Other blogs will no doubt deal with the logistics of the adventure, the flights, the lodge, the bus rides, the camps, the treks, the food, the team, the camaraderie, the mutual support, the porters, the guides, and the views – but to avoid repetition I’m going to talk mostly about the Mountain, and our… ‘rocky’ relationship.

So… just before setting off for Africa, I wasn’t quite the full Dreyfuss, I wasn’t quite making Kili-mash-jaro effigies out of my Sunday lunch

but I probably wasn’t far off… in retrospect the mountain had become a bit of an obsession.

The first and most obvious area of the Mountain’s influence was on my approach to fitness – which this time last year wasn’t great… Previous injuries having already delayed the ill-fated ‘Fit-by-Forty’ plan turning it instead into a ‘Fit-at-Forty’ campaign. But being confirmed as a Team Twende member meant that I knew I had to get properly serious and that another ‘well intentioned’ fitness programme wouldn’t suffice.

So I created a plan:

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General fitness took the form of mountain biking 550 miles over about 40 rides (plus a few more that I know Strava missed). And swimming; gym work outs; and rowing through major sporting events like the Ryder Cup.

And I did find myself at the top of that first hill at the end of July – Ingleborough one of the 3 Yorkshire peaks, with assistance from my bestie Rob.

Avid blog readers will know about the trials and tribulations of the Liverpool-Leeds cycle https://autovistakilimanjarochallenge.com/2018/09/liverpool-to-leeds-cycle-127-miles-by-canal and the 3 National Peaks – and the hell on earth which was the 1-day 3 Yorkshire Peaks https://autovistakilimanjarochallenge.com/2018/11/twendscenders-assemble-infinity-walk which I will reiterate should not be attempted in late October, by anyone, ever.

What was also well documented was that shortly after that I suffered a fresh injury – which after having invested so much effort over the summer months, was a tough blow – and in retrospect I reacted badly. I took the huff, and very consciously self-medicated with way too much food and drink over Christmas.

In addition to the fitness saga, there was a medical one, one which encompassed nearly all posts and positions within the medical profession, having received advice from; consultants, specialists, GP’s, nurses, and pharmacists, in my run up to the Mountain no medicine stone was left unturned.

As previously blogged I had a pulmonary function test; https://autovistakilimanjarochallenge.com/2018/10/safety-first-and-check-yourself-dont-wreck-yourself the results from which (much to my considerable stress) were only received in writing two weeks before the actual flight!

And, added to this I also needed; two more separate GP approval letters; five sets of inoculations over three visits to two travel nurses in two different cities + physiotherapy rehabilitation sessions, I think eight of those; and of course the sports specialist for the ultrasound and the steroid injection in a pear-tree.

Not to mention the deep bonds of friendship I developed with the employees of Excel Chemists over those months.

But the Mountain also influenced other areas of my life too.

The digital me was under the influence, and the ad servers knew it – suddenly suggesting that I should compare duffel bags and buy Garmin products – the advert algorithms not having to work particularly hard though as my social media persona on Twitter/Facebook became almost exclusively Kilimanjaro/Unicef oriented.

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Other more subtle social changes were evident too; my family complaining about ‘the most boring Christmas wish list of all time, ever’. Apparently they weren’t much inspired by mosquito repellent and Nalgene drinking (well, weeing in actually) vessels. And looking back, I think I probably was a bit distant at Christmas – I was mid-injury slump, missing the exercise endorphins and the spectre of the Mountain was looming large.

There was no respite from the Mountain at work either, she was there in the weekly Twende team meetings, in every water-cooler conversation, and in the steady stream of updates, information, and reminders emanating from our brilliant Admin/Support team.

When you’re on the Mountain, the summit is ever present as you climb, a reminder of the task at hand and the mission ahead – what hadn’t been obvious to me at the time, was that in a similar way the Mountain had been ever present at home too.

And looking back, I can see that the Mountain was having a huge impact on me; sure on my motivations, how and where I spent my time, what I was buying from the shops but on my moods too.

So when I first saw her with the naked eye – it was kind of like meeting an old friend, there was a real sense of familiarity there. Some of ‘The Ascenders’ mentioned the jaw dropping moment when they first met the Mountain, and I had been expecting something similar.

But it wasn’t like that for me.

For me it felt a bit more like the scene in Heat where De Niro meets Pacino for the first time. Obviously, I’m neither of those… and in that scene the respect they have is mutual – and I didn’t expect that the mountain had any respect for me. But the first time I did meet her face-to-face there was some commonality for me, like I was meeting an adversary that I had known for some time now, one that I deeply respected, and one that I knew I would be doing battle with soon.

