Konquering Kili (Part 1) – Tanzania & Mount Kilimanjaro Hike

(July 24-25) I would like to start off this posting by first saying a late happy 15th birthday to my sister Jana. I hope she enjoyed the birthday feast my Mom made her in Minnesota – jealous. Also, we truly missed having Becky Mitchell on the hike with us; she was originally supposed to come and would have been an asset in so many ways (thanks for loaning me the jacket!). This will be the first of three postings related to my time in Tanzania and the Mount Kilimanjaro hike I did with John and Ben. The Kili hike was one of the most anticipated activities of my travels, so I think it is worthy of three write-ups.

On the morning of Saturday, July 24th we loaded into the back of a large uncomfortable bus headed to Arusha, Tanzania. This was a 5-6 hour ordeal on the usual unpleasant dirt roads with huge potholes, and to make matters more entertaining the bus driver would give John and I dirty looks in his rearview mirror after John asked if there was any air conditioning (no, apparently). Later we stopped for gas, and I really had to go to the bathroom, so I went to the front and kindly asked Mr. Happy (the driver) where it was. He actually told me I could not go to the bathroom, so I persisted and asked a couple of times (with my best surprised voice), “there is no bathroom here”?!? He eventually gave in, and I got to go to one of the most suspect bathrooms I have been in. Finally, this extremely unpleasant frown faced bus driver actually clipped some poor random guy when he made a tight turn into a parking lot; John and I had the pleasure of half seeing it and hearing the thud from the back seat. This caused the man to fall into a ditch (no apologies or concerns of course), luckily the guy was okay. At the end of it all Ben, John, and I had a good laugh after the crazy long bus ride thanks to the driver.

When we were about to enter Tanzania we had to get off the bus and wait in a long line to get our passports stamped to exit Kenya officially. We then walked across the border into Tanzania where we waited again, turned in paperwork, and got clearance to enter Tanzania (there is something fun about walking across borders as opposed to flying in). Anyway, Tanzania has a population of about 37 million people and is most famous for the Serengeti National Park (Tanzania side of Masai Mara) and Mount Kilimanjaro (the highest mountain in Africa). The portion of Tanzania we saw was greener and more mountainous than the areas of Kenya I visited. We also saw numerous corn fields and coffee farms, so I fell in love with a lot of the Tanzanian scenery. Similar to Kenya, Swahili is spoken, matatus are ridden (called dara daras), Masai tribes exist, local beer is consumed (Kilimanjaro & Serengeti, not Tusker), Schillings are the currency (they are of the Tanzanian variety and it was about 1,500 to $1USD) and ugali is eaten.


We arrived in Arusha, which is two hours away from the Machame Gate (our Kilimanjaro hike starting point). Arusha is a little town with various random shops and restaurants. There were plenty of friendly people trying to show us the town and sell us things. After a pre-meeting with our tour operator (Good Earth) and dinner at the hotel we tried to pack up and sleep. I was extremely excited, nervous, and my adrenaline levels were soaring, so sleep was hard to come by. As I get older it seems to be rare to have these moments, so I try to embrace them. I did manage to crash for six hours before waking up at 6AM with my hands slightly numb and tingling from my altitude medicine. After my last shower for a week (gross I know) and breakfast we were back in a van for a two hour (very smooth for once) ride to Kilimanjaro.

Mount Kilimanjaro is an inactive volcano, with three volcanic cones Kibo, Mawenzi, and Shira, that has not erupted in over 2 million years. It is the highest free standing mountain in the world and is one of the seven summits (7 highest mountains on each continent). There are three main hiking routes taken to the top (Uhuru Peak): Marangu (nicknamed the Coca-Cola route for its popularity), Shira & Lemosho combined routes (not used as often), and Machame (nicknamed the Whiskey route). Here is a very rough picture of the two main routes (a more detailed map will be in a later post):


Our plan was to take the Machame route, which is considered the toughest of the three routes. As you hike up the Machame route you pass through numerous ecosystems (rain forest, cloud forest, alpine desert, ice fields etc). It took us 6 days (a half day the first and last day) of actual hiking during which we hiked 40 total hours covering 13,961 feet (4,269 meters) of elevation and 37 miles of terrain. There was no substantial rain and only some significant winds, so we were very lucky weather-wise. Given we camped for a week without showers and there was tons of dirt and dust, it was definitely the dirtiest week of my adult life. The following chart summarizes the elevation and mileage we climbed each day. The only difference is we went from Shira Camp all the way to Barranco Camp passing by Lava Tower (so we hiked 6 total miles on our third day).


Day 1: We finally arrived at the Machame Gate on July 25th with our Good Earth team (Hamisi – Lead Guide, Abas – Assistant Guide, Emanuel – Cook, and 10 porters). Our guides had to complete the registration process with us, which included a lot of paper work and they had to weigh all of the gear in and get it approved. It was a bit cold and there were long lines of people waiting to hike, so things moved slowly. We eventually started the hike after noon as we headed up a paved road for a bit and then into the rainforest. It was beautiful and we were in mist for the first two thirds of the hike until we hiked above the clouds and were in a sunny cloud forest. We were finally able to get our first glimpse of Mt. Kilimanjaro and its snowy peak, our ultimate goal. It looked micro-machine size since we were so far away. I also had my first taste of altitude sickness (headache, dizzy, and light headed) as my body adjusted to the elevation.


When we arrived at the Machame Camp about five hours later we checked in with the ranger at the hut. The camp was busy with hikers from all over the world (mostly Europe) including a couple from Minnesota, a Michigan group, and a pair of medical students from Iowa. Our campsite was surrounded by trees which was nice. The camping was great, although I did manage to slowly fall backwards in my dinner chair since I was sitting on a slant (pretty hilarious actually). We had zucchini soup, breaded fish, veggies and sauce, and fruit for dinner. We were very tired, so I retired early to my own tent the first night (we were going to rotate among the three of us to be fair).


It was a great start to our long journey. Until next time…Sarah.