We woke at midnight for a quick cuppa and some biscuits, and got away by 1am. My head torch did a fine job of lighting the way so I was happy with that. I wore my Fjallraven trousers, short sleeved thermal and both Stellar tops, plus head band and fingerless gloves. Very soon I was too warm and by the time we reached Rhino Point an hour later, I was far too hot and so took off the windproof.

The route undulated a little and included some rock sections with chains and one with a chain fence. In the dark we had no real idea why although pointing torches down revealed no bottom! Not long after this I decided my fingers were cold so changed for my Rab gloves and warm hat. The rest of me was fine. Steadily up over rocky ground and then very slippery dust made progress slow, but eventually we could see the sun starting to come up.

By a coincidence we crossed to the other side of the ridge so were treated to an amazing sunrise lighting up Kilimanjaro nicely. Onward and further up we no longer needed our torches and eventually after a couple of false summits arrived at the flag and the top at 7:20am. Dan had been suffering all the way up so I popped down to help but was greeted with a very rude response so left him to it - I'll know for next time! The final tail-enders arrived by 8am and we spent probably about an hour on the top, taking photos, eating, drinking and even signing the visitors book.

Soon enough it was time to descend and we eased our way down over the steep rocky ground. It was a good walk out with all of the views we had missed in the dark. Finally Rhino Point appeared and we could see why it was so named - it looked just like a Rhino from the descent angle. From there it was still a good walk down to the hut but we arrived just after 11am.

Lunch was eggy bread, pancakes and banana fritters which was nice. By 1pm we had set off down to the next hut (Miriakamba) for our final overnight on this mountain. It was a long dusty 2 1/2 hour walk down with everyone feeling tired - not much chatter. Back at the hut I set about washing socks, shreddies a T-Shirt and myself (well overdue). I rigged up a washing line and hung everything out to dry, hopeful at least my socks would dry, otherwise it will be an unpleasant walk down to the gate in the morning.

Of course, no sooner had I done that than it started to rain! Everything in! No choice; wet socks would have to be worn for dinner and as long as possible afterwards. I figured I only needed one set, so the thin ones were worn to dinner and dried nicely, and the thick ones after, which also dried a little but not enough, so they slept with me in the sleeping bag which was fine after the initial shock of cuddling up to wet socks! Question is - how to dry shreddies? Answer - you can't, so they were left to dry as much as possible.

Dinner was at 6pm being its usual nice self of chicken, rice and potatoes. Also soup and Avocado pears for starter and dessert respectively. By 7pm most people had drifted off - well it was still raining hard and we had been up for 19 hours already.