Mount Kilimanjaro Part 1 - Getting ready

I'm writing this about two weeks from the trip to Tanzania to climb/hike Kilimanjaro. I'm going with Courage Rising a partnership between Valleywise Health Foundation and K2 adventures as a part of a group consisting of burn survivors, health professionals, and donors. We are raising money for the Arizona Burn Center, I need to raise an additional 7.5k to meet my goal. Donations can be made here

My friend and coworker Juan Palomino invited me. He set up setting up an NFT drop called Viva Muerto to raise money for Valley Health. Our friend and his girlfriend Mikala works at Valleywise Health and has been helping organize the trip.

The goal for each of the team members is to raise 10,000$ USD. This money goes to the foundation and K2 then has donated their guided tour, as of writing.

Fundraising is hard I've learned, it's not easy to push politely, with friends and family and any donations should be met with gratitude. Previously it was (verbally) mentioned that we could raise what we could and call it a day.

With a large amount of hubris during the on boarding call said I would cover what remained after my fundraising attempts. An email was sent out later mentioning anyone who doesn't meet their goal won't be able to attend, and further correspondence mentioned that we could (again) donate the rest ourselves (for a nice tax write-off).

The fundraiser does not include the travel or gear costs. The K2 team provided a gear list Although after a bit of research and discussion this gear list is slightly superfluous, eg multiple types of boots.

The flight to Tanzania on KLM is about 2000$ itself. And I've spent around 1000 dollars on gear. Some of which I'm hoping to use in the future. Currently, I've gotten my last haul of shipments and trying to open all the boxes.

The summiting the mountain for a group can take anywhere between 5 to 9 days. Longer trips give climbers more time to acclimate to the altitude, and they say 9 day trips have around 80% success summiting the mountain.

It's also recommended to get altitude medication, which is usually Diamox.

I've not done to much to prepare myself physically other than my usual powerlifting three times a week (dead lifted 450x4 today for example), Some HIT workouts in the pool and some hot yoga. I do wish I was running still a bit more and gotten more altitude training in.

I did some reading though on the world record holders and Kili has been (with acclimation and not carrying food) summited in 6 hours, this has giving me a large amount of hope that I won't have problems summiting.