Start: Shira 1; 3,600 meters
End: Shira 2; 3,850 meters
Hiking time: 3:25
What a cold morning! We awoke to find our tents and the ground covered in frost. It was hard to coax myself out of my sleeping bag, but I made it to breakfast and the sky was bright and clear by the time we started hiking. For much of the morning, we had a perfect view of Kilimanjaro and it certainly motivated us to have our goal looming right in front of us.
The hike wasn’t too demanding today: gentle terrain, minimal elevation gain, lots of breaks, and gorgeous scenery, including great views of Mt. Meru, Tanzania’s second tallest mountain at 4,566 meters.
We marveled at the clouds at our campsite. We were above the clouds, something you rarely experience outside of an airplane. The clouds were so incredibly fluffy looking that I just wanted to lean back into them and make cloud angels.
Lunch was not a great success to put it mildly. It was a fried extravaganza: onion rings, samosas, and some mashed potato/hard boiled egg combination. All that fried food did not sit well in our stomachs and, well, let’s just say there were some unfortunate gastrointestinal consequences for the rest of the day.
Captain G and Jimmy took us on a forty five minute hike in the afternoon to nearby Shira cave. Hikers used to be permitted to sleep in the cave but about twelve years ago, rocks started to frequently fall from the cave roof and hikers had to move back to the traditional campsites.
There was a large helicopter landing pad near the cave. Apparently it costs $5,000 for a Kenyan helicopter to pick you up here!
Afterwards, G gave us a Swahili lesson. He went over the days of the week, greetings, and numbers. I can now count to ten in Swahili and I’ve got a couple of the basic greetings down, but I’ll need to keep practicing since I’ve got a few more months traveling in Swahili speaking countries.
Sunset was phenomenal with pinks, oranges, purples, and blues streaking the sky. Almost immediately after the sun had set, the moon shot up over Mt. Kilimanjaro. I’m not sure I’ve ever seen such a fast moonrise in my life! To top it off, it looked like a full moon.
It was pretty cold by the time I snuggled into my sleeping bag but I was asleep before long, another day of hiking finished.