It was about 2 years ago that I started thinking of climbing Mt Kilimanjaro. After I survived (mostly) climbing over the Incachiriaska Pass (16,289 feet) in Peru during my Salkantay to Machu Picchu trek in 2017, it became a little more realistic that I could conquer the 19,341 foot high Kilimanjaro.

I had penciled in February 2019 to take advantage of the animal migrations during Tanzania’s short dry season (if you go to Africa, you HAVE to do a safari), but never did any serious research until mid 2018 and then my concern over my typical mid-winter slump in activity (and general fitness) made me decide that August-October was a better target (during Tanzania’s long dry season).

Initially, I focused on a 6 day Machame trek since it was the most popular and straight forward Kilimanjaro route. As I did some more reading and research, I found a little mountain called Mt Meru. Not as much name recognition as Kilimanjaro, but a good hike, with good views of the area (including of Kilimanjaro) and a nice high summit at 14,980 feet to help acclimatize my body to the altitude. I normally live at sea level, but do have access to the Sierra Nevada Mountains and a large number of 12,000 to 14,000 foot peaks to train on. Unlike Peru were I could spend time in Cusco at 11,000 feet to acclimatize, there weren’t any cities or towns over 5,000 feet to spend time in to get used to the higher altitude.

I went around in circles if I should do Mt Meru before or after Kilimanjaro or even do it at all. Doing it before Kilimanjaro may cause me to fail to get to the top of Kilimanjaro if I got too tired, got hurt, or otherwise overestimated my body’s ability to hike 70 plus miles up two tall mountains in less than two weeks.

As I pondered that choice, I started to focus on a longer Kilimanjaro trek on the Lemosho route which seemed like a better choice for views and more time to acclimatize. And then that shifted to an alternate route offered by several Kilimanjaro trekking companies that started on the regular Lemosho route for the first two and half days, but then instead of circling around the southern face of Kilimanjaro like the regular Lemosho and Machame routes it diverted onto the northern circuit. Nowhere near as busy or crowded as the routes that go around the southern circuit.

With the extra time on Kilimanjaro, a hike up Mt Meru for acclimatization wouldn’t really be needed.

In the end, I came to the conclusion that because:

1. This may be my only chance to get to Tanzania in my remaining lifetime (I’m an ‘ancient’ 53). 🙂
2. I’m going to have to spend the money on the flight to get to the other side of the world regardless of what I do and how long I take doing it.
3. I’d have to spend 22 hours on planes each way, plus 10+ hours getting to airports and during my layovers.
4. I have to spend almost 3 calendar days getting there and 2 more calendar days getting back (all thanks to traveling across 10+ timezones each way).
5. I have to spend time adjusting to the 10 hour time difference.
6. And I would have to spend a good chunk of the year training and getting ready for the trek regardless if I did a single trek or both treks.

For all these reasons and more, I WAS GOING TO GO FOR BROKE AND DO EVERYTHING I WANTED TO.

So, in the end I came up with this plan:

• 2-3 days to recover from the flight and adjust to the new time zone in Moshi and Arusha.
• A 4 day Mt Meru trek.
• 2 days to recover from Meru (any longer and my history indicates my body will get the idea that it’s done hiking and starts letting me know how it hates me).
• The 8 day Lemosho to Northern Circuit trek.
• And a 4 day safari at the end to decompress and recover from the Kilimanjaro trek before flying home.

After thinking about September, I went for early October to save a little money, avoid the September crowds, and since it was still the dry season I should be okay with the weather.

One thing about travel to Africa that I never had to worry about during any of my previous world travels (not even to Peru for my Salkantay to Machu Picchu trek) was the need for vaccinations.

Lots of vaccinations.

