One smiling Mama washing clothes in her yard looked up
at us with motherly endearment and called gently, “Pole mwanangu!” –
which loosely translates to, “Condolences my poor children!”. Riding slowly up a
long tree lined hill, I heard the melodic ding of a hammer striking
metal. In the distance
I saw an elderly man sitting on his porch under a spreading tree,
hammering slowly at a piece of tin that curled in his lap. “Ding…ding…ding”. The ringing hammer blows
matched the slow cadence of my pedaling. “Ding…ding…ding”. As I drew near and passed, I
called to him, “Mzee, pole na kazi.” (Elder gentleman, condolences
for you work.) Without
missing a beat he looked up, smiled back at me and replied, “Pole na
wewe pia.” (And condolences for your task as well). As I pedaled on, I listened
to his ringing hammer blows fading behind me, but his sound and
rhythm stayed with me.
It seemed to me to embody the slow deliberate essence of life
here, and consequently the rhythm of our journey through
it.
We had come here – I and my 3 traveling companions, to
complete one of the first ever circumnavigations of Mt.
Kilimanjaro on
mountain bikes. Many
hundreds of people come to Mt Kilimanjaro every year from all over
the world to climb this incredible glacier capped mountain, the
highest in Africa, and at almost 20,000 ft one of the highest in the
world. But there is
more to Mt. Kilimanjaro than simply
standing on its summit.
This mountain has been the home to tribal communities such as
the Wachagga and the Maasai for generations, and their simple
wholesome lifestyles have changed little over time. The regions around
Kilimanjaro are also home to a diverse community of wildlife and
flora, several hundred bird species, as well as classic African
wildlife, such as elephants, giraffe, zebra, baboon, warthog,
lepoards and even lions.
Our journey through these regions was not simply to conquer a
peak, but rather an exploration of the culture, the wildlife, and
the physical beauty of one of the most fascinating and mythical
places on Earth – Mount Kilimanjaro,
Tanzania.
We began our journey in late November, to coincide
with the end of the short rains. My traveling companions were
mostly younger than my 49 years. Steve, a Californian from
Santa
Rosa, had just completed an intense triathlon
training program and race, and Debbie, the youngest in our group,
was also an accomplished cyclist. Perhaps on par with my
physical abilities was Bruce, an American who had been living in
Venice, Italy for the past 23 years and who
now was the co-owner of a tropical beach villa in Zanzibar. I had heard the conventional
wisdom that on Safari you don’t have to be able to outrun a chasing
lion, you just need to be faster than your companions! So, I consoled myself that
even if I wasn’t the strongest rider, I needed only to stay one wild
animal ahead of Bruce!
I did have other skills that would serve me well
however. I was by far
the most experienced with Africa.
I had been living in Tanzania and leading
study groups for several years. My Swahili language skills
were good, and I was quite comfortable with the pace and style of
the local culture. In
fact, the journey had another special component for me in that my
wife’s family was originally descended for the Wachagga tribes that
call Kilimanjaro their home.
Therefore, this journey was a return of sorts to the roots of
my family’s history.
We left for the first leg of our journey with all of
our gear and bikes loaded on two sturdy Land Rover safari
vehicles. Our support
crew consisted of a cook, three crew, two drivers, a mechanic and my
long time safari companion, Emmanuel. “Emma” had been with me on
almost every safari I have been on in the past 5 years, and it is
difficult now for me to even think of going on safari without
Emma. By now he was
used to my penchant for leading groups to isolated areas that few
others visit, such as
Yaida Valley where bushmen still hunt wild game with poison
arrows. On safari, Emma
has always been the ramrod – he checks my plans, tells me which ones
are just not doable, and makes the other ones work. On this trip, his job was to
smooth over any problems along the way, and see that we made our
schedule. This was
important, because we had little idea what we would encounter; had
only a vague idea of where we were going; and no idea where we would
sleep each night. Part
of Emma’s job was to go ahead and make arrangements with village
chiefs for us to camp on their land, and to try to explain in terms
they could understand, why a group of sensible adults who could
easily afford the bus were instead pedaling bicycles around the
mountain. Not an easy
task.
