Mount Kilimanjaro Africa Hike Guide

Mount Kilimanjaro is the highest peak in Africa and a once in a lifetime hike. In order to hike Mt Kilimanjaro, a tour guide is required. The trail takes you through luscious rain forests, high desert plains and the summit has glaciers. It truly is an awesome trek! Most routes take 5-6 days but involve very little technical hiking (class 3 at most). Oxygen is not necessary to hike Mount Kilimanjaro, but some tour guides will have it. Go “Pole Pole” and you will have a great adventure!

Mount Kilimanjaro Quick Facts

Mount Kilimanjaro Video Review – This video is 7 years old, it won’t be the same standard you are used to, but gives a good idea of what the mountain/area looks like.

Mount Kilimanjaro: ★★★★★ (5/5 Stars)

Distance: 37 miles/62km from gate to gate

Elevation Start: 5,718 ft (1,743 metres) Machame Gate

Mount Kilimanjaro Summit: 19,341 ft (5,895 metres)

Total Elevation Gain: 14,000 ft (4,267 metres) approximate

Estimated Time to Complete: 5-7 days – depends on your route

Difficulty: Difficult What does this mean?

Class: Class 2/3 – Mount Kilimanjaro is really not a technically demanding hike – What does this mean?

Season: Year-round: Best time to hike: January – March & June – October

Check the Weather Forecast

Directions to Mount Kilimanjaro

Trailhead: Machame Gate

Getting Here: Most hikes start from the Machame Gate.

Fees: Unfortunately for budget hikers, a tour guide is necessary to hike Mount Kilimanjaro. Tour guides range from $800 USD – $2,000+USD depending on how much luxury you need and how long your hike is. Personally, I used Zara Tours and had a great experience. Fees generally grant you: access to the park, pay your guides and porters, food and of course lodging. However, tips are not included in these figures. Plan on tipping an additional $200-$300 total USD for your porters, guide and assistant guides. Generally, you can give tips directly to the head and assistant guides and they will distribute some to porters. Bringing gear for both the porters and guides is always appreciated as well.

Parking: 99.9% of you will not have to worry about parking for the hike of Mount Kilimanjaro as most tour companies bring you directly from your hotel to Machame Gate.

Summary

Dogs: Needless to say, dogs are not allowed on Mount Kilimanjaro.

Camping: Unless you work a miracle, plan on spending several days on Mountain Kilimanjaro camping. Conditions are quite pleasant until the last night when it can get cold at night due to high elevation.

Make it a Loop: Each route has a different path. While the Machame Route is a loop, others are out and back hikes.

Trail X Factors: Elevation

Whether you are from Cusco, Peru or New York City in USA, the elevation on this hike is going to test your mental and physical fortitude. I have loads of experience at 14,000 feet or above since Mount Kilimanjaro, but to date, it’s the worst I have ever felt with altitude, even after 4 days of acclimating. Most good tour companies will take your trek very slowly so that your body can acclimate to the higher altitudes. Generally speaking, you start your push for the summit at midnight. That night in my life is one that I will never forget, but is very blurry because of the lack of oxygen at 19,000+ feet.

Hike Tip(s): Respect your guides and other hikers

Chances are, when you set out to hike Mount Kilimanjaro, you are going to run into a million other hikers along the way. Some are seasoned mountaineers with years of experience, others are bankers from London who can’t even tell you how to use a compass. My point is, experience varies with each group. In general, clean up after yourself and respect the people around you. Pretty basic stuff huh? You would be surprised how many people couldn’t follow this.

On a separate note, respect your guides but don’t be afraid to speak up. At the end of the day, these guys (sorry ladies, every single guide I found on the mountain was a male) are looking to get as many people to the summit of Mount Kilimanjaro as possible. They have loads of experience on the mountain, so listen to them! Ask them questions and speak up about things you are curious about or how you are feeling that day. They aren’t mind readers and ultimately rely on feedback from the group on how to plan each day. I had amazing conversations with all of our guides while hiking Mount Kilimanjaro and recommend you do the same.

Best Views: Look, you are going to want to bring a nice camera with several interchangeable lenses for this hike. Sunsets? Stunning. Night photography? Amazing. The scenery along the way? Breathtaking. When I hiked Mount Kilimanjaro I brought a crappy digital camera and a sub par video recording device. Looking back, I would have killed to have a decent quality DSLR and my GoPro with me. Is it extra weight for you? Sure. Worth it? You bet.

Trail Route: Unfortunately, I hiked Mount Kilimanjaro before I had my Garmin. I took the Machame Route though.

Gear Needed

Since 100% of you reading this will be hiking with a tour guide, you really do not have to bring the typical equipment an overnight hike would demand. Check with your tour company to see what they provide, what you need and what you can rent from them.

