Mount Kilimanjaro

The wind rustled the mosquito netting above my bed, and the sounds of the African night, a discordant symphony of high-pitched insect song mixed with the distant, plaintive bleating of goats, echoed around the room. "What have I gotten myself and my daughters into?" I scribbled in my journal as the inky African darkness enveloped my home for the evening, the 42-room Mountain Village Lodge in the outskirts of Arusha, Tanzania.

Mt. Kilimanjaro is located on the equator. When Europeans first saw the mountain in 1848, they reported snow at the top. They were not believed. How could there be snow in such a hot place as the equator? Geographers said the white stuff must be salt deposited by the dormant volcano. They didn't know that the higher the altitude, the colder the air, even at the equator! As Julie, Carl, and Uncle Bill walked around Moshi in the morning, the air was crisp.

Just before Christmas, Jennifer Lambelet Mencken had hoisted a holiday flag in front of her Spanish-style house in Long Beach. The small red banner with white letters read, "JOY." Friends on Wednesday, remembering the Los Angeles librarian, said that message expressed a lot about Mencken's love for life and her devotion to mountain climbing. Before she departed on what would be her last hiking adventure, to Mt.