We get to Kibo Camp around 1 or 2pm, have a small rest, then have a very early dinner at 5pm. This was because we weren’t actually going to turn in for the night at Kibo, it was merely a rest until midnight when it was time to start our summit attempt. In the hours between dinner and our 11pm wake up call, I couldn’t sleep much for reasons I can’t explain. Before our “breakfast” at 11:30pm, we put on all the clothes we brought. Here’s what I wore – I know you all are wondering: underwear, under armor compression shorts to tuck my upper base layer into, three-quarter length Patagonia yoga pants with REI wool socks that came up on my calves past where the yoga pants ended, Under Armor cold gear leggings, my Blackbird sweatpants, Columbia hiking pants, Mac in a Sac waterproof rain pants, hand warmers under my toes in between the REI socks and Patagonia thick wool socks. And that’s just on the bottom! I wore my short sleeve Uganda frisbee jersey tucked in to the shorts, my long sleeve Blackbird jersey tucked in to the yoga pants, my light blue Patagonia quarter-zip micro-fleece pullover, my grey Patagonia Better Sweater full zip fleece, my Patagonia Nano Puff Hoody jacket, my Patagonia Houdini windbreaker jacket, a puffy fall coat that goes to my thighs branded Calvin Klein my mom bought for me years ago at Costco, a new fleece Kitenge fabric accented hoody, and my Patagonia H2No rain jacket shell. Then my alpaca wool hat from Peru and an ear warmer headband as a face warmer and winter ski gloves. That’s NINE layers on top. And guess what. I was STILL cold. The gear was great, but my circulation is terrible. (If it isn’t clear, I’m trying to get some serious sponsorships or free stuff here #patagonia #REI #patagoniananopuffhoody #hiking #REIhalfdometent #ospreywaterbladder)

The reason, I was told by Dennis, that we start the hike in the middle of the night is because the moisture in the air makes it so there is more oxygen in the air and therefore “easier” to breathe. I guess “easier to breath” is all relative. The downside about starting in the middle of the night is that as it gets deeper into the night, it gets colder, and as you go higher, it gets colder. That’s compounding colder. At some point I had to wear the Maasai blanket that Bill smartly brought. I wore it like a cape, but it did not give me superhero strength.

The pure uphill climb in the dead cold dark of night was absolutely miserable. I had trouble catching my breath and my heart and body felt like it was sprinting even though I was barely moving. Here’s a not good combo: having to move to stay warm but needing to sit on a rock and rest every fifteen minutes to recover my breath. I could barely keep the pole pole pace. Groups were passing us and it was demoralizing. And I felt so guilty for making the whole group wait for me while I took a break. Poor Victor especially since he is skin and bones and was literally shaking from cold. I kept insisting that Bill and Victor go on ahead with Dennis and Johnson while I go even more pole pole with Issac and Emmanuel. Bill did not want to continue ascending without me if I was to continue ascending, so I kept trying. Isaac led the way, followed by me, then Bill, Victor, Dennis, Emmanuel, and Johnson. Emmanuel carried snacks for us and hot tea. About two hours in (I think) I was feeling extra weak. The “breakfast” was porridge, which you now know I don’t like, so I didn’t eat. Bill gave me one of the pb&js that we had made before the trip and it gave me a small energy boost. I also popped a Shot Block in my mouth, but they were pretty frozen and solid, not their normal gummy chewy selves. I ended up spitting it out because sucking on it felt to be using up more energy than it was giving me. The hot ginger tea was a great for warming up and hydrating, especially since our water froze in the drinking tubes. And it was great for Victor, not only because he was cold but because he wasn’t feeling well at early dinner the day before, and after he drinks some and we start moving again, he bends over to the side to vomit. One thing about vomiting from altitude sickness is that you immediately feel better. “Lucky Victor,” I thought to myself.

Keeping my mind occupied to focus on something other than my misery proved very very difficult. In the light of the stars all we could see was a wall of black going straight up, with small bobbing lights of the headlamps of hikers way ahead of us. I would look up and see just how far vertically up those lights seemed and I was on the edge of losing hope. “Why am I doing this?” “This is stupid.” “There is SO much left to go up.” Then I look down and see the lights of headlamps of groups way below us and Kibo Camp. “I can’t turn back now, I am already this high up, THAT would be stupid.” This back and forth goes on in my brain for hours on end.

