Meru, Day 3.5 - The final ascent!

- this is final installment of the Mt. Meru saga. Its a long one, but so was that final day!

We left camp wreathed in darkness, our head torches providing blue pools of light for our feet as we stepped over the rocks beginning the 5 hour ascent. The heather forest, have dropped from their 10 feet height, to about 7 and continue to reduce as we carry on up the path. A waxing moon, 7 days from being full, lent the heather and ethereal yellow glow, its light sufficient that between the clouds we were able to save your batteries, walking under moonlight. As with Little Meru, we began the walk wrapped up against the cold night, but within 20mins, our journey is peppered with a series of micro stops as we shed layers into our packs in order to cool off. While the temperature may be low, the route is steep and we found, that protected from the wind by the heather we quickly heated up

I had honestly begun to think that the uphill would never end. I have no great problem with going uphill, but usually there is some variation, for an hour we continued at the same angle, zig sagging up the mountainside, before, sweat relief, we came to the summit of the first peak, a place referred to as Rhino Point (3800m, we seemed to spend a lot of time in the region of this altitude!). Rhino Point gets its name from the Rhinoceros bones found mixed in with the stones on the top of the kern. The story is that years ago, a rhino had climbed to the top of the peak before dying there; the first climbers to ascend the peak found its weathered bones on the summit, and Christened the peak in honour of that animal – I did find one of the bones up there, but I’m ashamed to say I have no idea what it was, it might have been a badly damaged skull, but Rhino bones are not really covered at Warwick

After Rhino peak, joy of joys, we came to a downhill stretch, signally the beginning of the undulating ridge walk which would take us to the base of the summit. The hail from the storm was thick on the ground now, in the chill of the night, it had frozen with the rain water giving a sensation of walking on a thin sheet of Plaster of Paris, our feet easily passing through the sheet to the soft volcanic ash below.

We were taken aback slightly to find a large rocky buff baring our way at the base of one of the dips, giving us our first taste of rock climbing. Everyone inched across the rock face, hands and feet outstretched, looking for grip. After only a couple of minutes negotiating the face we realised the need to look out for one another as well as our footing, as one of the group took a small slide after missing his footing. In the dark we were not able to see the size of the outcrop, giving us no idea how far we had to go, making each of the 15 minutes it took for us to traverse its girth an eternity.
During our climb, every member of the group, including porters, took a stomach lurching slip down the face, each time, being caught by their own footing, or someone’s lighting reactions, flashing out to steady their packs. Certainly it was the scariest part of the climb so far, our fear heightened by the darkness, hiding the true penalty should we have failed to stop someone sliding down the face

After our climb, we returned to drudging up the ash hillside, the path winding close to the edge of the world so it seemed as our torch beams disappeared into darkness on our right, to the left, a steep slope and dimly outlined rocks just discernable in the gloom, descended rapidly to the valley floor, both options keeping us all actively seeking to walk carefully in the middle of the path. Conscious of the choices that a stray foot fall would bring us, on the one hand a terminal descent into night and on the other a tumble into the waiting arms of the of dark jagged sentinels, this was probably one of the most mentally tiring sections, a fact that was shortly to make itself shown.

Our path had returned to a having a very pleasing safety margin on both sides of us, allowing us to briefly relax. The path was becoming steeper again, with our progress slowed further by the loose volcanic ash, your feet slipping slightly with every foot fall, making it feel like we were ascending the world’s highest, black sand dune. This slow progress began to rapidly tell on the group, highlighted by the increasing frequency of our 5min stops, usually taken even 45mins to an hour.
I had set my sights on making it to 4am before taking another proper break, and slowly trudged through the last 30mins. At 3:45am on of the young Americans called a halt, we were near to my goal, so I didn’t feel that I was stopping too early. One of the problems with taking breaks near to 4000m is that you have to balance getting a rest and catching your breath against the onset of the cold. After only 2minutes of inactivity, you can begin to feel the cold setting in.

The headache that one of the young Americans had complained of down in the Saddle camp was still present, and combining with a growing feeling of nausea was looking considerably like altitude sickness. However he gamely fought on at the back of the pack. However at 4:00am just 10mins after our last break, he called a break again. Sitting on a small outcrop he apologised to the group, everyone knowing what was to come next, before saying that he didn’t think he would carry on. Unfortunately at the same time the other young Americans mental reserves, weakened by the resignation of his friend also broke, stating that his feet were killing him and that he would return to base with his friend.

I can thoroughly understand why they both called it a day at that point, the journey simply to get us half way to the summit had been gruelling, and the knowledge that we still had another 2:30hrs to go before the peak, coupled with an acceptance that the route was only get harder, made it very difficult not to simply accept defeat – especially as by now my pack was really starting to ache.

We agreed that the best thing would be to split the group, Zach – the older American, two porters and myself would push on for the summit, although we were told we would be unlikely to hit the 6am, sunrise deadline, while the guide and a porter would take the others back to base. As the moon paled and passed behind the clouds for the final time, the group split and we steeled ourselves to carry on.

I must admit by this time I was thoroughly grateful of Zach’s company, I swapped stories with the easy going American and together we pushed on through the ice and snow, which had now become much thicker underfoot. As we came into the last hour, we also came to the hardest sections of the route; we were bent double, walking along a ledge under an overhang. Darkness only a foot away to our left. To don’t mind saying that it was at this point i developed a touch of vertigo, and cannot remember the last time I felt trepidation and genuine fear so acutely. Thankfully we were only on the ledge for at the most 50m but I found it a truly unnerving 50m, scrambling along with my heart in my mouth the entire way.

Finally we came to the actual summit approach. Just beyond the rocks we stood at the base of, we would be within 200m of the summit. I could practically taste victory – or perhaps just the remains of my Powerbar still stuck to my teeth – or so I thought until the guide said it would take us another 40mins. We set of off at a steady through, at times resorting to using both our hands, elbows and knees to scramble over the rocks. I really was thinking at this point that I was ready to give up, and then, just above the rocks, perhaps 200m vertically as the guide had said, I could see the corner of a metal flag illuminated by torch light. That little reflection gave us the drive we needed and Zach and myself set off like men possessed. Taste it, we could damn well see it and it was within our grasp. Our muscles burned and we gasped the thin and kept going. A final boulder and we were sat on the summit, almost too tired to breathe I gasped out a phrase that had kept me going for the last 10mins “Not, dead, YET!” and with that sat down heavily to try and catch my breath.

The thin air meant that it was at least 10mins of being at the summit before I had finally caught my breath. We had arrived at 5:55am, before the 6am deadline which our guide had thought we would miss, and as we that there, cold and isolated on the 5th highest mountain in the continent of Africa, we turned to the East to watch dawn beginning to break over Kilimanjaro. I had said that I didn’t think that adding a little altitude could have really improved the sunrise that we had experienced the other morning, but I was wrong. To be able to look down on the clouds, across to Kili and down to the mountain we had just fought our way up was a truly wonderful feeling. Oh don’t get me wrong, it was flipping cold, I could still feel my heart pounding in my chest, and every time I stood up to take a picture I felt nauseous with the altitude. Was it worth it? Undoubtedly. Would I do it again? Not if you paid me!

And then, after all of that, we turned round and walked back down.