Rwenzori, the Ptolemy missed mountain

I share a room with a stranger who, like me, is in Kampala to commemorate the centennial of the conquest of the Rwenzori summit by the Duke of Abruzzi, the Valle d'Aosta guide Petigax, and specifically for me, the photographer Vittorio Sella, a constant source of inspiration, way back in 1906. The stranger is calm and composed, while I am constantly in a frenzy. But he has a light in his eyes that I don't have and could never have. The stranger's name is Giuseppe Petigax, a mountain guide from Courmayeur, a small town of the Italian Alps. The Rwenzori is the last peak on his personal bucket list. By the time it's over, he will have climbed all the peaks his grandfather, Joseph Petigax, the Duke's favorite guide, had climbed a century earlier.

Giuseppe has this in his head and in his heart: reaching the summit, no ifs, ands, or buts. He knows full well that it won't be like an Alpine climb. In fact, the African unknown spurs him to hold firm. Here it's raining and there's mud everywhere. We'll walk most of the way up in rubber boots. Technical shoes are only for the final push to the summit, when we'll cross what remains of the glacier and scramble up the final rocks. I look at the Rwenzori as a photographer, inspired by Vittorio Sella, and I await the climb inspired by Giuseppe, who wants to reach the summit on the same day, a hundred years later, that his grandfather did. And so it was.