Day 6 - DAY 4 OF THE CLIMB!! - 26th August

Baranco Wall!

Jambo! Today has been a pretty rough day if I'm honest. Woke up feeling ill again and with very little appetite (to the extent that Simon forced me to eat some orange slices just so I'd gotten some sugar), but that all went away when we started walking. (Trekking up a beautiful mountain is a pretty valid distraction!)

Selfie at the top of Baranco
Wall!

We began the day with a climb up Baranco Wall (the one bit of the 'climb' that is actually climbing!) and it was great fun!! It was hard though as there was also hundreds of porters trying to get past us, so it kind of makes you feel a bit pressured to get a move on, and sometimes they took different routes, which was pretty scary to see... But I suppose they're used to it... Rather them than me! But nonetheless it was great fun, and really satisfying to complete!! And when we were at the top, we had sooooo many photos! And the girls all had a 'sports bra' photo, which I couldn't really participate in because my layers were a little tight... My bad!

After we had our little break at the top we continued on our walk to the next camp site, which is where we were going to have lunch at. That's when it got hard - we were high up and could see the camp, but little did we know it was going to take 2-3 hours to get there!! We had to walk down into the valley and then back up again - going down was so painful, it really got me down, when we got to the bottom, we had a break and I had a little cry as the frustration of my pain got to me and I started doubting whether I could really climb Kili. But Daudi advised me "stop crying, it'll give you a headache!" and I stopped anyway and then we cracked on, up the hill to camp for lunch!

Once we got up there I felt a little better, just by sitting down for lunch, and we even got a little cheer from the team when we arrived (as we were about half an hour behind everyone else).

Carrying on to camp!

Then we cracked on to camp, which was about another 4 hours away, and it was still rough, with ups and downs along the trek, along with a headache I had coming and going, which was delightful. But we finally got here after a painful slog and got some dinner and our briefing before heading to bed. So I'm currently sat in my sleeping bag, knowing that at 1am I'm going to be woken up, ready to set off up to Uhuru Peak at 2am. I am praying I wake up feeling good, as headache/sickness is last thing I need!

Dinner was great tonight, as even though we were all tired - we were all having a good laugh... Asin we'd laugh at something simple and then couldn't stop laughing until it hurt - probably from the lack of oxygen we have!! But it was fun nonetheless =)

I'm going to try sleep now. Biggest day of my life so far tomorrow, requires energy!!

La la salama!!

Day 5 - DAY 3 OF THE CLIMB!!! - 25th August

Jambo! Today we've done around 10 hours of trekking!! Woke up this morning not feeling too well and with very little appetite, so although breakfast was lovely, I just couldn't manage to eat much. So, therefore I got hungry real quick when we started walking, just to get to lunch 6 hours later, and lose my appetite again!!! (annoying!)

Our photo with Lava Tower!
Photo credit to George Murphy

The first 6 hours of the walk was very steep uphill, and then the 4 hours after that was very steep downhill... We did this to try and acclimatise, so lots of us felt quite ill when we got to Lava Tower for our lunch, but were blessed to have lots of oxygen back in our lungs as we walked back downhill to our current camp - Baranco Camp.

At one point while we were walking we were having a conversation (well I was kind of listening in to Simon & Will having this conversation, kind of joining in :P) about what we couldn't live without doing... And it got me thinking - as I don't have a clue! I don't really have any hobbies that I'm so dedicated to that life would be hard if it was gone... Is that sad? I don't know, maybe I'll get one some day! (Or just discover what it has been all along...)

Pretty picture of the mountain! With the moon there
too (if you can see it!)

Another thing I thought about was how music is awesome! - It can literally connect anyone! Like, the porters and I speak completely different languages (well, most of them knew pretty good English) but anyway, when I played 'Happy' on my phone Daudi and I were both singing and dancing along - it was great fun!

One last thing that occurred to me today is pride. I am proud of myself for getting this far. We are now over half way through our time on the mountain and I'm still going very strong. I think I deserve to feel proud of myself after struggling for the last 7 years, and figuring I was never going to do anything great. Well I've decided that even if I can't conquer Kili - I've still done something great, because I've tried - which is more than can be said for a lot of people. And also, I know a lot of people doubt me (even if they wouldn't actually tell me that!), and also some people believe in me (which is awesome!) and it's both of those that are driving me up the mountain! I want to prove the doubters wrong and the believers right! So, it can be done!

Anyway, end of the deep soppy stuff, after dinner (of pumpkin soup, rice and chicken! -yum, again!) Ami chatted with a few of us about the history of Kilimanjaro, he told us things like how 'Kilimanjaro' translates to 'small mountain with snow' which is hilarious seeing as it's the biggest mountain in Africa! He also told us about the different routes and why the glaciers are named what they are. The best thing he told us about was how Kilimanjaro is 'female', which is why everyone becomes so nice and caring during the trek - because we take on her femininity - but also, if you disobey her main rule of 'pole pole' she will punish you with altitude sickness! Because Kilimanjaro, can be a bitch! (funny!) He also told us some of his own stories of the mountain, like about the time he ran half way up Kili in 2 hours, and also the time he climbed with a guy who was completing the 7 summits, and the guy underestimated Kili because he'd done Everest (silly!)

After that we left for bed and saw, possibly the most beautiful view ever! The summit of Kilimanjaro, lit my the moonlight and surrounded by so many stars! (I've never seen so many at once!) It was truly beautiful, but I couldn't get a picture unfortunately as my camera couldn't see anything except darkness, but it's a view I will never forget! 

Anyway, time for bed, another long day ahead tomorrow!!!

La la salama!! =)