On day 2 of our climb, the summit of Kilimanjaro still looked to be a long way off.
But we had already climbed high enough to be above the clouds. It is a neat sensation to be looking down on the clouds.
When we got our first glimpse of the huts at Horombo, the clouds were starting to move up the mountain and it was getting quite cold.
But then the clouds lifted and we got a great view of the summit of Kili. Now it didn't look quite so far off.
On the other side of the huts we got a great view of Mount Mawenzi.
Again, Kelly was happy to relax in the hut, snuggled up with a good book.
When we booked our climb up Kili we decided on a 6-day climb instead of the usual 5-day climb. We thought this would help all of us acclimatize to the altitude better. So on our second day at Horomobo Huts we went on a hike up the mountain to see Zebra Rock. It was a tough climb at 12,000 feet of altitude.
On our way back to Horomobo Huts, we got a glimpse of the trail to Kibo Huts that we would be taking the next day. At this point in time, we were still feeling good and ready to tackle the summit.
Back at the
However, as evening progressed, the weather deteriorated and it started to rain. Later in the night, the rain changed to snow.
By morning, the snow at Horombo Huts had melted, but the summit of Kili sure was a lot whiter than it had been the day before.
As usual, our guides delivered tea to our hut fairly early in the morning.
We gathered our things and got ready to leave Horombo Huts. Both kids had suffered quite severely from altitude sickness and over breakfast we decided to head back down the mountain as opposed to gaining further altitude. It wasn't a difficult decision to make as we realized that health is far more important than getting a photo at the summit. We were just glad that we were able to make the decision ourselves instead of being told we had to descend when we really didn't want to. 
So everyone was feeling pretty good as we started back down the mountain. We had made it to over 12,000 feet and that is quite an accomplishment.
Dean and Emanuelle were all smiles on the way down. Emanuelle has been on the mountain since 1947 and has summitted over 300 times. He has led many diplomats up the mountain including Bill Clinton.
Kelly was all smiles when she got to the final trail marker showing the way to the park gates.
Back at the hotel, we shared a beer with our climbing crew. In this photo are Emanuelle on the right, then his son David, and then another son, Gipson. These were our guides on the mountain.
Dean and Campbell enjoyed some croquet on the lawn of the hotel.
I pulled out the maps on the lawn in front of our rooms and tried to figure out where we were going from there. As usual, Kelly was relaxing somewhere with a book.Our Kilimanjaro experience was fabulous. Although it was a tough climb at times and the altitude provided some of its own challenges, we were happy we had gone as far as we did.
