Richard at 12:00 AM  

5:45 PM at Horombo Hut. I didn’t really sleep at all last night. I just laid in bed and waited for the 12:00 AM wake-up call. I did have to get up once at 8 PM to pee - I went outside, turned off my headlamp, and squatted. Anyway, I’m too tired to write the rest of what happened, seeing as I got no sleep last night and hiked for over 13 hours today, climbing 4,000 feet and descending 7,000 feet. I need to rest...

I barely slept at all at Kibo Hut. I think I had myself convinced that I wasn’t going to make it. My headache had pretty much gone away, but I was really afraid that it was going to come right back as soon as I started to climb. I had gone over everything I might need about a thousand times during the night, and so I started getting dressed right away at the wake-up call. It seemed like everyone got ready so fast - I managed to have a cup of ginger tea and a biscuit. I also took some precautionary Advil, but no Diamox. Everyone was popping pills left and right - Advil, Tylenol, Diamox, Immodium-AD, vitamins, ginger, etc. etc., hoping that anything might increase their chances of making it to the top. I was finally ready and putting my coat on when George, our head guide, came in and asked how I was doing. He knew I had a headache the day before and I guess that he thought I was most likely to have problems. So when we assembled our group outside, George said “I go first, Mama next. Mama stay with me all night.” And in fact I did stay with George all night.

We started the climb at 1 AM from Kibo Hut, elevation 15,520 feet. It wasn’t a full moon, but the moon was still big and bright enough that we were able to hike by moonlight. We hiked in a line, George, then me, then the seven guys, and then the three other guides, Simon, Stephen, and Sanford. It didn’t seem too cold at first, but it quickly got much colder. Nobody spoke, everyone was lost in their own thoughts. It felt almost like an ominous funeral procession. I began to feel really weak, almost like I was going to faint. My head wasn’t hurting, but I had that tingling feeling in my mouth that you get right before you puke. I had that feeling all night long, and eventually I was spitting a lot because I was that close to throwing up.

   Hans Meyer Cave
I began to have trouble focusing on the next step. I was also stopping a lot, and since I was first behind George I felt like I was holding up the rest of the group. So I was starting to feel rushed and self-conscious of my pace. I would quickly become out of breath after 100 steps (I was counting). The scree was pretty loose but it wasn’t too bad because George had us doing switchbacks. I just kept telling myself to at least get to Hans Meyer Cave, which is the halfway point to Gilman’s Point. I kept telling myself that I could live with just getting to the cave and then I would turn back. Then I kept thinking about my nice warm sleeping bag and I really started to think that I would be much better off asleep at the hut waiting for the guys to get down. Somehow I was able to focus enough on getting to the cave that I was able in fact to make it there. I took about 2 ½ hours to reach Hans Meyer Cave. When we got there, everyone huddled inside and George gave us all tea and biscuits. I was pretty out of it. I vaguely remember saying something like “I’m thinking about whether or not I should just go back to the hut.” Nobody said anything to that. George kept forcing me to drink my tea. Then I remember George hugging me and saying “Mama you make it. You can do it.” And he looked at me closely in the eyes to make sure I was ok.

Getting up and moving on is definitely a blur, but somehow I did it. We continued on after the cave, and I kept asking if we could split up into groups because I wasn’t comfortable going my own pace if I knew I was holding the others up. Finally Don and Jeff went ahead with Stephen, and they were the first ones in our group to make it to Uhuru Peak. I kept trudging along right behind George. I started taking more and more breaks, sitting on a rock for a minute to catch my breath. Eventually the breaks became too frequent for Rich and Dad. So they went ahead with Jerry and Simon.

Slowly and miraculously I began to gain more strength, and I really started to keep a good pace with George. I began to notice that Paul and Wil were lagging behind me. Suddenly I realized that I was far from holding up the whole group. But I had George motivating me every step of the way, grabbing my arm and telling me that I was ok. So I started spreading that to Paul, saying “Paul you’re almost there. You’re going to make it.” I think I hit a certain point after the cave when I realized that I was more than halfway to Gilman’s Point, so there was really no alternative but to continue on, especially since I had no headache and wasn’t vomiting (even though I felt like I would). I never looked back, I just kept looking up, and mostly I just looked at the back of George’s feet as I followed him.

Eventually we came upon Jerry. I could only make out his white jacket in the darkness, and I asked if it was him. He told me he had to stop to take a shit, plus Simon was going a little fast for him. He rejoined our group, and so it was George, me, Paul, Jerry, Wil, and Sanford. George and I started getting more ahead and the others were lagging behind. Paul told me later that I really motivated him to continue and that he might not have been able to succeed without having my pace to follow. Jerry seemed to be a little hypothermic - he was slurring his speech and trailing behind Paul. Wil was even further back with Sanford. I didn’t realize until we were at the top that he was out of it too. While these three got weaker with every step, I really seemed to get stronger. At one point after the cave I thought that I was getting frostbite on my hands, and Wil lent me his nylon wind gloves. &Once I put those on the wind stopped cutting through my gloves and my hands got much warmer. I’m not sure how much longer I would have lasted without those.

Gilman's Point   

We finally made it to Gilman’s Point about 6:15 AM, just as the sun was beginning to rise behind Mawenzi and the horizon. It was so cold, I was shivering like crazy. I broke out the American flag and we took a bunch of pictures. Then the guys started talking about going to Uhuru Peak. That is the actual summit, but it is only 500 feet higher and over a mile and a half across the crater rim. I hadn’t planned on it - I had focused all of my energy on getting to Gilman’s. But then I kind of said why not and started moving.

Sunrise over Mawenzi

It took us two hours to get across the crater rim to Uhuru Peak, 19,340 feet. As the sun rose it became warmer. The hike to the peak was slow-going because we were all so exhausted. We passed Don and Jeff coming back around, and then we passed Dad and Richard. Dad was so happy to see me. He said “I would have waited but I thought you didn’t make it.” They headed down and we continued on to Uhuru. The glaciers were incredible to look at and the sky was totally blue. We got to Uhuru around 8:30 AM - it was me, Paul, George, and Jerry. Wil was behind with Sanford, taking his time and taking a lot of pictures. George and I got there first, and I hugged him and cried and thanked him for everything. There were four other people up there too. Then Paul and Jerry came up and we took pictures by the sign - Uhuru Peak The Highest Point in Africa. We all wrote in the logbook which was kept in a metal box. Even though the sun was up it was still really cold, so after about ten minutes we started the descent.

Glaciers

  George and I at the Summit