Elizabeth Gathoni is former student of Tembea Girls School in Kajiado, Kenya. Tembea is apart of Beads for Education whose mission is to improve the status of women in Kenya through girls' education and women's business development. WHOA travel is proud to be friends and long-standing partners with this wonderful organization, and to provide life changing adventure opportunities to these amazing women! Since 2014, we've summited Mount Kilimanjaro with 4 women from the school, and in March 2016, Elizabeth and Siodi will be the 5th and 6th Tembea woman to reach the summit of Kili with us...and on International Women's Day no less! Read, in Elizabeth's own words, what climbing to the highest mountain in Africa means to her.
Elizabeth, we're so honored to get to share this experience with you - see you in Tanzania!
HIKING KILIMANJARO
by Elizabeth Gathoni
This is really exciting…..! This opportunity is a surprise to me, a really plesant surprise. What a great way to celebrate finishing my tertiary education. hep! hep! I am so excited. This will be an opportunity to test my limits of endurance and determination. I can imagine it will not be easy but when I get to the summit then I will give myself a pat on the back as I am doing right now regarding my education.
I schooled in Taita Taveta a town in the borders of Kenya and Tanzania. Every morning as I walked to school I could clearly see the two peaks of Kili and watch them disappear into the thick clouds. After clearing my grade eight exam at the age of 14 years, my mum took me to Moshi Tanzania, to a place called Marangu where we saw fresh water streams that originated from Kili. By then I did a lot of imagination of how snow felt if It melted on my hands, now I will get the real experience.
I have involved myself in venturing into new place but nothing like this. Closely related to this was when I hiked 3 of the 7 Ngong hills. Once I did it on my own adventure then the second time was during an excursion with the scout members from Tembea Academy.
I am looking forward to ensuring am fit for the day by taking morning runs when possible, taking an hour or two in a local gym. I love riding bikes so I'll do that a lot and in January I will try and play though I am really not a sport girl.
Thanks again for the chance to do Kili.