I believe the whole thing is a national park, so there is no way but to have a guide. Our trip was 8 days long and although we travel alone a lot, I wouldn’t want to do this without an experienced guide.

We booked through Africa Travel Resource ( http://www.africatravelresource.com/T1/africa/tanzania/ne/kili/0/intro/ ) and they were great. They hooked us up with hotels and safaris as well which was great.

Go and do the climb. It was amazing!

Check out my site for a report on my Tanzania and Kili adventure. I highly recommend the tour guide I had (I booked through Gecko’s but suggest you go direct): http://www.haslimeier.org/kili and the recommended guide Justo: http://www.justostanzaniaadventures.com/

Good luck with your planning!
Felix

I found my Kili experience to one of the greatest things I have ever done. Everything about the trip was terrific; the people of Tanzania were fantastic, enthusiastic, and friendly. I was in a group organized by Thomson tours from Boston, MA. They were expensive but they took care of everything. The mountain is all you can imagine it to be and then some. As mentioned earlier you cannot climb Kili alone, you must be guided. Do your homework, prepare physically and mentally, learn and absorb as much as you can before going to Africa and then enjoy it. I read every book I could find in my library system and then searched the internet for more. Studied the Swahili language and immersed myself as much as possible. Do it, go…I cannot wait to go back.