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ClimateNE & Climate Change Schools Project support the move to a low-carbon, resilient economy and help businesses avoid risk and realise commercial opportunities. Posts by Jen Atkinson, Krista McKinzey and Harriet Thew » After months of preparation, it is only now that I am hearing the horror stories of Kilimanjaro.
Why do people feel the need to share these with us two days before we fly?
What I want to hear is how it felt to be standing on 'the top of Africa', the sense of achievement on reaching the summit, and knowing you had raised thousands of pounds for a charity that literally changes people's lives.
I do NOT want to hear about the horror stories!
As I did last night when I went to buy some last minute pieces of kit and the guy who served me told me about his friend who attempted to climb Kilimanjaro before Christmas. Yes, that's right he said 'attempted'. That was before he had to be airlifted off the mountain with acute altitude sickness!
This more or less topped off my day. It started off with a story on something called
periodic breathing, which occurs while acclimatising. It is common, I'm told, to wake suddenly with a feeling of suffocation and to be gasping for breath - with the non breathing part of this lasting for 30 seconds or more. Now, is it just me or does this sound less than pleasant?
I should have stopped there but I continued on anyway, only to discover that climbing Mount Kilimanjaro pretty much affects every part of your body:
Your lungs - due to the lack of oxygen resulting in the occasional gasping with exertion;
Your heart and blood - as your body produces more red blood cells, the blood thickens;
Your kidneys produce more urine as you acclimatise;
Your stomach is affected in many ways, either through traveller's diarrhoea or acute mountain sickness
Your joints and muscles ache after hours upon hours of walking uphill;
Your ears and nose - causing dizziness and light headedness
Perhaps it would be quicker to say which areas AREN'T affected!
Obviously, my first thought was "What have I let myself in for?"
But after the anecdotes, came the antidote.
How can a part of me not look forward to the massive impact the trek will have, not only on my life but on the lives of thousands of handicraft makers across Swaziland?
It will make their dreams of increasing their income reality, so they can afford things that we all take for granted like sending their children to school.
In my mind, we are free to do whatever we want to do. All you need is the ability to dream, explore and discover. As soon as you have a dream, you can make it become a reality one step at a time. And that's how we'll tackle Kilimanjaro. Exactly one step at a time!
"Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you didn't do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines, sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover." - Mark Twain
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