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The view from Martha Gilliland's tent shows 19,340-foot Mount Kilimanjaro looming in the distance during her trek this summer to the peak in Tanzania. It is the highest point in Africa.
Courtesy of Martha Gilliland
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Did you know
Tucson resident Martha Gilliland, who recently climbed Africa's Mount Kilimanjaro, serves on the President's Council of Advisors on Science and Technology.
President George W. Bush appointed Gilliland, an accomplished geologist and environmental scientist, to the post in 2001.
She also held several administrative and academic positions at the University of Arizona in the 1990s.
Kilimanjaro's waning glaciers
The snows of Kilimanjaro, portrayed famously in a short story by Ernest Hemingway, are in decline — with glaciers on the mountain shrinking over the past century.
Some scientists have blamed global warming, but others say warming probably isn't the main culprit in the decline of glaciers on mountains in the tropics, such as Kilimanjaro.
A more likely cause, they say, is a combination of two factors: a decline in the amount of snow falling on the mountain, and a process known as sublimation.
Sublimation, caused by exposure to sunlight and dry air, occurs at below-freezing temperatures. Ice is converted directly to water vapor without going through a liquid phase.
Tucsonan Martha Gilliland, who climbed the mountain recently, says she saw clear signs that Kilimanjaro's ice is retreating.
"Being a geologist, I noticed all the moraines — debris left as a glacier melts back," Gilliland says. "There's no question that the glacier is shrinking."
Determining the cause of the glacial decline — and predicting whether the ice eventually will disappear completely — will require more research and observations on the mountain, scientists say.

