Crawling out of the tent after a dinner of dry bread and
tinned sardines, I looked up. Straight ahead was the ominous grey-brown, 2700m
high cliff of Mount Roraima. Then FLASH, the cliff lit up with pinks and
yellows, illuminated by a distant electric storm over the town of Santa Elena
in Venezuela. Aside from the storms on the horizon, the sky was clear. Clear
but close, made closer by the star which were numerous and vast. The sky was
full. The fullest I have ever seen. Orion’s belt was to my right, the big
dipper over my shoulder and the Southern Cross hanging just above the storms.
All this was cut through by the sweeping arc of the Milky Way.
Long days of sweaty trekking, countless meals of tinned
sardines on bread crumbs and cold damp nights even inside a 4 season sleeping
bag seemed so insignificant with this nightly spectacular at the base camp of
Mount Roraima.
We woke bright and early for the final trek in which we
would summit Mount Roraima. I have wanted to do this for years and now the time
had finally come. The full day’s route could be seen from base camp as if in a
final effort by the mountain to scare off weary climbers or at least fill them
with the nightmares of the prehistoric beasts that still ruled the top of the
mountain.
We spent the morning scrambling upwards through dense forest
towards the foot of the cliffs. At lunch we reached the base of the cliff. It
was so close that we rested our bags against it but a quick glance upwards gave
us our plan for the afternoon. The cliff soared straight upwards from where we
stood. You couldn’t even see the top which was shrouded in clouds. Occasional
plants dotted up the cliff face, gripping on for fear of plummeting to the
forest below. Waterfalls sprouted out of “The Wall” and gave us the source of
our midday wash/ water refills.
Getting our fill of the mountain delicacy that is boneless
sardines, we marched onwards. The final section is known as “The Ramp.” It is
the only way up the mountain without ropes and the reason we had to come to Venezuela
for the climb even though it borders Guyana and Brazil. The ramp was pioneered
by two Brits in 1884 with ideas of finding dinosaurs on top. It is hard to
decide if these two were brave or stupid. Walking through Amerindian villages
on the way, they were warned of the beasts that lived on the mountain that occasionally
flew down to steal Amerindian babies.
After three hours we closed in on the end of the ramp.
Blocking our final ascent were the “Tears of Roraima”- a waterfall that spouted
from the top and never ceasing in its year-round deluge onto climbers heads.
Blindly we rushed through the water in a last scramble over the loose rocks
that made a sketchy path up the narrow ramp...
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