Chrissy & Debbie's - Kilimanjaro Trip Feb 2007

The trip was absolutely amazing, I’ve never done anything so wonderful, emotional and hard in my life. The rest of the group were really great people, there were 9 Brits and 6 Norwegians. We all became very good friends, very quickly. There were 2 other girls about our age who we shared a hut with each night. We had so many laughs and tears together and became very close.

Friday 2nd February 2007

The adventure begins with picking up our hire car at 8am from Newquay airport, all went smoothly nice helpful man, collected our Punto Grande (AJ), shame about the strange green colour!

Loaded up my huge red bag and rucksack, said goodbye to Mum (very tearful), Kev (hubby) & Billy boys (my dog). Tried to keep myself together, and drove up to meet Debbie, even managed to find her house!

Debbie was all ready to go, said bye to her Mum, Dad & Kevin, Konna was hiding (her cats).

Good journey to Heathrow. Stopped at Taunton Dean for some lunch. Topped up with petrol in Slough. Had a slight hitch finding the drop off for the hire care, but found it in the end. Men appeared as soon as we drove in and kicked us out and took the car away. Caught the bus to Terminal 3, nice driver helped us with our bags. Got trolley for our bags and found Ethiopian airlines. Booked in at 6pm, met 1 chap called Mike doing Kili (bit worrying he had rucksack badges, one with Everest Base Camp on) + 3 other chaps.

Had some food, phoned home, then joined massive queue for passport control. Went through to the departure lounge at 8, on the plane at 9, but the plane eventually took off at 10, an hour late. Very small plane, no leg room, couldn’t sleep. Had chicken & rice meal and various drinks came round. Sat with a lovely Sudanese born girl called Lewis from Leicester, heading off to live in Sudan and work as a judge. The flight took 7 hours, Debbie squealed on landing!

Saturday 3rd Feb

Amazing sunrise from the plane. Breakfast arrived after a lovely nights sleep – NOT! Arrived at Addis Ababa at 8.45am, met up with more kili looking walkers.

Flight to Kilimanjaro airport went well, had more food, chicken and rice at 10am! Caught sight of Mawenzi peak through the clouds as we flew in. Small airport, looked nice and welcoming, weather cloudy, but warm. Bags all arrived safely, passport control fine. Met by Explore men, and taken out to mini buses along with 7 other Brits on our trip. Saw some lovely ‘Sun Birds’ in the car park.

Exciting hour drive to the hotel, real Africa, saw maasai and their animals, children waved as we drove by. Don’t remember chatting much with the other walkers, think we were all deep in our own thoughts.


Turned off the main road over a rickety cattle grid onto a very bumpy lane, and then into the hotel grounds. The hotel (The Mountain Inn at Moshi), looked lovely, hotel staff took our bags to our rooms for us. As we walked to our room, we saw lots of lizards on the walls, a very nice one was bright green and orange. Our room was fine, twin beds, bathroom with loo & showers, not too bad at all (Lizzy the little lizard wandering about in the bathroom). Decided to go for a quick swim, along with a frog and a large beetle and some lizards scurrying around the end of the pool.


Had a meeting with Jo, our leader and met all the gang. The gang consisted of 4 Brit girls (me, Debbie, Sam & Jacqui), 5 Brit boys (Chris, Alan, Simon, Martyn & Mike) and 3 Norweigan couples, who were all doctors (Sven, Rolfe, Paul, Sissel, Mary Brith and Ingered). The age range was between mid 30’s to late 50’s. Everyone seemed really nice. Jo the leader was 27, she gave us all the information we would need for the next day and answered any questions we had, great to have someone English to deal with. All very exciting and scary.

We walked over to have a quick look at the shop selling wooden animals, gifts etc. Then we went back to our room to sort out our bags and split what was going on the mountain and what was staying at the hotel. Had our evening meal and then off for an early night. Not been in the room long when I spotted something under the bed, we weren’t sure if it was a large spider or a large cricket, so Debbie knocked next door and Chris & Alan appeared in boxer shorts to rescue us, turned out to be a cricket!! Bet they thought we’ve got a right pair here!

