Well Well Well....
God gets me to do the most amazing things...
Firstly sorry that it's been ages since i Blogged.
About 3 weeks ago I found out that I was going to climb Mt. Kilimanjaro! and I only had a week to prepare, so I spent some frantic time trying to prepare myself and get the right gear and then it was off to Tanzania to climb the giant of Africa!!
Mount Kili From the Plane.I was part of a team of 6 and the reason for going was to raise awareness that the COPT (community outreach program trust) is running low on funds and needs to gain more donations to keep running, especially to help Kids in really really poor impoverished areas to get free food and free pre school education. It's really important and 100% of donations go to the children because everyone who works for the COPT (including me) is a volunteer.
So... we spent 5 days climbing and 1.5 coming down. It was a climb that involved everything, all emotions from joy and extreme happiness to stress, pain and giving up, I gave up 3 times on the climb, and each time God made things happen to get me back going and to climb the mountain.
I started suffering altitude sickness from day two, mainly in the form of mind numbing headaches throbbing away and pounding from the inside of my skull...
The mountain is beautiful though and sunrise over kili makes it all worth the pain, the rainforest is also such an incredible sight, the many shades of green, the intricate vine workings holding everything together and the diversity of tree specie, shape and form. It was a real blessing to be able to go, because it was a climb full of personal lessons, mainly that I cannot do anything from my own strength, but I need to rely on others, especially on God. This was shown mostly when I Gave up climbing 100 metres away from the top of the Mountain... I had thrown up, I had a headache, I was dizzy, I couldn't concentrate on one thought, and I just had a lot of pain, I sat down and every part of me said go down the mountain, I pleaded with the guide to let me retreat and get to lower altitude, but the guide grabbed one arm and my teammate grabbed the other and they hauled me up the last bit so that I made it to the crater rim of the mountain! I was dazed and unaware, but at least I was there!
Me shattered at the top (trying to smile!)I quickly raced/tumbled down the mountain and soon got better when there was a better amount of Oxygen in my lungs at the lower altitude. It was a lesson in suffering as well, but for me it finished after a few days, for the kids in south africa it lasts a lifetime... so..... to help out you can donate money and make there lives a bit less full of suffering. any amount is appreciated
This is the sight to donate at.
This is the blog that was updated as we went along.
The View from the top of the crater.
A huge Mountain (from halfway up!)
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