A wedding and a Kilimanjaro adventure

The wedding was intense. Matt and I didn't know what we were getting into at
all. On the actual wedding day while our buddy Francis was getting prepared
as the groom, we were named his best men. It was wild. I have never been
exposed to a traditional Muslim wedding. I also haven’t been exposed to many
traditional African traditions until the wedding either. Before marrying the bride,
it’s tradition to fight or pay off the bride’s brothers. Francis turned to me before
walking in the door and said he needed money. Luckily, I had 500 Kenyan Shillings in my pocket. Otherwise, he would not have been able to get married. It is amazing how
deep bribery goes in the African culture. There will be more on that later. While I
was in the country, I learned that Kenyans really don't like Americans and Francis
had to tell the rabbi that we were German. Otherwise, he would not have presided
over the ceremony. I was also the unofficial photographer for the wedding. In
all, I took more than 600 pictures. When I get back to the United States, I am going to print a bunch out and put it into an album. He has done so much for Matt and me.

After the wedding, we took a bus to Moshi and found an expedition company to
take us up with food, four porters, two guides, one cook, equipment, and clothes
for $900. The research that I have done for a Kilimanjaro expedition and people I talked to on the mountain had the price at $3000-5000. The fees just to walk into the
national park are $635.

Hiking Kilimanjaro is a mental game not a physical challenge. Well, at least until the
summit. The Machame trail we took was the most scenic and one of the most
difficult. The first two days of hiking were relatively easy and had epic views. Our
final two days went like this: 15 km straight up Barranco Wall, dinner at 7 p.m., went
to bed and the alarm went off at midnight. I didn't get much sleep, maybe a half-
hour. It was a six-hour trek to the top and with four hours to go I didn't think I was
going to make it. I became like a zombie. The altitude really hit me hard. Upon
getting to the top, we had to hike another 30 minutes to the actual peak. It was
between -10 and -25 degrees with 20-30 mph wind. It was the hardest section
of Kilimanjaro. The altitude sickness at that point made me feel completely drunk and
incoherent. It was a horrible way to feel.

At the peak, I put a World of Beer sticker on the sign and got a picture. My
buddy Derek works there and said that there is a competition for the coolest
picture. I am going to enter and maybe win some stuff. We reached the top
right before sunrise but only stayed on top for ten minutes and then made our
way down. They don't recommend being up there for more than 20 minutes and
with the way we felt, we started down fast. On the 30-minute walk across before
heading down, the sun came out and I got to see the massive glacier on top and
the enormous crater (I didn't even know that Kilimanjaro was a volcano until then). It
was beautiful, absolutely gorgeous. I wish I had more pictures but my camera
batteries literally froze.

The way down was a blast. It was all dirt and small rocks, so I was literally
sand skiing. I was moving really fast, running most of the time, and got down

in 40 minutes. I was blown away. Six hours up and only 40 minutes the same
distance. Our guide was signing us out and told us to go ahead and he would
catch up. I started to book it and made it over a far ridge when I came to a
sign that said "alternate route this way", I followed the well-traveled path and
even though I am no bushman, I was following these two guys tracks. I felt like
Crocodile Dundee or something. Matt caught up to me and asked if I thought that
we were on the right path because our guide was not behind us. I said I didn't
notice any other path so had no doubt that I was on the right one. A few hours
would pass until I found out that I was mistaken.