Its incredibly hard to explain succinctly the scale of the challenge Kilimanjaro offers and what the team gets out of the expedition.

Perhaps its best summed up bu Josh, who yesterday said to me that on summit night what he learned about himself was “maybe i’m not invincible after all”. (He’s our youngest member of the group, at 21 years old).

Not all of us made it to summit, but everyone here faced huge challenges – planning, fundraising and training for 12 months or more before the adventure.  This was the real “charity challenge” and in this spirit i found myself last night thinking about what each member of the team brought to the trip. In no particular order then:

Nick & Stu – fearlessness, grace and perfect manners at all times…

Tom, Josh, Dave – laughter and wisecracks, often in the face of adversity and the ability to help the whole team defuse.

Simon – comedy innuendo as well as the extraordinary ability to always know who needed help to get through the hard bits

Richard – scientific reasoning and cold hard fact

Olivier – European panache and mountaineering professionalism

Jen D, Craig, Rick and Steve – grit, stoicism, guts and determination in the face of extreme adversity.

Jodi and Mia – smiles, charity, prayers and endless kind words

Joe – paternalism and fatherly instincts  (Papa Joe, you rock!)

Andy and Mark – pioneering & adventurous spirit

Kirsten – fire and passion

Jen W – organisation, order and encouragement

Mark K (our noble leader) – Ozzie lassitude and the relaxed leadership that got the best out of the team, always.

Congratulations everyone, its been a privilege.

Jim 12/10/2011