Kevin J. Kelly
14 August 2007
column
Nairobi — The EastAfrican's US correspondent Kevin J Kelly, a 58 year old from Vermont, recently climbed Mount Kilimanjaro and managed to reach Uhuru Peak, the tallest point in Africa. Vomiting, diarrhoea, dehydration and even the possibility of being one of the five people who must die annually while trying to go up the mountain were just some of the obstacles to contend with
THE AGONY EXPERIENCED BY OUR party during the last day of a recent climb up Mount Kilimanjaro was offset - almost - by the collective ecstasy felt at reaching the top of the world's tallest freestanding mountain.
There were individual joys as well. At the 19,340-foot summit, two men in our seven-member group made marriage proposals that were accepted by their respective sweethearts.
Uhuru Peak certainly serves as a uniquely romantic setting, although the two couples may have trouble remembering their magical moments there. All of us were at least slightly delirious by then, and most were also suffering the messy symptoms of acute mountain sickness.
One of the newly engaged women, an Australian, had vomited 25 times during the final ascent. And her partner, an India-born Aussie, would take a nasty header after inexplicably breaking into a gallop on a section of loosely packed glacial scree during our descent. He lay unconscious, face-down, for a few minutes, but turned out to have only sustained cuts to his face and arms.
The other prospective spouses, Norwegians in their late 20s, were also feeling the predictable effects of having reached an altitude hostile to all life forms. Excruciating headaches afflict almost every first-time Kili summiteer. And diarrhoea seems to be as common as vomiting, with the result that climbers leave plenty of unpleasant evidence of their presence on the mountain.
We couldn't say we hadn't been warned of what awaited us.
Seamus Brice-Bennett, manager of the Marangu Hotel near Moshi, Tanzania, had given our group a thorough briefing the night prior to the start of our climb. Our host's comfortable accommodation didn't help, however, in preparing us for the rigours of the climb up Kilimanjaro's Marangu Route - one of three trails to the summit used by inexperienced tourist-adventurers such as ourselves.
Mr Brice-Bennett described the signs of a pair of altitude-related ailments that require immediate attention - including a non-negotiable end to an affected climber's ascent.
Cerebral oedema, potentially fatal, is easily identified, Mr Brice-Bennett explained. Its sufferers start acting like drunks - swerving, stumbling and often slurring their speech. Some become belligerent as well, he noted. But a speedy descent almost always results in full recovery, he reassuringly added.
PULMONARY OEDEMA IS Harder to detect partly because its main symptom - shortness of breath - appears in almost all climbers once they pass the 12,000-foot mark. The key distinction between "normal" gasping and a life-threatening condition, Mr Brice-Bennett pointed out, is that pulmonary oedema causes a climber to continue panting even after resting for a few minutes. Again, an immediate descent is essential.
The hotel proprietor, an experienced mountaineer, didn't tell us that an average of about five Kili climbers die annually. Most recently, for example, a 65-year-old Canadian lost his life near the summit last March.
That death rate is certainly daunting, but it's actually not much greater than for other extreme sports given that some 30,000 tourists set out to conquer Kili each year.
Mr Brice-Bennett also offered advice that probably proved instrumental to our group's relative success. Take it pole-pole, he told us. Ignore the hiking times posted on signs at each of the three overnight huts along the Marangu Route. If the posting indicates the next stop is five hours away, allow at least seven hours to get there. Proceed at "window-shopping pace," Mr Brice-Bennett suggested. Give your bodies plenty of time to get acclimatised to the altitude.
"A surprisingly high proportion of overweight smokers do get to Uhuru Peak," he explained, "because they have the proper respect for the mountain." It's the super-fit show-offs who invite failure by assuming they can't be adversely affected by climbing as rapidly as possible, he added.
We were also advised to drink at least two litres of water per day, even if we didn't feel thirsty. Regular hydration helps the body function properly at heights where it's not meant to be at all, he said.
I don't doubt the wisdom of the water-intake recommendation. (After all, I did reach Uhuru Peak with few physical problems, despite being, at age 58, the senior member of our party by at least a dozen years.) But extra hydration comes at the price of frequent urination. At home in the United States, my sleep is seldom disturbed by the demands of a brimming bladder; on Kili, I had to seek relief at least twice a night.
THE MEMBERS OF OUR FULL contingent, which originally numbered nine, were in high spirits as we set off from the Mount Kilimanjaro National Park's Marangu Route base station at about 6,000 feet. We were strangers prior to meeting at the hotel the previous night. All of us - four Australians, two Norwegians, two Canadians and I, the lone American - had booked the climb through Intrepid Tours, a Sydney-based budget-travel company that I had previously used for satisfying trips to Vietnam and Thailand.
The increasingly difficult circumstances drew us closer. Despite diverse professional backgrounds - two lawyers, a public relations executive, computer software specialist, real estate agent, housewife, doctor, civil engineer and journalist - we shared many laughs along the way. Gallows humour, it might be called.
