Wow, I just heard about this guy, Ken Noguchi - he was the youngest person to climb the tallest mountains on all seven continents. But he's not just a mountain climber in it for the ego trip - he also wanted to enjoy the beauty and majesty of the scenery. Unfortunately, he would often find tonnes of garbage littering the slopes. He was so disappointed, he decided to do something about it - for Mt. Everest, after several expeditions, he and his team were able to remove EIGHT TONNES of garbage. 8 Tonnes!!! Shocking! But, it's really having an impact, and now he wants to do the same for his beloved Mt. Fuji, from his native Japan. He joined with a local environment club, and they have spent many, many hours cleaning up the rubbish from the mountainside. I mean, people had dumped tv sets there! Having participated in clean ups myself locally, it is often amazing at what some people will throw away in the woods, turning them from a nice bit of wilderness beauty to basically a trash dump. Pretty awful to look at.So, hats off to Ken Noguchi, saving and protecting the beauty of one of the most famous peaks in the world! Read a little more about him here. His blog is here, but it's in Japanese (bien sûr!). Click here to get a rough translation of it.
The Family