Andy Schiestl has masterfully profiled his February Kili climb with Embark. Check out his step-by-step retelling here:

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Arriving in Moshi

February 14th: Everyone got to town alright, we went on a tour around Moshi in the morning. Stopped at the Kilimanjaro coffee company again, there was coffee brewing class going on and a guy from Portland was one of the instructors, amusingly enough. Toured around the market (first the big market, then the slightly smaller more spread out one. Got to be a bit overwhelming, I split off to head back to the hotel for lunch. After a briefing that evening, went through my bag with Freddie and confirmed that I had the right gear.

Tree Camp / Miti Mikubwa

February 15th: Off we go! Stopped for a bathroom break on the drive up along dirt roads, had a couple of Masai come up and ask if they could get a ride (they weren’t going to the same place we were). It was kind of amusing to see one of them in traditional Masai garb chatting on a cell phone. Stopped to pick up porters (37 of them!) and get gear distributed at check-in station, then proceeded to the trailhead along a road that started out sketchy and quickly escalated to hair-raising (banged into a tree a couple of times trying to get past it on muddy ruts). We began climbing through the jungle from about 6000 feet at about 2 in the afternoon (with monkeys hooting in the background). Got to Big Tree camp just before it started pouring, thankfully the mess tent and our tents were situated already. Dinner was amazing, much better than any of us expected. The whole scope of the group was pretty amazing, 58 people in total (cooks, porters, guides, “juice machine” operators, and the 12 climbers) heading up the mountain.

Tree Camp to Shira One

February 16th: Woke up at Big Tree camp at 9000 feet, and it was raining. It rained pretty much all of the previous night, and I was looking forward to a rather wet trip, but by breakfast it was only misting, and it cleared up about an hour into our hike. We had some of the crew come by with tea or coffee for us in our tents, by the end of our trip we had gotten use to the “Good morning! How did you sleep?” that they would greet us with. Cleared out of the jungle at around 10,000 feet, it was very noticeable and happened within minutes on the trail. Got our first good view of Kilimanjaro coming over a ridge line onto the Shira plateau. It looked big, far away, and very snow covered. Stopped at Shira 1 at about 11500 feet, nice little river running nearby and great view of the mountain when it was clear. I started taking Diamox this evening, since I was getting close to the edge of the altitudes I was used to going to.

Shira One to Shira Two

February 17th: Got up and began trekking across the Shira plateau to Shira 2 camp. Got a mild headache while ascending to the next camp (at 13000 feet), but went away shortly after we got there. Fairly easy day, not much elevation gain and into next camp not long after noon. Had some time to explore the area, there was a very interesting creek with several waterfalls right near camp. Shortly before dinner, several people from our group ran into another group who was heading down without attempting to summit, they had multiple horror stories about icy conditions, other groups turning back, and groups of porters that had gotten snow blindness. Many people in our group were concerned, but Freddie (our lead guide) said not to worry and that we’d see what things looked like at lava tower when we climb there the next day.

Shira Two to Lava Tower

February 18th: Up in the morning and began hiking to Lava Tower at 15,000 feet. We start encountering snow at a little shy of 14,000 I would guess. The weather throughout the day was ridiculous, went from sunny and warm to mild hail and back to sunny again within 10 minutes. The temperature difference when the sun was out was incredible, at one point after we arrived at Lava tower, I was lying in my tent in just shorts (at 15,000 feet) and was almost too warm. We also had the incredible experience of looking down at the top of thunderheads. I felt fine when we got into camp (on the border of a headache again, a lot of people experienced that), but started feeling really tired just before dinner, and just crashed afterwards (on the plus side, got 11 hours of sleep). Jenny in our group had a pretty serious stomach bug as well, thankfully we had the rest day on the 19th.

Lava Tower

February 19th: When I get up in the morning, I try walking on the snow, it’s pretty solid after multiple warm days, but the surface is excellent, not slick at all. As part of the rest day, we hike up to Arrow glacier (about a 2 hour hike up) and get our first good view of the route up through the western breach. It’s looking pretty promising, and other groups are heading up ahead of us as well. I’m feeling pretty good about the climb at this point, the snow level appears to be receding and the forecast looks positive.

