I will not further comment on KPAP as I have written an article HERE
In this article I want to go into detail about the Kilimanjaro guides and porters. The information shared here is collected from my chats with several guides and porters from Kilimanjaro and Mt Meru.
DIFFERENT ROLES
Porter – Porter is a person, who is carrying heavy load. They also set up the campsite and fetch water if any is available nearby. They might be asked to help to do any additional to tasks to make sure the customer has best possible experience. The maximum permitted limit they are allowed to carry is 15kg (33lbs) and this is strictly regulated at the start. The requirements for this position are minimal, English is not required.
Cook – Cook is a porter that in addition to the porter responsibilities described above also needs to cook for the customers. The only requirement is ability to cook, they are also not required to speak English in most cases. They are responsible for planning the menu and purchasing all the ingredients. In larger group trips, there might be few cooks, with one being the lead cook.
Waiter – Waiter is a porter that in addition to the porter responsibilities described above also needs to serve the customer. They are responsible to set up the table, carrying dishes to the table and clearing out after. They sometimes help with the cooking. There are no specific requirement, and some do not speak English or very minimally. In larger group trips, there might be few waiters.
Guide – Guide is a person looking after the customers. Guide is also carrying some load although not as heavy as the porters as at times they might need to carry daypack of struggling customers. They must have completed official guide training and speak English well. If the group is larger, further guides might be required. There will be always guide lead and then supporting guides. The ratio can vary but I recall that usually there was a guide for every 3 customers, this might seem excessive but it is to support the customers in case they are struggling, or that group can be split if necessary. gui
GUIDES
In majority of the cases, guides are freelancers. They might be working with specific companies bit more closely and be their go-to guides, but they can accept offer from any company. The company only chooses the main guide and the main guide chooses rest of the crew. The guides do not have fixed crew because the number of porters will depend on the number of customers in given group. Also they might need to approach other guides to be supporting guides.
I find this whole system interesting because the guides are competition to each other but at the same time they need to build relationship and stay on good terms with each other for the times when several guides are required for a trip.
To become a guide, the porters first need to learn English, in case they do not. The lessons are not exactly cheap. Once they learn English they need to pay for the school to become guide. The school takes few weeks and it is intense. They learn various key skills such as mountain rescue, first aid, customer service etc. The school is also very expensive. Therefore the main requirement to become guide is to have money. Of course you need to learn well to pass all the exams, but if you are good porter, there is no “promotion” after certain time, is has nothing to do with your performance as porter, it is all about money. So if the porter has large family they need to support, they might never become a guide as they will not be able to save up.
PORTERS
The porters are dependent on the guide. It is the guide who decides which porters will join each trip. The porters can of course decide who they want to work with and might work with few different guides but usually the guides tend to choose the same porters, who they can trust.
HOW BIG WILL BE MY TEAM
The number of Kilimanjaro guides and porters required is actually quite large. This is because there is no infrastructure on the mountain and everything needs to be carried.
As a solo trekker, I had team of 7 = 1 guide,1 porter/cook,1 porter/waiter, 4 porters
This ratio is not fixed, it all depends on the weight being carried because porters are allowed to carry maximum 15kg. For example if I had booked personal toilet, that would require 1 additional porter.
In case of group of 2 people or more, the ratio might be anywhere between 5-8 crew per person.
I met a couple who had a crew of 16 people.
You might not be certain of the size of your team until the registration point. When you arrive to the Kilimanjaro start, there is a point where the crew has to register and weight in everything. Re-packing might be required to even out the weight equally to meet the max 15kg limit. In case the group has more weight than the assigned number of porters, new porter might be assigned by the authorities to help with the weight. There are few unassigned porters hanging around this area for this specific reason.
One other interesting fact specific to Mt Meru is that there is fixed ratio of porters that must be from local tribe. There are tribes in Tanzania, and for my Mt Meru trek one porter must have been from specific local tribe and was not chosen by the guide.
CAN I TRUST THE GUIDES AND PORTERS
Yes, you can trust your guide and porters. Of course you need to take caution, however it is not in interest of the guide that something happens to you. For example if something gets stolen, they will likely not get any tips and they will likely not be hired again. So they will do what they can to protect you, also from others.
I would assume problem might occur in case the porter has not been chosen by the guide but assigned by authorities, see previous part for the 2 cases when this can happen. These porters might not care about the trustworthiness of the group, however if something happened, they would be likely first to blame, so I’m not certain if this is real concern.
Other occasion where you should be cautious, is at the last camp of the trek (whichever camp that might be, depending on your route). Some companies might send another porter from the end to the last camp bring any required supplies. So there is a lot of people coming in which were not part of the trek. My guide has told me that during covid some porters or even non-porters became desperate and there were few occasions where items were stolen from the customers at the last camps. So he advised me to sleep with all my valuables tacked in at the bottom of my sleeping bag.
