All things considered, we'll be fine!

AAAAAAAAAAAAAGggggggggggggggggggggrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!! I just needed to get this out of my system. Oddly enough, the apprehension hasn’t subsided. The more I read about this climb, my heart runs faster than I can ever on that treadmill. Thanks to wonderful people who have done this before and possess the uncanny enthusiasm to document it all, I have gone from emotions of slight skepticism (electric ear muffs?) to high alarm (we need to carry portable heated toilets?!).

I had imagined unforeseen dangers, like the volcano becoming active all of a sudden and geologists finding my fossil a few years later, ‘Look fellow Geologist, the most primitive human! Look at this camera she is carrying… so outdated!’ Then of course you can’t discount the hazards of falling from 19,340 ft praying you land safely on your feet. But you happen to smoothly land into the open jaws of a lion waiting at the base of the mountain, ‘Alright cubs, open wider…the husband comes now. Grrroowwwl’ Next there is the killer cold that could potentially freeze your saliva before you could spit on yourself for even attempting this. Hypothermia, Fatigue, Delirium, Yellow Fever, Malaria, and Homesickness could be possible reasons for death too. By the way, homesick people can die too when they fall and get eaten by lions.

According to all the articles I have come across, I shouldn’t really bother with all that. AMS (Acute Mountain Sickness) is the biggest cause of death in Kilimanjaro and many high peaks around the world. Yes, you could be happily sauntering up the Volcano taking in the views and poof! you could drop dead because of a headache. AMS has been studied in detail and the only cure is to get back to sea level as quick as you can. You get pounding headaches, giddiness, nausea, short of breath and if you hadn’t figured already, a general feeling of lousiness. Acclimatization (spending a few extra days at higher altitudes getting used to low atmospheric pressure) helps tremendously and that is the reason why we are spending an extra day in the mountain. Recommended acclimatization period for any altitude greater than 9000ft is to sleep no more than 1000ft higher than your previous night’s camp, and to spend an extra night at every third camp. That is also the reason why we do not spend more than an hour at the summit, which is higher than the Everest Base Camp. I don’t think anyone can train for AMS other than smoking a few packs of cigars daily and hope your lungs get damaged enough not to tell the difference.

One problem I did not foresee is this recent Kenyan unrest. It’s really sad. We are hoping things do subside in a few days or Nairobi might be out of our agenda.