Hepatitis A, Typhoid Fever, Cholera, and Malaria Medication were needed (or at least highly recommended). I already had Tetanus, Tuberculous, and Measles vaccinations. Since I didn’t visit any countries where Yellow Fever was prevalent, I didn’t have to get that one at least. Still, that was a lot of vaccinations to get for one trip. But getting them would increase the chances of me not getting sick and successfully reaching the two summits I was aiming for. All part of the lifestyle I was now enjoying (with the occasional suffering). 🙂

As for training, I tried to keep busy doing my usual weekend hikes, planned (and did) some long Mt Shasta, Yosemite, and Sierra Nevada treks, started to take a bike to the train I take to get to work (4 miles per day), and even started doing longer weekend bike rides to keep my activity level up and try to get my old body in shape for the challenges that were fast approaching.

In the week before I flew out, I also shifted my bedtime a bit to try to get a little closer to the new time zone. I couldn’t shift all 10 hours (my boss generally prefers that I don’t sleep at work), but it hopefully would help me adjust faster once I arrived in Tanzania.

I did my best to sleep on the planes (first from San Francisco to Dubai, then from there to the Kilimanjaro International Airport) and match the new time zone as close as possible. Why they insist on serving breakfast at the end of a flight that lands in Dubai in the evening is beyond me. I did take the opportunity to get dinner (a Big Mac, very exotic) at the Dubai airport as I waited for my flight to Tanzania.

Arriving in Tanzania, I was met at the airport for what I assumed was my shuttle to my hotel in Moshi, but it turned out that my trekking company had arranged a pickup (despite my itinerary explicitly stating they would not pick me up). I was actually in the car with my baggage before we worked out their mistake. After the long flights I was not in any shape to argue, figure out where the actual car with my correct driver was, or pull my luggage out of the car. So they ended up taking me to Moshi.

Moshi
It was still before dawn, so I only had a couple hours to rest a bit (I did not want to go to sleep and have my body think that it was bedtime as the sun was actually rising) and have breakfast, before venturing out into Moshi.

I had chosen to start in Moshi since my trekking company was based in Arusha, so I would be in Arusha before and after my two treks and safari. Moshi is smaller than Arusha, but more geared towards people climbing Kilimanajro since many trekking companies were based there until the Kilimanjaro International Airport was built roughly halfway between Moshi and Arusha. This allowed trekking companies to work out of Arusha to take advantage of the larger infrastructure and population there.

It was a nice enough town, but clearly showed the fact that two thirds of Tanzania’s population lives below the poverty line. The condition of the roads, sidewalks (or lack thereof), the empty shells of buildings that were abandoned, street vendors selling everything you could think of, and cars of all shapes, condition, and age doing their best to not hit each other, pedestrians, or buildings next to the road.

They drive (mostly) on the left side of the road in Tanzania, but I never saw a yield sign, stop sign, or stoplight in Moshi. Somehow they managed to avoid crashing into each other during the chaos of getting from A to B. I doubt I could keep my sanity long enough to try to drive there, so thankfully the drivers of the vehicles I used while there kept me alive.

Being geared to tourism (both Kilimanjaro climbers and for people just visiting the area for safaris) there were a good deal of souvenir shops and other tourist orientated restaurants and shops. While I would have time between treks, and after my safari to do some shopping in Arusha, this would be the only chance to shop in Moshi. I took advantage of it and got my first three T-Shirts (only one of which claimed I ‘climbed’ Kilimanjaro when I hadn’t yet), some wall hangings, and various typical Africa souvenirs.

The biggest problem? The street hawkers that would try to get you to go into their shops and buy their wares. I was used to this from my time in Peru, but they took it to a whole other level in Tanzania: I had multiple hawkers try to ‘befriend’ me and offer to help me despite me not asking for help or needing it. If that wasn’t bad enough, some actually would follow me FOR BLOCKS. I assume they would hope I’d give them a tip for their help, guide me towards shops their friends or family ran, or buy something from them. Many of them would produce roll up portfolios of paintings they did themselves (despite the paintings being very similar to other art work offered all over the place) and try to sell me those.

