Day 7 Kilimanjaro climb via Lemosho route

Day 7 Kilimanjaro climb via Lemosho route

Elevation: 19.341 ft – 10,080 ft Distance: approximately 7.8 miles Hiking Time: 8 hrs ( 1hr rest in Barafu Camp and 30 min lunch not included) Uhuru Peak – Mweka Camp

Day 7 Kilimanjaro climb via Lemosho route – descend

Uhuru peak

We spend brief 20 minutes on the summit and started our descent. Right after we left the summit, I saw the Russian couple that I met the day before. The girl looked exhausted, but very happy. “Told you “I will see you on the summit!””, I said. “There’s no leopard!”, she smiled, “I know! What a disappointment!”, both of us laughed.  She made it!! I was so incredibly happy for her.

After Stella point we past 2 large reverse icicles fields.

“Screeing” techniques

The highlight of descent was scree skiing or “screeing”(my new word). My next trek’s favorite after Barranco wall climb (the summit not included, of course). So, the screeing! Scree is a mountain part covered by small loose gravel. You either love it or hate it. Only 3(including me) out of 14 climbers in our group enjoyed it, the rest hated it. Usually I’m a very clumsy person, but, surprisingly, I figured out the sliding process and enjoyed it. I suggest to just start sliding, a little bit at a time, making small steps and eventually you get a feel of it. You will fall once, twice, but once you realize that it is not dangerous just very unusual, you will get more comfortable with it. The key point to understand is that you can’t get down without sliding. Once you start sliding, you will need to keep the momentum going, step by step. You will develop your own technique, slide sideways or forward, making small or large sliding steps. The technique that worked for me was making large steps forward.

Yes, you will be tired and yes it will be frustrating at first but try to take it as an opportunity to learn how to scree( the important skill that you most likely won’t use anywhere else), make couple of videos (I regret I didn’t) and have fun watching them later at home.

The “fun” scree part of our descent ended, and the rest of the trail was covered by small to medium size rocks. Here is the view of Barafu camp from the trail.

Rest at Barafu camp

Once we got down to the Barafu camp, we rested an hour in the tents, had lunch and continued our descent to Mweka camp using Mweka route. The group separated and now we were hiking in small groups of two-three. It took us about 4 hours to get to the Mweka camp.

Mweka camp

By the time we got to the camp, I had been up for 38 hours. I got to the tent and changed,  I was hungry and tired. After one energy bar and decided to take a short nap before the dinner. I woke up next morning. This rest was  great after restless night and 38-hours-long day.

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Day 7 Kilimanjaro climb via Lemosho route – summit

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