Kilimanjaro - Summit

Fredy seems unconcerned that Noelle, demonstrating the classic symptoms of altitude sickness, decides to turn back. He delegates her safety to Linus and Herman. This sudden responsibility rudely interrupts their inattentive ambling and joking. Dave chooses to accompany the descending group.

With less than two hundred metres to the crater rim, I press on with Fredy. He coaxes me to Gilman’s Point with a sequence of promises about how little distance remains. There, the mist shares little but I can see the crater floor which is covered in snow. The peak is reached through a climb of another two hundred metres along the crater rim. Climbers usually take about ninety minutes to complete this stretch but exhausted, I decide to stop here. I assure Fredy that I will be disappointed with this decision for the rest of my life. I keep this promise for about two weeks. We start down, running once we reach the soft sand.