The Kilimanjaro Diary, part 2
“I didn´t sleep anything”, MJ said when he stepped into the mess tent. “I had diarrhea all night.”
“I didn´t get any sleep either” , said Richard: ”And I feel nauseous.“
All signs of the altitude. And adjustment to Africa. I said:
“Keep rehydrating, 2 liters when you wake up, 2-3 liters during the day, and 2 liters at arrival. This will make a huge difference. Start taking Imodium and paracetamol right now. It will also help a lot.”
Richard didn´t seem convinced. He hasn´t made it this far in his work life, just agreeing and not questioning. Like me, he is a bit of a health freak and have many gadgets telling him how he is feeling. Or should feel. It doesn´t always help. His gadgets told him he didn´t feel well. Which we all could see. Moses, our head sherpa came in with another gadget. This was an ultra-professional set up, so they were bringing oxygen, an oxygen bag, professional tents, sleeping bags and so on. He had a gadget to put on the fingers to measure heart rate and oxygen level. Richard was not happy with his reading. We were served a huge breakfast which Norm and I devoured like hungry lions at a kill. But feeling nauseous, sleepless and worrying about going to the toilet made the food harder for MJ and Richard to eat. A tough start for both, but I was sure they would both make it all the way. They were very determined, even though I already knew there would be challenges on route.
The plan for the day was an easy walk, with just slowly putting one foot in front of the other, for some time to make it to camp 2, called Cave 2. Located at 3452 meters. So only about 780 altitude meters to gain and it took us only 1½ hour to walk the 5.5 km. Ten minutes from Camp the team had set up a table, with a table cloth and chairs. Cookies, great Africa instant coffee, juice and cakes. And, more important, great weather, sunny offering superb views of my favorite mountain, Mawenzi. Kilimanjaro was growing smaller in our sight, but had more snow covering the volcano, than I had ever seen before. It was beautiful and we had now left the moorland for rocky alpine terrain. But no wind, lots of fresh air and a strong sun. The weather had worried me, because this was the monsoon season with lots of heavy rains, but nothing so far. And good weather makes a huge difference. So does the company. A new personality had appeared in the shape of Ishmael, or Suma-Ji as his friends called him. He had so much natural joy, laughter, charisma and he was always full of songs, encouraging words. Encouraging singing, joy and words would be a major part of this great experience!
Before dinner we walked another hour and gained altitude, with the old mountain idea of walking high, sleeping low. Easy walk with yet another stop with cakes, biscuits, coffee and tea on Maasai colored blanket.
Richard and MJ seemed to have recovered a bit at dinner, though they had a bit of headache. We had such a good atmosphere in the group, so they were still smiling, laughing and taking part in the dinner discussions. Food was spectacularly good, done by the experienced mountain chef, Juma. We also had a private toilet, a tent with a real toilet inside. Which we all visited a lot. This night, I went up twice to pee, but hard the some of the others did plenty of more visits. And in the morning, both Richard and MJ felt weaker, though MJ was on paracetamol and Imodium, which seemed to help little. Richard still in thought what was good or not. We Westerners were all on Diamox and especially Norm felt the side effect of taking it, with tingling fingers. Richard didn´t want to mix medicine.
“I am feeling worse” , Richard said at breakfast: “That extra walk didn´t help. No sleep this night either.”
MJ had had the same difficult night. Norm and me slept great. 8 hours plus. Moses and the A-Team as they called themselves, slept ok, but nothing great. It wasn´t altitude that was the problem for them, they had done the same trip two weeks earlier and where acclimatized. But it was all suddenly very hard work. And except Moses, they all slept in a big tent. This season, the monsoon season, wasn’t the easiest time to find people who wanted to do this job, because it was considered very cold, due to rain at lower altitudes and snow at higher ones. They carried their stuff -15 kgs per person- on their heads, if it wasn´t a rucksack, African style, not like the Sherpas of Nepal who have a headband.
The third day offered yet another spectacular day with great visibility and weather. No wind, just great views of Mawenzi and Kilimanjaro. We were heading for the plateau and Cave 3. It took us a bit more than an hour to do the 3.5 km and we gained 393 altitude meters. After lunch we did an hour more up beyond camp and back to walk high, sleep low. Richard and MJ were fighting hard. It is not easy having diarrhea, fever, headaches and no sleep, but they were fighting on. And the plan was that at midnight between the 5th and 6th day, we would go for Uhuru Peak, the highest peak in Africa via Stella Point. So we had basically 2 days to make the duo feel better.
But first we had to make it to the crossroad of Kilimanjaro, the Kibo Hut, at 4700 meters. It took us only 1½ hour to do the 4.5 km and 633 altitude meters to get to this impressive hut. This was the first time since we started, that we had seen other people. The Kibo Hut area had grown a lot since I was last there, like 25 years ago. They even had wifi today! Which quickly turned the group into Iphone watchers. Luckily it didn´t work to well, so we could stay away from reality a bit more and enjoy the peace.
There were to other hikers, a white middle-aged fella who wanted nothing to do with us. And a young German girl from Kiel, a midwife, who decided to climb Kilimanjaro the same day she landed. She had walked up in three days and I begged her to take a day off to acclimatize and then go for the top. (Which she did and made the top 2 nights later and walked all the way from Kibo to the top and all the way down to Mwema Gate in one day. Spectacular!) We would use two days for this and we didn´t know if everyone would make it to the top, because at dinner Richard said:
“I have decided to turn around from here.”
A personal account of the trip here, https://youtu.be/594sM-bxrXA?si=lA3HHD8m5iirTz_u
Read the previous climb https://www.mikaelstrandberg.com/2025/03/27/climbing-kilimanjaro-in-the-year-2000-bestigning-av-kilimanjaro-ar-2000/
Great thanks to Jeff Willner and Kensington Tours for doing this Kensington Alpine Club!
