South Pare Mountains: Chome

Climbing up the mountain.

We are massive fans of hiking the Eastern Arc Mountains (North Pares, West Usamabaras, East Usambaras, Uduzungwa) and the last remaining patch to explore in our area was the South Pares. We met a friend in Moshi and turns out him and his wife are living up in the mountains, about 2 hours from the main road in a small picturesque village called Chome. On our way to the coast, we decided to branch off and see them as they had said a hike to the highest peak in the South Pares could easily be done from their house.

View of Chome's flat area.

The drive up the mountain was beautiful offering a view of the plains to the west, and cloud covered mountains to the east. Chome sits in a plateu of sorts in between two different ridges of mountains, and a particularly picturesque scene occurs when the flat area is filled with green maize and potato leaves.

Our friend told us to prepare for rain, but we were lucky that it neither rained, nor was extremely cloudy and cold on the mountain. He had a troop of local kids that joined us on the hike, which we started at around 9:30. The hike initially scaled a ridge, and then through a flatter area where there were eucalyptus trees recently burned out by a fire. We were informed that this large fire was likely caused by honey farmers whom have the unfortunate habit of sometimes lighting an entire tree on fire just to extract the honey.

It was interesting to hear the narration from our friend as he'd been living up there for the past year and a half. Illegal bauxite and gold mining, failed irrigation projects, rumors of feral and dangerous cows...it was great to have some background on the area and he had obviously done this hike many times and knew the surrounding landscape.

After the burnt eucalyptus there was a stretch of shrubs and short vegetation, likely deforested areas growing back in a strange way. The edge of the forest was abrupt and upon entrance we were suddenly surrounded by dense forest, complete with some blue monkeys in the trees. An old irrigation system from around the 70s was built in and we followed it to a stream to refill on water. We then began the real ascent and the trail became dramatically steeper. We pushed on until about 1:00 when we reached the summit. Because there is another ridge to the west, the peak didn't offer the same spectacular views as other parts of the Eastern Arc, but it was a treat to watch the clouds roll through.

We enjoyed a lunch at the dilapidated "picnic area" which was no more than a few rotting boards nailed together to create makeshift benches. There was a strange large structure at the peak that looked to be four stories high, but there were no stairs or ladders built in. A wooden sign with fading paint read "UNDP tourism development", which obviously hadn't spurred tourism as they had wanted (our friend said he's never seen anyone else on the trail).

The hike down was a lot quicker than the hike up and we were all thankful the rain held off. We decided we had to return another time to do a bird census and maybe explore some more of the forest. Because it takes so long and it is so steep, perhaps we have to do a camping expedition?

Shengena Peak. You can see where the deforestation abruptly stops and gives way to new forest.

Walking through a cloud.

On the trail, very green!

The peak!  2,462 m (8,077 ft)

A view of the peak with red earth.

On our way down.

Short vegetation dominated a part of the walk.

Everyone loves climbing under a fallen tree covered in moss and lichen.

The ridgeline had short and windswept trees.

Moss and lichen covered the very wet upper trees.

We stopped to refill some water up here.

An interesting fresh water crab. A lot of endemic species of plants and animals, wouldn't be surprised if this guy was ONLY in this water.