There were others as well who had thought our trip was
less than sensible. In
planning this journey I had very limited information to go on. We had no clear idea where
the road led or if it was even passable. There were no good maps of
this area and what I was able to find certainly did not detail the
meager path we were to follow.
One fellow who had explored this area 5 years ago told me
that one evening he had asked a villager’s permission to camp on
land near the village, however he was told to first to go to the
local police office to explain his purpose there. When he got to the police
station he found the only jail cell empty, so he spent the night
there. He had warned me
that even then, the track through this area was barely passable, and
it was unlikely that we would be able to get through with any kind
of motorized vehicle. This caution was echoed by another, who warned
me that what little trail there could be rendered impassable due to
long sections in which a fine dust was so deep that any movement or
disturbance, such as a passing bike, would stir up a choking dust
that was impossible to penetrate. I shared these concerns with
my fellow travelers, and also warned them of my own concern that if
we inadvertently strayed across the border into neighboring
Kenya, we could be
detained and arrested for illegal entry. Lastly, I had been cautioned
by several people that due to the close proximity to the border and
the wild lands beyond, that this was smugglers country, where one
was prudent to guard their camps at
night.
We began our ride outside of Moshi, near the Marangu
Gate where climbers enter Kilimanjaro National Park to begin their
quest for the summit.
At 4,500 ft elevation the tarmac road that leads climbers to
the gate abruptly ends, for there is not much through traffic beyond
this point. The
red-dirt track there is rutted and bumpy. Small shops, simple houses
and family farms dot the landscape among the banana, papaya, mango
and avocado trees. The
area was lush, green and cool, with numerous small streams running
through the valleys cut by the mountain runoff. To our left, Kili’s peaks
were shrouded in mist and clouds. Occasionally an overloaded
bus with baskets of chickens, produce and even goats tied to the
roof would come lumbering by, but most of the time we shared the
road only with walking villagers carrying water buckets, bananas and
other miscellaneous items on their heads. (I saw one young woman
strolling by with her lunch - half a sandwich, perched on her
head). We passed old
men walking together, moving slowly, leaning on their staffs and
canes, on paths they had walked since their childhood. Young children played on the
road with homemade toy cars made of cans and wire, villagers rode
alongside of us on ancient Chinese bicycles and occasional chickens
that strayed too far from the courtyard darted in front of our
tires.
It was impossible not to be conspicuous in this
environment, and as obvious visitors we were treated according to
the dictates of African hospitality, which requires one’s hosts to
greet and welcome their guests. By the time we had made our
first camp that evening, we had been well greeted and welcomed by
the local population, and word of our presence had traveled ahead
even faster than our bikes had carried us.
We made our first camp near a small school near the
sleepy village of Machame Alen. As the sun set behind the
mountain and darkness fell around our tents, we toasted the day with
a bottle of red wine, enjoyed our first of our cook’s excellent
campfire fare, and all too soon crawled off to our beds with the
African night all around us.
In the morning, we woke to the sounds of curious
school children and the smell of coffee beans roasted on the
campfire. The air was
fresh and clear, and the sun was shining through the trees in the
forest around us. It
was a beautiful day for our 20 mile ride to our next camp somewhere
near the village of Useri. We did not suspect though
that our good weather was not to last. We left camp fairly early,
just as a couple of fellows arrived with a very large tortoise,
which they had brought with the hopes of selling to us.
As we rode, the plains of Kenya spread out below us
to the East, while the peaks of Kili remained hidden behind the
clouds. Steve and
Debbie continued their mobile Swahili lessons with the locals. We arrived at Useri just as
the sky began to darken with small rain clouds in the East. We had
just enough time to finish dinner, and a gin and tonic, before the
sky opened up and the hardest rainstorm I had ever felt, began. I dove into my tent as the
thunder cracked down from the mountain. The rain fell in waves that
rattled against the tents.
I lay in my sleeping bag and counted the time between the
lightning flashes and the crack of thunder that followed. The center of the storm was
somewhere above us. Some African Zeus was throwing lightning bolts
down on us mortals below, but I was too tired to fight back. As I drifted off, I heard
the crew splashing through the rain outside throwing plastic sheets
over the tents and trying to anchor them against the wind. It was a valiant effort, but
my lightweight tent was no match for the storm and by dawn I was
squishing on a wet mattress.