In an effort to help me, Bill said to just focus on keeping a pace. But my brain had more excuses. I did gymnastics and play ultimate, both of which require extreme amounts of energy exertion but not at a consistent pace with opportunities for recovery, if even for just a few seconds. Bill, as a cross country runner in high school (and the pitcher on the baseball team and the salutatorian and Math Team champion #humblebrags), knew how to pace himself over the course of many hours and how to not let the mental game win. He was trying to help me, but it didn’t really. I started just literally following Isaac’s footsteps, stepping on this rock, stepping in this spot, etc. Focusing on that seemed to work kind of. Over the course of what seemed like an eternity, I tried keeping my mind off of the task at hand. Why did we already discuss all wedding things and what we have been reading on the earlier hikes! Now what was I supposed to think about?! I decided to sing every single Beatles song to myself. “Damn it, why can I only think of 4 of them! I usually know all the words to all the songs! Ok let’s try 90s and early 2000’s pop. You are, my fiiiiiire, the one desiiiiiire. Oh, a fire would feel so nice right now.” That clearly didn’t work either. So then I imagined myself singing a handful of different fun and silly kids songs to Bill’s nephews and imagined them getting such a kick out of it (Wellllllllllllll I walked around the corner and I walked around the block and I walked right in to a donut shop and I scooped up a donut right off the grease and I handed the lady a five cent piece. Wellllllllllllll she looked at the nickel and she looked at me and she said this nickel is no good you see there’s a hole in the middle I can see right through and I said there’s a hole in my donut too. Thanks for the donut. So long. … You put your butt in, you put your butt out, you put your butt in and you shake it all about. You do the hokey pokey and you turn yourself around, that’s what it’s all about! … I’m bringing home a baby bumble bee, won’t my mommy be so proud of me I’m bringing home a baby bumble bee. Ouch! It stung me! …) You get the picture.

After about 3 or 4 hours of off again on again pole pole, sit, walk, rest, drink, sit, pole pole, Isaac links his arm into mine and is now basically pulling me up the mountain. This was immensely helpful because I was so tired and ready to admit defeat. There was a point where I even closed my eyes and just walked as he pulled. Since he was now pulling me up the mountain, I had no choice but to keep going up. There was some rock stepping which required that he hold my hand instead of my elbow, and mind you, he was gloveless. I couldn’t let him down now and turn back after he willingly and glovelessly was helping me, could I? During one of our resting seated stops, Isaac points out Oliotuktuk town in Kenya thousands of miles below us. I only later found out that the joke in Swahili was on all of us suckers, as all the townspeople were sleeping warmly in their beds. Why were we up here again? We could be warm in our sleeping bags right now. But if we can keep going, the sun will eventually rise and warm us up. And that’s exactly what happened. We were able to hold on for 6 hours after we begin our ascent, and the sun crept over the horizon. Our entire group’s hope had been restored and it feels great. Don’t get me wrong, I was still tired and winded and felt like I wanted to die, but I was somehow, strangely, happy.

Kibo is actually a dormant volcano so there is a big crater inside and the peak is along the rim. We climb for about one more hour after the sun comes up to make it Gillman’s Point (5,685 meters; 18,651.5 feet), which is on the rim! It felt like such an eternity on the brink of death to get there, and once there, I take in the views and the sun, and remove my Maasai blanket cape. Dennis and Victor had made it up there at least 30 minutes faster than me, so they were ready to keep going. From Gillman’s we can see Uhuru Peak, the final destination. Seeing it felt pretty much like this: you know when you’ve played a full tournament Saturday of ultimate and you feel exhausted and sore in that sense of accomplishment sort of way and as you begin to take your cleats off your blistered feet you fantasize about that warm shower and welcome cookie at the DoubleTree followed by all you can eat salad and breadsticks at Olive Garden and you hope they are doing that Tour of Italy special when your captain/coach/tournament director says that there’s actually a crossover game right now and it’s going to be the hardest game of the day. Your heart sinks. Your head drops. But you know there is no alternative. You have to play. You have to get yourself up mentally and convince yourself you can do it physically. That warm shower and Tour of Italy is going to have to wait as you change your socks hoping it will make you feel like a new person, and you lace up your cleats for one more last big push. That’s what it feels like to see the actual peak, another two hours away uphill on the other side of the crater.