Accent

The call of Kilimanjaro

A breathtaking view of life

Mount Kilimanjaro cannot speak. • But its grand visage — a mass of rock, snow and ice towering 19,340 feet into the African sky — manages to communicate a clear message to many who see it: Climb me. • Tucson resident Martha Gilliland got the message and recently trekked to the top of Kilimanjaro. • The ascent, while not a technical climb, posed a rigorous physical challenge and brought some unexpected rewards. • Gilliland, 63, like most who climb the peak, found exquisite natural beauty — but she also came down from the mountain with a new regard for living fully in every moment of life. — Doug Kreutz
By Doug Kreutz
Arizona Daily Star
Tucson, Arizona | Published: 08.24.2008
Martha Gilliland trekked to the towering, snow-crowned, sublimely beautiful roof of Africa and found something even more precious than the rapturous view.
The present moment.
"The most important thing that happened to me on the climb of Mount Kilimanjaro was having 10 days of being completely present in the very moment I was experiencing," says Tucson resident Gilliland, who ascended the 19,340-foot mountain in June.
"Everything extraneous was stripped away up there on the mountain. It was down to the essentials of breathing, moving, eating, sleeping . . . the pure pleasure of being present moment after moment."
If the climb inspired an almost Zen-like focus, it also marked the fulfillment of a longtime dream for Gilliland, 63, a geologist, educator and university administrator.
"I learned about Kilimanjaro when I was 18 — in a class that included a study of volcanoes," Gilliland recalls. "I forgot about it for a long time," but the dream of climbing the mountain resurfaced around the time of her 2005 retirement as chancellor at the University of Missouri-Kansas City.
After moving to Tucson in 2006, she began to wonder: "What would it be like if I could get in fantastic shape and go climb Kilimanjaro?"
The decision and preparation
Even though Gilliland had no experience climbing high mountains, an ascent of Kilimanjaro would be possible with proper physical conditioning. The trek, while long and high, poses no technical challenges — and professional guides routinely lead people with little or no previous climbing experience to the summit.
The gradual ascent doesn't require ropes, ice axes or climbing anchors.
By last November, Gilliland had made up her mind: She would try to trek to the top of Africa.
Job 1: Get in fantastic shape.
The mother of two grown children and the grandmother of six, Gilliland took that challenge very seriously.
Already benefiting from the cycling and hiking she'd done since moving to Tucson, she embarked on a specially designed regimen of cycling, hiking, interval training, strength training and core-and-balance exercises.
"I started it in January and stuck with it — six days a week — until I left Tucson on June 14," she says, crediting many friends for encouragement and companionship on training treks.
"By the time I left for Tanzania and Kilimanjaro, I had begun feeling very confident and strong."
Starting up the slopes
Gilliland is quick to acknowledge that her ascent of Mount Kilimanjaro was made possible — and sometimes quite comfortable — by a large paid support team.
Her $4,000 guided trek, with a California company called Tusker Trail, was staffed with two guides, 20 porters, a cook, a person carrying medical equipment and another person handling the group's portable latrine. Two other paying clients joined Gilliland on the trip.
After arriving in Tanzania on June 16 and making final preparations, the group started June 18 on a 10-day trek to the summit and back down.
They would follow the long Lemosho Route, which allows gradual acclimation to the altitude. Another very popular route on Kilimanjaro takes only five days, but it requires climbers to adjust more quickly to the thin air of high altitude.
The hike began in a rain forest at an altitude of about 7,500 feet.
"It was a beautiful area of giant trees and lush vegetation," Gilliland says. "We saw monkeys, parrots and elephant dung along the way."
Porters hurried ahead of the group and had camp set up each afternoon — complete with popcorn, peanuts, tea and filtered water — when the clients arrived. Dinners were served later in the evening, with fare ranging from pasta and rice to potatoes with meat and vegetables.
On the second day, the group ascended out of the rain forest into moorland.
"When we came up out of the rain forest and saw the mountain, I started crying because it was so beautiful," Gilliland says.
The third day's trek led to a large lava amphitheater at 11,500 feet. On Day 4, the climb continued past Lava Tower at 15,000 feet to Arrow Glacier at 16,000 feet.
High on the mountain
Adventures on the fifth day included an ascent up rocky terrain in an area called the Barranco Wall.
"Nights were cold, much colder than I expected," Gilliland says, noting that temperatures at the higher altitudes were sometimes 20 degrees or more below freezing. "Daytimes were delightful for hiking, usually with sunshine." Daytime temperatures ranged from comfortably warm in lower elevations to below freezing in the glaciated heights.
On the sixth day, the group reached Karanga Camp.
Gilliland recalls "following the expansive, deep and harsh Karanga Valley across glacier moraines left by the receding glacier."
Carrying only a day pack because camping supplies were lugged by the porters, the clients sometimes moved quickly and were urged by the guides to slow down a bit.
"The mantra was 'pole pole' — Swahili for 'slowly, slowly,' " Gilliland says. "A perfect pace for being fully present."
The Day 7 trek took the group to a base camp at 15,200 feet — the staging area for the next day's push for the top of Mount Kilimanjaro.
To the summit
The night before the final climb was anything but restful.
"The wind started howling around 1 a.m.," Gilliland says. "I tried to convert the emerging fear into laughter and delight in the experience, with only partial success.
"That was the end of the sleep. Wind howling, fear in the air, adrenaline flowing, we met in the mess tent at 3:30 a.m. for breakfast — dressed and ready to go. The temperature was 10 degrees and the wind was 40 mph, sometimes 50."
Bundled in high-tech underwear, fleece, down jackets and windbreakers, the climbers started up the trail at 4 a.m. by the light of headlamps.
Then it was a seemingly endless trudge — 9 1/2 hours — to the summit. The effort was rewarded with beauty all along the way.
"The sky glowed bright reds, yellows and orange as Mount Mawenzi began to take shape on the horizon — a very craggy high volcano itself," Gilliland says. "Tears welled up with the magnificence of it all, but I pushed them away and refocused on balancing against that crosswind."
Gilliland moved in short stints — sometimes eight steps between rests, sometimes only four.
At times, the summit seemed impossibly far away. Gilliland concentrated on just the next four steps.
Then, finally, she reached a landmark known as Stella Point.
"At Stella Point, you come up onto the rim — and I knew then that I would make it."
She did.
And she felt waves of relief and emotion when she stepped to the top.
"I cried a long time when I hit the summit, I was so happy," Gilliland says.
"From the top, you can see forever. It was clear all the way down to the plains."
It would be all downhill from there. The trekkers would return to base camp for the night and then make a fast, two-day descent to the foot of the mountain.
But there on the summit, perched for 20 minutes on the top of Africa, Gilliland could only marvel, and feel thankful.
She had carried some small items with her — a "special treasure I was carrying to the top for my friend, a picture of my mother and the list of people who had donated to Literacy Volunteers of Tucson on my behalf."
With those keepsakes in hand and thoughts of loved ones in her heart, Gilliland took a last look around before beginning the descent.
"It felt like you could touch the sky," she says. "It was crystal clear, incredibly bright, incredibly beautiful.
"I was blessed. I got to see one of my dreams come true."
● Contact reporter Doug Kreutz at dkreutz@azstarnet.com or at 573-4192. — Doug Kreutz
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