Kilimanjaro
Apr 2nd, 2008 by Juha Ylitalo
This week’s letter in ABC Wednesday is K. I decided that K is for Kilimanjaro, highest mountain in Africa.
While nothing is going to challenge its place as highest mountain in Africa, it remains to be seen how long its going to have glaciers and snow on its peaks. According to Wikipedia current estimations vary between 2015 and 2020, which is not that far in a future. Due to changing conditions, they’ve already closed at least one popular hiking route (Western Breach in January 2008) from public. Once the glaciers and snow have disappeared, it will undeniably have some sort of impact to the whole ecosystem in a mountain, because glaciers have provided water for the nature beneath them. Even from tourism’s point of view, it will become less interesting place to visit. So if you are thinking that it would be nice to one day climb to Kilimanjaro, now would be good time to do something about it.
Location: 3100m above sea level in Mweka route (we went up in Machame route and used this one for descent)
Technical details about photograph: Canon PowerShot G3 (11.2mm, 1/100s, f/5.6, ISO50)
Earlier post from Kilimanjaro: Summary about my vacation Tanzania.
12 Responses to “Kilimanjaro”
It will be a tragedy if we loose the snows of Kilimanjaro.
What a privilege to have climbed it.
Blue’s last blog post..ABC Wednesday – K is for…!
It is a sobering tought.
I just wonder what we will be looking at in years to come.
Denise’s last blog post..ABC Wednesday….K is for…..
The photo on your K-post is beautiful,well done:o)
Anne-Berit’s last blog post..K-on ABC-Wednesday.
Nice K post
Andrea’s last blog post..ABC Wednesday Round 2……….”K”
Great photo of Kilimanjaro! and interesting facts about how long the snow will last.
Leslie’s last blog post..ABC Wednesday – K is for Kisses
I really would love to hike up there….
Nice post!
Petunia’s ABCW
petunia’s last blog post.. K is for Kids
At least for Finns, there are two main routes that are been used. Those are Marangu route (so called Coca-Cola route) and Machame Route (so called Whiskey route). In Marangu route people hike up and down along the same route and sleep in huts. In Machame route people go up in one way and come day in other route. They also spend one more day (in comparison to Marangu route) up there in a mountain. The risky part in Machame route is that hikers have to sleep in tents.
On my climb to Machame, all the days, when we were hiking up followed same pattern, which started with lovely sunshine, but by the afternoon (at latest) it started to rain and it kept on raining to the night. We didn’t have any opportunities to really dry our gear, etc. At the end of our hike up, all that rain had broken my motivation to really go all the way up into top. As a result, I made U turn around 5100 meters above sea level and returned back to camp. After this journey, I lost my need to get really high.
It is much easier to hike around with SLR cameras in lower altitudes and there are lot of beatiful places in 3000 meters above sea level and below that.
We had a chance to join a group to Africa and Kilimanjaro next month, but unfortunately, it is not to be. I would likely have had to do the alternat tour instead of the climb, anyway. Our glaciers at Mt. Rainier are also shrinking.
katney’s last blog post..ABC Wednesday: I
Great post for K!
John’s last blog post..ABC Wednesday – K is for…
Kilimanjaro looks fabulous
I don’t have enough time to see everyone’s photo’s so I jump around, but I HAD to see Kilimanjaro! beautiful photo!
Diana’s last blog post..Alphabet Wednesday
Sounds like you had quite an adventure in Africa whether or not you went all the way to the top. Regarding your kayak photos, don’t feel bad, you can use them the next go-around on ABC Wednesday.
AVCr8teur’s last blog post..K is for Kayaks and Kangeroo on ABC Wednesday