Kilimanjaro: the snows are almost gone

Usually I don't post videos that are more than a couple of minutes long -- but this from Jack Dolan of the Los Angeles Times is too poignant for me not to share.

Dolan tells the story of his recent climb of the 19,000 foot Tanzanian peak with grace and respect -- for the mountain, for the Tanzanians who make the tourist expedtions possible, and for the changes that planetary warming is making to this forbidding environment. 

Erudite Partner and I trekked the same trails twenty years ago. The experience was so different as to make Dolan's path seem unrecognizable.

Partly that's just weather, not warming. We never saw the peak; from every vantage point, the mountain was obscured by clouds, rain, and snow. None of our eight days on on the trail was without downpours verging on sleet. We rushed up and over the summit as something like a white-out closed in. But in those days, though glacial melting was already underway, the high plateau and crater were not yet a dusty desert. 

Here are a few photos from that trip:

At the lowest elevations, this was the trail. Slippery mud was no fun.

Somehow, guide Freddy Chikima shepherded our crew up this pitch.

This, from about 12,000 feet, was as wide a view as we ever saw.

At the summit, we were eager to dash down before blizzard conditions engulfed us.

With Jack Dolan, I mourn what our civilization has done to the mountain. I'm glad to see what the mountain looks like today.