February 26th, 2018

Kili Team Reaches the Top (Tye Chapman)

100% on top of Kilimanjaro is always good news.  100% down at Mweka Camp and safe is even better.  We received two messages from Tye Chapman last evening and early this morning – one from the summit and one from their final camp.  Mweka Camp is at 10,000 ft and there’s a lot more oxygen there and temps are much warmer.  Add in all the effort of the summit day and it all makes for big appetites and some great sleep for a seriously tired team.  What a great kind of ‘tired’!

A good night’s sleep and a few hours of hiking tomorrow and the team will be heading for the showers at K’s Hotel.  Time to start celebrating the summit and to start thinking about the upcoming safari.  All is well in Tanzania.

Phil Ershler

February 25, 2018

The team is at Barafu (high camp), and all is well. Light lunch, early dinner, get packed for summit attempt, rest/sleep as much as possible — done or in process of ‘getting done’. Everyone’s planning on taking a shot in the morning, very early in the morning. It’s game day, and everyone’s excited.

Fingers crossed for tomorrow.

Phil Ershler

February 24, 2018

IMG guide Tye Chapman just checked in from Karanga Camp over on Kili. He reported that everyone really enjoyed the the Barranco Wall today and that everyone is happy and healthy. That’s great news. And the weather continues to cooperate too!

After a steep hour and a half climb to the top of Barranco Wall, the rest of the hike over to Karanga Camp is pretty easy. And scenic! About 5 hours of hiking for the team today. Once they got to Karanga and moved into the tents, they enjoyed a nice hot lunch — french fries, chicken, and fried bananas! Then they had the afternoon to rest and enjoy the views.

Tomorrow is another short day for the team. They will hike for about 4 hours before arriving at their high camp. The high camp is called Barafu which means ‘ice’ in Swahili. This is fitting, of course, as it sits at over 15,000 feet. The anticipation is really starting to build at this point. The team will only spend about 12 hours at high camp before starting their ascent. They are getting close!

Dustin Balderach

February 23, 2018

Tye Chapman just checked in from Barranco Camp over on Kilimanjaro. The team had a big day today. This is always a long day as you really cover some terrain and pop up to 15,000 feet before descending down to camp. Its good trail though and not very steep, just slow and steady. It’s usually about 8 hours of walking and second toughest day of the trip – after summit day of course! A bit overcast this morning but cleared off this afternoon and clear now, which is pretty much normal weather for this time of year.

That’s good news as the views today are incredible. The first half of the day you spend walking directly towards the mountain with Kili staring right at you. After lunch you drop down and traverse below some of the southern glaciers. This is always cool to see and I love the hike from Lava Tower down to Barranco Camp. Just before camp you walk through a high elevation grove of the Giant Groundsel trees that are endemic to the high volcanoes of east Africa. Awesome trees! Then you arrive at Barranco Camp at 13,000 feet but sitting inside a deep ravine. Because of this, the sun sets early and rises late so it tends to be a fairly cold camp. The views of the steep southern face of the mountain are totally worth it.

Dinner’s finished and the team’s settling into tents for the evening.   Dinner conversation included plans and the trail for tomorrow. I’ve had this discussion many times. From camp you can plainly see the trail tomorrow zig-zagging right up the Barranco Wall. It looks really intimidating from camp. However, it’s not nearly as bad as it looks and it is often remembered as one of the highlights of the whole climb. It’s about 1,000 feet of steep trail and some scrambling (occasional use of hands) and takes around an hour and a half. But there is very little exposure and the trail is quite good. To alleviate any concerns I always point out that the porters all do this with 30 pound duffels on their heads! The team is going to have fun tomorrow!

Dustin Balderach

February 22, 2018

IMG Guide Tye Chapman just called in from Shira Camp over on Kilimanjaro.  He reports that the team had a great hike up from Machame camp this morning. They saw some of Kilimanjaro’s very unusual plants today and got their first view of the upper mountain – always a nice site!  This is a fun day and a tough one, although not super long.  They only had to gain a couple thousand feet of elevation, but the trail is steep in places.  No problem for the team though as we always move slowly up the mountain.  “Pole Pole” is a Swahili phrase which means “slow”.  It is spoken often on Kili and is both encouragement and a reminder to move slowly to conserve energy and acclimate properly!

Sitting at 12,600’, Shira Camp is a neat one.  The Shira Plateau has unobstructed views of the upper mountain and plenty of space to move around.  It can also get cold here at night!  Nice views over to Mt. Meru and the Shira Ridge off the other side of the plateau.  Our schedule puts us in camp in the early afternoon with plenty of time to drink, eat, rest, and take in the amazing views.  Hot drinks and popcorn awaited Tye and the team when they arrived.

Tomorrow they will head over to Barranco Camp at 13,000 feet after first climbing to over 15,000 feet at Lava Tower. Climb high, sleep low is the name of the game for the next couple days.

Dustin Balderach

February 21, 2018

Tye Chapman and team checked in early this morning, our time.  First day on the trail is ‘in the books’.  A couple of hours of drizzle today but everyone’s staked out their tent and settled in.  Snacks, hot drinks, dinner and more hot drinks will round out their day.

Good first day for the team.  The hike from Machame Gate to Machame Hut is on good trail but they knock off a couple thousand feet of elevation gain.  To see the team do well and stay together throughout the day makes for an auspicious start.  All is good.

Phil Ershler

February 20, 2018

Second half of the winter Kili season has begun.  Tye Chapman is leading and the team is gathering.  Here’s the message we received from Tye this morning:

“Great day today!

The team (and their bags) all arrived safely over the past couple days, but today was our first official day together. We all had a nice breakfast getting to know each other. After breakfast we jumped right into gear checks.

Once the gear checks were completed we went into Moshi for a quick tour and to run a few errands. On the agenda was money exchange, the local market, a milkshake, the pharmacy and the supermarket.

Once the tour was complete it was time to get back to the hotel and pack up our gear and get ready to start the climb tomorrow morning. We’ve just finished dinner and duffel weight checks and are officially ready to go!

Oh yeah, Tatsuya’s and my bags arrived, too!!!”

Tomorrow, they’ll start walking.

Phil Ershler