Saanvi sood is the Youngest Climber to climb Mount Kilimanjaro in northern Tanzania. Which is a spectacular natural feature that’s famous the world over. It has many notable and oft-repeated claims, but also some lesser-known traits and stories that are also fascinating.

Youngest climber Saanvi sood on Mount Kilimanjaro which is one of the world’s Seven Summits. The Seven Summits is the name given to the highest peaks from each continent. They vary greatly in height, topography and climbing difficulty. Mount Kilimanjaro is the fourth highest of the Seven Summits.

Saanvi Sood hiked Mount Kilimanjaro without climbing gear. Barranco Wall is one of the steepest sections on the mountain, and even there she didn’t used any equipment to climb it. Saanvi Sood simply hiked up to one of the world’s highest peak! A great challenge more accessible.

There’s more than one route to the summit of Mount Kilimanjaro. The seven standard routes to the summit, as well as the most common descent route, are all trails that can simply be hiked. In fact, with the notable exception of Barranco Wall, your hands are mostly free throughout the trek.

Mount Kilimanjaro rises up out of an African plain, where elephants and other large game dwell. Mount Kilimanjaro’s isolated position and staggering prominence that allow you to see it from so far away. These same features also afford you such spectacularly far-reaching views from the top on cloudless days. Mount Kilimanjaro has a prominence of 4,900 m.

Mount Kilimanjaro is a volcano, and it has three volcanic cones Kibo 5,895 m (19,341 ft), Shira 5,149 m (16,893 ft) and Mawenzi 3,962 m (13,000 ft). Not everyone is aware that Mount Kilimanjaro is a volcano. A dormant one, to be precise. This means it has vented through three different openings during its history.

The tallest of Mount Kilimanjaro’s cones is Kibo, because this is the cone that last vented. But nobody knows when that was exactly, as it was so long ago. Mount Kilimanjaro is a dormant volcano situated on the East African Rift Valley.

Tanzania lies just north of the Equator, meaning Mount Kilimanjaro is situated in a hot region. Yet the summit of the mountain is an unforgiving world of snow, ice and sub-zero temperatures.

The climb from the mountain’s base at around 1,000 m above sea level to its summit at 5,895 m therefore involves moving from a tropical climate to an arctic one. And this is why folks often say that climbing Kilimanjaro is like hiking from the Equator to the North Pole.

According to a 2006 survey by Kilimanjaro National Park, only 45% of climbers who attempt to summit Kilimanjaro each year actually make it to the top. This is mostly down to people getting altitude sickness. It’s a sobering statistic, and shows why it’s so important to choose one of the longer Kilimanjaro routes that allows for good acclimatisation.

Trekkers taking a rest and sitting on rocks on Kilimanjaro Roughly 50,000 people attempt to climb Kilimanjaro in an average year. The park didn’t collect data for the nine-day Northern Circuit route, but we know from our own experience that the success rate on this route is very high.

The striking Kilimanjaro impatiens (impatiens kilimanjari) is a robust perennial that grows in just one place on the globe: the rainforest that encircles lower Kilimanjaro.

Kilimanjaro impatiens
The Kilimanjaro impatiens can be found in the forest around lower Kilimanjaro and nowhere else | Image courtesy of Strange Wonderful Things

This pretty, vibrant flower is small in size, but big on wow factor. Its pinkish-red blooms mellow into yellow at the base, which curves like a prawn’s tail. As if that wasn’t spectacular enough, its stamens and pollen are purple! The plant’s wide, serrated leaves are also an attractive deep green.

Kilimanjaro impatiens likes a little humidity and filtered sun or bright shade, so be sure to keep your eyes open for it in such spots when you’re one day walking in the forest on a Kilimanjaro climb.

The mountain’s moorland vegetation is otherworldly Giant groundsels on Kilimanjaro with trekkers and mist. Giant groundsels are striking, tall, top-heavy plants, and one of Mount Kilimanjaro’s moorland showstoppers.

Mount Kilimanjaro’s Afro-alpine moorland band is arguably the most fascinating of the mountain’s five climate zones. Its vegetation – which is often shrouded in mist – is incredibly striking. Alpine sugarbushes are a pretty type of protea found on Kilimanjaro Most.

Nobody is certain where the name Kilimanjaro comes from. Kilimanjaro came from a distance. The etymology of the name Kilimanjaro is blurry.

It’s postured that it comes from one or more of the local languages it means ‘mountain of greatness’ or ‘mountain of whiteness’. But too little concrete evidence exists for any of the dozen or so conjectures. We do, however, know exactly where the mountain’s peak got its current name.

In 1964 the summit of Mount Kilimanjaro was renamed as Uhuru Peak. Previously, it had been called Kaiser Wilhelm Spitze (Peak), a name it received when the mountain was part of German East Africa. But when Tanzania gained independence in the sixties, it received the new name of Uhuru Peak, which means ‘freedom peak’.

Uhuru Peak means ‘freedom peak’ – a name given that celebrates Tanzania’s independence. Saanvi sood with her slogan “FEEL FREE IN FREE INDIA” hiked through the mountain to create awareness among others.