Fortunately the morning after the storm was as clear and
sunny as a day could be.
The plains of Kenya spread out before
us 5,000 ft below, and fluffy white clouds dappled the sun
light. The only sign of
the violent downpour in the night was the saturated ground and the
rivulets cut from the rain that all seemed to lead to my soggy
tent.
From Useri the road starts to climb for what would be
the most challenging leg of our ride. We would gain almost 2,000 ft
in elevation, following a little used narrow dirt track, ending in
the wooded alpine forests of Rongai. We had been in communication
with the outside world with short wave radio and Emmanuel’s cell
phone, but now we were entering Kili’s “Dark Side of the Moon”;
about as far away from it all as you can ever get - tucked away in
forests and bush on the back slopes of Kili, on a narrow perch of
land between the high mountain summit and the wildlands of
Kenya. We would have no
radio or phone contact with the rest of the world until we emerged
from the other side of the mountain 3 days later – if all went
well.
Rongai has a surreal beauty and tranquility that only
high mountain forests seem to possess. In the forests, the mountain
air is crisp and fresh, and the quality of light seems more
intense. We made our
highest camp there at an altitude of almost 7,000 ft. In the morning, the twin
peaks of Kilimanjaro, Mwenzi and Kibo, emerged in the direct rays of
the morning sunshine, and stood majestic above the pine trees and
forests of the sleepy village.
This could have been Switzerland, except that Kili dwarfs
any peak in Europe.
As we began our ride, a farmer came down the path from
his house and called to Steve to take his picture. Almost before Steve could
reply, the fellow reached down and took his own right leg, and
pulling it in the air, miraculously tucked it firmly behind his
head. As he hopped
around on one leg to keep his balance, inviting Steve to take his
picture, Steve fumbled through his pack to get his camera. A small group of
passer-byers had gathered by the time Steve finally found his camera
and our new friend was able to stop hopping and retrieve his foot
from behind his head.
It was a tough act to follow, but I guess that’s the way they
make new friends in Rongai.
Over the next few days we continued our journey
through the small villages, forests and farmlands that flanked the
mountain, and passed into the land of the Maasai, where umbrella
acacias dot the landscape and tall red-robed warriors graze their
cattle with spears in hand. We had survived the dreaded man-eating
dust pits (actually we didn’t even see any); avoided the nefarious
smugglers; and we were able to keep from illegally drifting into
Kenya and being arrested
and thrown in underutilized jails by the police. Aside from being rained on,
attacked by thousands of dung beetles, and suffering one minor
skinned knee, we had made it through relatively
unscathed.
As we began to emerge from the shadow of the mountain,
I wanted to make contact with my wife to let her know our position
and to invite her and our kids to join us for our end of journey
Thanksgiving celebration at Ndarakwai Wildlife Reserve, our final
destination. Some local
Maasai had told us there was a certain hill, some distance away,
from which the radio signals of our phone could reach the
communication grid. How
they had discovered this I haven’t a clue, but we followed their
directions, and as the sun began to set in the west, we arrived at a
small group of thatched huts at the base of a hillock. After inquiries there, a
tall Maasai wrapped in a red robe confirmed we had indeed found
“phone call hill”, and led us from his hut up the hill along a faint
path.
The sky was shot through with the red and gold colors
of the setting sun, and distant clouds wrapped the peak of 14,000 ft
Mt Meru, 100 kilometers to the west. A panorama of vastness and
beauty spread all around us.
Not a sign of civilization or human habitation, could be seen
in any direction as far as the eye could see, but we watched the
flickering reception level meter on the phone, like Mr. Spock and
Kirk checking their life form detectors upon arrival on a new
planet, as it led us atop a little pimple of red dirt, high above
the plains below. The
freshening wind pulled at our wraps, and the sun dipped into the
horizon to the west, as we perched there punching buttons on our
cell phone. In a way,
it was hard to believe that there was anyone or anything else out
there, and even more hard to believe that this puny phone could
bridge the vastness of the infinite panorama around us. But there it was on the
display – a flickering meter level that confirmed that civilization
was detected. Emma
smiled, handed me his phone, and my wife’s familiar voice tickled in
my ear. “Hi,
Honey! We made
it!”