Julius White, known to everybody as Whitey… our head guide (and mountain mentor) he talked about the intuitive relationship he had with the Mountain, developed over many years. He talked about his ability to know her moods, and where and when she would be hospitable, and at other times when she might be harsh and unaccommodating.

I don’t claim to have developed an affinity with the Mountain.

But to some extent, I do feel like, maybe she had some sympathy for me.

Perhaps she knew I was struggling; that I was injured from the outset, and that I was bang in the middle of a minging cold virus. I was far from the personal best that I had promised myself I would be when I set out.

And while, in retrospect, I can say that I thought she took pity on me, that doesn’t mean she was a comfortable bedfellow – she was hard and cold and for a few of us it was a real struggle to sleep and (maybe due to the illness) despite being swathed in a flock of down, I still struggled to get warm at nights.

But I still very much enjoyed being with her.

She was beautiful, undoubtedly, and fearsome, she constantly inspired awe and respect.

And the first camps were reached without (significant) injuries – no blisters, mild sun burns, shoulder coping ok, and the usual joint issues (knees & ankles) behaving.

As for altitude sickness, I also seemed to be fairing ok.

I think I was affected worst by the altitude sickness on day 3, and after we had arrived at our camp early that afternoon I just wanted to collapse in my tent and try to catch up on some sleep. The itinerary mentioned an ‘acclimatisation walk’ later that afternoon i.e. going up a few hundred meters to come straight back down again (walk high – sleep low). But earlier that day there had been some debate about the usefulness of such walks, on the basis that what the body really needs to deal with altitude is red blood cells, which apparently take two weeks to produce. So I’m confident that someone definitely said ‘optional’ – but despite being at least 30 or so into my 40 winks Whitey popped his head into my tent to let me know that this walk was in fact mandatory.

So by the time I got sorted I set off about 15 mins behind the group – which felt a bit odd. But actually made for quite an experience, it was foggy and rainy that afternoon so the team had disappeared into the fog; which meant, I got to spend some time alone with Whitey, and ‘his’ mountain – and as we walked as a pair through the fog, with the summit hidden but present, talking about Africa and his adventures with the Mountain, it really did make me feel more connected. And for whatever reasons, the headache went and didn’t reappear.

Having read a fair bit of Tolkien, William Horwood, C.S. Lewis, Colin Dann, Richard Adams etc – I was very happy to anthropomorphise the mountain, and when it came to summit day, I did feel like ‘she’ was encouraging me upwards.

We got up early that day (not quite as early as the lovely Denise) but it was early enough that the first couple of hours of the climb were by head-torch. I thought my virus had been improving; but a hacking coughing fit on the outset suggested to me that I had been overly optimistic.

The team had received advice from the UK guides Christine and Mike, which I had taken to heart, which was; should a guide offer you help or assistance, this help should be taken ‘no arguments’. No worries, I thought, I can get behind that.

This moment came slightly sooner than I expected, and what seemed like quite early on (but having seen pictures was actually very high) when my guide John asked me if he could take my back pack. I agreed. And then I did have a little look around at the rest of the team, and slightly dishearteningly I suspect I may have been the first… and I did think to myself ‘Oh, it’s going like that is it’.

Then after what seemed liked maybe only an hour (it was probably longer) later, John asked me for my poles… I thought, that’s an odd thing to ask for, but again I didn’t argue. Once he had them he told me to instead grab on to the hip straps of my pack, which he was now wearing… He was offering to help drag me up the final stages.

What was still to follow, seemed like a never ending climb, we could see the summit, but towards the end it just never seemed to get any closer… But our company moved slowly onwards, lumbering on like a horde from The Walking Dead, shuffling, shambling, lurching and groaning at every step (inexplicably craving brains…. well…maybe that was just me).

And when I got to Gilman’s Point – I had myself a bit of a cry. Nothing specific. I knew I was tired. I was probably more exerted than I had ever been, I had been climbing a 7 hour staircase. But, exertion in itself, wouldn’t usually make me cry. Maybe I did need some kind of a release after the climb, or maybe it was the culmination of the months and months of preparation, I still don’t really know. But for a good five minutes I blubbed like a baby.

I gratefully received some team hugs up there, Julia in particular spotted I need one, and was fast on the scene, despite having just climbed the biggest mountain of her life too. And after a quick emote, I felt quite surprisingly recovered.

