Tanzania UNESCO World Heritage Sites

UNESCO just finished their annual meeting and added 13 new sites to their list of 890. "The World Heritage List includes 890 properties forming part of the cultural and natural heritage which the World Heritage Committee considers as having outstanding universal value."

I just love the way that sounds. If you're having trouble deciding where to go on your next vacation this list is a great place to start. While none of the new sites are in Tanzania, I just had to give a "shout out" to this organization. I couldn't help but go back and remind myself which sites were already on the list:

• Ngorongoro Conservation Area
• Ruins of Kilwa Kisiwani and Ruins of Songo Mnara
• Serengeti National Park
• Selous Game Reserve
• Kilimanjaro National Park
• Stone Town of Zanzibar
• Kondoa Rock-Art Sites

Kilwa Kisiwani, Stone Town and the Kondoa Rock-Art sites are all cultural sites while the rest are natural. Aside from global recognition UNESCO has also donated thousands of dollars to protect Kilimanjaro and other precious natural resources of Tanzania.

Treasures in Kilimanjaro

I tripped across this recent account of a 1978 Kilimanjaro climb. It's fantastic to read what it was like for Bob McKerrow to ascent the mountain before it really became the adventure tourist destination it is now. But the best part is the folklore he uncovered in Ethopia. I've heard some interesting stories before, but never a link between King Solomon and Kilimanjaro.

I don't want to give away too many details because Bob also has some great pictures and I'd hate for you to miss them. Take a look and let me know what you think.

Kilimanjaro; what's in a name

Another Kilimanjaro fact that seems to create a great deal of confusion is what the name actually means. I've seen writers define it any number of ways. But the fact is, no one is entirely sure of the origin or even the native language of the name itself.

In the local Chagga dialect it could mean Mountain of Greatness or even Mountain of Caravans. The nearby Maasai tribes might call it White Mountain. In Swahili it could be translated into Shining Mountain, the unlikely Little Mountain or even Mountain of the Cold Devils. It was believed by early tribes that there were devils on the mountain who punished anyone who tried to climb it by turning limbs black. This is believed to have been frost bite.

The translation that seems to have the most support is Swahili. One translation of kilima is "top of the hill" and njaro is believed to refer to snow or white. Even the locals don't know for sure where the name comes from. But after Hemmingway and a few thousand adventure toursits have shared stories about the fabled flat top mountain, most people these days agree it means adventure.

How tall is Kilimanjaro?

I've been writing this blog for a few months now and monitoring daily the web conversations and articles about Kilimanjaro to keep up to date. And I'm amazed at the variety of facts and figures people quote about this humble mountain. For the next few posts I think we need to clarify a few things about Kilimanjaro.

First, the mountain is officially 5,895 meters or 19,341 feet above sea level as stated by the Tanzanian Embassy. Some people don't round up with the metric conversion and call it at 19,340 feet. But I recently saw a post that Kilimanjaro is over 20,000 feet above sea level (no link to avoid embarrassment). Wiki knows it's 19,340 feet. Even the Journal of the Tanganyika Society (Tanganyika was the original country name before adding Zanzibar and renaming it Tanzania) reported the correct height back in 1965. Even my watch's altimeter knew it wasn't 20,000 feet above sea level, although it would have been cool to show people a reading above 20,000 feet when I got home.

I can almost understand people getting the height of the mountain wrong, what with everyone converting back and forth between metric and English measurements. But the fact that really confuses me is the debate about where the mountain is actually located. Some people continue to think a portion of the mountain is in Kenya. It isn't. 100% of Kilimanjaro has been in Tanzania for a very long time. Germany and the UK cut the country borders a while ago and they have not changed. If you don't believe the Tanzanian Embassy then maybe you'll at least believe Google Earth.

Brief History of Kilimanjaro

Roy J Hinde of the Travel Zone blog has posted a nice, short geological history of Mt. Kilimanjaro as well as some of the thoughts on how the name came about. Check it out.