News / media
The Enham Kilimanjaro Challenge - On Top of the World
23 July 2008
On July 11th 2008, 9 members of the Enham Kilimanjaro Challenge team reached the top of the mountain. After a difficult and emotional climb, they proudly summitted early on a beautiful morning, accompanied by a film crew and other support members.
In total a team of 28 had started the climb, believed to be the first multi-disability team challenge to climb Mount Kilimanjaro in Tanzania. Every member of the team has trained for the past year and raised their own sponsorship to take part in the climb, and 16 actually reached the top, way above the average 35% success rate for the Machame route.
Whether they reached the summit or not, the whole team were thrilled to have had the opportunity to travel so far up this outstanding and challenging mountain. Steven Ballantyne of EPM Ltd., who led the expedition, said “The Enham Kilimanjaro Challenge has been one of the most amazing expeditions I have had the privilege of putting together. The inspiration of each and every participant regardless of their ability to complete the climb goes beyond words.”
Enham Vice President, Herta von Stiegel, who first developed this idea over a year ago, and who was among the team who reached the summit, said “It was an amazing experience that seemed to bring out the best in all the participants. It was a truly multi-cultural and multi-ability team and we all worked together through some difficult times. Everyone should be congratulated on their incredible achievement. We accomplished our objective to raise awareness of the work of Enham in helping disabled people to realise their full potential.”
The Enham Kilimanjaro Challenge was sponsored by Camco, a leading climate change business, Blacks, one of the best names in outdoor clothing, and The Centre for Health and Human performance at 76 Harley Street London.
Enham commissioned FocusUp Media to produce a film of the whole project, and this will be released in the autumn. Following the climb, most of the members of the Challenge team took part in a specially organised Safari, and only returned to the UK on the 18th of July.
