I have huge respect for people who follow their dreams, put it all on the line, and accomplish great things.
One friend who has just returned from an amazing trip to Kilimanjaro, Lisanne Lewis, is the Director, Business & Community Development for the Shaw Conference Centre.
She is one dynamic human being and shared the intimate details of her dream trip with me for my Edmonton Sun Page 6 column.
Due to the length of the column I felt it best to post the 'full response' to my questions so that you could enjoy the full impact for 'following her dream' to the top of this legendary mountain.
The idea got started…
I turned 50 in July this year and about two years ago started looking around for something big to mark the milestone. I had a chance dinner conversation with Bunny Ferguson at the Harvest Gala Celebration that year where she described how she and John Ferguson trekked Kilimanjaro, the good parts and the challenges – and I thought hey, I think I could do that.
Much research followed, including the realization that, as a complete non-outdoorsy, non-athlete, I was going to need to train hard and ideally find someone to go with me who was much better at this hiking stuff than I was.
Carrie Doll, always my muse and inspiration was my original partner in all this but she had just retired from TV to pursue her own business adventures. So during a Sunday river valley walk with my favourite group of wise women I jokingly asked if “anyone wants to climb Kilimanjaro with me” and the lovely Carmelle Boston, VP of Communications at the Alberta Cancer Foundation put up her hand.
Carmelle and I were new friends, liked and knew each other socially but that was about the extent of our knowledge of each other.
What followed next was essentially a year of speed dating to get to know each other.
The preparation…
I needed a major physical overhaul to get ready and began training HARD twice a week with a trainer, Luke Logan at Body By Bennett for 18 months leading up to the climb.
They have a photo of Bunny and John Ferguson’s climbing group posted on the wall in the gym so I thought this was a good sign. Lots of lunges, squats, weights, lifting, high intensity workouts that included a lot of boxing gradually started turning a skinny tall girl into strong tall girl.
Sunday’s became long hike days carrying a 10lb pack and Carmelle and I would escape when we could (together and alone) to get some altitude climbs in around Banff, Lake Louise and Canmore.
For the last few months I basically hurt all the time from workouts.
For the last few months I basically hurt all the time from workouts.
My eating habits also changed, dropping most sugars and glutens and they even lined me up with a nutritionist for coaching and to monitor my body composition.
Two months before the climb the goal shifted to putting ON weight and building lean muscle – which was way harder than you would think.
The other part of preparation was gathering gear. As someone who doesn’t normally venture outside I had a lot of gear to buy and borrow.
It takes a village to get a girl up a mountain and so many very kind friends loaned me everything from hiking poles, to sleeping bags, to headlamps and polar sleeping bags.
Time frame and flight path…
I was away for 19 days, including a couple of days to sleep off the 9 hour difference jet lag. This took place right in the middle of busy, high-event season for us.
EEDC was very supportive of my time off, Brad Ferguson in particular.
There was a Ferguson theme throughout my climb it seems. Looove the new LMN direct flight to Amsterdam. They partner with Kenya air and the local hopper flights so I was able to check my kit bag all the way from Edmonton to Kilimanjaro, Tanzania.
When we arrived…
Two 8-hour flights, and a 9-hour time difference leaves you feeling bevy shell shocked when you arrive to a beautiful hot world of colourful sights and sounds.
I was amazed at how soft and beautiful the Swahili language is and how respectful and helpful the traditional Maaisai locals are of trekking tourists.
We were part of a tour group, joining three other people on the climb. Our tour guide Jackson picked us up at the first tented hotel we stayed at in Arusha, then we picked up the other three (all Brits) who had flown in separately, and the five of us embarked on a 2-day safari that also helped us acclimatize.
We quickly learned that Jackson would be glued to us day and night. He told us when to sleep, when to wake, when to wash, when to eat, what to eat, what to wear, when to walk, when to rest, when to walk again and would monitor us closely for the rest of the trip for any signs of injury or altitude sickness.
After the safari we left our non-mountain gear at another beautiful hotel, re-packed our kit bags and met our 25-person crew that would get us and all stuff up the mountain.
We each had our own porter to carry our bag and set up our tent plus we had a chef/ mess tent and the luxury of a private, tented portable “biffy.” Yes, a porter was assigned to carry our “biffy” up the mountain every day – and he made great jokes and songs out of it. God luv him.
Being looked after by this massive crew quickly got rid of any apprehension; it was their job to get us to the summit in a safe and healthy way and we knew we were in good hands.
The trek…
It was hard, very hard, the hardest thing I’ve ever done in my life, physically and mentally. It was 6 days to get up the mountain and one day to get down. You are walking uphill every day for hours, over very rough terrain, climbing 1,000 meters each day, very slowly in order to acclimatize.
We only had to carry our day packs and water (10-15 lbs) since the porters carried EVERYTHING ELSE ON THEIR HEADS up the mountain, passing us to scamper ahead and make camp and dinner for us. God luv them.
