Ultimate 2-Day Kilimanjaro Summit Guide: Conquer 66km Safely & Successfully

🏔️ After witnessing the Great Migration in Kenya, my friend and I spontaneously decided to climb Kilimanjaro. We dashed all the way to Moshi, the Tanzanian town at the base of the mountain.

🤨 In Moshi, we found a local trekking company and negotiated with them. We learned that climbing Kilimanjaro comes with mandatory policies:
— Each climber must be accompanied by one porter, one guide, and one cook, making it a 1:3 ratio.
— No matter which route you take, you must pay around $500–600 for the climbing permit.

😬 After getting a rough idea of the costs—around $1,200 per person to summit—I showed them my guide certification from back home and used some clever tactics to negotiate the price down to $700 per person. We even managed to share a single guide between the two of us. We tried to push further, asking if they could just arrange the permit for us, but they refused, saying they didn’t dare take the risk. 🥹

😭 Now, about the climb itself. Kilimanjaro has multiple routes, and after discussing with our guide, we chose the Rongai route for the ascent and the Marangu route for the descent. The entire journey took two days. On the first day, we trekked about 30 km to reach a 4,000-meter camp, where we rested overnight. Early the next morning, we made the final push to the summit before descending back to Moshi.

😇 Our guide was a local with two kids. Due to my oversight, I left our tent at the hotel, so the three of us had to squeeze into a two-person tent—thankfully, just for one night. Along the way, we chatted a lot with our guide. He said his income was relatively high for the area and that he’d never met anyone who completed the climb in just two days like we did. He admitted it changed his perception of Asians. He was pretty exhausted by the end, so my friend and I tipped him $100.

😶 As for the difficulty—Kilimanjaro is nearly 6,000 meters high. On our route, the final ascent included a long, treacherous stretch of loose scree, and the last 300 meters had snow-covered paths with strong winds. At the summit, we saw remnants of glaciers, which were absolutely breathtaking.

😲 Along the way, we met people from all over the world. I wonder what they thought when they saw two Asians hauling heavy backpacks and speed-walking up the mountain, haha!

Climbing is dangerous, no matter the mountain. Friends, always remember: safety first!