hump in front of us. Khatib got alongside our group and slowly we inched forward as person after person disappeared over the hump. Finally, our group got close enough to the top of the hump to see over, and the feature was a “slide” of sorts, steep and requiring some usage of one’s butt to feel totally safe. It wasn’t slick or something you actually slid down, in fact you could stand partway through your descent of it, but it was one lane and dangerous if you weren’t given space or time to figure out how to get your body down the steep feature. Alongside the pedestrian route, to the right and on the cliff edge, was the porter route. They were much more quickly and stealthily moving down their section and onto the next part of the wall, as our lane crawled.
At one point, as it got close to our turn, a porter decided to come up and try to squeeze his way into the pedestrian side instead of waiting his turn on the porter side. Khatib noticed this immediately and unleashed on him, yelling in Swahili and gesturing wildly. Khatib is known for being kind and smiley, in the most infectious of ways and pretty much always. So to see this shift, and so suddenly, was shocking. He continued to yell and gesture, getting in the way of the porter and shouting for Mongi below to not let the guy down. Hyland and I, wide eyed, looked at each other and laughed, commenting on how chaotic and enjoyable this day was so far; pole pole is just fine with us if there’s chaos included apparently.
We made it down the feature eventually, and then began the next ascent.
The next feature was a series of very high steps, above the waist almost, while holding onto the rock shelf above, and then squeezing between two rocks to enter an also somewhat tight maneuvering between the wall and some large boulders. Sam and I, as climbers, were having a blast.
Additional features included “the kissing rock,” which we were told was this scary traverse on a little ledge over a cliff in which you must stay very tight against the wall, almost “kissing” it to stay safe. It ended up being all of one move, on a very not scary ledge. You did need to stay close to the wall, but it was short lived and felt very safe overall.
Bill’s favorite feature, he told us later, included some more high steps and rock climbing, and then a very large step, almost jump, across to another rock. It was a jump more for us short people and was definitely exhilarating in its exposure. At no point did I feel unsafe, partially because of my climbing and rock scrambling experience, but also because the guides were so great about stationing themselves in the right spots to offer support where needed.
We finished the wall, had our regular tea break, and then split into a fast and slow group for the second part of the day. This included a lot of descending and the guides knew that we’d all go at very different speeds for that. Our fast group was with Khatib, and we sure did make great time down the hill. Stoked to be moving fast, we saw camp not too far off in the distance and got more excited. Khatib squashed that pretty quickly when he said that we had at least another hour of walking; unsure of how that was possible because camp looked perhaps half a mile or so away, Khatib explained that what we couldn’t see was the Karanga valley between us and camp. We were going to have to go down more, and then up.
As we descended into the valley, we got engulfed in a cloud. It was misty, mysterious, and magical, and made our surroundings just a little eerie.
As we neared the bottom of the valley, the mist became heavier and we started to get wet. Then it lightly began to rain. Oh thank goodness, I was going to get to use the rain gear they had made me pay extra for! Except that rain is so not ideal when you’re on a mountain and going to remain on said mountain for a few more days. We asked the guides if we should put on our rain gear, as we were starting to get wet, and they said no and that it would be fine.
They were wrong. It was not fine. We continued to get wet, and then it started to actually rain. Not caring what the guides said, we stopped and dawned our ponchos, which were massive and covered us and our backpacks.
It rained a few more minutes and then, of course, stopped and became thick mist again. We, by this point, had made it to the bottom of the canyon and were ascending. The ponchos were so large that Sam and I could not see our feet, so every step felt a bit precarious, and eventually the exertion of going uphill mixed with being in a giant plastic bag made us start to overheat. It was a great time. Sergei, bless his heart, had continued to say “good job, good job” the whole way, keeping spirits high. The thought of hot beverages and popcorn when we got to camp kept morale and motivation high-ish.
As we neared the top, a group of porters was sitting on some rocks overlooking the trail and they yelled words of encouragement at us. It was necessary and welcome'; We were having a hard time. We made it to the sign, worse for wear for sure, but glad to be able to change into dry clothes and have some food.
