Trail notes from Kilimanjaro Machame Route – Day 6 - 7

Trail notes from Kilimanjaro Machame Route – Day 6 -7

by Kathleen Lisson

I climbed Mt.Kilimanjaro with Serengeti Pride Safari in July 2014. Here are some tips from my hiking experience.

After a nap and meal, we set off from Barafu to hike past Millenium to Mweka camp for our last night. The hike took us back into the land of plants and thicker air. I didn't know how I was going to hike for four more hours when I first returned from the summit, but a nap and meal made everything feel possible.

I luckily had no knee pain.

We traded email addresses over dinner and enjoyed sharing our plans for the first things we would do when we returned to Arusha. 

On the last day, we got up extra early and hiked 3 1/2 hours to the Mweka gate. It started raining halfway through the hike, so we used raingear and pack covers.

Porters will be RUNNING down this section of the mountain, so be careful and stay left.

The entire hiking party must be present when signing out, so make sure you know where all your hiking mates are. The line can get quite long mid-morning.

There are people who will sell you soft drinks and beer as well as clean your boots and gaiters.

There is a wait for the official certificates, so make sure you have snacks if you get hungry before lunch.

Everyone was happy, even with the rain! Watching the trucks maneuver around the parking lot reminded me of India.

We tipped the porters before we left Mweka camp and I tipped my guide when I got my certificate.

Trail notes from Kilimanjaro Machame Route – Day 6

Trail notes from Kilimanjaro Machame Route – Day 6

by Kathleen Lisson

I climbed Mt.Kilimanjaro with Serengeti Pride Safari in July 2014. Here are some tips from my hiking experience.

Summit night: Barafu to Uhuru

I woke up before midnight and it took a full half hour to put on my hiking gear and get ready before breakfast. Do not let yourself be rushed! 

No one had much of an appetite but I appreciated the hot food. 

We started off very slowly walking through camp. The sight of headlamps snaking their way up the mountain let me know that it was our summit night and made me feel like a part of a larger group. Later on in the hike, I looked back down and saw the headlamps below us. I used the headlamp line to get a sense of where our hike was going throughout the night.

The middle hours of the hike were discouraging. I felt exhausted and my heart was pounding. My thoughts and interior monologue were dulled and I felt like I was barely surviving. I decided to never hike again in those hours, until I remembered the Star Trek TNG episode ‘Tapestry,’ where Jean Luc Picard sees how his life would have ended up if he hadn’t gotten into a bar fight when he was young. I decided that this climb was my bar fight, and I summiting would be my success.

I was dressed well and didn’t feel cold. In fact, my face was exposed and event my nose never felt cold. I would pull my balaclava up over my chin when it got windy.

I never had a headache or nausea and never breathed too fast or shallow. 

Once the sun came up, I was amazed to see the number of hikers that were clearly suffering along the side of the trail. I never felt any sickness from the altitude.

I used 2 liters of water on summit night. I put one liter in my Camelback and kept drinking every few minutes until the tube froze a few hours into the hike. I knew the tube would freeze, but having constant access to water during the first part of the hike was important. I switched to Nalgene bottles covered with insulators. Our guide recommended that we carry our bottles upside down in our packs so the ‘bottom’ of the water bottle would freeze and we would still be able to drink water from the top. Because of the insulator, my bottles never froze.

Urinating and drinking water at a rest break is exhausting. I concentrating on just resting on our third break of the hike and felt better when I resumed hiking.

Listening to empowering fast paced music really changed my attitude and unlocked energy.

Concentrating on holding on until the dawn helped me through the night. The sunrise raised my spirits and I knew that the summit was near, even though I had an hour and a half of hiking left.

Trail notes from Kilimanjaro Machame Route – Day 5

Trail notes from Kilimanjaro Machame Route – Day 5

 by Kathleen Lisson

I climbed Mt.Kilimanjaro with Serengeti Pride Safari in July 2014. Here are some tips from my hiking experience.

Karanga to Barafu

My temper got short and I had easily hurt feelings. Luckily, I had my husband to listen to my troubles and I realized it was a combination of altitude and being far away from home with new people around. 

The trail was hot and dusty. I took my time and made the final ascent quite slowly to not overwhelm myself. 

The mountaintop seems close from here! 

We slept and had dinner and tried to sleep again. I have been having vivid nightmares for a few nights now and sleep felt like a drug-induced state. 

We camped right at the end of the trail. The camp itself is long and uphill from the end of the trail. The hikers that made the trek to sign in at the rangers station found the additional walking quite discouraging, likely due to the altitude.