This journey of a lifetime was made possible by the trust and faith of some special people that came into my life recently. First of all I’d like to thank Mrs. Upesi Mtamobuz for providing me the opportunity to make the trip to another continent and also for introducing me to Pete O’Neal. That in itself was an experience. I’d also like to give my heartfelt thanks to Michael and Vickie Greer of Waveland Capital Group. Their support of Pioneer Climbing Expedition gave me the necessary funding to make climbing Kilimanjaro a reality. All of these exceptional people have successfully proven that hard work and the strong belief in what you are doing will most certainly bare fruit. I am blessed to have such great role models.
Pete O’Neal and me

This is the story of my journey.

My trip started out like most trips usually do, loading the back of theV70 with large yellow North Face bags with the help of Jane and heading to the nearest LAX international airport that offered the lowest airfare available at the time. But one minor difference with this trip is that… I was going solo. The last few years, my climbing and extended expedition activities had been with the team exclusively. I had a few flights ahead of me, from Los Angeles to Washington’s (IAD) and Ethiopian airlines from (IAD) to Kilimanjaro (JRO). Ethiopian airlines marked the point of new territory. For the first time in 51 years, the plane was full of individuals who resembled me or looked like me. Twenty-five hours and forty-minutes later, I landed at JRO and looked out of the window to see Air Force 1 and 2 on the tarmac. Just my luck to come around the world and be hung up by security forces because of the President. I’ve had the misfortune of missing flights out of the Orange County that have been directly attributed to the President. But here I was, miles from home and it happened again. It actually turned out to be quite amusing.

The first summit of the expedition was Mt. Meru’s Socialist peak at 4562.13 m. and it’s little sister Little Meru at 3801.0 meters. We left Pete O’Neal’s compound in Arusha and headed toward Arusha’s national park to start our climb around 10:00 that morning.

We headed out on a series of dirt roads to our destination. I remember someone saying to look at the giraffes, but I only remember looking at Meru’s east side and how immense the wall looked from where we were. I could only imagine what it looked like from its base. Surely this was an invitation to a second trip in the near future. From the start of the trek, I found myself more times than not, at porter speed in lieu of group speed, which inevitably seemed to put me a couple of hours ahead of the group.

On summit night, we started out at 2:00 AM with one other group member in tow, as the others, against my better judgment, decided to sleep in at start at 4:00AM. The terrain was pretty straightforward in the beginning and eventually turned into a two-step forward one step back, ash-like substance. A somewhat slippery 70 -degree assault vertical slope covered in fresh ice particles that ran for 150 yards followed it. I soon saw what appeared to be the summit and decided the rock face that stood before me would be the most expeditious route to the summit. Despite my guide’s suggestion that I take the long way around, I decided to do the 5th class face climb instead of the 4th class 30-minute trek. It paid off and 5 minutes later I was at Socialist Peak. Two minutes and a quick photo shoot later I was heading down to base camp where the thought of climbing into my rack was overwhelming.

I made base camp by 8:00 AM for a total of 6 hours only to find my room locked as my room mate had decided to do a 2 hour trek up Little Meru. To pass the time I visited with the cooks in the cooking tent and hung out with the support staff in true Tanzanian style!

I didn’t understand the language, but we all had a good laugh. The group that had decided to leave at 4:00 AM finally showed up at 5:00 PM, only 2 of them making it to the summit.

The following day was spent trekking back down to our first camp and trucking back to the main gate of the reserve. With transportation waiting, we headed back to Pete O’Neal’s compound for a two-day rest before setting out for Mt Kilimanjaro.

I was invited to stay with the owners of Massai Moja Expedition Company at their villa in Moshi where I taught the guide staff basic rock craft knot tying in preparation for future climbing ventures (yet to be developed). Despite all the activities of the previous days and the summit expedition, I found myself feeling strong and ready for the next challenge ahead. The compound was held secure by a Massai Warrior complete with machete and cleaned by an adorable little old woman who lived in a traditional Tanzanian dwelling.

Finally the day that I had been waiting for arrived… climbing Kilimanjaro’s Rongai route from the east side of the mountain. The trek to Kibo Camp (the base of Kilimanjaro) was 5 days ahead of us and would take us through four ecology zones ranging from agriculture to low desert, high desert and eventually to the glaciated zone. After the first day at a snails pace trekking to acclimatize, which was more for the benefit of the Diamox group, I was itching to put some distance between us and get away from the constant yakking which distracted me from my goal. I needed to feel the peace of my surroundings and not listen to constant chatter.

Finally, the day came when I arrived at Kibo Camp just 10 hours prior to summit time. Once the group arrived, 3 hours later, we had a briefing to discuss meals and kick off times after which I headed straight for my tent for some much needed rest. Unfortunately, the chatting continued into the night from the next tent and I found myself unable to get a good sleep. Contrary to the plan discussed the night before our start was late which was beginning to become a habit. By the time we left for the summit there was already a long stream of headlamps lighting up the trail ahead of us. As pre-planned, I was to start the trek with the group and would be pulled out with Davis, my guide, to go solo speed. Within 15 minutes of breaking with the group their headlamps were out of sight. I eventually passed the 2 groups ahead of us to move up into the second position.

When I heard of Gilman’s plateau, for some reason, I envisioned Kilimanjaro, as being somewhat flat similar to Devil’s Tower, but what I found at 5:00 AM was an area that made my living room look vast. I asked Davis if he could point to Uhru (the highest point) and he pointed to the other side of the crater. We traversed the western ice fields and then to the northern glacier by way of easy walking. I was less than 100 yards away from the summit when my body yelled “BARF!” I was stricken with the thought of 5,895 m. AMSL (above mean sea level) and quickly realized that AMS (altitude mountain sickness) is the product of lack profusion. Two very deep breathes and I was good to go again and did not leave my breakfast on the trail!

Uhuru Peak

We made the summit at 7:00 AM where we quickly took photos and headed back home. From this point on the only thing on my mind was getting back to my family – although saying goodbye was very hard to the men and women that made this trip an amazing journey into a culture that is part of my heritage.

In summation of this trip, I found the people of Tanzania to be most delightful and hardworking and despite their living conditions managed to maintain a positive and happy attitude. I look forward to returning one day.

About Stephen Shobe:
Stephen Shobe is a professional climber and founder of Pioneer Climbing. Shobe has been climbing since 1989 and has traveled around the world to pursue different aspects of climbing, for business and pleasure. Shobe has worked with the French Government as a climbing instructor in the South of France, and as an instructor at an indoor climbing gym. He has also helped to expose the sport to inner-city, at-risk youths.