Mission Accomplished: 1 Day Early

Hey folks, back in Moshi, finished the climb in 8 days instead of 9. I should probably just leave it at that since it actually sounds impressive. But it really is not impressive. The record for the 9 day climb is 6 days and 8 days lets you fully enjoy the scenery and the experience. So we mashed days 5 and 6 together because they were 2 separate 3 hour hikes (1 each day). That seemed ridiculous and I was happy to eliminate a night at the cold, high altitudes in exchange for a slighlty tougher trek (although 6 hours is not that bad, just tougher at 14,000 feet).

Climbing Kili was great. We had a great crew and my guide, Genes, was very knowledgeable. I will get to the crew later, but first explain the climb. Kilimanjaro is not a technical climb in any sense of the word. Honestly, it does not require great physical fitness, it just requires acclimatizing which is pretty random and hard to predict (unless of course you were born in nepal and have much more oxygen absorbing hemoglobin in your blood, you could run up Kili without breaking a sweat if that were the case). The first and last days are really just short 2-3 hour bursts of settling in and exiting the park gates. So you really only "climb" for 6 days. The route i took (Lemosha) is longer and more scenic than the normal 6 day Macheme climb that most people take. Lemosha allows you to see more of the terrain (rainforest, to moorland, to alpine desert, to inactive volcano, etc). The hike gradually takes you up to 15,300 feet over the first 5 days. This allows you to acclimatize which posed no problem for me up to that point. On day 6 we hiked to the summit. This is a bit more intense. It is steeper and you ascend 4,000 feet in 6 hours (much faster than we had been doing in prior days). We eventually made it up to Uhuru Peak (the summit of kili). In swahili, Uhuru means: "massive headache." Well, it doesn't, but it should. It actually means "Freedom."

The climb to the peak was fine until about 17,500 and then the massive headache set in. The guide just makes you go slower, take more breaks, drink more water, and eat packets of glucose all the way up. By the time you reach the summit, you just want to take your pictures and head down the mountain. So that is what we did. A rapid descent would be a understatement of the process. We literally ran down the mountain. It took us 6 hours to get up and 1 hour to get down. But your lungs and head thank you for running down the mountain where the O2 is slightly better than the thin air at 19,300 feet.

On summit day, Genes and i went up with 4 porters. They didn't carry as much stuff as normal, as they agreed to split the weight and spread out the pain. Also, one of the younger porters had never actually been to the summit (although he had carried many a bag to Stella Point, the last stop before the summit at 18,700 feet). We hike to the summit during the day (7 am til about 2 pm). Most people start hiking up at midnight in order to see the sunrise at 6 am. Hiking up during the day was just fine. You still get to see the early morning sun and the scenery from the climb up was spectacular that day. Since it is "winter" here in Tanzania, clouds usually cover the entire valley starting in mid morning, but on our summit day the clouds were sparse and provided for great pictures.

It is very quiet on much of Kili, i think this was because i took an alternative route and also was climbing about 1-2 weeks prior to the start of the busy season (tourism is also down a bit given the economic situation). The first night we were the only ones at the campsite, the 2nd and 3rd nights there was only 1 small group at each campsite. Finally on day 4 we met up with the people climbing the popular Macheme route (mostly Canadians and Americans with a few Brits thrown in). Day 5 was the only real intereaction i had with "westerners" as a fellow New Yorker and I spent the day climbing together from Barranco to Barafu (the "base camp" for sumitting Kili). He was a colorful character that was from Alaska, China, Vietnam, San Fran, NYC, etc. An entrepreneur that does a bunch of adventure travel, he has been his "i don't feel like working and want to travel" routine for about a year, something i am just embarking on. We will likely meet up to do some good traveling, maybe another hike or some scuba, because working is really just so overrated.

Ok, the Tusker Crew (i climbed with Tusker Trail). There were 12 in all. Genes was the guide and we spent most of the 8 days together. He was a great guy and we had a lot of fun. Tusker is a very serious outfitter that takes all necessary precautions, does a medical check every morning and night to ensure that you acclimatize well. The biggest problem with those that can't acclimatize is pulmonary or cerebral edema. These are bad news and if you get them at any point you can be finished for good. We actually spent much time talking about our respective countries and how they each operate. He wanted to learn more about the economic crises and why Americans spend so much money and why we thought it was ok to invade Iraq. We talked about African politics, Zim, Sudan, Kenya and spent much time talking about the Middle East. He also didn't understand how there were still poor people in China and didn't believe that given their economic boom it was possible. Unfortunately most of China is still very poor even by Tanzanian standards. We also got to talking about religion, most people here are Christian (Islam is dominant on the coasts of East African countries).

The rest of the crew was also great. It feels weird to be "served" while climbing, but that is part of the job. After a few meals, i eventually convinced Genes that i wanted to sit with everyone in the kitchen and interact, not be segregated like many of their other clients are used to. Although much of the conversation took place in swahili, it was still great to be involved and be part of the "inside jokes" and nicknames that went around. We really did have a great time and we actually finished our climb by having beers at the gate at 11 am. Apparantly it is not normal for the clients to interact so heavily with the crew. But it was great to do so, and they appreciate it much more that way. If i am going to come live/work here at some point, i better get used to interacting (and learning the language)!

So here is the list of the crew:

Genes - Guide
Gusto - Cook; everyone called him Keyla (a girls name) and also called him "Pretta Jhay" (i am probably butchering the swahili spelling here), but that effectively means "spoiled" He was the talker of the group and tried to pawn the name Pretta Jhay off on me at the end of the trip given we had very similar birthdays, and obviously i was the client that had all his stuff carried for him!
Francis - Rescue porter, walked with Genes and I the entire time carrying a stretcher in case of emergency (this is a purely Tusker Trail luxury, unnecessary, but better safe than sorry. He busted his ankle on the 5th day and had to be escorted down the mountain, he is doing ok now, just needs some time to rest.
Vasco Joshua - The waiter (which means he cleans all their dishes too). His nickname was "Cheersman". The only one was was not Chagga - he was from southern Tanzania
Herbert - The campmaster. He would speed past us on the trail despite carrying 15 kilos on his head and would set up camp by the time we got there.
Arnold - He carried and took care of the latrine. Yes, i am serious, Tusker carries its own personal shitter. I thought it was ridiculous, but this guy gets paid more than a normal Tusker porter, so i guess it is somewhat desirable. I tried to be a man and use the woods like anormal outdoorsman as much as possible. Apologies for the graphic nature of this portion of the entry.
Rogers - porter, youngest one on the trip, 21
Malisa - porter, very tall kid, another young one, 24, was the assistant cook all week
Godchance - yep, that is right, his real name, oldest one, 36, porter
Azael - smallest guy, probably 5'2" pushing 110 if lucky and still tougher than me, carrying all that heavy stuff.
Habib - porter
Yasin - porter

Honestly, these guys are tough. They carry 15-20 kilos on their head and they go up the trail faster than us and come down faster than us. The food was actually really good and Genes forced me to eat so much that i probably didn't lose any weight all the way up.

They are all part of Genes' crew, i would highly recommend Tusker Trail and this crew for your climb! I would be happy to do it again in the future (i know some of you have expressed interest...hamptons crew...). Let me know, maybe later this year or next year when i am living here or nearby.

Long entry, ok, off to Kenya tomorrow. Probably won't have access for the next 2 weeks. Hope everyone is well.