Tanzania has been an amazing country to explore and discover and has so much to offer. What I thought would be a once in a life time trip has turned into a place I now hope to return to someday. And I’ve been so inspired by this area, I’ve already planned a tour around all…
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10:30pm. It’s dark. It’s cold. Fortunately there’s little wind. Amy and I crawl out of our warm sleeping bags. We get ready in our tent by headlamp. We slept in most of our clothes so we only need to add our top layers. After a quick bite to eat and some hot coffee, we’re ready to…
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Today we tackle the Barranco Wall! This is the Barranco Wall. It’s nearly 1000 ft of almost straight up climbing. More of a scramble than hiking, requiring us to use our hands to get over several obstacles. It’s one of the most challenging parts of the climb, besides summit night, especially since I agreed to…
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It’s day 4 of our 8 day climb. Today we head up to the Lava Tower at 15,200ft for an acclimatization hike, before heading down to Barranco Camp to spend the night. We’re up early to get a head start on everyone else headed this way today (as this is where the Lemosho Route meets…
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This is a pretty easy day for us. We cross the relatively flat Shira Plateau, gaining only about 1000 ft, most of it at the end. With views like this, how can you not start the day in good spirits? At one of our breaks, I take pictures of Amy and our guides. They are such…
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Day 2 takes us up into the moorlands of Kilimanjaro. It’s much longer (6 hours) and more challenging hike than day 1, so we get an early start. I didn’t sleep well the night before, and I realize it’s because I was still wearing the same sweaty clothes I arrived to camp in so I…
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Oh my gosh this is it. It’s here. Our first day of our climb up Mt Kilimanjaro! We’ve been planning and training for this trip for over a year, so it’s really hard to believe that we’re actually heading to the mountain to begin climbing it today. We’re meeting our guide Innocent at 830am, so…
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After 7 days of hiking, 42 miles covered and 13,000ft gained (total, not counting the ups and downs), we made it to the summit of Mt Kilimanjaro! It’s probably the hardest thing I’ve ever done. Amazingly, I barely felt any affects of the altitude, with the exception of how hard it was to breathe. Thank…
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Today we explore the town of Moshi, located at the base of Kilimanjaro. We stayed last night in the Springlands Hotel, which is owned by Zara Tours, the company we are doing our climb with. The rooms are basic and the walls are thin, but the grounds are beautiful and they have pretty much everything…
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This is it! Our very last hike before we leave! I can’t believe it’s really here! We wanted to do something fairly easy, but still get a work out in. Poo Poo Point fit the bill! It’s 3.6 miles each way and 1800’ elevation, it was the perfect level of difficulty for us to taper….
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It’s almost here! With only 2 weeks left before we fly out, I back up to the mountains for my last big training hike. I’ve done McClellan Butte before, but it was raining and cold and there was still snow at the top. Amy was out of town this weekend so I went with my…
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This past Saturday, Amy and I did one of our last training hikes before we actually begin our climb! We’re both nervous and know we want to train as hard as possible, but we’ve also both reached burnout. We can’t wait until we can have a weekend to relax, and only go hiking because we…
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