Mount Meru at 4,566m is regarded as a dormant volcano, since lava flowed from it as recently as 100 years ago.

Though low-key by comparison to nearby Kilimanjaro, Mount Meru is regarded by many perhaps the most rewarding mountain to climb in East Africa.

Meru is just as interesting as Kilimanjaro from the biological point of view and, because comparatively few people climb it, you are more likely to see forest animals.

MountMeru is the product of the same volcanic activity that formed the Great Rift Valley 15 to 20 million years ago, and it attained a height similar to that of Kilimanjaro until a massive eruption tore out its eastern wall 250,000 years ago.

The Arusha and Meru people deify MountMeru as a rain god.

It is unlikely that any local person actually climbed to the 4566m peak prior to Fritz Jaeger´s pioneering ascent in 1904.