Canadian Captures Epic Icy Photos On Africa’s Third Highest Peak

Paul Zizka is one of Canada’s most well-known mountain photographers, and he was recently in Africa taking photos of a remote and cold mountain.

Tucked into the Rwenzori Mountains along the border between Uganda and the Democratic Republic of Congo, at an elevation of 5,109 metres, Mount Ngaliema (Mount Stanley) is the third highest peak in Africa after Kilimanjaro and Mount Kenya. The first recorded ascent was in 1906 by Luigi Amedeo, J. Petigax, C. Ollier, and J. Brocherel.

Banff-based Zikza just visited Ngaliema to capture images of ice for a much bigger project that he’s working on. “It was certainly an adventure, between the remoteness, the Covid commute and the iffy weather,” said. “Worth it all the same, just to be documenting that vanishing ice, spending time with the local mountain folks, and truly getting away from it all.”

According to The Last Tropical Glaciers, “East Africa is home to three glacierized mountain massifs: Kilimanjaro, Mount Kenya and the Rwenzori mountains. Located slightly north of the equator, along the border between Uganda and the Democratic Republic of Congo, the Rwenzori, also called the Mountains of the Moon are the largest of the three massifs and hold some of the most mysterious and least studied glaciers of the continent.”

After Ngaliema’s huge equatorial glacier split in 2010, the director of Uganda’s National Environment Management Authority said the entire glacier is melting so rapidly that it will disappear entirely within 40 years. Researchers said the ice cap had shrunk in size from about six square kilometres in the 1950s to its current coverage just under a square kilometre.

Two other mountains in the Rwenzori Mountain, Mount Speke and Mount Speke have completely lost their glaciers in the past decade. In 2012 and 2020, Klaus Thymann led expeditions to the area and documented the glacial recession. Watch the below video for before and after photos.

After a five-day approach, Zizka and his team left at 1 a.m. to be at the summit for sunrise. “The poor visibility and icy conditions made the climb rather demanding,” said Zizka who’s based in Banff, “but we pushed on with hopes that the weather would eventually clear. It never did. We stood on the top for a few minutes, one foot in Uganda and the other in Congo, and then started back down the remnant glaciers and rock ribs towards camp and warmer temperatures.”

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2012 and 2020 Expeditions