One other point I read somewhere about it is that some crew might try to cheat with the number of porters. They might give you impression that for example you have 20 porters with you but on the mountain are only 18 and the other 2 will pop up only at the beginning and at the end for the tipping ceremony. I’m not sure if this is actually happening, but wanted to bring awareness to this. I had only 7 crew and I get to know them all.
TIPPING ETIQUETTE
Of course, all companies will tell you tipping is not requirement but recommended. The tipping might be tricky part because as spoken in my article HERE, some companies might keep all the tips.
If the company does not keep tips, tipping is very much expected by the crew. When I was choosing company to go with, I have seen in some reviews that at times crew were asking bluntly for tips and requested specific amounts. Luckily I had only good experience and my crew were were polite, they hinted the topic of tips, also since I was asking so many questions around it.
I understand that the trip is very costly and since we pay the company a lot of money, we expect that the crew is paid well. But I would urge you to save up good money for the tips. The tips will make massive difference in the life of the people who were taking care of you and made sure you get to achieve your dream.
Many times I have heard of people leaving very poor tips and how that impacts the crew and also their morale to deliver best service. They might try very hard to make you happy and if you or several people do not leave any tips or only minimal, it is not helping with their motivation to deliver good service all the time. It might be the difference for their family to be able to eat in the off-season.
The recommended tips are:
Guide – 20 USD/day
Cook – 15 USD/day
Waiter – 12 USD/day
Porter – 10 USD/day
If you are in the group, you can split the cost of tips, but if you can afford it, try to give more.
What happened to my friend was that she joined open group and she knew there are 3 other people in the group, so she budgeted for lower tips. However the other people cancelled last moment which she only found out when she arrived to the start. She did her best to give as much tips as she could, but the crew got less than half of the tips that they expected/deserved.
HOW CAN I SUPPORT THE CREW
In addition to tips, there are other ways how you can support the crew.
Leave sparkling review where you can specifically naming the guide. Say praise about the crew to the company, even if they do not ask, although they should. This will assure they will get hired more often. Also go on tripadvisor or other trip review platforms and leave good comments not only about the company but also the guide and suggest that people specifically ask for that guide.
Other non-monetary way to help is donate gear. One regret I have is that I have not organised collection with my friends and family before I went asking specifically for hiking gear for men.
You can donate to the company you are going with or KPAP but I suggest to give directly to the crew. And also I suggest to donate to the whole crew, not only guide. Depending on the guide, they might not even share if you give directly to them. You will see the clothes and gear of the porters often in very sorry state. When I have spoken to the crew about it, and in case of clothes they are partially doing this on purpose as they do not want to damage the good stuff so they purposely wear their worst clothes even if they have better one available.
I think these might be great items to donate:
Backpack with a lot of volume (no daypacks), like 60l or more. I believe this item is most needed because the amount of porters I have seen with pack that has holes and stitched up/patched up 100x was crazy
Trail runners or trekking boots, even regular sneakers, also highly needed since it wears out quiet quickly especially with all the heavy load they carry
Rain gear, including ponchos and umbrellas
Hats
Gloves
Warm socks
Buff
Down jacket
Head torch, small lightweight lamps
Power bank (they might resell, but this was hot item on the mountain)
I gave some other small items to the guide (medicine, hand warmers, wet wipes…) with intension to give it to crew but the guide mentioned he will keep for next customers, which I told him I’m not happy about as I wanted it to go to crew. I’m not sure where these items ended up.
Be aware that some items you donate, which might be considered as luxury items for the crew (trekking poles, sleeping bag liner, new clothes), might go to the next customers or the crew might sell them.
You can also bring some practical kids stuff as the crew usually have many kids and they might appreciate some treasures for them. Things such as clothes, backpacks, sunglasses, hats, rain gear, books….
Also I purposely brought more cookies or other candy and gave some to the crew each day. They were extremely happy about this. It is of course more weight, so be cautious about this. I had fairly light pack, so could afford to bring couple packs.
INTERACTING WITH YOUR CREW
Part of the reason why I went in private tour rather than open group is to get to know the locals. I actually loved doing both treks on my own as I get to know many people both local and Western. I spend a lot of time chatting to the guides and porters to learn about them, the culture, their job and lives in general. Even if you go with a friend or open group, I would suggest you make an effort to interact with locals.
Also few Swahili words will go long way. I learned few phrases, also silly ones, and it caused many smiles and laughs of the crew. Also crew from other companies got to know me thanks to this and interacted with me whenever they saw me and it was very fun and lovely experience.