My Trip to Mount Kilimanjaro: July 2011

Editor’s Note: I hike Mount Kilimanjaro in July of 2011 (IE a long time ago). The following trip summary is to my best recollection, every.single.detail. is not going to be correct.

Like many college students, I entered my senior year of DePaul University and had a thirst for something different. Change from the same bars, people, places that I had been with for the last 4 years. I wanted an adventure! My cousin hiked Mount Kilimanjaro the summer before and inspired me to plan a trip of my own. I saved for about a year and was ready to depart for Tanzania in July of 2011. I was going by myself, which many people couldn’t believe, but solo adventures are kinda my thing.

Day 1 United States to Tanzania

I am a planner, detail oriented and had this trip down to a daily itinerary. Naturally, after a few connecting flights and 16+ hours of traveling, when I landed on the small dirt runway in the Tanzanian airport, I had no shuttle to take me to the hotel which was about 30 minutes away. Neat. This was great for a number of reasons: Uber wasn’t a thing at the time (and frankly I am not sure it would have mattered if it was), I spoke none of the many languages spoken in Tanzania and it was 11PM at night. I lucked out times a million and somehow landed a ride to the same hotel I was staying at with some Germans who arrived on the same flight. #blessed

Day 2 Hotel

I woke up the next day in a room I hardly remember entering into hours before, in a hotel that could have been on Mars for all I knew. Jet lag, as it turns out, was a real thing. Who would have known? I spent most of the day catching up on sleep, exploring the self contained hotel and grabbing some food. Later in the afternoon, I met up with my group (3 other hikers) and our guide, Chombo. Chombo welcomed us to Tanzania, laid out the general plan for the hike of Mount Kilimanjaro and asked us to be ready to rip in the morning. No prob bob, I was ready to go!

Day 3 Machame Gate to Machame Hut

I awoke on day 3 of my trip and was so anxious yet excited, my bags (all two of them) were packed an ready to go. I met up with my group and guides to load up and drive to Machame Gate where we would check-in to the national park and begin our hike of Mount Kilimanjaro. The “roads” in Tanzania were something out of a story. In sections, standard dirt roads, in others, massive potholes, broken bridges and borderline un-drive-able conditions. Somehow though, the driver of our van had no problem flying through these roads like they were freshly paved. Driving through the country opened my naive eyes as to how many in Tanzania live. Since I arrived, it was the first time I had actually seen the country outside of the secluded hotel.

After a long drive, we arrived to the gate and boy was it a scene. Our small group joined hundreds of other hikers, porters and guides. Vans and buses where parked all over the place. Piles of gear covered the large parking area. Once inside, you could see about 20-30 locals outside of the gates trying to sell all kinds of things to hikers: gear they may need, food, souvenirs etc. It was a wild scene. Chombo asked us to separate our gear into two bags: one for the porter to carry, one for you to carry. This felt extremely weird to me and I asked if it was necessary. Chombo and I later had a conversation about how the tourism we bring to Mount Kilimanjaro affords many young men the chance to earn income for their families. After an hour or so, we were finally ready to go and took our first steps up Mount Kilimanjaro.

The trail was extremely apparent (almost the entire hike up Mount Kilimanjaro) and started off as well traveled dirt trail about 5-6 feet wide. If I was looking for a secluded hike up Mount Kilimanjaro, I could flush those dreams right down the toilet. Porters were flying by us for the entire day and we piggybacked with other tour guides as well. There were hikers from all around the world, which made for an interesting crowd and conversations.

Almost all of the first day of hiking was in the rainforest. At the time, this was the first rainforest I had been in and I was blown away by the scenery. We could hear monkeys and other wildlife, but never actually saw anything outside of a few birds. Crowds were intense and the bottle necking occurred often with other hiking groups, especially in steeper sections. Around halfway through the day, we stopped for a boxed lunch and looked in awe at another tour group who had a table, folding camping chairs and a warm meal. This is what paying an extra $1,000 – $1,500 for your hike up Mount Kilimanjaro would get you. Our group found a comfortable looking rock formation and opened up our bagged lunch, which honestly, was quite good. 

After lunch, we hiked for another couple of hours and reached our first campsite on Mount Kilimanjaro at Machame Hut. The camping space was littered with porters who were working hard on setting up tents, showers/bathrooms (for some groups) and starting meal prep for the evening. There were scattered outhouses built in the camping area to help with the massive amount of human waste.

Until the first evening, I had no idea what to expect for dining on the mountain. I assumed we would pop a squat somewhere, enjoy a lowkey hot meal and call it an evening. What actually happened was a hot meal in a small dining tent (just big enough to fit 4-5 people) equipped with a small table and folding chairs. It felt like luxury compared to the spam/ramen camping meals I was used to. Chombo came into the dining tent about halfway through dinner and gave us a summary of the next day, had some conversation and wished us a good night sleep.