Hours later, the slow group came in. By then it was dark and we had sat down to get ready for dinner. They’d been walking for so long, in the rain and the cold, and were so miserable. Unfortunately, Rich was one of those people, and that additional exposure to the elements did not bode well for him or his sickness.
When we exited the mess tent that night, the sky had cleared and we were left with an absolutely stunning view of the mountain. The small storm had left it covered in snow in a way it had not been before and it stood even more majestic than before in front of us.
The next morning was our last hike before summit. It was day 6 and we needed to get from Karanga camp to Barafu Camp/base camp (15,331’) so that we could start summit that night.
It was only a 2 mile hike, but it took us hours and hours and we once again were passed by group after group. At our tea break, Ron, who seemed really sick of how slow we were walking, talked to Peter about whether or not we were walking normal pole pole or Richard pole pole. Peter admitted it was Richard pole pole because he was so sick, and Ron advocated for the group, saying that that wasn’t fair. Rich then got his own guide, and we finished the hike separately from him.
This was especially important because the amount of time it took us to get to base camp ate into the amount of time we had to sleep that afternoon before being woken up at 10 pm for dinner and the start to our summit hike. Our slow pace earlier in the day meant we didn’t get to camp until almost 2, didn’t eat lunch until about 3, and then didn’t get to go to sleep until 4/4:30.
This hiking day, we added another call and response to our chant. Our group had become very fond of our soups and our nutella, with the mere mention of it being motivation during hikes to get ourselves to camp for lunch or for dinner. Sergei, Khatib, and I jokingly started saying “more soup” with the response “more nutella” and it resonated so much with our group that it became a part of the regular motivational chant.
At 10 pm, as promised in our briefing, we were woken up by Emmanuel serving us a hot beverage. We had the smallest of dinners, consisting of crepes, eggs, and sausage, which was strange given that we were going to be walking literally all night long.
Post-dinner we geared up, and hit the trail. My gearing up consisted of three layers of pants (base layer, somewhat insulated hiking pants, and summit/snow pants), four layers for my top (short sleeve base layer, long sleeve athletic shirt, fleece jacket, and my summit jacket), a pair of wool gloves inside of a pair of snow mittens, two pairs of socks inside of double layered mountaineering boots a friend from home let me borrow, a fleece balaclava, my beanie, and a headlamp. I, surprisingly, didn’t feel like too much of a marshmallow, and even if I had, it would have been worth it to not be cold.
Our group of eleven was accompanied by about nine guides/assistant guides/guides in training/porters, all there for support and safety. Together, we trudged uphill in the dark for hours. Within the first 30 minutes I got way too warm and started to sweat, which was real dangerous. They’d warned us against that and I knew from hiking in New Zealand that if my clothes got wet from sweat there was not way I was going to be able to stay warm. I stopped and took off my fleece and had zero heat issues after that.
About an hour in, we took our first break. They reminded us to drink water, had us sit for a minute, and then ushered us on; Stopping for too long meant we had a chance to get cold and we wanted to avoid that at all costs.
For the first few hours, I kept trying to remember to hydrate on my own and while I still could; we’d been warned that our camelbacks would freeze and we’d be unable to drink water from them eventually. At our second break, much to our surprise, they provided hot tea for us. What a wonderful shock it was to have the guides pull the giant silver thermoses from dinner and tea breaks out of their backpacks and pour us cups of tea. Even more shocking was the amount of powdered glucose they dumped into each steaming cup before handing them to us. Hydration wasn’t going to be an issue, nor was energy apparently. If we asked for it, they would also give out small cookies or cakes.
These breaks were always rushed, with the above happening in less than a minute. Stop, whip out tea, dump in glucose, hand to hiker who then has a minute or two to drink, and then onward. If you had to pee, guess you weren’t going to get to drink much or any of your tea. No time for both.
The guides had warned us that around 3:30 am it would become the coldest part of the night and would remain that way until the sun came up. They told us that everyone would be miserable and cold, even them. We were told to expect to not feel our hands and feet, and that we needed to just push through and move forward; it would be over eventually.
Sure enough, around that time it became bitingly cold. It didn’t help that the wind picked up and it was frigid in a way I have never experienced. Lola claimed it was -4 degrees, which is the coldest I’ve ever been in, hands down. The guides during this time of the night began pretty regular chants and songs, but not the call and response from before. These were beautiful and harmonious, motivating and joyous. I was so so impressed that in the dead of night, in the freezing cold, this group was in a space to sing and chant and continue trying to motivate us.
