A LLANDRILLO man has successfully tackled the biggest challenge of his life.
The Free Press reported last September how Allen Alcock was busy preparing for a climb up Kilimanjaro, the highest mountain in Africa, on February 26 this year.
Allen now shares his journey:
This trek was the most demanding thing I have ever put myself through.
However after three solid days of sleep and rest when I got home, I can look back on it as one of the most amazing and rewarding things I have achieved in my life so far!
The trip took six days to complete in total using the very beautiful, but more difficult machame route, this route takes you through lush forest up into heathland and finally through alpine dessert to the base camp at Barafu.
It was very demanding hiking with a average walking time of around 10 hours per day, with 6am starts so we could fit the walks into the schedule.
The pace was very slow but when you are at this sort of altitude slow is good.
The African guides were always saying pole! pole! which means slow in Swahili and trust me, we did as they asked.
The fourth day started at 5.45am with a vertical rock scramble up the Barranco wall, this is a 1,000ft sheer rock face that allows us to get up to the Karranga Valley and upwards to base camp.
After an 11 hour trek we arrived at Barafu were we got to sleep for five hours before attempting the summit just before midnight.
Summit night was a surreal experience, you walk in the spot of your head torch, looking up you can see the snow capped summit of Kilimanjaro and looking down I could see the cloud base below us.
There was a thunder storm occurring in the rift valley below and I could see lightning forking through the clouds below me, quite unnerving!
This trek would take eight hours just to reach the summit so head down, poles working I pushed on, my only focus was getting to the top.
I simply had to ignore the people who were falling over and vomiting or just sitting sobbing with their heads in their hands.
It’s so difficult to function at such high altitude, your mind plays tricks on you. I had some instances of hallucination where I was sure there was someone walking alongside me but when I looked there was no one there.
And so for the next seven hours I just walked and breathed and listened to the advice of the summit porters who stayed just behind us.
The sense of relief at reaching the top was quite overwhelming and outstripped the sense of achievement.
I was just glad to have completed the task I had given so much time in training and money over the last year and the fact that I had not let my sponsors down, even though I feel I have earned the money I raised.
Looking back now after a few weeks back in reality I can feel a sense of pride in my achievement and I am sure my little boy is impressed!
I would like to thank everyone who donated to my charity, family and friends for their support and to Ifor Williams trailers for their generous contribution.