tanzania: climbing kilimanjaro by lemosho

It is a long, high walk, not a climb in the technical sense.

There are no ropes, and National Geographic calls Kilimanjaro a high-altitude trek for which a few months of regular walks, runs or hill days is sound preparation. You are on the mountain for eight days with a team carrying the loads, and most of it is steady going.

Two parts stand out. On day seven the path leaves the Barranco Valley by the Barranco Wall, a rock face roughly 250 metres high where you use your hands in places. It needs no climbing skill and takes one and a half to two hours.

Summit night is the real test: climbers are typically woken around 11pm at Barafu, walk uphill for seven or eight hours in darkness and severe cold, then descend to Mweka the same day.

Walking fitness gets you to Barafu. Above that, altitude decides. The park does not allow children under ten above 3,700 metres.

Better on a long route like this one than on a short one, but nobody can honestly give you a percentage.

There is no official success figure, and the numbers quoted online mostly come from companies selling climbs. What does exist is medical research.

A study of trekkers who climbed in four or five days by the Marangu route found that 61 per cent reached the summit. A later study of a six-day ascent by the Rongai route recorded 88 per cent, and concluded that a slower ascent lowers the risk of altitude sickness.

They were different groups on different routes, so read them as a direction, not a forecast. TravelHealthPro, the UK's official travel health service, names climbing Kilimanjaro in under seven days as a concern.

This trip spends six nights on the mountain before the summit attempt. Altitude sickness is common on this mountain and cannot be trained away, so no outcome is promised.

Most people notice the altitude, and nobody can tell you in advance how you will respond.

The NHS and the US Centers for Disease Control both say that altitude illness can begin from about 2,500 metres, that gaining height slowly is the main protection, and that anyone who is struggling should go down. The CDC and the UK's TravelHealthPro add that being fit does not protect you.

That is why this climb takes eight days, with six nights on the way up. Partway up you cross high ground near the Lava Tower, at about 4,600 metres, then drop some 650 metres to sleep at Barranco, and the nights that follow stay between about 3,900 and 4,200 metres before you move up to Barafu.

The park's own rules tell climbers not to push on when exhausted or suffering from mountain sickness. We are travel planners, not medical professionals, and we do not give medical advice: please talk to your own doctor about altitude before you book.

June to October is the window we rate highest, the long dry season, when the forest trail is firmer and the views from the Shira Plateau are clearer. Within it, late June to September is the driest stretch, with cool nights and clear days.

January and February are the second choice. We rate them as in-between months because cloud and showers are more likely low down, though they are dry months too, and the mountain is quieter then than in August, its busiest month.

November, with the short rains, is less settled. We steer climbers away from April and May, the long rains, when the forest is wet and snow builds near the top. That snow is the one upside of the wetter months: a whiter summit in your photographs and fewer people on the trail.

In tents, every night of the climb.

Only the Marangu route has huts, so on Lemosho your camp is carried up the mountain by porters, pitched before you arrive and taken down after you leave. You walk with a day pack and nothing more.

The camps stand on the park's designated sites, which have toilet facilities and are used by other climbing parties too, and the park keeps first aid, radio contact and rescue services at its mountain stations. Park rules limit each porter to 25 kilograms, including their own belongings, which is why you will be asked to keep your main bag light.

Expect real cold. The temperature falls by about six degrees for every 1,000 metres you gain, and at the summit it can drop to minus 20 at night, so a warm sleeping bag and proper layers matter more than anything else you pack.

Yes, around the climb, though not within it.

This is a private climb, so it can start on any day you choose, and the nights at Ngare Sero before and after can be lengthened. The order of camps on the mountain is fixed by the route, and we would not shorten it, because the published research points one way: slower climbs succeed more often.

If you have the time, the change most worth making is to climb Mount Meru first. At 4,566 metres it is a three to four day climb in Arusha National Park, on whose slopes the trip begins, and both the park and the British Mountaineering Council's advice describe it as acclimatisation for Kilimanjaro.

Afterwards, Arusha is the starting point for Tarangire, Ngorongoro and the Serengeti, so a few days of safari fit naturally. Scheduled flights reach Zanzibar from Arusha in about two hours.