To try to combat the cold and knowing that my hands are the most cold sensitive part of my body, I’d put hand warmers in my mittens prior to this especially cold part of the night. They were mildly helpful, enough to keep my fingers useful and mobile, and to keep them from feeling like they may fall off. My feet, shockingly, were not cold at all and I was so grateful for my friend and her generosity that I could have cried.
Unfortunately for me, I soon had to pee. At our next break I searched for a wind-sheltered spot, but, understandably so, the sheltered spots were where everyone was taking their breaks. This meant I had to go around to the side where the wind was, take off 3 layers of pants, and pop a squat. It was an experience unlike any other; I was sure that my pee was going to freeze as it was coming out and, my goodness, never in my life have my bits been so cold.
Sometime in the next hour, I had the scariest of my experiences on the trip. I had struggled the last few days to figure out how to breathe with a buff covering my mouth and nose - it was hard to breathe and they always would get wet, which I knew would be an issue on summit. Balaclavas are thicker than buffs, and mine especially given that it was fleece, so the wetness was a concern as well as actually being able to get in enough air while at altitude.
Instead of leaving my balaclava covering my mouth and nose, I’d let it primarily cover my mouth and then occasionally and briefly my nose to warm it up. I really only could let it cover the lower part of my mouth though, as breathing just through my nose didn’t feel like it was giving me enough oxygen and I needed to mouth breathe now and again to supplement. Deep in the hours of the coldest part of the night, the air I was inhaling felt so cold that it felt like my lungs were freezing. The more breaths I took, the colder the inside of my chest felt and the more anxious I got that something was wrong. I panicked internally for a minute or two, really panicked, and then when I couldn’t handle it anymore, asked Ria, the girl from Dubai, if she was having the same experience. She said she was, which made me feel slightly better. That didn’t mean it was good though. So I asked Peter, who was leading the charge, and he said that was perfectly normal and not to panic too much. It would be getting warmer soon enough.
That soon enough could not come soon enough. I don’t remember much more of the walking or breaks; It’s almost like my body and brain zoned out and blacked out those portions until the moment where Hyland turned around and said to me “Ally, look to the right.” Off at the horizon there was the slightest bit of pink, barely noticeable, but absolutely there. The sun was going to come up. We were not going to be walking in the dark for forever. My eyes welled up and I cried. It wasn’t even close to light out yet, but the hope of light and warmth, the joy of knowing we were so close and had come so far, the exhaustion from being up and walking all night, and the intense feeling of camaraderie and togetherness in this experience overwhelmed me.
The sun slowly made its way up as we too made our way up. The lighter it got, the more invigorated we got. We could see the top, and the sky was doing beautiful things. It was going to be a good sunrise, and the last 7 hours of walking was going to absolutely be worth it.
Just as we took our last few steps and reached Stella’s point (18,885’), the first of the two summits, the sun broke the horizon and bathed us in a beautiful orange glow. The snow covered peak stood before us and we excitedly and exhaustedly cheered. We had made it (almost) and were getting to experience the most stunning sunrise on the tippy top of Africa.
After a quick rest at Stella’s point, we had some more walking to do to get to Uluru Peak (19,341’). It took us about 45 more minutes, but we had full sun and more motivation than ever after the stunning sunrise experience we’d just had.
The terrain was different than the dirt, rocks, and occasional snow patch we’d just been walking up for hours. This was all snow, which meant it had more give and a little slip, and felt like it used a lot more energy to make forward progress. Halfway into this last section, my body screamed at me that it was beyond depleted. It was done. Not knowing what else to do, I gave my backpack to a porter, thinking that having a lighter load might help. It did, but only for a few minutes. I realized, I needed food. ASAP. It was 7 am and all I’d had since 10:30 pm was glucose filled tea and one cookie.
