This is an email home from Kilimanjaro where you can see what an arduous task this has been.

Craig is making good progress up the mountain along with 40 others as part of the axawealthclimb – including his son, James and daughter Clare.  

Greetings from 3700 meters on Mount Kilimanjaro - we are in bed and it is only 8pm but we have had a beast of a day. Woke this morning to news that it is pouring down in the area but given that we are above the cloud level not our problem. In fact it's been a day of brilliant sunshine and lots of time applying the factor 50.

4 hours before lunch saw us gain about 800 meters followed by a further 4 hours in the afternoon: only 200 meters this time but over very rough terrain so it was a killer. Quite a few people hit by altitude sickness but the guides soon sorted that out and it's a full house in camp tonight.

The shout you hear all day is poli poli (slowly slowly for the non Swahili speakers). You ignore it at your peril and the sick notes today were victims of going  paci paci. The guys who put you to shame are the porters who fly past you as the carry the bags and equipment to the next site - they must be carrying 30 or 40 kilos at least as well as their own kit.

Tomorrow we only have a 4 hour walk in the morning but apparently it's straight up and we will need to sleep in the afternoon to recover. it is great fun honest!

James and I were wishing we could be back home and in the hot tub for an hour or two.

Sorry not to have called. We have been trying all day but no signal. Not sure when you will get this.

Love CCJ (Craig, Clare & James)

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This is the following and final communication by iPad/Email:

Sorry for the delay in updating but things have been very hectic, much more so
than many of us had anticipated.

At midnight on Wednesday green team was the first to set off for the summit.  It
was around -5c  with the wind taking it down to -15, so we were all togged up
like Michelin Men. It took us nearly 7 hours to reach the rim of the crater and
I have never done anything so physically and mentally draining in all my life.
It is pitch black and you just seem to keep going on upwards forever.

Having reached the rim of the volcanic crater we then had to walk for a further
hour round the rim to the summit which is a further 200 meters higher. The sun
came up and it was spectacular - huge glaciers that are hundreds of meters
thick and a desert landscape.

We got to the summit around eight and the necessary pictures were taken. Our
only problem was that Clare had the camera and her red team had yet to appear.
There is no hanging around at the top as it is so cold and very difficult to
breath, added to which one of our team members was almost unconscious and we
needed to get him back down to lower altitude. Anyway, as luck would have it,
just as we headed off, in comes the red team led by Clare. Everyone kindly let
us do the Wetton photographs and then James and I were off to catch up with the
green team.

Now we come to the light bulb moment - thankfully I was not alone - in all the
excitement of getting up the mountain we had total forgotten the getting back
down it bit. It took us two hours to slip and slide down the scree slope that we
had taken 7 hours to climb. Most of the descent involved linking arms with one of
the guides and running down the scree. We were total grey with all the dust and
my lungs are still full of it.

I now also understand why you do the summit climb in the dark. Looking at the
climb in the cold light of day I am positive a number of us would have said '
you must be joking'

The rest of the day involved a 17 kilometre walk down to our next camp so by the
time we sat down for dinner, summit day had been going for 18 hours. We slept
well that night.

Yesterday, Friday, we walked 22 kilometres down through the gate. Fantastic
scenery as we went from desert like conditions into tropical rainforest. Not so
good on the knees as steep and very uneven!

And we were done! You sign out at the gate, get your certificate, drink an ice
cold Coke, say good bye to the porters) and its back on the bus to Arusha ( Mum,
you asked me to describe what Arusha is like - it's home to 2.5 million people,
has 5 star hotels and it's first shopping mall is under construction. All
courtesy of the Chinese). We stopped in Moshi for lunch and the cheeseburger and
chips tasted like nectar.

We are staying overnight in Arusha at a cracking hotel and after a look round
Arusha tomorrow we are on our way home. It has been a fantastic 10 days, I have
had a lot of time with James as we were both in the same team, and we have all
made some very good friends. That said, we are looking forward to coming home.

See you soon   Lots of love.  CCJ