We keep climbing, Isaac is still pulling me. Other than feeling exhausted I feel great: no headache, no light headedness, etc. Bill’s heart rate, while sitting down and resting, climbed up to 90, which is not a great sign, so we really needed to keep the pole pole pace. That was no problem though because there was no way I could go any faster. The scenery up there is quite impressive. We are higher than planes, higher than the clouds, and there’s lots of snow and glaciers all around us. We are inching closer to the peak and I am getting slightly warm. Feeling comes back to my toes. People start passing us on their way back down, they had their turn on the peak and soon, hopefully, it would be our turn. They tell us encouraging things like “this is the hardest part but you can do it!” The people passing us on their way down were of huge age ranges, 20 years younger than me and 20 years older than me. I thought if they can do it, I have to be able to too. It also gave me hope that I will still be cool and adventurous in 20 years. We also see a few people being escorted down quickly by guides, people who are clearly sick from the altitude and look completely out of it. Some tours will rent portable oxygen for extreme emergencies, but from my understanding it should not be used preventively at all, and only after the first medical intervention of descending quickly is complete. Luckily, no one in our group had that sort of emergency. I later found out that all of our guides except for Emmanuel, who wasn’t even a guide, just a very helpful happy waiter and porter, felt lightheaded or sick. Had I known that then, I would have been scared for my life. Isaac was feeling sick but still pulling me up, but maybe that’s why he felt sick.

Nine hours after we leave Kibo camp, Uhuru Peak is just within reach. The whole climb, every next goal, whether it was the next turn of the switchback or that rock up there or Gillman’s or Stella’s Point, felt so close yet so far. As we near the congratulatory sign on Uhuru Peak, I take Bill’s hand and we step closer and closer and closer and finally…

we made it.

A flood of emotions happened next and tears start streaming down my face. I hug Bill crying and he, and Victor, both say they are proud of me. Still crying, I go over to Isaac to hug him and thank him for pulling me up. We all take a bunch of pictures at the sign, and I am sitting down in all of them. We let the next group of folks have their turn at the sign and go sit down on some rocks. A week before the trip I had purchased a chocolate bar that I put in a secret pocket in my backpack. I told myself, “This is Victory Chocolate, and it can only be eaten on Uhuru Peak”. I take out the Victory Chocolate and share it with Bill and Victor, informing them that this is no ordinary Cadbury chocolate bar. After about 30 minutes on Uhuru Peak (elevation: 5,895 meters; 19,340.6 feet), and after I peed up there and took off a few layers, we begin our descent. It took 9 hours to get up, and just over 2 hours to get down. We practically flew down. Once we were off the rim, the sandy rocky scree was really fun, although dusty, to run down. I found a good technique of leaning back and digging in my heels as I stepped down allowing for a few inches of sliding before my next step. Also, I just really wanted to be off the mountain and in the comfort of my sleeping bag. We have only one hour to rest before we have to continue hiking for another 9 kilometers (5.6 miles) to our camp at Horombo Hut that night. We didn’t mind leaving Kibo though because it had begun to snow. Basically our Friday consisted of about 16 hours of hiking, a majority of it a crazy uphill climb, at extreme altitude.

That night at Horombo I sleep so well. I think we all did. We were tired from missing a night of sleep (remember those previous paragraphs where I talked about how we hiked all night) and also exhausted (from that same all night hike) but so happy and feeling accomplished. We have one more day ahead of us. Day 6 we have to go 19 kilometers, 11.8 miles, to get to the Marangu Gate. But before we go, chef Adam has made us a cake and our porters sing us celebratory songs during breakfast. It was awesome. The hike to the gate was pretty much downhill through quite beautiful terrain. We were now on the other side of Mawenzi and it was incredible to see it knowing we had come from the clear other side. We had walked SO much over the past 5 days. And today was no different. We make it to the exit gate at 12:20 in the afternoon, have lunch, sing more songs, then pile in the van back to the hotel. In the parking lot we bid farewell to our porters, and the whole team after we give everyone a nice tip for their hard work. Before we head to our rooms, Johnson and Isaac present our gold certificates that say we made it to Uhuru Peak, and it felt good knowing what we have accomplished. Another thing that felt good: pooping in a toilet and taking a 30 minute hot shower after a week of wet wipes. Though the dirt may be gone from under my fingernails, and I am slowly starting to walk normally again without any muscle pains, I will always have the memories and experience of the mountain. And also a T-shirt.

It was by far one of the hardest physical challenges and mental toughness tests of my life, yet it was also one of the most incredible things I have accomplished. But I never want to do it again.