Day 4: Machame Hut to Shira Cave

Sleeping with  a stranger (both sexually and non-sexually) can be a gamble . On night one, I figured out that my tent-mate was a heavy snorer. This would turn into an extremely “fun” experience to deal with the next handful of nights. I felt bad it aggravated me so much, because outside of this annoying habit, he was such a great guy; but god damn did this drive me bananas.

After a loud night of “sleep” we started off the day back in the dining tent with a warm breakfast of oatmeal, some fruit and powdered coffee/coco. This turned into the standard breakfast on the trip with occasional ham/bologna like lunch meats mixed in as well.

After breakfast, we were ready to start our hike for the day. It was so odd to have just a day pack and leave all of my tent/gear behind when starting the day. I don’t think I really got used to this concept and looking back, I still feel guilty about other people carrying my own gear. This day’s hike brought a much different scenery. We had finally left the luscious rain forest behind and were now above treeline.   The hiking was similar to the day before in the sense that it was very low class (class 1 and 2) with loads of other people around us. The trail was mostly dirt/gravel with some minor rock scrambles mixed in. We could see a few false summits of Mount Kilimanjaro, but not the true summit yet.

During the day, I enjoyed some awesome conversation with an assistant guide, Duela,  about Mount Kilimanjaro, Tanzanian culture and comparing lifestyles in the US vs Africa. As we neared our campsite for the evening, we encountered a few caves which were cool to check-out. After a day or so of hearing wildlife, we finally started to see more in the form of several different birds.

We arrived to the Shira Cave campsite near dusk and took some time to explore. I found a “helicopter pad” IE a bunch of white rocks in a circle. Chombo later told us that this was the last spot on the mountain a helicopter could safely land due to elevation and terrain. Re-assuring stuff. The sunset at the Shira Cave campsite of Mount Kilimanjaro was stunning and I tried to capture some pictures, but my crappy digital camera did it no justice.

Day 5: Shira Caves – Barranco (Breakfast) Wall

After the standard breakfast and debrief session, our group hit the trail again. Day 3 on Mount Kilimanjaro brought some crazy scenery. I felt like I was on the set of Star Wars or on Mars…at times, both. The hiking was similar to previous days, but crowds started to thin out a bit (not sure if our group was ahead or behind the others). About halfway through the day, we reached the lava towers of 15,000+ feet. This was easily the highest elevation I had ever been at in my life and did find it hard to breath. We spent a bit of time on a break there acclimating and eating our usual boxed lunch. After the lava towers, the hike lost some elevation as we worked our way down to camp for night 4: Barranco Wall Camp.

At dinner, Chombo gave us a rundown of next day including the Barranco Wall, the most technically difficult portion of the hike. It’s a narrow class 3 section of trail, that really was not a big deal, but by this point of my hike up Mt Kilimanjaro, I had learned that our guides were extremely cautious (and for good reason). The  guides that lead hikers up Mount Kilimanjaro use their success rate to leverage promotions, raises and jobs with high profile tour groups. Of course,  tour groups use these numbers to attract tourists to use their group over others. Even though we were just hiking up a mountain, Mount Kilimanjaro tourism is a very competitive business. 

Day 6: Barranco Wall to Barafu Camp

Barranco Wall was certainly a hypebeast (at least for me). Honestly, it was the first time during my hike up Mt Kilimanjaro that I was somewhat challenged and enjoyed the feeling of that. . Barranco Wall had a well established narrow trail, but there were sections in which I could be creative and do some minor rock scrambling. It was the first time on the hike that I felt free and not forced to take the exact same line as my group/guides. When we reached the top of the Barranco Wall on Mount Kilimanjaro, we stopped a took a break. We sat on large slabs of rocks and enjoyed the views, which were amazing. We were now above the clouds and if you took the right camera angle, you appeared to be standing on top of the clouds themselves. After Barranco Wall, we hiked for a couple of more hours to our last camp, the Barafu Camp. For the first time on our hike up Mount Kilimanjaro, I felt as if the summit was in reach and I was ready for the final push. During our dinner, Chombo told us we would be starting our hike around midnight to give us enough time to summit and get back down before we ran out of daylight. I was anxious, but ready to go.

Day 7: Barafu Camp to Summit

The tent mate’s snoring problem reached its height on the night before our summit push. At one point during the night, I got so mad, I woke up my tent mate which stopped the snoring for about 3 minutes until he went back to sleep right back into the loud cycle. Some of this frustration was certainly because of my anxiousness and nervousness to start the summit hike up Mount Kilimanjaro. This anxiousness before a big hike is something I keep to this day, so even if it was silent, I guarantee you that my sleep quality would have been shit. I woke at midnight and slept about 4 minutes the night before. Even though I had little to no sleep, I still felt ready to go.