The views at Gilman’s Point are breath-taking, my only cultural reference point for looking down into volcanic craters is James Bond (You Only Live Twice) and yup – it was that cool. From clambering up a dusty, scree covered track, having been staring at your own dust covered feet for hours, to being at the top of the world looking right down into the volcano itself, down the almost sheer 300ft drop to the crater floor, carpeted in the snows of Kilimanjaro; and in the other direction back over my shoulder Mawenzi peak with the sun blazing overhead… and… in the distance Uhuru peak.

My fatigue temporarily disappeared as my excitement and curiosity took over, so I asked John where the route to Uhuru started, it wasn’t obvious at all, so he indicted the way and asked me if I’d like to lead the team that way – so I did.

The last approach to Uhuru is only another 200 metres in elevation, which doesn’t seem much more when you’re already at 5,685 but it is also another 3 kilometres, which also doesn’t sound that much as I type it – but I can assure you it is a long way when you’ve already climbed so high you can’t even see this mornings camp.

We were told this would take us another 2 hours, so I concentrated on making progress, I channelled the advice ‘pole, pole’ (slowly, slowly) and thought about the summit day stories I had heard from those who went before me. I tried to find a rhythm and would make about 5 steps and then have a quick stop to put my hands on my knees and dredge in some more breath.

In my own little way I felt confident that this plan was working; and that I had found a bit of a rhythm. But then John offered me his arm, this time I made to decline, but he said to me ‘Come on Dan, in your condition we need to get you down as soon as possible’ – after hearing that I immediately took his arm, and he helped me up until about the last 200 metres were he let me make my own way to the top under my own devices.

As for being at Uhuru… yes, that was quite an experience… In the run up people had told me that you might not want to spend too much time there – but I dismissed that, I thought that however I was feeling that the summit would still be the zenith for me. But, the stories turned out to be true; I had been a bit alarmed by the ‘in your condition comment’ and I was having another coughing fit, so I was happy to take a few quick pics and then get down asap. Gilman’s Point was the emotional peak – and reaching Uhuru was a cherry on the top of the cake, but not one I wanted to need a helicopter to digest.

I think it had been about 8 hours on the way up – but we made it down in 2. I say ‘we’ because it was very much a team effort. One the way down I had a guide on each side as we scree-slided our way back down 1,000 metres in altitude, like it was Scree Sunday.

I knew I wasn’t quite in the category of some of the causalities we had seen carried off the mountain that morning; or whoever the poor soul was that the rescue helicopter had actually been called for, or for our own guide who Denise witnessed collapsing – but I did feel like I had been ‘carried’ down the mountain.

When we got to the bottom I profusely thanked my guides for ‘carrying me down’ but John said that they hadn’t – and that helping people in the way that they had helped me that day was entirely usual, and that I had done well in fact. Which, even if they were being nice, was good to hear, and renewed my personal sense of achievement – when I landed back in my tent I was dazed, but happy and spent a couple of hours in a haze of exhausted, celebratory contemplation.

As I lay there, I said a little ‘thank you’ to the Mountain, it had been hard for sure, but she had been very magnanimous to me.

So… now I’ve been home a couple of weeks…

And I’ve been thinking again about Richard Dreyfuss’s character, and how he might have felt after the end of Close Encounters. When he got home and plonked himself down on the sofa next to that 6ft model mountain he made in his front room… I wondered how he felt in the aftermath:

And now… well the Post Mountain Blues are improving – but it’s still a very strange feeling for the Mountain not to be present in my day to day life; other than as a memory.

I’m sad that it’s over – but what an amazing experience – one which I’m very grateful to have had the opportunity to ‘experience’. One that tested my resolve and limitations, taught me about what teams and individuals can achieve when given support and encouragement, about accepting help, about the value of sharing, about performance-perceptions, and about being in a team where everyone is willing to give the very best of themselves.

And with this final blog my relationship with the Mountain ends…

Breaking up is hard to do, so I just wanted to give a shout out to some of my other favourite bits… as Sam rightly said; ‘you had to be there’… but here goes anyway:

• Watching a near by thunder storm through the window of the plane
• Spending time with my Trail family
• Tiger balls
• Afternoon poolside/mess tent/bus journey jam sessions
• Dancing on the way up
• Watching the scenery change from jungle, to alpine, to lunar/marsian, to vertigo inducing, to polar, and then back down the scale
• The wildlife; giant bread stealing ravens, safari ants, two horned chameleons, surprise camels, Iggy’s monkeys. Oh and the potentially rabid (or not) fiercely ferocious kittens
• Leaping over the flames in the limbo competition
• Mr Funeral
• Helicopters (or not)
• Toyota Hilux adventures
• Re-oxygenating and the associated head rushes from cheating on the 02 test
• Red Stone Night Club
• And The Golden Orb of Truth