Once we get to camp every day we drop our bags, snack, then go on a 1-2 hour higher hike up and back down to acclimatize. “Sleep lower than you climb” is the standard. At this point your legs and back are beyond sore every day.
Yes, we were all popping Advil like crazy. No “impressions” from past treks, except for the inukshuks past hikers have left at major milestone areas, which are oddly comforting if you are having a tough day.
Worst part was summit night: after climbing all day we get to Kibo camp, exhausted, we were all suffering from mild altitude symptoms at this point (nausea, fatigue, headaches), then get taken on yet another mini-acclimatization hike, forced to eat, sleep and woken up at 11 pm to start the summit climb in the pitch dark.
We climbed by headlamps, in the cold for 6 hours, then summited at sunrise. The lead guide sang beautiful Swahili songs all night to keep our spirits up. I was shocked at how much the altitude can affect you: at one point I was taking only 5 steps before stopping to catch my breath, with 50% less oxygen in the air at 5,600 metres your body begins panting trying to get enough air.
One member of our team began to see phantom animals passing us. I couldn’t stop my nose from bleeding and freezing on my face.
The guides would put chocolate in our mouths for energy, pat our cheeks for reaction, adjust our water hoses and headlamps and actually shove us up the next step so that muscle memory would kick in and we would start walking again … for another 5 steps … then repeat entire process.
The summit ….
By 3 am we had split into two groups: three of us, including Carmelle were feeling well enough to try the extra 2 hours to another summit called Uhuru.
Along with Jody, a tough little nurse from England, I was happy to continue to the original summit goal of Gilman’s point since Jody and I were moving much slower due to altitude effects.
Carmelle and I had pre-agreed we would split up if needed so we hugged it out and continued towards our separate summits.
Our guides wouldn’t let us look up while we were climbing that night because we tended to get off balance and fall easily. But on one of our many (many) breaks, just before sunrise, when we were feeling our coldest and our most fatigued, we paused to look up and there was Venus, Mars and Jupiter clustered together right there, looking huge and bright and feeling so close that you could reach out and touch them.
Then the sun began to rise, we got over that last rock, and poof, we were at the top!
I finally snapped out of robo-walk mode and whooped it up, hugged Jody and we both had a little cry but had to stop because the tears were freezing to our faces.
We snapped the obligatory photo and shared a celebratory flask of fireball whisky I had brought with me with our guides.
Aftermath…
We “skied” down 1,000 meters of scree, shredding our pants but feeling better with every metre we descended. After a one-hour nap we descended to Horombo, and the next day walked 6hours out of the park, all in about a 35 km walk off the mountain.
We flew to Zanzibar and baked on a beach for two days, then began the long flights home.
(FYI you can rent beautiful private shower rooms in the Amsterdam airport, just sayin’)
I’m sunburnt, my face is still marked up from the ice, I’ve damaged my right ankle, lost a toe nail or two and may actually have malaria. It was all worth it.
The fulfilling part of this journey turned out to be in the months leading up to the actual climb: the commitment to the physical preparation, the research, learning to hike, finding the right gear, the generous support of friends and colleagues, and the partnership and now close friendship with Carmelle.
We are planning a “Kili Didn’t Kill Us” event for November.
The adventure has changed how I feel about moving through the world.
The adventure has changed how I feel about moving through the world.
We were told repeatedly by well-meaning folks that two “girls” should be scared about going to Africa to do something so physical but instead we listened to our strong community of dauntless friends, family and workmates who said we could do it.
They were right.
They were right.
Favourite stories….
- The uniting power of football. Turns out our entire crew of porters and guides are huge football fans, Team Arsenal specifically. So was one of the Brits travelling with us, a nice fellow named Terry who looked like a Navy Marine but was actually a Barclays banker. He would put on his parka and gather around the radio on game night, with the porters translating the Swahili play-by-play for him for their beloved Arsenals, who are currently no. 2 in the standings. I know this now because we all became oddly focused on the team’s success.
- Tanzania’s national elections took place the Sunday of our climb. The porters had a large flagpole placed at the centre of camp every night for the favorite political party’s flag. We learned a lot about the election process, the hopes and fears of the locals, celebrated with them when the results came in and grieved with them when the long-time sitting current party refused to acknowledge the results that would have ousted them. There was a strong army presence in Zanzibar because of the demonstrations so tourists were discouraged from going into town.
Our federal election took place that same week and no matter what you think about the outcome, we had new-found appreciation for Canada’s transparent, democratic and peaceful election process.
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Lisanne thanks for sharing your trip with my readers - and we are all glad that you and Carmelle are safely home - but more so that you followed through on a once in a lifetime pledge that took courage, physically demanding work, and dedication to 'reaching the top' of this legendary mountain.
So...simple question to end this...