After popping on several additional layers of clothing (it was surprisingly cold at night), I tore open the tent door and looked up the mountain. I could see a steady stream of white headlamps leading up the mountain and out of eye-site. Around camp, other groups were gearing up to go as well. It was a bustling scene at 17,000+ feet at 12AM. The hike up Mount Kilimanjaro on the last night felt like a drug trip: pitch black except for the headlamps in my group. I could make out no scenery, had no idea what time it was or how long we had been hiking with no idea of  how long we still had to go. At that time, my experience hiking under the stars was somewhat limited. Those stars though, boy were they stunning. It was like the sun was a lamp and the sky was a black sheet of construction paper. If you took the paper, poked some holes in it and  held over the lamp, that would replicate the stars brightness. The stars were insanely bright, the milky way punched you in the face with its presence. It is something I will never forget.

As we hiked higher up, my head got very light and my consciousness started to slip. My memory of the night is still hazy. I know that we walked for a LONG time in the dark. At one point during the night, one of our group members started to get sick. At first it was a simple puke session, but as we hiked on, his AMS got worse and ultimately, had to turn around. I felt bad for him and knew it could have easily been me. To make things worse, his dad was also in the group and decided to continue on. Our group was now 5 – our lead and assistant guide with three hikers. When the sun did finally rise, I was so happy to see it, I could have cried.

Near the top of the Mount Kilimanjaro, the hiking got extremely frustrating due to trail conditions. We were going so slowly in the loose gravel that we would take one step forward and then slide about a half step backwards. Eventually, my frustration of our pace got the best of me and I asked Chombo if we could pick up our pace just a bit. He had no problem with that request and was glad I spoke up. Eventually, we reached the last false summit of Mount Kilimanjaro, Stella Point. We could see a massive crater in front of us , which looking back, I would have loved to explore some more. From here, we were told it was about another 30 minutes to the summit.

We continued up the dirt trail and saw the stunning blue summit glaciers of Mount Kilimanjaro. Chombo told us how small they were compared to past years (I am sure they are gone by now). When we reached the summit, I was ecstatic. I couldn’t believe I was standing next to the famous three tiered wooden sign. I had seen it in pictures and videos so many times before, but it was right in front of me. After a short time on the summit, Chombo rushed us down because of the lack of oxygen at this elevation. In retrospect, I wish I could have spent more time there to take it in, but since I was with a guide, I was pretty handcuffed. 

The hike down the summit of Mount Kilimanjaro was a blur. At one point, I asked Chombo if we had taken the same way up the night before because the scenery looked so foreign to me. He laughed and said it was the exact same route.  We hiked for hours, past our previous camp and continued down the mountain. We made camp about ¼ of the way down and traded stories/memories from the previous night, all while feeling bad for the one hiker who couldn’t join us at the summit.

Day 8: Camp to Machame Gate

Honestly, I can’t remember if the last day was two days of hiking or one. I can tell you that we worked our way back into the rainforest and our hiking pace increased greatly from the trek up Mount Kilimanjaro. I don’t have many memories, but I can tell you that I had some great conversations with Chombo about culture, politics and learned a lot about Tanzania and Africa in general. Towards the end of the hike, I stepped off the trail to pee. After I was done, I felt something on my leg, looked down and had about 3-4 massive ants biting into my flesh. Even though I had just been up to 19,000+ feet peak, this was the first time on the trip I felt any kind of danger, go figure. I told Chombo about it and he didn’t seem too concerned, so I figured I was fine.

As we hiked down the mountain, my group and I discussed tipping for the guides (something I had not budgeted into my trip). I only had a certain amount of expendable cash and felt that what they wanted to tip was far too high. We got into and argument and at one point I had to say, “look I just graduated college, what I have in my pocket is all I have to my name. You guys are welcome to tip what you want, but I can only offer this amount.” “This amount” was about $150 for the group, but the rest of my crew planned on tipping $300 each. Mind you, all three of these guys were both well established older men and it was infuriating to hear their lack of understanding on where I was coming from. Eventually, my tent-mate leveled with me along the way in a private conversation to let me know he would cover my portion of their proposed tip. I am forever grateful for him, so thank you Frank.

When we got back to the hotel, we were all handed certificates with our name, signed by our guide stating we had climbed Mount Kilimanjaro, the highest peak in Africa!

Summary

Overall, my trip up Mount Kilimanjaro was a positive one; a trip of a lifetime and one I will never forget.

Pros: amazing scenery, great bonding experience, memories of a lifetime.

Cons: Lots of people, felt chained to the guide aka no freedom to explore, expensive trip for hiking

I would highly recommend Mount Kilimanjaro to anyone reading this and would be happy to answer any questions about the mountain or planning the trip. Feel free to message me on Instagram, Twitter or Youtube!  

Mount Kilimanjaro Video Recap

Note: This video is 7 years old, it won’t be the same standard you are used to, but gives a good idea of what the mountain/area looks like.