Sunday 4th Feb – Marangu Gate (1900M) to Mandara Huts (2700M) – 7KM

Had a good night sleep, Debbie went for a quick swim before breakfast at 7am – fruit, scrambled egg (very pale), toast and tea. Got all our gear ready eventually for leaving at the hotel, put our valuables in the safe, collected our packed lunch, we were loaded up on our bus and ready to go by 9am.


Bumpy ride with great sites again to the start at Marangu Gate, took about an hour. Once at Marangu Gate Jo, the guides and porters sorted all the kit out ready to go. We were introduced to our guides – Didas (head guide), Hilary, Alex, Naftil & Harrod, and the porters (32 in total), the porters load up our bags ready to go. Jo took a photo of us all at the start sign, with each camera!




We walked through the rain forest, it was lovely, big trees with beards, waterfalls, good track. The walking was quite easy and very beautiful, you could feel the altitude though. We saw Colobus and Blue Monkeys along the way. We knew it was important to go really slowly to acclimatise, even when the going seemed easy. So we drank in every moment, got to know our guides (who later proved to be supermen!) and took our time at the back. As porters overtook us they all said Jambo (hello) and Pole, Pole (slowly. slowly) they were mostly all friendly and good fun. Had lots of chats with the gang, all getting to know each other.

We had lunch on picnic tables, sitting under a tree as it had started to rain. Sat with Chris & Mike, whilst Alan got to know the guides & porters. The path became a bit steeper after lunch and it poured down with rain, which I guess is quite apt in the rain forest! We quickly put on all our waterproof gear.

We arrived at Mandara Huts, our first camp mid afternoon, the porters had tea, popcorn & biccies for us in the main hut. Jo had put our bags in our hut for us, we were sharing with Sam & Jacqui. We had to hang up our wet clothes from nails in the hut roof, so every time we came in we got wet stuff wrapped around your head – um nice. Four of us then took the optional walk to look at Maundi Crater. As we arrived back into camp we found a Blue Monkey sitting there, waiting for us to take his photo!

At this point my camera battery decided it had had enough, bit of a panic on for a bit, had to get Debbie to take lots of photos for me as well, came back to life the next day – panic over.

Evening meal was served in the main hut at 6.30, around a big table with the Explore table cloth on, which you had to all squeeze onto. We had a lovely veg soup, followed by pasta, roast potatoes and veg sauce, then banana. They did an amazing job considering the lack of facilities.

We went back to the hut for an early night, but not much sleep to be had, we seemed to be in and out half the night peeing and crying with laughter. The final straw was when the other 3 girls were in the woods and a monkey came past, they came back hysterical with laughter, think we woke the whole camp! It was great having Sam & Jacqui to share with, think we are all going to get along just fine.

Monday 5th Feb – Mandara Huts to Horombo Huts (3700M) – 11KM

Hardly any sleep last night, breakfast at 7am, porridge. Everybody a bit disorganised, struggling to pack, all stressed and we were being pushed to get going. Tummy not very good had to take some Imodium, soon OK. All feeling OK after we got going.

Hot & sunny morning, we left the rain forest and entered into heath and moorland, terrain a bit harder today. Great views of mawenzi and kibo peaks, still looked a very long way away. Crossed lots of wooden bridges, fabulous flowers and huge lobelia type trees, which were amazing . Saw a sun bird and a fat stripy mouse at lunch stop.

The cloud came down after lunch, which cooled us off. All feeling quite tired today, so ‘Pole Pole’ and us girls arrived last to Horomobo Huts around 3pm, after about 6 hours walking. Sharing with Jacqui & Sam again. What a lively, colourful and exciting place, great atmosphere. This is where people stop on the way up, for acclimatisation days and on the way back down again, so lots of huts and lots of people, but all really friendly. We had a great hut, with a lovely view. We were now at over 12,000 feet!!



