Many people dream of standing at the summit of Longs Peak, but 69-year-old Estes Park resident Ingrid Drouin set her sights 5,000 feet higher, aiming to climb Mount Kilimanjaro in Tanzania, instead, at 19,341 feet high.
This petite Estes resident started the nine-day hike to The Roof of Africa, the highest peak on the continent, just eight months after her second knee replacement surgery last November. And she followed up the climbing adventure immediately with a seven-day African safari in the Serengeti National Park.
Twenty years ago, a friend told the adventurous story of climbing Kilimanjaro, and Drouin made that a personal goal. Following her father’s advice to her many years ago to “set goals,” “believe in yourself,” and “persevere,” Drouin chased the Kilimanjaro dream after her retirement.
In August 2025, she began the ascent with her son, Marc, and his girlfriend, Sierra Latshaw.
Drouin had never climbed Longs Peak, camped out, or slept in a tent, but she was ready to hike 43.5 miles for nine straight days with no shower, using portable toilets, and sleeping alone in a tent every night.
Besides Drouin and her companions, there were two other climbers paying for this adventure with the same goal: a 78-year-old man from Miami and a 67-year-old man from Wales. Only four of the five achieved their goal.
Challenged by the altitude, sub-freezing temperatures, high winds, and narrow channels through ice fields that are almost two feet deep, the climbers trekked up the Lemosho Route, considered the most beautiful course. This route sometimes dips in elevation, which helps climbers acclimate to the altitude.
The professional outfitting company, Ultimate Kilimanjaro, provided three guides and 19 porters for the group of five.
Around day four of the climb at 13,500 feet, the 78-year-old climber started suffering from balance issues and had to be escorted off the mountain with a guide and three porters.
When the remaining four climbers reached an altitude of 15,500 feet, they camped there for a night, getting ready for their final ascent of over 4,000 feet in a three-mile hike that would take eight hours to reach the top of Mount Kilimanjaro.
They started that final ascent before dawn and saw a beautiful sunrise. “Pole, pole!” the guide cautioned them in Swahili all the way up. It’s pronounced “po-lay” and means “slowly, slowly!”
At Stella Point, 18,600 feet up, the 67-year-old man from Wales started suffering and could not continue. One of the two remaining guides stayed with him to rest, hoping he would summit later, while the third guide escorted the remaining group of three to the top.
At Stella Point, winds gusted to over 40 miles per hour, and as they began the last push to the very top, they had to navigate through two-foot-deep ruts in ice made by previous climbers. Because the ruts were only 10 inches wide, the climbers could not plant their hiking poles in the ground beside them as they walked, so they extended their arms overhead to ground the poles in the ice banks as they moved gingerly on the thin, slippery ice path for at least a quarter of a mile.
Eight hours after they started the summit climb, Ingrid, Marc, and Sierra achieved their dream at 19,341 feet. Marc carried his mother around on his shoulders, celebrating the victory.
After about 40 minutes on the summit, the man from Wales made it to the top with his guide, but Drouin and her group had to start down. On their way, they heard radio calls from the summit requesting another porter to come up and assist the Welshman on the descent, followed by a call for more porters to come up and carry him down.
The 4,000-foot descent back to base camp at 15,500 feet was especially challenging due to blowing “African snow,” which is actually volcanic ash, white like snow, and very slippery.
The man from Wales recovered his faculties by the 10,000-foot mark and joined Drouin’s group for the rest of the descent.
The professional guide company Ultimate Kilimanjaro is advertised as “The #1 Guide Company for Climbing Kilimanjaro,” and Drouin says, “I couldn’t imagine any better support than what we got.”
The group had three hot meals a day in addition to a happy hour each afternoon. The porters set up and deconstructed their camp sites each day and transported everything up and down the mountain. The climbers carried their own 15-pound backpacks, which contained water, additional clothing, snacks, and other essentials. The five climbers also had their vitals checked by the staff every morning and every evening.
How did Drouin prepare for this arduous trek? In March 2025, Drouin and her adult daughter, Katie Zimmerman from Lyons, completed the Manitou Incline in Colorado Springs, a 2,768-stair ascent gaining over 2,000 feet of elevation in less than one mile.
Two weeks before Kilimanjaro, they also climbed Mount Bierstadt in Pike National Forest, 14,060 feet high. That was the highest climb Drouin had ever done.
The seven-day African safari that followed the Kilimanjaro climb was also a wild adventure. Drouin, her son, and his girlfriend camped six nights in various locations around the Serengeti National Park. Several nights, they were in semipermanent tents, which had only two solid walls and two open ends, made of just mesh canvas. Campers had to have an escort whenever they left their tents at night as a precaution due to prowling animals.
The scariest moments included “a water buffalo in the front yard of my stationary tent in the middle of the Serengeti,” says Drouin.
The closest encounters were “the elephant right next to our jeep, and the lion that was maybe five feet away,” she says. “Fortunately, he was taking his afternoon nap.”
A highlight of the whole African adventure was Marc’s marriage proposal to Sierra, who accepted while Drouin filmed the moment from a distance.
While Drouin is active and in good health, she has given up tennis and running from her earlier years and now enjoys hiking, Pilates, and walking 18 holes of golf in the summer. Her next personal goal? Improving her golf game.
Drouin is the secretary of the Estes Park Health Foundation and chaired this year’s gala committee, which raised more than $360,000 for the remodeling of the hospital’s diagnostic imaging center. She is also involved in the Rooftop Rodeo’s Paint Estes Pink Crowns for the Care program and is first vice president of the Estes Park Women’s Club.
Although Drouin has an impressive resume, she said she is most proud of her three amazing children, two incredible sons-in-law, and five grandchildren.
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