Day 6 - Arrow Glacier to Crater Camp (18,500 ft./5640 m)

| Home | Day 1 | Day 2 | Day 3 | Day 4 | Day 5 | Day 7 |

To get a better appreciation of the ascent of the Kibo massif via the Western Breach, here is an aerial view of summit. This site also has excellent photos of the three craters on the summit of Kibo: the outer Kibo crater, the inner Reusch Crater, and the Ash Pit. The Western Breach was created by lava breaking through the wall of the Kibo crater.

Dawn breaks and it's a beautiful morning with the clouds illuminated below us. It's also very cold with lots of frost on the ground. Louise and I don hard harts as protection against falling rocks that might be dislodged by those hiking ahead of us. The bottom part of the breach consists of deep scree and loose rock, but we soon start to cross the ice field. Raymond and two porters take turns chopping steps in the ice with their picks, so it's very slow going. I don't look down very often; the ice field is very steep. Louise and I move forward one step at a time, leaning sideways into the ice between steps. It's pole, pole, whether we want to move faster or not.

Three long hours later, we are across the field. Now, it's straight up over the large rock formations, hand over hand, carefully positioning each foot. Take a breath, take a step. Take two breaths, take another step. I was glad Louise and I had practiced this type of climbing on Lava Tower. What a sight when we crested the crater rim. Lots of snow underfoot and blue-green-white glaciers in the distance. We walked quite some distance across the floor of the crater to our camp. Fortunately, the porters had found a bare spot to pitch the tents. Our nightly ablutions were done quickly; within 30" of hanging our washcloth on a pole to dry, it was frozen solid. Needless to say, we went to bed wearing every article of warm clothing we owned.

Photos from today, June 17, 2003.

Day 6 begins.	Sunrise at Arrow Glacier	Western Breach	Western Breach
Ready to hike	Breaking camp	Preparing to leave	The trail ahead
Lava tower in background	The trail	On the trail	Crossing Arrow glacier
Eduardo, one of our porters	Arrow glacier behind us	Crossing Arrow glacier	Almost over the glacier
Porters ahead	We reach the crater rim	L with Furtwangler glacier in background	H with Furtwangler glacier in background
L with summit in background	H with summit in background	Us in crater	View of Mt. Meru
Our goal - the summit	H & L with glacier	L with lava rock and glacier	Our camp at the crater camp.