5-Day Kilimanjaro Marangu Route Trek to Uhuru Peak with Hut Stays

Receive breakfast and a briefing from your guide.

Leave Moshi at 9 AM and drive for 45 minutes to Marangu Gate on the eastern side of Kilimanjaro. Register with the national park and begin hiking at 10:30 AM. In the rainforest, look for towering eucalyptus trees, birdlife, and Colobus monkeys. At these lower elevations, it can be wet and muddy, so gaiters and trekking poles will help. Shorts and T-shirts should be sufficient, but keep your rain gear and warmer clothing handy.

Stop halfway for lunch and reach the Mandara Huts at 2 or 3 PM.

Unpack, rest, and have some tea or coffee.

Take a 15-minute side trip to Maundi Crater, a good way to see the surroundings, including Northern Tanzania and Kenya. Dinner is served in the early evening at 7 PM. Bathrooms with running water are available.

Wake to a 7:30 AM breakfast and pack for your next trek.

Break camp by 8:30 AM and hike for an hour through rainforest glades, then follow an ascending path through heathland where you can look for giant lobelias and groundsels.

Continue up into open moorlands where small shrubs are the main vegetation.

Stop halfway for lunch, where you can enjoy amazing views of Mawenzi.

Arrive at the Horombo Huts by 3 PM, where you can see Kibo's summit.

Rest, unpack, and prepare for dinner. Bathrooms with running water are available. You may start to feel the effects of altitude here, and to aid your acclimatization, you can choose to spend an extra day resting at Horombo or climbing to a base camp below Kibo's sub-peak, Mawenzi.

Wake to breakfast as usual, but if you wake early, you can get some great photos of the sunrise. The first part of the day's hike climbs through the dwindling heathland that blends into a moonscape as you enter the sweeping saddle connecting Mawenzi and Kibo.

Stop for lunch, and later, when you cross this surprisingly large saddle, you can examine the summit climb up Kibo that you will be starting in just a few hours. Be careful to notice any signs of altitude sickness. There is no running water at the Kibo Huts.

Wake at midnight to a light breakfast, then prepare for your summit ascent. The goal is to climb before dawn so that you can reach Uhuru Peak shortly after sunrise.

Leave at 1 AM, switchback up steep scree or possibly snow, and reach Gilman's Point on the crater rim at 5,861 m/18,640 ft between 5 and 7 AM. Here, views of the fabled crater and its icecaps greet you.

Hike for another 2 hours along the crater rim near the celebrated snows, which take you to Kilimanjaro's true summit, Uhuru Peak, by 9 AM. This is Africa's highest point, and you would have to travel more than 3,000 miles toward the Himalayas to find a higher peak. Be sure to have your picture taken at the summit to show your friends.

Descend after your summit stay to the Kibo Huts, have lunch, rest, collect your things, and recross the saddle to the Horombo Huts.

Eat dinner and get some well-deserved sleep.

Wake as usual, pack, and descend through the moorland to the Mandara Huts.

Have lunch there, then continue your triumphant recessional down through the lush forest to the park gate, which you should reach around 2 or 3 PM. Remember to tip your guides, cooks, and porters, since you will be leaving them here.

Board a vehicle that will take you back to Eastpoint Hotel or a similar hotel in Moshi, where it is definitely time for celebration.

Depart for the airport or other destinations in Tanzania or Kenya. A trip to the beaches at Zanzibar is a good way to recuperate. The guides can arrange many reasonably priced trips and safaris around Moshi and the Kilimanjaro region.