We chilled in our hut, unpacked and chatted, Martyn came and joined us for a chat and some snacks, shared my malt loaf with him – bless! Simon joined us a bit later. Sam told us some of her BA funny stories. Had dinner around 8pm, tummy still not good, just had some soup and rice. Chris didn’t come for dinner, not feeling well. Back in the huts by 8pm and into bed. Feeling a bit colder in bed tonight and we could hear the wind howling. Usual nightly starlight wonderings!

Tuesday 6th Feb –Horombo Huts passed Zebra Rocks to plateau – acclimatisation day (4350M)

Not too bad a night, bit cold at times, slept quite a bit though. Woke up to glorious sunshine, with full views of Mawenzi & Kibo (covered in snow), still looked a long way off, all a bit daunting. Also gorgeous views down onto the clouds. Breakfast at 7.45am, porridge & toast with peanut butter, had a job to get it down, not feeling too good.

We set off up towards Zebra Rocks, lovely views back down to the camp, and up towards the peaks. Very hot this morning and the path was pretty steep and tough, our breathing was becoming laboured now.



Walked very Pole, Pole and eventually arrived at Zebra Rocks where we had a break and some snacks. Jacqui started to feel quite ill, she was sick quite a few times, I wasn’t feeling too well myself, I felt sick, but wasn’t actually sick. Before we got to the end of the days walk, Jacqui decided to turn back, so I went with her.

Neftil our guide took us back down, Jacqui still being sick on the way down and we both had headaches. We didn’t have much further to go up, so at least we had gained some height.

By the time we got back down again, we both felt quite ill, so we went back to our hut to rest, both feeling quite upset and worried that we wouldn’t be able to go any further.

Debbie & Sam arrived back, they were both fine and went off to have some lunch, we both skipped lunch. Jo came to the hut to visit in the afternoon and stayed for quite a while, we were both feeling quite a bit better by then. We sat with the door open whilst watching 2 German men washing naked in the river – Debbie took photos!

We had dinner at 6pm, veg soup, pancakes and spaghetti, ate as much as I could, but didn’t fancy any of it. Us girls all had a hot chocolate drink outside and then back to the huts to get ready for tomorrow – fingers crossed.

Wed 7th Feb –Horombo Huts to Kibo Huts (4700M) – 11KM, then start of summit attempt



The next morning I woke up feeling much better, breakfast at 7, at 8 we set off on the long hard slog to Kibo Huts. We now walked on the ‘Saddle’ between the two peaks. It was very sparse of any plants or vegetation and all you could see was sand/rock. Passed the last water point and had a rest. Saw a Lammergayer fly over, looked like a very large buzzard.






Jacqui was still feeling ill and eventually had to turn back, and about an hour later also 2 of our chaps (Mike & Chris) turned back, it was all very emotional and we all cried buckets, then gave ourselves a slap and went on, all thinking is it going to be me next.






Eventually Kibo Huts came into view, but it still seemed to take an age to actually arrive at them. I think everyone was feeling the altitude by now. Arrived at Kibo Huts around 4pm, very bleak place, but buzzing, we all shared a room, ‘boys & girls’.

Encountered the long drop toilets, several times! We had some food at 5pm, then off to bed by 6pm, ready to be woken at 10.30pm, had some tea and biccies and got ready to set off for the summit at 11.30pm. Tummy still quite bad, asked Doctor Paul how many Imodium I could get away with, he said take 3, he’s a doctor, so I did! At this point Martyn decided not to go any further, the numbers were dropping.

We were wrapped up in layers of clothes, balaclavas with hats over and big gloves, head torches on and ready to go. It was freezing cold and dark except for the lovely moon, we walked in a line along with other groups, up and up the steep scree slope we had seen from the huts, at a snails pace. It was all you could do to put one foot in front of the other, I felt so tired. After 3 hours we arrived at Hans Meyer Cave, which is halfway to Gillman’s Point, at this time I didn’t even think I could make it there, I felt like just sitting down and sleeping. Not long after setting off again I was sick quite violently, but felt OK after, Hilary (one of the guides) took my rucksack from me, and I kept stumbling on.