I actually had to start walking towards the Shanty Town part of Moshi before I could shake one of them. Despite it’s name, Shanty Town is actually one of the better areas of Moshi with many nice hotels and homes (many were former plantations). It was a nice place to stroll through. One odd thing I found: The street signs seemed to be ‘sponsored’ by Coca-Cola. Each sign had the Coke logo and the name of the street on them. Found that a bit amusing. After that, I also noticed the central clock towers in Moshi and Arusha both had Coca-Cola logos on them as well.

There was a scale model of Mt Kilimanjaro in a traffic circle on the way to Shanty Town that was an interesting find, but the highlight of the day was:

My first views of Kilimanjaro! I had arrived at night, so never saw it on the flight in or ride to Moshi. So the clouds parted several times that first day to give me a glimpse of my ultimate goal for the trip.

This is also when I started to notice that outside of Tanzania most photos and descriptions focused on the main structure of Kilimanjaro, the Kibo volcano cone which contains the glaciers and the main summit, Uhuru Peak. But in Tanzania, they tend to depict the entire Kilimanjaro mountain as a whole. Including the Shira and Mawenzi volcanic cones. Mawenzi, in particular. sticks out proudly to the east of Kibo. I guess it’s just a matter of the people in Tanzania having a broader view and understanding of the mountain as a whole.

With my sightseeing and shopping pretty much done in Moshi and not wanting to deal with more hawkers, I decided to take a local tour of a nice waterfall and coffee making at Materuni Village. The hike to the waterfall had some nice views (including seeing the bottom halves of Mt Meru and Kilimanjaro) and the waterfall was beautiful. I decided not to swim in the large pool at the base of the waterfall. With my luck, I’d get sick and not be able to do any of my treks. The day ended at a fairly typical tourist tour of how they grew and made coffee in the village. Despite my not drinking coffee, it was an interesting way to spend a couple of hours.

Arusha
After two days in Moshi, I headed over to Arusha in preparation for my Mt Meru trek. Arusha is much bigger than Moshi, but did suffer from the same lack of road repairs, street sellers, chaotic traffic, and signs of poverty. It also had STOPLIGHTS! And many of the drivers actually obeyed them.

I had some time to look around Arusha before I could check into my hotel and again had the ‘pleasure’ of a street hawker following me around for blocks. I tried to be nice as I tried to dissuade him from following me or selling me anything. It wasn’t until he ‘led’ me to the Masai Market (which had been my destination anyway), that he gave up.

Got some more T-Shirts and souvenirs. One odd thing was that they didn’t seem to sell any Mt Meru t-shirts. I know Kilimanjaro is the big draw for tourists in the area, but Mt Meru is very close to Arusha (and can be seen from most of the city) and I assumed they would have at least some Mt Meru t-shirts and other memorabilia. Nope. I found that odd.

My hotel was the ‘Outpost Lodge’, which was was very much what you’d think of when you think of a lodge in Africa. A nice compound, with nice wooden buildings around a central pool and lounge area. Didn’t have air conditioning, but fortunately it never got that hot during my stay (although it would have helped a few times). I did try the pool once, but only to say I did it. Again, it didn’t get hot enough while I was there to need a dip in the pool to get some relief from the heat.

WIFI at the lodge was kind of slow and had spotty coverage. Cell data coverage in Tanzania was much the same. Since I had hoped to use a local data SIM and WIFI to provide a cloud backup for the photos I took during this trip, this was a bit disappointing. I wasn’t there to surf the Internet, but it would still be useful for weather info, communicating with the trekking companies, and sending status updates back to my fiends and family (and website).

Mt Meru awaited me…

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A collection of all of my Tanzania 2019 Photos and Movies:

https://www.flickr.com/photos/wanderingjim/collections/72157711519926736/

Moshi Highlights:

The rest of the photos:

Arusha Highlights:

The rest of the photos: