[ insects chirping ]
[ mid-tempo music plays ]
Kyungai: this is the land of our earliest ancestors,
Where the wild earth of long ago lives on -- east africa.
[ elephants trumpeting ]
Beyond the abundant life
That flows across these endless grasslands
There is one great landmark of beauty and mystery
Revered like no other.
[ birds chirping ]
From the heart of africa, it looms above the clouds,
A solitary giant, the largest freestanding mountain on earth.
It is a mountain of strange wonders,
A place created in fire and crowned by ice.
It is a source of ancient fascination,
A snowcapped volcano at the equator.
People come from every land to see for themselves this,
The highest mountain in all africa,
And maybe even to climb to the snows of kilimanjaro.
I have spent a lifetime climbing this mountain.
I was born here.
My name is jacob kyungai.
I am a mountain guide.
I tell each traveler who comes here,
To learn the secrets of kilimanjaro,
We must begin beneath the clouds,
Not in snow, but in mud.
[ bird chirping ]
Each group I guide is different and the same.
People of every age and origin --
Ordinary people, mostly,
But all drawn to the magic of this place.
In this group, there's roger,
A scientist who understands how this mountain was made.
Bilham: kilimanjaro is the largest volcano
On any continent.
It is a tremendous attraction for a geophysicist like me.
It's difficult to imagine,
Now that I'm here in the middle of this incredibly lush forest,
That actually I am sitting on the volcano,
That there's a half a mile of volcanic rock beneath me.
Kyungai: and there's audrey,
A writer who has read about kilimanjaro for years
And has finally come to see it for herself.
Salkeld: all my life, really, I've written about mountains,
But rarely do I ever get to the top of mountains.
And so it's hard for me to imagine myself
On the top of this one, but I can dream.
Kyungai: some come to see if they can reach the summit,
Some to explore a curious world,
And some, like heidi, come to learn if the real kilimanjaro
Matches the mountain of their imagination.
Albertsen: I've dreamed of coming here since I was a child,
Hiking in the alps, pretending I was in africa.
I can't believe I'm actually here.
I almost feel like I'm in a dreamworld.
I asked somebody earlier to pinch my arm
Because, like, you're, like, going like this.
It's unreal. It really, really is beautiful.
Kyungai: mostly, I guide people from far away.
But this time,
The son of a good friend here in tanzania has come along.
Hansi wants to learn about the towering mountain
He sees from his backyard.
Mmari: I want to climb kilimanjaro
Because I want my family to be proud of me and...
[ clears throat ]
And I think I can make it because I'm strong, you know.
Kyungai: few 12-year-olds have made this climb,
But nicole made her father promise
To show her the great mountain he had climbed.
Wineland-thomson: today has been really hard,
Going uphill in mud for eight hours.
Everybody's been telling me that, like,
"you're doing a great job.
Just keep on going. You'll make it to the top."
I hope so, because I've always wanted to see what's up there,
Especially the glaciers, ever since my dad told me about them.
Kyungai: the climb ahead is long and demanding.
In the coming days, we will hike more than 45 miles
And climb to over 19,000 feet.
From here, the route to the summit
Passes through many different worlds.
We began far below,
In the humid rainforest that encircles the mountain.
We will reach the unusual trees of the heath zone,
Then grassy moorland and, above that,
Increasingly harsh conditions.
There is an alpine desert above 15,000 feet.
Higher up, just below the mountaintop,
We will enter the arctic region, windswept and bitter cold.
It is like walking from the equator to the north pole
In only a week.
Now, at 10,000 feet, we can see mount meru,
Kilimanjaro's smaller sister volcano,
As darkness ends our first day on the mountain.
Bilham: kilimanjaro is such a vast and broad mountain
That it's hard to tell how big it is when you're on its slopes.
You're such a tiny part of the mountain,
But you begin to get a sense of its immensity at every step,
As the mountain slowly reveals itself.
And you begin to notice things
You could not have imagined from afar.
Salkeld: above 10,000 feet,
We entered the heath zone, a kingdom of shrubs.
But even here, there are splashes of color,
Like the red-hot poker.
They may appear fragile,
But they're exposed to rugged extremes,
And they're tougher than they look.
Bilham: I wonder what early man
Thought of this colossal volcano.
During the past half-million years,
Our ancestors would have watched its birth.
Scorching rivers of lava poured down these slopes,
And eruptions lit up the night sky.
Later people saw the great mountain grow quiet and dormant,
As it is now.
Perhaps they, too, were drawn upwards
To touch the icy glaciers that advanced and retreated
Across its huge summit.
In recent times, the top was an impenetrable shield of ice that,
As far as we know, was unconquered
Until a climber stood on its summit in 1889.
Kyungai: there is an endless rhythm
To the coming of the mists each morning
And their disappearance each afternoon.
They bring enough moisture that exotic plants can thrive here
In dry conditions that would wither them elsewhere.
Albertsen: the mist rolling in quickly
Changes the mood around us.
It shuts out the world, and it feels lonely and mysterious,
As if kilimanjaro is hiding its face.
As I climb with hansi and roger,
It seems like we are traveling on another planet.
Everything is on a different scale.
We have heather in europe.
You can pick it, and you can hold it in your hand.
Here, it's giant and over 30 feet high.
Kyungai: 3,000 feet higher,
The air grows drier and colder still,
And the landscape is transformed.
But here, I like to take people to a place off the main trail,
Where melting snow
Feeds a special hidden valley full of life.
Salkeld: this is a most beautiful place,
And it comes as something as a surprise
Because, suddenly, you drop into this valley,
Which is walled in by mountains.
And best of all, it's walled in by kilimanjaro's summit itself.
[ hammer banging ]
We're at about 13,000 feet here,
Which is quite high for such a proliferation of plants,
And they're probably going to be the last ones we see,
Because higher up it will get increasingly barren.
It is a wonderful place.
All sorts of little streams and gullies go off,
And you hear waterfalls.
And the plants are absolutely fantastic.
Weirdest of all are the giant groundsels,
Like great candelabras with pompons on top.
Nicole and I went to a little groundsel forest
On the other side of this valley,
Which was pure heaven, really.
Wineland-thomson: it was beautiful,
And it sort of felt like I was in dr. Seuss land
Because, like, the trees are so unfamiliar.
Jacob told me that some of these plants
Are more than 100 years old.
They survive that long
Because they can shield themselves from the cold.
When their long, green leaves die, they don't fall off.
Instead, they wrap themselves around the branch,
Insulating the plant like a layer of fur.
Because I've never seen them before.
Like the snow up there -- never seen snow with my eyes.
Just snow -- I've never seen it before.
Stepping on it, I've never tried.
I've never even stepped on snow. It's going to be my first time.
It's really great, you know.
Bilham: up here at 13,000 feet,
The intensity of the equatorial sun makes it summer every day,
Nurturing the plants.
But every night, it turns to winter and freezes solid,
Only to melt in the next day's sun.
In these extremes,
Plants have invented ingenious tricks to survive...
...None more clever than the lobelia,
Which wraps itself up to ward off the night's biting frost...
Then unfolds the next morning
To absorb the warmth of the rising sun.
Albertsen: how can we understand the natural world like this?
To succeed up here, near what feels like on top of the world,
You, your body, has to change just like the plants.
The thin air is what gets to you.
I don't know.
I think you can be the healthiest person on earth,
But you might not be able to make this mountain.
Kyungai: for most who try to climb kilimanjaro,
It is the journey of a lifetime,
But only half who begin the trip make it to the summit.
The great height of the mountain
And the thin air force many to turn back.
Up here, you have to pay attention to your body.
I make sure everyone is eating well.
My role is to watch out for their safety
In a world unfamiliar to them.
Nicole has her father, rick, along to look out for her.
The real challenges are just beginning.
Bilham: climbing up the valley wall,
We could sense we were leaving the pleasant regions behind.
It's beautiful up here,
But we're entering a harsher world above 14,000 feet.
[ screeching ]
Kyungai: we have reached the cold and barren zone
Of an alpine desert.
We are halfway now, four days to the summit.
I tell them, to avoid altitude sickness,
We must go slowly and acclimatize
To the decreasing levels of oxygen.
Salkeld: thinking how I huffed and puffed up here,
I'm a bit worried about how we're going to manage it.
But I guess if we take our time, we'll be fine.
I sincerely hope we all do make it up there.
I'm longing to see the crater.
Kyungai: the alpine desert is a battle zone for plants.
During the day, mist soaks the soil.
But overnight, the moisture freezes into tiny ice spears
That shoot through the dirt, churning it up.
It is hard to gain a foothold in such an unwelcoming home.
And so we come to a mystery of kilimanjaro.
There is little to eat on the high slopes.
But a few animals come up here, and no one knows why.
I know where an elephant died far up kilimanjaro.
What made this elephant leave its herd
And climb almost 15,000 feet up?
And it is not only this elephant.
I have seen the remains of antelope and a leopard
That climbed all the way to the ice on the crater rim.
Why would such animals climb so high?
What were they looking for?
The hardest moment walking was probably going downhill,
And when I was going downhill, I wished I was going uphill,
And when I was going uphill,
I was wishing I was going downhill,
So it got really confusing, and it was a -- it was a --
[ laughs ]
I've been thinking that it's gonna be a very,
Very tough, long journey to get to the top.
Albertsen: lava tower is 300 feet high,
And it's right on the trail.
Roger wanted to study it. I wanted to climb it.
Bilham: at the top of lava tower,
Hansi and I talked about one
Of the most extraordinary natural features of africa.
The mountain we're sitting on exists
Because of the great rift valley,
A 4,000-mile-long crack in the earth's crust
That is slowly separating east africa
From the rest of the continent.
We can't see the subterranean violence,
But we can see the scar,
Marked by clifflike escarpments walling these broad expanses.
Where the valley floor has sunk,
A chain of shadow lakes has formed,
Many so poisoned by volcanic acids,
They are nearly devoid of life.
The violent forces beneath
Have deeply altered the face of africa here,
But they have also shaped a land of mesmerizing beauty.
In some places, volcanoes have risen and remain active.
Other volcanoes have collapsed
To become freshwater havens for wildlife.
[ birds squawking ]
Long ago, as the valley floor moved,
Molten rock beneath it was squeezed out at the sides
And spewed to the surface, producing volcanoes
That stand today at the far edges of the rift.
The greatest of these volcanoes arose
Along one branch of the rift valley about 360,000 years ago,
A mountain so massive,
Its weight depresses the earth's crust beneath it,
A towering island of stone
That would come to be called kilimanjaro,
Meaning "mountain of greatness."
Kyungai: at 16,000 feet,
There is only half as much oxygen as at sea level.
This barren world is the last outpost of life on kilimanjaro.
Albertsen: we are at arrow camp, and we left great barranco,
Which is completely different than this place.
I feel like this is ghost land or something.
It's abandoned. It's just filled with rocks and mist.
I'm a little worried about the glaciers,
That they might fall or something.
But I just can't wait to get to the top and see,
Like, an open area of white snow.
Salkeld: I feel a little breathless,
Having got to a higher altitude.
And it was a bit sobering when we arrived
To find that there's a memorial to a young man of 27
Who died of altitude sickness in this camp.
It brings home to you what altitude means, really.
You can see the physical dangers on the mountain,
But the scarceness of oxygen to breathe is invisible.
Kyungai: the climb tomorrow is the biggest challenge,
And it requires stamina and strength of heart.
They won't know if they have it until they need it.
Tonight, they think only of the test ahead.
Mmm...
So, I'm really scared, actually.
I'm not sure if I'm going to make it up there.
Kyungai: 3,000 feet above them is the edge of the crater.
Today, they must push themselves up a sheer rock face
For seven hours
To reach the crater's rim and the wonders beyond.
Salkeld: we set off this morning in chilly dawn --
Really very, very cold but clear
With views as far as you could see.
Wineland-thomson: at first, my feet got really cold.
It was way below freezing.
But I was determined to see the glaciers and the crater.
Kyungai: up here, where the air is thin and cold,
I tell them, "keep moving.
One foot in front of the other, and you will make it."
I stay close to the youngest and say in swahili,
"polepole," "slowly, slowly."
"just breathe and climb."
I really got a hard time getting up here, and...
[ sighs ]
...My legs are very tired.
My legs are, like, just, like, finished, you know.
Salkeld: it's very steep up here,
And I've been getting increasingly breathless
As we come up.
I know there was a time halfway up
When I wondered whether I would make it or not.
And I certainly said to myself,
"you're a silly old fool to be doing this
When you could be sitting at home, all comfy and warm."
But now we're nearly up to the crater,
And there's tiny bits of blue sky showing through,
And I think I'm in for a bit more of this yet.
Kyungai: this is my greatest reward as a guide,
To watch as they climb above the clouds
And enter the realm of the crater,
A place only a few people ever see.
This is the moment they will never forget.
They have done something remarkable.
They have reached the snows of kilimanjaro.
Wineland-thomson: it was beautiful,
And it was like arriving from the amazon to the antarctic.
It was amazing how fast it just happened, like, "boom."
It was the hardest and steepest trail I've ever been on.
I was so happy that we made it to the crater
And that we made it together.
I could hardly believe a kid like me
Had made it to a place like this.
Albertsen: while the others went to set up camp,
Roger and I decided to explore the glaciers.
Roger told me the first european explorers
Who saw kilimanjaro 150 years ago
Reported that they had seen a snow-covered mountain
Near the equator.
Nobody believed them.
Bilham: the glaciers
Are a great part of the mystique of kilimanjaro.
The ice looks eternal,
But it's the last stand of a process begun long ago.