At this time I was walking with Sam, Debbie was further back (she had been sick earlier and Alex was looking after her and carrying her rucksack), I said to Sam if I could make it to Gilman’s Point, that would be it, or I would never get down again. I just couldn’t keep my eyes open, every time I stopped for a rest and leant on my poles I fell asleep, Simon came up behind me at one point and gave me a hug and said “come on Chrissy keep moving, you can do it”. At this point our water tubes had frozen, and I’d bitten through the end. After another 2-3 hours the scree turned to large boulders, we could now see some torch lights at Gilman’s above us. The guides dragged us up over the boulders and after 6 hours we arrived at Gilman’s Point.

Thurs 8th Feb – Gilman’s Point (5685M) to Summit (5896M) and back to Horombo Huts

A hot, sugary cup of tea was put in my hand by a guide, it tasted amazing, I only had a couple of sips and then Jo our leader was saying Chrissy & Debbie are you going back or coming on? I heard myself say I’m coming and so did Debbie. All the rest of the Brits, Simon, Sam & Alan & 2 Norwegians decided to go back. By this time it was around 6am and the sun was rising, it was stunning, we moved on round a corner and came face to face with wall to wall snow, wow, it was so white and glistening like diamonds, – just what was needed to give us the strength to go on. We walked around the crater, it was like entering another world.


The terrain was much flatter now, not long after Debbie slipped on some ice and nearly smashed into a ice wall, Neftil (our hero) caught her just in time. Not long after Paul, one of the Norwegian men, became ill and him and his wife turned back. We walked for another hour or so, huge ice glaciers appeared, then we had to walk slightly up hill, then in the distance we could see the summit sign, still quite a way off, but nothing was going to stop us now.





We eventually made it, along with 2 Norwegians at 7.45am, (out of 15 of us, only us 4 made it) what an emotional moment, I’d seen that sign on so may websites, with other people standing there and now it was us! We all hugged, cried, laughed, had photos taken and drank in the breathtaking views, you could see Mount Meru and for miles over the plains of Africa – words can’t explain it.

We stayed for a short while drinking it all in and then it was time for the long, long walk down.













We back-tracked along the same path, all through the snow again and back to Gilman’s Point. This time we had a short rest and took some photos of the sign there. By now we were totally exhausted, Jo and the Norwegians went on down and Debbie, me and our guide Neftil, carried on down, over the boulders and then onto the huge scree run down. You could now see how far we had come up in the dark.

Debbie was very nervous about going down on the scree, I went ahead for a while and then Debbie & Neftil appeared, he had grabbed her arm and made her scree-run and they came zooming down to catch me!









As we got nearer Kibo Huts, Neftil radioed ahead to get 2 porters to come and meet us, they took our bags, coats etc and stayed with us the rest of the way down to Kibo Huts. We arrived at 11.30am (12 hours after we left), we were met by Didas & Hilary, and some of our group, lots of hugs and tears all round again, and a lovely drink of squash! The rest of the group had waited for us in the room. The guides were trying to feed us soup, the last thing I wanted to do was eat, I climbed into my sleeping bag and slept for an hour, I was sick again when I woke up, then we had to pack up our bags and carry on down to Horombo huts, I felt so, so tired.




It seemed to take ages to get back down to the huts, but eventually we arrived. Jacqui, Martyn & Mike came a little way up the path to meet us, which was lovely of them. We had some tea, which I nearly fell asleep in and then off to bed by 7pm.

Friday 9th Feb – Horombo Huts to Marangu Gate

Got woken up at 6am after sleeping like a log, feeling refreshed and very excited by what we had achieved and ready to complete the walk. We had breakfast at 6.30am and set off again at 8am. It stayed sunny and dry all day, so we had a really good look at the rain forest without all the rain we had on the way up. We saw Colobus & Blue monkeys.















Had our lunch at Mandara Huts, half the group had gone on down leaving us with Sam, Jacqui, Simon and Martyn, along with Neftil and Harrod, we set off down to the gate where we started. Debbie & I went ahead a bit and Harrod joined us, we had quite a laugh with him, he said Debbie could be the guide, and then we kept trying to overtake her, whilst she beat us back with sticks - you had to be there!!