That first day's jaunt was misleadingly pleasant. We strolled (pole-pole!) for six hours along a smooth rainforest trail that ascended gently. Because it was the first time many in our party had visited Africa, the antics of monkeys brought yelps of delight and frequent clicking of digital cameras.
The merry mood was dispelled at one point, however. Halfway to the first night's huts, we clambered to the side of the trail to make way for the rapid descent of a pair of one-wheeled stretchers, each accompanied by a few Tanzanian guides. The first carried a large-framed white man. He was holding his head in both hands and groaning loudly as the stretcher bounced over rocks. A porter - silent and eyes closed - was borne in the second stretcher.
The seriousness of our undertaking had been vividly dramatised.
Fataeli Mwangi, our 53-year-old head guide, said later in the day that the two probably suffered oedemas and would likely be fine once they reached the park gate. Mr Mwangi also acknowledged that he has seen many climbers in distress during the 35 years he had been leading parties up the mountain. No one in any of his own groups had ever experienced serious physical problems, he added. And that might be attributed to the pole-pole pace at which the usually smiling Mr Mwangi himself proceeds.
Mandara Hut, at 8,000 feet, was a comfortable stopping place where we slept placidly - urination apart - after being well fed by our party's cook, Mr Mwangi's son, who also prepared full English breakfasts and pack lunches for us all. Each meal was in fact amazingly tasty and abundant. The standard dinner fare of meat sauce, rice, potatoes, cabbage, salad, bread and fruit was accompanied by tea, tea and more tea. One member of our party was a vegetarian and her diet was always accommodated as well.
The second day dawned cold and wet. We had all come equipped with clothing not usually associated with Africa - gloves, woollen hats, thick jumpers, scarves, hooded parkas - all of it toted up the mountain by the 13 porters who worked with Mr Mwangi, his son and three assistant guides.
One of the Australians began to feel feverish as we walked through a desert-like landscape on Day Two. All of us, including a Canadian of African descent, followed Mr Brice-Bennett's instructions to apply sunscreen repeatedly while on the unshaded parts of the trail that had now become the norm. The searing effects of the sun would be intensified as ultraviolet radiation increased in tandem with the altitude, he had warned us. "I've seen climbers come back here with oozing blisters on their faces," he had told us during his briefing.
The jagged peaks of Mawenzi Mountain (16,890 feet) loomed alongside the trail as we climbed, more steeply now, toward Harambo Hut, our second night's resting place.
Frozen puddles greeted us the next morning. But the day grew warmer and warmer as we trudged across increasingly barren terrain. Only a few plants clung to the leeward side of rocks, although some sparrows did swoop down in hopes of sharing our lunches at Zebra Rocks, aptly named for their colour combination.
BY THE TIME WE HAD HIKED the exhausting final kilometre to Kibo Hut (15,500 feet), both the feverish Australian and his wife seemed in no shape to continue the climb. The challenge would have been especially punishing because we were scheduled to rest only six hours at Kibo before setting off, at midnight, on the final section of the Marangu Route. The ailing Aussies decided to head down from Kibo at first light on that third day rather than join the remaining seven of us for the trek up glacial scree towards Uhuru Peak.
And what a trek it was.
Headlamps shining, we trooped zig-zag and in single-file behind Mr Mwangi. None of us had ever been this close to the stars, billions of them blinking in the moonless heavens. Another 150 or so climbers were also heading up the topmost section of Marangu Route that same night, and their own torches twinkled above and below us.
But I soon learned that looking up in the direction of the summit produced a dizzying disorientation that threatened to send me tumbling backwards down the trail. I instead stared at Mr Mwangi's heels, thinking only of taking just one more step - and then another.
"How much longer to the top, Fataeli?" became a frequent refrain from those of us still able to speak.
"Today is today," came his response every time. "Tomorrow is tomorrow. Pole-pole we go."
At about 4 am the moon rose, a luridly orange sliver. We were plodding now at a roughly 50-degree angle of ascent through a field of small boulders. Rest stops occurred at 5-minute intervals as we all struggled to regain our breath, each of us wondering, no doubt, if we were suffering pulmonary oedema. This is also where the vomiting became frequent.
WITHOUT FANFARE, WE arrived as dawn broke at Gilman's Point, a small circular indentation on the rim of the Kibo volcano that had once, Mr Brice-Bennett indicated, been considered the summit of Mount Kilimanjaro. But the true summit, Uhuru Peak, lies 800 feet higher on an opposite point of the rim.
"No sleeping!" Mr Mwangi warned as a couple of our heads drooped during the 10-minute tea break at Gilman's Point. About an hour and a half later, having traversed an ice field exposed to piercing winds, we were standing atop the Roof of Africa.
Handshakes and back pats all around. And in five minutes we were off again - heading downward this time, fatigued as never before but also exhilarated at what we had achieved.
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