August 8 - High Camp

It is about 3:30 in the afternoon on August 8th, and we are all alone in our high camp on Kilimanjaro 15,700 feet ( 4.785 meters). We are in the clouds and Kili is up there somewhere mysteriously and beckoning us all. As I finished my dispatch to you last night I turned around and I saw the glaciers and the moonlight above our camp, I am confident that when we wake to begin our climb we will have the same situation, we have clear sky and beautiful moonlight to climb by and as you probably know that’s only hours away.

We are going to settle down, we just had some tea, popcorn and cookies and in just a bit we will take soup and dinner, we will settle down and at 5pm we will get into our tents and try to relax and rest until 11pm when the Chagga guides and staff will bring the wake up tea. That's a signal for us to arise, stuff our big bags with most of our gear, get our summit packs ready and take off in the darkness to climb through the crater rim and on to Uhuru. The entire group looks good, we feel the altitude and some of the symptoms of the altitude, but our acclimatization is evident and we're confident. We are going to sit and talk in just a bit about the final stages of preparing for the summit and as I said we will rest and in a matter of hours we will be on our way for our summit attempt. People in this group have worked and dreamed for months, and some cases years.

So, I hope that everyone is wishing us luck and we will report to you hopefully from the rooftop of Africa in a number of hours from now.