We Made It!

After hiking 15.6 miles and rising 6300 feet in elevation over 2.5 days of hiking, the medical students and I summited Mt. Kenya at 6:50am on Sunday morning.  The assault on the Point Lenana (the 4th highest peak in Africa) started at 3:30 am.  The joy of reaching the peak at sunrise was especially nice as peaks are covered in snow.  It was the first time that any of the Kenyan medical students had seen or walked on snow.

The whole trip was fantastic.  It could not have been better "scripted."  We arose at 5am on Friday, ate breakfast and left Nairobi at 6am.  We arrived at the small town of Chogoria at the base of the mountain to meet our guide and his crew of 9 porters and cooks.  We then travelled by Land Rover through Chogoria Forest, getting stuck in the mud just once!  After 2 hours we arrived at the gate of Mt. Kenya.  After repacking our gear for the porters to carry, we hiked an easy two hours to Chogoria Roadhead and pitched camp.  Before dinner we took a side trip to see Nithi Falls and boy was it a beautiful site - a drop of about 200 feet.  Then, as the sun set, and dinner consumed we had our first of 5 bible studies/devotionals covering 2 Timothy.  Afterwards we spent some time around the campfire and enjoyed the brilliant clear skies with thousands of stars visible!

Saturday's hike was more challenging.  We left camp around 9am and trekked our way 12 kilometers (about 7 miles) while climbing 2700 feet. For most of the hike the skies were sunny and clear.  The beautiful and varied vegetation and rock formations was a delight.  I better understood when Scripture says that the "rocks will cry out" the praises of God!  He sure had fun creating this mountain range.  As we approached our campsite for Saturday, the clouds rolled in and the temperature dropped like a rock.  We were tired and went to bed around 8pm so we could get in some sleep before attempting our summit of Lenana.

After we all reached the summit, we did the only proper Kenyan thing - we had tea at the top!!  Our guide brougth it up it his bag.  After hugs, pictures, and the like we started down the mountain.  This was just as difficult as the climb as the combination of incline and snow made it a slippery proposition.  After getting down to a more level path, there was a slight slope where the snow was thick and safe.  It was obviously from the markings that some people had purposely "slid" down the slope.  Knowing the guys had never gone "sledding" before, I asked our guide if we could and he said yes.  So, I dropped to my seat and slid down.  The guys were open-eyed in amazement.  And then they followed suit.  It was great to see them hooping and hollering acting like kids sliding down some of the mountain.

After this, things turned a little "dicey".  One of the guys had been struggling with some Altitude Sickness.  I did too.  So we tried to get down as quick as we could safely do it.  I started feeling better when I got back to camp, but I still had a bad headache.  I ate breakfast, drank coffee, and started packing.  As the other guys were returning, the weather turned bad and it started sleeting.  As it did, my headache worsened and I knew I had to get down the mountain to more oxygen.  We took off and descended about 3000 feet in 2 hours.  As my headache improved (Altitude Sickness resolving) my legs started hurting.  I found I was stronger going up than coming down (because of the different muscles used).  At the end of the day, we had hiked over 12 hours and covered 32 km (18 miles) - needless to say we were exhausted.  But, man were we overjoyed at our success of climbing the mountain!

Thanks for praying.  The trip was incredible.  The devotions were timely and well illustrated by the climb.  I think it is something that none of us will ever forget.

Comments

[Jim]

Wow - that sounds fantastic! Congrats!

[Rob T]

Tim,

Sounds great!
Congrats to Sir Edmund Hutchison.

Rob