Adventures in Africa: Descending Mt Meru, Tanzania

Dennis had me up early this morning, before breakfast, for a climb up to "Little Meru," a much lower summit on Mt Meru (and more commonly done as an acclimatization climb on day 2). I was not terribly motivated for this climb since I had already reached the actual Meru summit, but I told myself another 300 metre climb would further contribute to my acclimatization for Kilimanjaro and so we set out just before sunrise at 6:30. 

There was a lot of fog, so the promised views never materialized, and the trail proved quite slippery due to all the moisture, but actually in the end I enjoyed the climb nonetheless. In some ways the visibility was so poor that I found it quite an interesting experience, especially at the summit!

The fog did clear quite quickly as we descended back to Saddle Hut . . .

. . . and in no time at all the day was clear and sunny, and we could see Kilimanjaro about 70 kilometres away.

For some reason, descending, at least from Saddle Hut to Miriakamba Hut, does not require accompaniment by a park ranger, so Dennis and me and another guide and his climber (the young man from Spain) began our descent after breakfast as a foursome. I find when climbing a mountain that it is difficult to fully appreciate the beauty because I am so focused on the goal, but look at the type of breathaking views we had while descending!

At Miriakamba Hut we had the option of riding down to the trailhead in this "ambulance." To be honest, the situation confuses me a little bit, but taking the ambulance was clearly the option Dennis preferred, and the point of mountain climbing to me is the ascending, not the descending, so a chance to save a couple of hours and mitigating risk of injury without sacrificing money or, in this case, acclimatization, made jumping in a no brainer. 

It was a squished and bumpy hour drive down the mountain, but we reached the trailhead around noon. 

For some reason, the monkeys at the trailhead were much more active today than they had been on Friday. 

We had some paperwork to complete and also the critical tipping process. Tipping is an extremely important part of climbing in Tanzania, such that it makes me wonder if it may be the only way the guide, cook, porter, and waiter are paid. In any case, on the advice of the tour company owner, I tipped $200 USD and allowed my guide to do the work of allocating it as is appropriate. To be honest, I am not a fan of tipping generally and the situation here is very opaque and awkward. Anyway, Dennis was good about it all and we found our ride and drove back out of Arusha National Park, passing various animals including a giraffe along the way.

We stopped briefly at the park gate to complete check out procedures, and then we were on the road en route to Moshi. 

Moshi should be about 80 minutes from the park, but a major car accident had closed the highway, forcing us on quite the back road detour. At one spot a bus had got stuck attempting to get through a road it probably should not have attempted and forcing the other traffic to get around off road. I took the photo below leaning out the window, and you can see the stuck bus just over the van roof.

Anyway, we got to Moshi eventually and I checked into the Keys Hotel (included as part of my tour package), where I am staying in one of these "huts."

Dennis was then kind enough to take me to get my laundry done, pick up the rental gear I will need for Kilimanjaro tomorrow (mainly a parka, as it will be much colder at the summit of Kili than it was on Meru), and finally eat a late lunch. After dropping me back at the hotel, Dennis headed to his home to spend the night. We will meet up tomorrow morning to start tackling Kilimanjaro!