Everyman's Everest

That’s what Kilimanjaro has been called.

As one of the Seven Summits of the world, it claims the middle spot on the list, buffered by three higher peaks and three lower. Each continent offers up its top contender in the contest of glaciated giants, and this is how they place:

Carstensz Pyramid (Australia) 16,024’
Vinson (Antarctica) 16,050’
Elbrus (Europe) 18,510’
Kilimanjaro (Africa) 19,340’
Denali (North America) 20,320’
Aconcagua (South America) 22,841’
Everest (Asia) 29,029’

Kilimanjaro National Park was declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1987. In 1991, park authorities made it compulsory for all summit seekers to arrange their trek through a licensed agency and be accompanied by a guide on the trek itself. While aiming to preserve the natural wonders of the mountain, this has also increased the cost significantly in the form of park entrance fees, guide and porter fees, rescue fee, camping fee, food, tips. And before you even entertain the thought of stepping onto that extortionate playground, you have airfare, vaccines, passport and visa, trip insurance, medical release…and GEAR! Even so, the mountain can support 400 people starting their trek (total of all trails, including guides/porters and clients) on any given day, and often during the peak season the treks are sold out months, if not a year, in advance.

The main reason so many hiking enthusiasts are lured to this summit is because no technical skill is required. It is the highest “walkable” mountain in the world. Because of this, Kili is also the most underestimated mountain of the Seven Summits. At least half a dozen times, someone has said something to me like, “Kilimanjaro, that’s just a walk, right?“ I can’t argue with that. I can only suggest to the person that they skip the elevator and take the stairs up to the next floor “on one breath of air, even when you stop between floors, and then keep doing that two or three hundred more times. Now do it with the worst hangover you‘ve ever had.” Some kind of walk, huh? According to statistics, the average success rate on the entire mountain (all trails) is less than 50%.

Success has largely to do with acclimatization, something that cannot be rushed and is earned by putting in time and paying your dues in the form of varying degrees of Acute Mountain Sickness (AMS). This is a very good description of AMS and the symptoms that go along with it. On our trek, we will spend our last night sleeping (more likely Cheyne-Stoking, or gasping) in the red zone of “extremely high” altitude at 18,500’ before making our summit bid the next morning. I must admit, I’ve had my share of bad mornings after, but most of those were at least a decade and a half ago. While it’s highly unlikely that any residual tolerance from my youthful overindulgence remains, I will at least be familiar with the symptoms of AMS if the vice grip of altitude starts to squeeze my temples and my brain starts knocking on my skull.

There are a few grocery store items that are said to help combat AMS, and I have been taking them semi-regularly for the last month. Interestingly, two of those things supposedly work in concert: ginkgo and garlic tablets. It’s not the combination that I find interesting, but the fact that I can’t remember to take them, and ginkgo is supposed to help your memory. Somewhere I read that broccoli and blackstrap molasses are dynamite for boosting red blood cell production (good for transporting oxygen from the lungs to the rest of the body). I have been working the red blood cell factory overtime with my increased consumption of broccoli. I have refrained from drizzling blackstrap molasses on the broccoli.

The best way to prepare for altitude is to get high - as in elevation, not chemical substances. So, if you’re trying to find me in the next few weeks, chances are I’ll be hanging out with my snowshoes somewhere above Timberline Lodge, getting high, hopefully with some friends.