Journey

Nairobi

We departed from Mumbai to Nairobi around 6:30 AM. The seat next to me was occupied by a teenager from Tanzania who was studying in Bangalore. He had successfully climbed Kili on the Marangu route - didn't make the task seem any easier since he was also the Tanzanian natl. TT champ. We reached Nairobi around 10:00 AM in the morning after a six hour flight.

Arriving in Nairobi.
Standing: Aradhana, Chetana, Pratima, Sandy, Ravindra, Suresh, Sharath.
Sitting: Suveer.

View of Policemen on horses as we drive through Nairobi

The weather in Nairobi was great - just like Bangalore! It was summer, bright and sunny, but the temperature was ambient probably around 25 deg. C. Paul had sent a minivan to drop us at the "Park View" hotel, facing the Jamnajee Park(?) in central Nairobi.

After checking into the Hotel we walked around the market area, visited the Nakumat super market. Aradhana bought some local handicrafts including rose wood carvings of Maasai tribesmen. For lunch, we had our first taste of the staple East African food - Ugali and some curry. The Ugali was kinda rubbery to eat and did not soak in the curry well - basically, that was the last Ugali we ever had and switched over to rice after that. In the night, Chetana, Pratima and Sharat got their hair braided so they could now almost melt into the crowd. We considered seeing a Swahili movie but there was no theater nearby, so we postponed this for another day, maybe in Moshi.

The next morning Aradhana and I preferred to sleep an extra hour while the others went to see the local market early morning. Around 8:00 AM, the bus that would take us to Moshi was waiting outside the hotel. We had a continental breakfast before leaving. The bus ride gave us our first glimpse of a sight typical of the region - unending plains as far as the eye can see with a lone Maasai herdsman coloring the bare landscape with his distinctive red and blue shuka.

On the bus, Suveer struck up a conversation with this lady from the Netherlands. It was strange to see him suddenly break out in an alien language and seemingly making sense. Suveer had apparently spent many years in the Netherlands and picked up Dutch while there.

Moshi
We had to alight at the Kenya-Tanzania border to clear immigration formalities. We were ambushed by a horde of Maasai women selling handicrafts - one of the women forcibly handed off a trinket to Aradhana "for free". We didn't want to take advantage of her generosity so we paid her what we thought was fair and also got a picture taken with her (if you want a picture with a Maasai you have to pay, that's the unwritten but verbally enforced rule).

Aradhana with a Masaai tribeswoman, at the Kenya-Tanzania border

Immigration happened smoothly and we were back on our way. I think we were around a 100 KM from Moshi when we first saw Mt. kilimanjaro. We could make out its faint outline in the distance, its distinctive snow-capped peak rising over the white clouds resting on its slopes. Later, one of our guides told us that when the Chagga tribals first saw the snow-capped peak of Kilimanjaro, they exclaimed "Kibo!", which means "Amazing!" in Swahili. This apparently caught on and the highest volcano on Kilimanjaro is now named Kibo.



We stopped at the Impala hotel in Arusha for lunch and then proceeded to Moshi. While Arusha is the safari capital of Northern Tanzania, Moshi is a small town with the tourist population primarily comprising of Kili aspirants. We reached Hotel Golden View around 5:00 PM. At the Hotel, we met Paul Roberts - our agent, Adidas - the guide for the climb, Jakob Xwatsolu - the asstt. guide and some of the porters. Paul gave us a primer on what the climb would be like, how cold it could get and what gear we would need. I asked him his opinion on Diamox (a medicine to counter altitude effects), he recommended against it - an opinion that the guides shared, they felt that Diamox would hide symptoms of altitude sickness and could make things worse for the body. It was best to descend rapidly in case of severe altitude sickness, a descent of 200m is usually sufficient to remove all effects of altitude sickness - however it could be fatal if one ignores the symptoms and proceeds higher.

Paul examined our gear and recommended rental equipment where needed. We rented hiking poles, a balaclava and the outermost warm layer - from Dunga, also called Dunga Boy. Dunga Boy was the most flamboyant in the group; he had the jewelry, attitude and swagger befitting a hip-hop style icon.

After an early dinner we retired for the night, anxious but excited about the climb to begin the next morning. We had a good view of Kili from our room.



The moon was out and the mountain was visible till late in the night. Though I was fairly confident about our fitness level, I was still apprehensive about how we'd react to the altitude during the climb. But I hoped that all of us would get to Uhuru, the summit.