Today's the day. I woke up at 5 a.m. this morning to prevent jet lag upon arrival in Tanzania tomorrow night. (We'll see how well it works out. Tanzania is 7 hours ahead of Georgia.) I might not have lengthy internet access for a few days, so I want to relay a more detailed itinerary of my pit stop in Tanzania before departing this afternoon.
I leave Atlanta tonight, and after two 9-hour flights with a layover in Amsterdam, I arrive at the Kilimanjaro International Airport in Tanzania. I'm meeting the UGA group at their hotel in Moshi (see northeast Tanzania on map), where my beautiful friends Sarah Alongi and Addie Jones will be waiting for me with open arms (or else...). June 1st will be spent in Kili orientation: renting extra gear, unpacking and repacking bags, eating our last meals (maybe ever), etc. On the morning of the 2nd, we climb.
At 15,100 feet from the base to the summit, Mt. Kilimanjaro is the tallest free-standing mountain in the world. Its altitude of 19,340 feet makes it the tallest mountain in Africa, placing it among the famed Seven Summits. There are 5 routes to the highest point, Uhuru Peak, and we're hiking the Marangu Route, which doesn't involve any mountaineering. We're hiking up old-fashioned style, no ice climbing or glacier hopping.
The climb begins with a 3 hour hike through the rain forest and then takes a sharp turn upward. The whole climb takes about 6 days. On the second or third day, we stay at a high altitude camp to acclimatize. (Climbing Mt. Kilimanjaro often leads to severe altitude sickness, so we give our bodies as much time as possible to adjust.) Shortly after midnight, we'll begin our 1.5 hour final ascent to Uhuru Peak. According to Wikipedia, an extremely reputable source, only 40% of all climbers reach the summit. If we make it...well, I hope we make it.
After Kili, I head to Madagascar for a more, for lack of a better word, "academic" experience.
To long flights and (hopefully) interesting seat buddies...
