Six Days And A Mountain Called Mount Kilimanjaro

September 2012 I traveled with a group of people to Tanzania, our quest was to climb Mount Kilimanjaro. Following the Rongai route would take six days in total, four days up the mountain and two days down.  The trip had had two years of prior planning, and participants had undergone various training regimes. Walking was the main discipline in preparation, taking walks that lasted around six to eight hours preferably over uneven terrain. Now after the walk has been done I realize that it did not really matter how well you think you had trained or how well you think you had mentally prepared yourself, nothing can really prepare you for a first time expedition like this. Every day had a different aspect that would challenge you, some small and minor and other having the ability to sway the scales between achieving this challenge or conceding defeat.

 I knew I wanted to express my view of Kilimanjaro in black and white even before I left home. I researched pictures other people had taken, I searched all the search phrases I could think off, so I knew what had already been before me, I wanted to express a strong feeling in my pictures that expressed what I saw and what I felt being there. Black and white pictures express a very different way of seeing the world, they can tell a very dramatic story.

Kilimanjaro is a place that no one word can describe or sum up, the landscapes vary from the forest around Simba Camp, to the moorlands at Kikelewa Caves Camp, to alpine desserts of the Saddle and that is to name but three. With the images I took I wanted to create questions for the people that have never been there and memories for the people that have, I wanted to tell a story of a journey to a remarkable place and give you an insight in to the remarkable people that live and work there, but this story is not just about Kilimanjaro, Kilimanjaro and the six days on the mountain is just one chapter, over time other stories will get told.