Mt Kilimanjaro
Climbing Mt Kilimanjaro is the hardest thing I have ever done both mentally and physically. It is the tallest free standing mountain in the world at 19,341 ft. It took us 6 days to climb 4 days up and 2 days down and one of the biggest reasons that it’s so hard is that you have to adjust to the altitude so you are able to breath :) We were with a big group about 16 of us along with our porters and guides. The porters are the locals that help us transport all of our tents, food, tables, chairs, water, etc. They are amazing!! Some of them have climbed the mountain over 100 times.
This hike was done through GIVE Volunteers. Its an add on to their Tanzania program.
Throughout the hike I recorded voice memos about two times a day. They are VERY explicit so i’m sorry for my language if you listen to them :-)
Day 1:
The day started off colder than expected at about 55 degrees, so I was in a tank top and shorts where we hiked about 4 hours to our first basecamp. We had our day backpacks along with our walking sticks, some snacks, and two liters of water. Altitude sickness was one of the things that we were very cautious about, so all of us took medication to prevent this. All in all the first day wasn’t too bad.
Day 2:
Honestly this was the second hardest day 😂 It was supposed to be the dry season and all of the sudden it starts raining and it was so foggy that we couldn’t see anything and it was so slippery while we were jumping passed huge boulders I thought my life was flashing before my etes. Some of the people in our group were not prepared for rain at all. Thankful for my grandpa for getting me all water proof gear 🙏
Day 3:
After the terrible day 2 we finally were able to see the sun for the first time in days. We could finally bring out our speaker and listened to music while trekking. We went to the lava towers which was over 13,000ft high within 4 hours. At the end of this it started to hail and we finally got to basecamp at 12,000 ft high. Went through the desert and the Alpine forest where we saw a waterfall and very odd trees.
Day 4:
About 5 people puked during the night. I woke up in the middle of the night just listening people vomit :) Other than that it was a beautiful day. We rock climbed and got to above the clouds and got some awesome photos. Today we hiked a total of 8 hours.
Day 5:
We started our day at Midnight in hopes that we would summit before the sun came up. It was pitch black, snowing, and freezing. We put on our gear and started to head up the mountain (very slowly). I really thought this hike was never going to end since you are too tired to speak to anyone. Basically you’re left with only your thoughts in your head while putting one foot in front of the other. This is when I started to notice the lack of oxygen we had because even if you wanted to take a sip of water it felt like you had just ran a marathon.
As we were nearing the top one girl was in front of me and the guide kept telling her that we only had 20 minutes left (THANK GOD). Once we got to that point I fell to the ground crying tears of joy thinking how in the world did I just freaking do that. PLOT TWIST it was only Stella’s point.. which is NOT the top and we still had another hour to the tallest point. I was so mad and didn’t even want to do it anymore so I started crying again :) , but obviousIy I didn’t make it all that way to quit. So we hiked another hour made it to the top saw all the glaciers and I felt like I was on another planet. Physically and mentally I felt like I was not on Earth.
The Climb Down and Ending Thoughts:
The climb down from the top was so painful i thought my kneecaps were going to explode. You have to keep catching yourself from falling and at one point I had zero energy left and just fell to the ground and laid there for a little 😄 We finally made it back on the ground and got our first shower in 6 days..
We packed up all of our stuff and I got on a plane heading back to the states. The plane took off and I started watching La La Land with a glass of wine in my hand.. someone who worked on the plane started speaking Swahili over the intercom and this lady next to me tapped me very hard and told me to lift my window up (i was very annoyed since i wanted to watch my movie) anyway i lifted it up and that’s when I saw the mountain from up above. I was in such disbelief because we had been ascending for 20 minutes and how in the world did I freaking climb that!!! That’s moment when I realized how amazing the whole experience was and how grateful I was to have had that opportunity.
