A Dangerously (Funny) Night on Bald Mountain

You're Too Old to Spend the Rest of Your Life on the Couch: Let's Adventure!

Photo by Crispin Jones on Unsplash

Not Moussorgsky’s Bald Mountain, but close

The flashlight climbed insolently up and down my body from about twenty-five feet away. It was below twenty degrees, about three am local time, November 18th, 2013.

About a thousand or more feet below Gilman’s Point, Kilimanjaro. In other words, dark, cold, high, limited oxygen, limited visibility.

Why the hell couldn’t I bloody walk?

Let me back up here.

I just published a story about climbing Kilimanjaro. That was the serious part.

This is one of the side stories which I tend to recall a lot more vividly than any triumphant idiocy on top of the mountain. At that point, I was punch-drunk from lack of oxygen and as likely as anyone to try to belt out my rendition of God Save the Queen, and I’m not even English.

My route was Rongai, an eight-day trip, two climbers, two guides and our porters. My climbing partner was the safari operator’s young wife Aurelie. August, the lead guide, with more than 350 summits under his belt, was out in front; Ignas, second-in-command, took up the rear.

By the time I had a flashlight waving over my body, we were well into the hike. This typically starts at midnight on summit day, so that you reach Gilman’s Point right as the sun tops the clouds. That’s about 90-120 minutes shy of the actual summit.

We were two hours from that point when, as is typical of me, I hadda pee.

I’m a leaky vessel.

So August stopped us on the trail and pointed me off to the right. We were summitting under a full moon, which had been my request. The weather had accommodated us by staying ridiculously clear and gorgeous. I was able to make my way, using my hiking poles, to hide behind a rock for privacy.

Like anybody effing cares at oh-dark-thirty on the mountain, right?

There I squatted, having jerked down some seven layers of Lycra, down, Goretex, winter biking tights and more that I’ve since blessedly forgotten. Rookies, right?

After finally coaxing out the midnight coffee while being buffeted by some damned icy winds - you gentlemen really do NOT appreciate how fortunate you are- I jerked my duds back up and started forward.

But I couldn’t move. My feet were locked in place. I could barely shuffle them forward a few inches at a time.

WTF, right?

My headlamp refused to reveal the problem, so I called out to my little team.

Ignas, at the back, took out his powerful beam and slowly began to inspect me from top to bottom, from about twenty feet away.

Finally he stopped at my boots.

Then everyone started guffawing.

I stood in the black night, illuminated by the full moon, not illuminated by what was going on at my expense.

The flashlight jerked as Ignas struggled to control himself. Between gasps and another bray of laughter I heard someone say,

“Pull up your underwear!”

Sure enough, my tightey-whiteys had snagged on the heavy metal lace hooks of my Lowa’s. I didn’t know elastic could stretch that far. Somehow I had been able to get all those layers up around my waist, but my undies had me locked in place like an old-time hobble skirt from 1910.

Laboriously I shoved my duds back down to my ankles- Ignas had kindly removed the spotlight but everyone was still laughing hard - and I released my overstretched undies.

They did NOT snap back, by the way, they were toast. Then with all the dignity I could muster, which wasn’t much, I rearranged myself and got back in line behind August.

And promptly nearly fell over laughing myself.

You’re already oxygen-deprived at that altitude. I’d been hallucinating giraffes and a floating mess tent long after we’d left base camp far below.

Laughing this hard threatened to send me ass-over-teakettle all the way back down to land in our porta-potty two thousand feet below us.

Happily, August steadied me while the lot of us giggled. We made our way to heaven’s door to watch the sun rise.

The sun never rose again on those undies, however, which were not designed to be stretched several feet. I was left to use them to tie up some of my belongings at trip’s end.

It was a good end for what covered my end right until the end of our trip.

Photo by Anna Claire Schellenberg on Unsplash

Thanks for joining me on one of my side trips, a peek behind the curtains of the “epic adventure.” These are among my favorite stories, for they are the truth of what happens on the journey. They are also why I travel. If you had fun, please consider supporting my work:

If you know someone who appreciates the reminder that every single epic trip is full of moments like this, and that the highlight reel rarely includes the true trip highjinks which are what make the journey worthy, please also consider

Either way, above all, let’s play.