It's part of a timeless earth cycle,
And it's astonishing and a bit sad to think
That the glaciers we marvel at today
Are only the smallest remnants of the massive ice cap
That covered this mountain thousands of years ago.
There's very little water on the ground here.
That's because the glaciers aren't melting.
They're disappearing into the atmosphere
Because the solid ice is turning directly into vapor
In a process known as sublimation.
Albertsen: in such thin, dry air,
This ice is completely exposed
To the intense rays of the tropical sun.
That, along with the sculpting force of wind,
Creates fantastic shapes.
Bilham: as I walked with heidi,
We realized that we were both thinking the same thing,
That this delicate fin of ice
Would be different in a week's time.
In fact, in less than 100 years, all this ice will be gone.
But glaciers will inevitably reappear
During the next ice age, many thousands of years from now.
Since on the climb this morning he had hurt his knee.I,
He was trying to be so brave.
He didn't want to slow anyone down.
[ cheers and applause ]
Mmari: I was just very tired because the day was tough.
So when I get to the camp and it was really hurting me --
I don't know why.
Did you take something for it?
Do you want something? I have something.
Bilham: what's wrong, hans?
My knee.
Your knee, huh?
Mmari: I was just walking in a lazy way,
So I just twisted my knee in a funny way.
Kyungai: we can only hope
That hansi's knee and his spirits recover soon.
We are camping at over 18,000 feet.
We still have to climb to the summit,
Which rises above the glaciers behind us.
But first, roger wanted to understand
The shape of this great crater,
So I showed him the route we've taken up to its rim
And the site of our camp,
And I promised to take him more than a mile from camp
To the inner crater and the great vent at its center.
Bilham: early the next morning,
Jacob and I set off across the vast expanse of the main crater.
It was well below freezing, and we got very cold.
In the distance, we could see the central volcanic vent.
As we descended the steep wall of the inner crater,
The central vent itself never seemed to get any closer.
It was difficult to get an idea of scale
Because there were no familiar objects
To determine the size of the place.
It was like walking on the moon.
We finally reached the rim of the central vent
And peered 300 or 400 feet down into its depths.
Standing there, I felt very small,
And I tried to imagine the fiery and tumultuous forces
That had built this gigantic mountain of lava,
All now beneath me.
We were at the very core of the violence,
Where molten rock blasted out for millennia
And where just a few hundred years ago
Kilimanjaro breathed its last breath as an active volcano.
The inner crater surrounding the volcanic vent
Was formed during kilimanjaro's last eruption
And is one of the most perfectly symmetrical craters
In the world.
Mmari: I've been on this mountain for days.
And I haven't bathed. I'm kind of smelly.
And I think also the others haven't bathed.
And I just want to get up there. I'll be happy.
Kyungai: hansi seems just fine.
But to be safe, I wrap his knee
For the climb to the summit tomorrow.
I rise at dawn on the day
We will finally climb to the summit.
I can see all the way down to the clouds
Covering the warm forest where we started 14,000 feet below.
For 30 years,
I've enjoyed bringing people to this special place.
I have climbed kilimanjaro more than 250 times,
And I don't know how much longer I can keep guiding people here.
But I do know that they will keep coming,
Drawn by its power and its mystery.
And like my new friends,
They will find the strength and the spirit
To make the summit they have dreamed of reaching.
It is now only a few hundred feet away.
Wineland-thomson: yeah, sometimes,
I thought that I wouldn't make it.
I thought it would be too hard.
Oh, gosh, it's just beautiful.
I'm thinking of how happy I am to be up here
And that I'm here with my dad and that I made it.
Salkeld: it was such a relief to know that we had all done it
And here we all were on the roof of africa.
Albertsen: at first, I thought, "maybe I'll make it."
I didn't know.
But now I know, and I'm a stronger person
Than I was when I came, and I'm happy about that.
Bilham: I'm extremely pleased to have experienced this firsthand.
Kilimanjaro is a geological paradox.
And it's a really thrilling feeling to be standing
Where all this rock poured forth less than a million years ago.
Salkeld: it's the first real mountain I've ever climbed,
And I'm absolutely delighted to have done it.
I can't believe I --
I don't really think I ever thought I would do it
Until we did it.
Mmari: when I reached the summit, I pulled out my radio.
I told dad, "I'm at the summit of kilimanjaro, top of africa."
After finishing that, I sat somewhere,
Thinking about going down,
Seeing my small sister, my dad, my mom,
Having a bath,
Having some hamburgers, pizzas, yeah.
Mmm!
Kyungai: kilimanjaro is a place where ordinary people come
To do something extraordinary, to leave their daily lives
And stand in a place between heaven and earth...
...A magical place in the africa of their dreams.
[ mid-tempo music plays ]