Kilimanjaro is the world's highest free standing, snow-covered equatorial mountain. Images of the towering snow-covered cone rising majestically from fertile green foothills have become a powerful motif of Tanzania's extraordinary extremes. One of the most amazing aspects of the mountain in the present day is the accessibility of its peak to climbers with no mountain climbing equipment or real previous experience of scaling such heights. The climb is done in three phases. The first is through the tropical forest – dense vegetation between 1850m and around 2800 m. Then we move to a wide expanse of moorland, here the climbing is gentle but oxygen now begins to thin. Even higher over 4000m is the Alpine desert. Here the weather conditions are have swings and only the odd lichen survives above 5000m. Now we are at the final steep push to the summit.