I turned to Hyland and said “I am so hungry and depleted. I’m not sure I’m going to make it.” Then this remarkable human pulls a little cake out of his pocket and hands it to me. I squealed with delight, thanking him profusely, and did my best to unwrap it with my double gloved hands. My best ended up being a bunch of fumbling, frustration, and then dropping it. I stared in horror as the cake laid on the ground and the saran wrap that had been on it got whisked away off the mountain by the rather strong winds on the ridge-line we were on.
Needing the food, I picked it up and ate it, meanwhile making a promise to myself that I’d pick up all the garbage I see on trails from here on out to make up for littering on the top of Kilimanjaro. The cake gave me the littlest bit of life, enough to let me actually appreciate the beauty of the mountain we were on and get me to the real summit.
The top was somewhat chaotic. The guides seemed really worried about letting us hang out there too long. So we dropped our stuff and lined up to take photos with the sign.
Picture. Go. Picture. Go. Picture. Go. The only disruption to this process was when Bill decided during his and Channing’s picture to get down on one knee and propose. There was a roar of applause and hooting and hollering. Channing looked beyond stunned, eventually composing herself enough to say yes. What a place to get engaged!
Not enjoying the craziness of the area around the sign, I went back to the backpacks and found Sergei there. He had his thermos out and in it was the special Nutella hot chocolate I’d been making since day 1. He poured me a cup and as I drank it, the warmth of the hot chocolate, as well as the love for this group and this experience with them spread through me; a cup of hot chocolate has never tasted so good.
After mere minutes on the summit, the guides got us geared back up and started us back down to Stella’s point. It was much slipperier on the way back down, and I may or may not have taken a spill that then turned into a rather fun slide. Back at Stella’s point, we were given our “breakfast” which was a box of mango juice, a little cake, and a snickers bar. SO. MUCH. SUGAR.
During this food break, Rich showed up! He had been doing the entire summit with his own guide and at his own pace, and he had made it! The group was overjoyed to see him, and so proud of him for making it all the way there.
The descent, which we had been told was the most dangerous part and the part where most people get hurt, was heinous. Instead of going back down the way we had come up, we went an alternative route that was remarkably steep and slippery. It was scree and slick dirt, and was downright terrifying. Pair that with little to no sleep, walking all night, not having a real meal in far too long, and being at altitude, I’m not surprised so many people get injured.
We split into a fast and slow group again, with our little group led by the ever jolly Khatib. He was such a good sport about our endless complaining about how much our feet and knees hurt and how tired we were. We asked him at one point, at the very last part of the descent if he hurt anywhere and he simply said, “nope.” What a beast.
We got down exactly 12 hours from when we’d left camp, exhausted and ready for rest and food. Ron, who was in our group, was especially suffering and looked much worse for wear. It was pretty concerning. As we came down the hill and entered camp, the porters who had stayed behind serenaded, greeted, and celebrated us with another chant and song. Their cheerful clapping and chanting was the perfect way to end such a long, arduous day.
Cruelly, after our celebration, we were informed that we had 2 hours to pack, eat, and rest before needing to walk some more down to our camp for the night. We were in disbelief. There’s no way they expected us to be in good enough shape to walk more milage after what we’d just been through.
Luckily, because we were the first group back, we got a little bit of extra time. Eventually all the Rhinos trickled in, and we had lunch. Ron and Rich were oddly absent from lunch, and we were informed that both of them were getting oxygen and were not doing well. They’d join us when they could.
Slightly less beat up after eating and a little rest, our fast group literally raced down the mountain to the next camp. Peter I think was trying to make me put my money where my mouth was when it came to speed, because that man pretty much ran down the mountain at points. I kept up, as did Sam, Hyland, and Sergei, and eventually he just let us do our own thing and had me lead while he socialized with other guides.
We made it down to camp in record time, before most of the porters actually and before camp was set up. They seemed embarrassed about that, but we were fine to lounge around on the ground and chat more. We were just happy to not be on our feet.
As we entered camp, I got sort of proposed to for the second time on this trip. A guide from Altezza, but from another group, was nearby and had a nametag that said “Ally.” I’d learned by now that in Africa, that’s a male name, and as we passed I said hello to him and told him that we had the same name. He was overjoyed and said “seems like we need to get married then.” We had a quick banter about it and I moved on. I know my standards are historically low, but I need a bit more from someone before considering marriage.
