1. It's not a good idea to start packing on sunday night, when the flight leaves on monday morning. I forgot a few things - although I managed well without them. 2. Most accounts about the Kili climb are scary. The climb is not that bad .. really! Its a bit demanding physically, but its more of a mental thing. I just had 2.5 weeks to prepare for it. Lonely Planet and other books are overtly conservative iassesment, and if you follow them, you'll end up over-preparing and over-packing. 3. No need to get typhoid/Hepatitis/yellow fever vaccination and malaria pills. They [View Full Entry]

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I had time till lunch to see more of Arusha. So after breakfast, I went to local bazaar - it was very crowded. I took some pics of people in farmer's market ... reminded me of "sabzi-mandis" in India. Like I said before, there are lot of similarities between india in 1980s and today's tanzania. John, my tourguide took me to his home. He had a beautiful house., but it had no street address. Infact, there was no street - it was just a maze of alleys. We walked through banana fields to reach his house/office. It was quite unusual to [View Full Entry]

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Because I climbed Kili one day early, I had an extra day to spend. I tried hard to move my return a day early, but Ethiopian was fully booked. So 2nd was my day to rest and enjoy Arusha I went to cyber-cafe, walked around the city, met a couple of interesting swedes at a cafe and talked about liberal politics. This person I met was more militant than green peace demonstrators, and was denied entry in US because she belonged to a socialist group in sweden. All through the trip, I met most interesting people with such diverse background! She [View Full Entry]

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I had a bad start for the year. My car had starter problem and I had to join a group of dutch to go down into the crater. I was quite pissed .... Instead of starting at 6:30, we started at 8:30 am! My fellow land-roverites were friendly. A mom with 2 teenaged kids - everyone was very well traveled and very well spoken. Ngrongoro Cater is the place where most of the Discovery/National Geographic safari game videos are shot. Its a small flat caldera (part of volcano) surrounded by tall mountains from all four sides. It has a very large [View Full Entry]

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This was my last day in Serengeti, and I hadnt seen lions from close proximity. I woke up early yet again, to beat everyone to toilet, and also to start the game-drive really early. I even skipped breakfast because I wanted to spend as much time as possible watching animals. I asked Omar to take me to those lion dens (Kopjes). We were rewarded at the first Kopje itself - 3 lions (1 male and 2 females) walked right past our car. They were so close that I could almost touch them. And then we saw a whole pride of lionesses [View Full Entry]

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We got up early to go for morning game drive. As usual, I went straight to the toilet, before other campers could make it un-usable... and gee .. being the first one for the day, I found everything in pristine condition :) It had rained all night, so there was slush/water everywhere. Even though rain had stopped a few hours back, rivulets/channels were all flooded. Thats because encatchment area is all flat and it took time for all that water to collect. The scene reminded me of National Geographic/Discovery shows and how they talked about Flash Floods. Morning wasnt very productive [View Full Entry]

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In my excitement, I woke up early on 29th. I didnt need a wakeup call from front-desk because the mosque and church did that job dutifully (precisely at 5 am). I met Ameer - my safari guide/driver after breakfast. He was a Bantu (majority tribe in Tanzania), very friendly, wise and knowledgeable person. I liked him from the start. Our vehicle was Range Rover whose top could come off .. and I got myself the front seat. We went to pickup other 5 of our group. The group I met was predominatly Aussie. There were 11 of them, and 12 of [View Full Entry]

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I woke up feeling good, thanks to the painkillers last night. The first thing I did was call up my parents in India to tell them that I managed to get my ass on the top. My mom sounded very excited. Cellular coverage was very impressive during my entire climb. I saw Ambrose texting at Uhuru Peak. If only mobile companies in US would visit developing countries and see for themselves how good the coverage is. Then it was time to have a group photograph with my crew, pay the tip and listen to Jambo song/dance routine that other climbers were [View Full Entry]

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So I was forced out of bed by noise-making room-mates by 11. Tea and biscuits (much like glucose biscuits in India) were served. I could only take 4 of them. At 00:10, Ambrose and I started. We were the last ones to leave from our hall. It was a clear night - moon was bright, even though it wasnt a full-moon. Suky was beautiful with so many stars... I have never seen such a beautiful, starry night. Too bad I couldnt take any pics. For this climb, I just had my guide with me. Porters and cooks stayed back. Plan was [View Full Entry]

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I woke up early for all the same reasons, and was greeted by a memorably beautiful sunrise. I also caught the glimpse of Kibo (Main crater rim) and Mawenzi peak. Mawenzi was covered with snow, which is apparently unusual. Within minutes, cloud covered them again. we started at 8:15. First 1/3rd of climb was steep. Toughest part was crossing Mawenzi Ridge. Vegetation was getting sparse. Once we crossed the ridge, almost all vegetation disppeared. For next 5 kms or so was "Saddle Zone". A barren, cold desert area between Kibo peak and Mawenzi peak. the place was relatively flat, barren and [View Full Entry]

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