Leaving Kilimanjaro

Dispatch from Kilimanjaro: Last Glimpse of Uhuru Peak

I believe we all choose to remember people, places and events in our lives as they appear at a particular moment in time. My Grandpa de la Pena will always be seen through the eyes of a ten-year-old boy, when he was the most resourceful and knowledgeable man I knew. My old hometown of Lincoln, Nebraska, does not look the same through the eyes of a 29-year-old as it did through the impressionable eyes of an eight-year-old.

I awoke this morning to use the bathroom around 5 a.m. at Millennium Camp (12,500 ft.). This camp has my favorite view of Uhuru Peak, the summit of Kilimanjaro, and is surrounded by wind-bent trees (resembling cedars) that stand slightly overhead, some reaching 10’. My tent is facing south and the silhouettes of the Usambara Mountains far beyond the lights of Moshi Town are starting to emerge from the faint dawn light.

In the sky sits Venus with the Milky Way slowly being devoured by the sun that has just cracked the horizon. The colors are like those reflected on the mirrored sunglasses worn by the beach volleyball players and lifeguards at Redondo Beach in the early 90’s. The horizon is deep blue fading into black the further west I look. To the east are shades of orange and greenish-yellow tints topped with a velvet crimson layer. The Southern Cross is visible along with all the constellations existing near the equator, some Southern and Northern.

Often my guests have marveled at just how many stars are visible, their own memories of childhood before ambient light was so dominant in the skyline or perhaps they have never seen the stars with this much clarity and abundance.

To the north lies Kibo, the youngest volcanic formation on Kilimanjaro. In the dawning light the white of the Rebbman Glacier swallows the volcanic rock around the crater rim and then pours over the sides and begins to glow with the rising sun. I blink my eyes and cannot trust them at first because I thought I just saw headlamps up high near the crater rim. I refocus and sure enough there is a large group of hikers looking south that makes one huge, bright white LED light. Judging from the time, they are nearing Stella Point with mixed feelings of relief and dread as they finally reach the crater rim. After five-plus hours of hard walking and focusing on “step, breath, step and repeat” the summit is but an hour away for most climbers. The 5’ world in range of their headlamps slowly starts to expand. They can see more than just the feet of the person in front of them and the lights of Moshi Town. Then the massive glaciers appear on their left side for the first time, the enormous crater realized!

Back at Millennium the camp has started to wake as it does most mornings, the last day always a little earlier for porters and climbers alike, as all are anxious to get back to their families, beds and a cold Kilimanjaro beer. The cooks are making breakfast and the porters are quietly murmuring to each other, possibly about last night’s English Premiere League football match or the news reports flowing from their little hand-held radios.

Glowing orange, red and yellow orbs start bobbing in the dark as the climbers turn on their headlamps and stretch after 12 hours of well-deserved sleep. Sore knees from the descent and dry, scratchy eyes from the dust, 40 mph winds and intense sunlight are the common ailments after summit day. The camp songbirds begin singing and scavenging for food scraps, out early to beat the much larger and more aggressive white-neck ravens.

To the east over a ridge juts the ominous peak of Mawenzi, now crumbling rock as a mountain returns to the earth. I unzip my tent and kick off my Crocs, time to start packing. It’s my last trip on Kilimanjaro and this is how I choose to remember Kili…