Arrow Glacier

February 20th: In the middle of the night when I get up to go to the bathroom (drinking 5 liters of water a day will do that), I start developing a stomachache. Which gets pretty bad, takes me about 2.5 hours to get back to sleep, and when I’m waking up still not feeling too great, not much of an appetite. Jenny is better, but now her husband Eric seems to have the same thing. Just before we get started I’ve got some minor nausea, Amy, Bridget, and Christy hit me with a variety of remedies (Tums, pepto, acid reducers, ginger stuff) and the combination of everything seems to help quite a bit, still feel a little off but not bad. We head up to Arrow glacier and go through a safety talk, then after dinner everyone tries to get some sleep.

Arrow Glacier to Crater Rim to Uhuru Peak

February 21st: Summit day part 1. They start waking everyone up at 11:00pm, I woke up at 10:30pm (due to cold) finished packing and gearing up (3 insulating layers and 2 wind shells on legs, 3 insulating layers and a shell on my body, 2 glove liners and a shell on hands. From the sound of it I got more sleep than just about anyone else, went to sleep right at sunset so I got 3.5 hours. Unfortunately the wind has come up a bit, pretty cold out. We head out at midnight. The wind and cold are a little nasty (my fingers are occasionally getting numb until I warm them up, other layers holding up okay), but other than that conditions are pretty good, snow solid and good steps kicked in. Everyone is starting to feel the altitude after the first couple of hours, about 2-3 hours in Christy starts getting really dizzy and passes out, Celia ahead of me starts picking up a cough, I hear Alex is starting to get a little dizzy as well. Route is turning out to be more exposed than I expected, pretty narrow as well (really glad for the steps). About 2 hours in I stop looking up because it’s too disheartening. About 3 hours in, I stop looking down because the exposure is starting to get disturbing. About 4 hours in I stop looking at anything immediately in front of me, it looked like we were almost there, but someone asked and it was another 2 hours up. My camelback freezes up about an hour and a half in, my nalgenes freeze up to the point I can’t drink from them about 5 hours in, all my snacks are too cold to eat (except for the GU, it’s an extremely thick paste). “The only way out is up” becomes a mantra to me. We clear the crater lip a little before 6:00am, the wind starts blasting us (I’d guess sustained 25-30mph with gusts substantially higher), but I can already see the sky lightening.

Uhuru Peak to Mweka Camp

February 21st: Summit day part 2. As we clear the crater rim, we stop briefly but begin moving almost immediately to get to crater camp and out of the wind. Things are lightening up and we start moving out of the wind, I start laughing with tears in my eyes, from some combination of watching the sunrise and relief at making it to the crater rim. Christy starts heading down after they get to camp, she’s showing a lot of symptoms of rather serious altitude issues. Peter (her fiancee) goes with her, as do Alex (he feels better a bit later, but we’re already making the last push for the summit) and Eric and Jenny. The remaining 7 of us and two guides continue. The last run up (even though it’s only about 500 feet up) is in a few ways harder than the climb up to the crater rim, we’re barely moving and I feel like I’m running, and I can tell I don’t have much left. We finally get to the top and congratulate each other, spend about 20 minutes taking pictures. The altitude is really having some interesting effects, standing still I’m taking more than a breath a second, and the side of my hand facing the sun in just a liner glove feels warm the instant it’s in the sun. I start bonking not long after we leave the summit, and about an hour later I actually start getting altitude sickness on the descent. We’re still at about 17000 feet, and I’m dehydrated, have barely eaten anything, and I’m 3 hours past when I should have taken my last diamox. I fix all three issues and continue descending, within 15 minutes I feel fine (although tired). We stop at 15000 feet for lunch, unfortunately there was a miscommunication and our lunch is down at 12500. We take a half hour break to recover, then continue. After lunch, we continue descending to camp at 10000 feet, and arrive a little after 3pm (that’s a 15 hour day for those keeping track, almost all of it in motion). I’m so tired I sleep through dinner, wake up to brush my teeth, than go back to sleep.

Mweka Camp to Park Gate

February 22nd. Finish the descent down, goes pretty quickly. Almost feels anti-climatic, it took almost a week to ascend and only a day and a half down. Head back to town and clean up, turn in some laundry since heading out on safari the next day, and hang out at the pool for about an hour (have a couple of beers, local beer Tusker is an excellent lager) go out for dinner with the whole gang. I break out the schnapps from Pension Christina and share with everyone (turns out quite smooth and tasty). Back to the hotel and finish packing up for safari, ready to go.