Africa 2026

Kilimanjaro Trek

Mountain Gorillas of Rwanda

WHY? In 1988, I dreamed that I climbed Mount Kilimanjaro - not that I had climbed it, but that I was actually climbing it. The dream was vivid and I can still recall it - moving through the different climate zones with their unique topography and vegetation: rainforest,, heath and moorland, alpine desert, and arctic summit. Then not 2 weeks later, I happened upon a PBS show on climbing Kilimanjaro; and what I saw was exactly what I had dreamed. I also learned that it is not a technical climb, but rather “just a hike.” The challenge is in the altitude (19,341 ft.) and the stamina it takes to hike such a distance at that altitude. In that moment I simply said, “I want to do that some day.” Fast forward 38 years and the dream became a reality!

And since we were in the neighborhood, we decided to add on a visit to Rwanda to see the Mountain Gorillas that Dian Fossey had studied and made famous back in the 80’s as well.

We were there from Sept. 5 - 23, and as you can imagine we were without connectivity for most of our time there, making daily blogposts and updates impossible. Plus we were too damn tired to have any energy for anything other that focusing on the climb!

Now that we’re home, I hope to blog through the trip one day at a time, so you can join us on our journey to the summit, even after the fact. Needless to say, this was the hardest thing we’ve ever done; and we’re so glad we did it!