When we arrived back Jo presented us with a gold certificate to say we had made it to Uhuru Peak. We gave all the porters and guides their tips in envelopes, each came and shook our hands, and then they sang a Kilimanjaro song to us all, which was very emotional – again! The Norwegians sang their national anthem. We decided it would be nice to sing to them and agreed on ‘The Grand Old Duke of York’, which amused them!! Then we all had to say goodbye as we set off back to the hotel on our mini buses.

















When we arrived at the hotel, we had been given much nicer rooms than before, ours had two big single/small double beds, and a bathroom with bath, shower & loo – luxury, also overlooked the pool. We went for a quick shopping trip to Glady’s shop, and some chaps selling at the hotel entrance, got t-shirts, badges, etc. We had quick shower to remove all the grime of not washing for 5 days (just wet wipes), and then had a lovely dip in the pool and then after that a lovely bath/shower, washed hair and put on the clean clothes we had left at the hotel – bliss. Everyone looked so different when we met up for dinner. We went mad a celebrated with a glass of Fanta! We had collected some money for Jo the leader, so us 4 that made the summit presented it to her and Debbie was volunteered to make a speech, more tears. Stayed chatting for a while then after much bag packing and diary writing finally went to sleep.

Sat 10th Feb – Safari & Home

Wake up call at 6.30am, breakfast at 7. Lovely nights sleep. The Norwegians came to say goodbye to us, they were going onto Zanzibar. Said our goodbyes to Jo (sob, sob).


Packed everything up and our safari jeeps picked us up at 8am to go off for the day, we shared our jeep with Alan and Chris and our driver was Twar. We had a great time, saw lots of giraffes, zebras, monkeys (colobus & blue), water buffalo, wart hogs, dik dik, water buck, gibbons and a hippo in the distance through binoculars.



Debbie and I stood up at the front nearly the whole time, didn’t do our nice clean hair much good.

Then we had a quick side trip to the snake farm, I was not at all keen on this idea, but didn’t want anyone else to miss out, Alan and Chris promised they would look after me and not mess around, so I braved it. I even managed to touch a rat snake and Debbie held it. We saw boomslangs, cobra, mambas (including black) and vipers. We also saw crocodiles, one with a tortoise for a mate and chameleons.



Then the driver dropped us, and our luggage to the airport ready for the long flight home.

As we flew out we had great views of Kilimanjaro, looked like we were nearly level with her, she’s huge! 2 hour flight to Addis Ababa, then 5 hours wait for flight back to Heathrow. Did lots of shopping to pass the time and had food and chats with the gang. Heathrow flight OK, bigger plane, managed to sleep quite a bit, had a spare seat between us, so we could spread out a bit.



Sunday 11th Feb – My 40th Bday

All waited at Heathrow together to collect our luggage, even Jacqui’s huge wooden giraffe appeared in one piece. We all said a quick goodbye, and went our separate ways.

Simon was coming with us for a lift back to Exeter services. We got the Europcar hopper bus, picked up another Punto Grande (AG), grey one this time, and headed for home.

Dropped Simon at Exeter where his wife was meeting him. And then on down to Deb’s house. Cuppa and chat with Ma & Pa and then home for me. Felt quite sleepy on the way home, just managed to stay awake, pulled into our local garage to fill up with fuel, couldn’t get the petrol cap off, had to be pathetic and ask Mick for help. He knew all about the trip from Kev and asked what it was all in aid off, when I told him it was my 40th birthday he disappeared and came back with a hug and a bottle of champagne. Managed to make it down the road.

Lovely welcome home/birthday by Mum, Kev & Wendy, had loads of cards for birthday and well done, great cake, and loads of pressies. Kev got me a cuddly giraffe – now called George! Mum & Wendy got me a voucher to have a massage, will get that booked soon – all very overwhelming, but great to be home and see everyone.

DON'T THINK THIS TRIP CAN BE TOPPED
BUT WATCH THIS SPACE!!