Uhuru Peak (the top of Kilimanjaro) is 20km ahead of me, and so is Marangu Gate (the entrance to this hiking route). I’m right in the middle of one of the most challenging hikes I’ve ever done. Now I just have to wait and see… and rest. We are above those clouds by now, so I enjoy watching it rather than worry.īefore heading to bed, I load on painkillers and pray to God that my knee will not be the reason I’m not making it to the top. While I walk back to my hut, I can see far in the distance the noiseless thunderstorm that is covering Moshi. Our tiredness is accumulating, and we still have a long journey ahead of us. He’s unconvinced but lets it go.Īfter dinner, no games or music.
He looks at me with an “are you sure?” look. Issa, our main guide, comes to me and discretely asks me if I’m fine. I try to dissimulate the pain by limping the least possible, but trained eyes cannot be fooled that easily. The bending of my right knee sends this energy through my nerves that makes each stepping painful – more than the last. The knee I injured a year ago in Honduras is calling my attention. Now, the one thing I feared before the hike makes its appearance. Now, there are no trees, only a variety of bushes in a gradient of greens and browns. There’s the 6:30 am knock on the door indicating our hot water is ready and that we should prepare for breakfast.Īfter breakfast, we depart in our usual manner pole pole.Īfter about an hour of walking, the scenery changes to something completely different. I never go to bed this early, but I’m tired, and so are they. Dave, Hugh, Neil, and I become roommates – and very cool roommates they are!Īt dinner, we get to know each other even better (beyond all the talking we did during the day hike) and listen to some music on my x-mini while playing the Monopoly card game that Laura brought. We get to Maranda Hut, our campsite located at 2,720m. The trees now don’t look much like warm weather forest trees, they are slowly morphing into cold weather pines, and they are less dense and shorter than the former.
All imperative to take seriously if I want to reach the top.Īs we make our ascent, we can clearly see the change in our environment. There are a few reasons behind this pace: to prevent sweating, conserve energy, and better acclimatization. This is not even a leisure pace this is the pace of someone sentenced to death, dreading his unavoidable fate. Day 1: Starting the Marangu RouteĪt 8:00 am, we part from Moshi, by bus, and head to Marangu Gate – where we officially start our hike, at 1,840m. We make our introductions, talk about the hike and what it means to us to do one of the best hiking trails in the world and conquer Kilimanjaro.Īfter a while, we get a good night’s rest… the last one for the next five days. There I meet with the other hikers who I’ll be joining on the hike. I’ve been traveling through Africa for a few weeks by now, so I reach Moshi –the base point to start the Kili hike– on my own after a seven hours bus from Nairobi. They are not the cheapest tour company, true, but I’ve traveled with them a few times, so I know the type of quality I get from this kind of trip.Īnd believe me, on hikes like this, a good tour company makes a significant difference. For my hike, I decided to do the Marangu Route with G Adventures.
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