Kilimanjaro: A physical and emotional achievement!

Posted By Annie Cap on Jan 21, 2014 | 1 comment

I made it to the top!!
Of course, in my head, it wasn’t an option to not succeed, but the last part turned out to be much harder than I thought.
It was a seven day journey, five days to ascend and two days going down. The first four days felt like a piece of cake, no altitude symptoms bothered me whatsoever and physically I was feeling so strong and energized by this whole adventure. As we rose to the summit we saw many different landscapes, all respectively attached with their unique astonishing beauty. The sun was mostly bright and shiny in the day, getting stronger as we rose, sometimes hidden by clouds which we had to find our way through.

On the fifth day we had to get up at 11:30pm and start the ultimate climb to the top at midnight so we would reach the highest summit in Africa as the sun shows its first rays. I was feeling slightly weak because of a small insolation on that last day of climb, the sun being so strong… I thought: “Really?… What a timing!” as we were just about to face the most important part of our journey. So we left at twelve, we rested in our tents for a couple hours and fortunately I felt much better when it was time to get ready. It was really cold but we were all dressed accordingly so that wasn’t an issue. The sky was so bright and full of stars, and I saw about 7 or 8 shooting stars along the way! At that point I was thinking to myself: “I got this”, I was even getting a bit impatient because we were walking so slow. This was like a wonderful dream, i was on a high of joy and peacefulness…. Until at around 3 or 4 am I started to feel so tired all of a sudden, and really weak, my steps slowed down, I couldn’t go any faster even if I wanted to, the dizziness took me over, it became really hard to keep going.

This part I’m describing is actually a steep hill of about 1000 meters of altitude difference, the summit being almost 6000 meters high! The altitude sickness I was experimenting was very similar to being drunk, and yet I was still overwhelmed with joy even if my body wasn’t quite following, I was somehow fully conscious of the extraordinary journey I had put myself into.

So I had to maintain a conversation with myself for the hours of climb remaining to just keep going one step at a time, it never crossed my mind that I wouldn’t achieve my goal.

Climbing at high altitude for many hours to reach a summit is very similar to run a marathon; you just have to keep running no matter what in order to reach that line. These are physical experiences but very emotional too as it’s mostly our guts and willingness that keeps us going even if the body doesn’t seem to respond so well anymore. We push through it because we want to reach that goal and we know we will, just like anything in life.

What a feeling when I finally reached the summit!! The beauty of Uhuru Peak is beyond expectations, I felt a powerful energy in me as soon as I knew I had made it! Tears of joy and exhaustion came down my cheeks, I was so proud and so happy to be able to finally enjoy this incredible view… I was on top of the world… Glaciers were surrounding us and the clouds seemed so far down. Right at this moment I knew that I really could (and so can you!) achieve anything I wanted in life, it’s really just a mindset! I came back down with all my energy back, I wasn’t feeling any altitude symptoms anymore and I was on the high of having accomplished such a feat, it’s even more rewarding when you really had to struggle through it. This was probably the most inspirational experience in my life, and I hope it will inspire you too and show you that anybody can really decide and create his own destiny, like I said, it’s all a mindset, a very powerful one if we let it be.

Face your fears, welcome them and let them know you’re just stronger than them and you’ve decided to go your own path, they are not needed anymore, follow your own dreams. This goes for any small achievements to the biggest crazy goals we can set ourselves.

I grew so much along this journey, and I enjoyed very much spending time with my own self, I learned so much and I will cherish this experience in my heart for the rest of my life.

The connexion is far from optimal here,  it’s not very strong so I had to restrain my communications, but many more pictures and stories are to come.
I am coming back on the 28th, currently enjoying Uganda now.

I can assure you that I will be so energized to give the best treatments when I get back, I also learned from some local massage therapists from Tanzania and got some swahili and indian inspirational knowledge also.

So I’m ready and very excited to come back and share the energy and knowledge I learned through this fantastic journey!

As they say: kill kili or kili kills you! Goes for anything in my opinion!

Thank you for following and I will see you soon 🙂
Annie Cap