The rest of our group, sans Rich and Ron, showed up an hour later and we enjoyed our final sunset together before dinner. The moon was full and we were still high enough that we were above the clouds.
Rich and Ron eventually showed up, but during dinner. They both looked and sounded awful and it had taken them almost 4 hours to walk the 3 miles down to camp. Ron couldn’t eat, and was slouched over in a very concerning way. He kept complaining about his head hurting, his chest hurting, his abdomen hurting, etc. Something was very wrong.
During medical checks, the guides seemed very concerned and as we all got into bed, you could hear that they were doing some more checks on him. One of them went to fetch Hyland, and the poor guy had to spend 30+ minutes convincing his father that he needed to go down and go to the hospital. Peter had heard fluid in his lungs and every time he tried to lay down he’d start choking. Ron refused for quite some time, but eventually Hyland let him know he didn’t really have a choice. So at 9:30 at night, they put Ron on a stretcher and took him down the hill.
On our final morning, the moon was still out and the sky was just as beautiful as the evening before. It honestly looked like a continuation of the same sunset.
After breakfast and before our 13 km hike out, there were speeches, appreciations, chants, and lots of love shared among the 53 people who had embarked on this journey together over the last 8 days.
Peter led the fast group again, as he needed to get to the gate and get our certificates printed from the park office before the entire group showed up. Hyland and Lola and I walked with him, but then Lola fell pretty far behind and Peter stayed with her, leaving Hyland and I to fend for ourselves. The path was a mixture of slick rock that was quite wet and mud, lots of mud. It was true adventure hiking.
We watched a number of porters fall and toss the load they were carrying in the process, which made us all the more cautious. These guys do this all the time and were falling, which meant this trail was no joke. Hyland and I spent the whole time talking about a variety of topics, furthering our bond, and just enjoying the joy of slipping around in mud and getting dirty. We occasionally had a moment of concern for Rich walking down such a precarious trail, and moments of awe that his dad had been brought down this trail in the night on a wheeled stretcher.
One of my favorite moments from the muddy trek down was this yo-yoing we did with a pair of women and their two guides. We’d trail chat, saying “jambo” or “mambo” and “poa,” and then maybe make a comment or two about the trail conditions or the fact that we were alone with no guide (Peter had fallen behind to who knows where and Hyland and I were on our own). On the third yo-yo past this group, one of their guides looked at me and said “naku penda.” I stopped, got a surprised looked on my face, and responded with a perky “oh wait! I know what that means!” I couldn’t remember for the life of me, what the response was though. The man, looking horrified that I understood, had just said “I love you” to me and gotten “oh wait! I know what that means” as a response, with nothing else. I eventually said “asante sana” (thank you very much), but the damage was done. The poor guy and I had a few more passes after that, and each time we shared a somewhat uncomfortable, but sweet smile.
When Hyland and I finally reached the gate we were really grateful. As fun as it had been to slip and slide and chat, our legs were tired and after days of walking we were ready to not be walking anymore. They had us sign in the registry one final time and then we got to just hang until the rest of our crew showed up.
Eventually they did, also overjoyed to be done, and we feasted and drank. During our final meal together, which sadly did not have any soup, we laughed, celebrated our accomplishment, retold stories, and enjoyed each other’s company.
Once our bellies were full, the guides, who had all somehow showered and changed into nice clothes and were putting all us dirty hikers to shame, lined us up and did a small ceremony to present us with medals and certificates of accomplishment. It was cheesy and silly, but heartwarming and sweet.
By the time we were back at the hotel, our group had been split up. We’d dropped various pairs off at different lodgings, and only Bill and Channing and Sam and I remained. We planned to reunite for dinner, whoever could make it, which ended up just being Sergei, Hyland, Bill, Channing, Sam, and I. We learned that Ron had pneumonia, as did Rich, but both were doing just fine and would recover. As a small group, we drank the champagne that was given to us by Altezza to celebrate and had our final meal as a baby version of team Rhino.
Sleeping in a bed that night was glorious. Taking a hot shower for the first time in 8 days, also glorious. But best of all was finishing this last piece of my year off of work, stand on the highest freestanding mountain in the world, and getting to do it with the best group of people.