The General Assembly of the United Nations declared in 2002 December 11 as International Mountain Day. It has been held since 2003 and encourages “organizing events to highlight the importance of sustainable development of these fragile ecosystems to be protected with two objectives: reducing the carbon footprint and caring for them as natural treasures.” It is the objective of mountaineers and hikers from Tenerife, who advance the celebration to tomorrow the 10th with an act at the Víctor de Santa Cruz cinema (6:00 p.m. to 9:00 p.m.). Pedro Millán, a hiker and participant, highlights: “Two great references are coming, such as Sebastián Álvaro and Eduardo Martínez de Pisón.”
Millán emphasizes: «Mountaineering is not commemorated so much as the populations of these areas with a great ecological value. The idea is to help them improve resources or accessibility ”. This year’s motto connects directly with the reality of Tenerife: Sustainable tourism in the mountains. Millán values; “Ours is rather unsustainable due to overcrowding and we have to manage it better.” This mountain connoisseur adds: «We will have Sebastián Álvaro, journalist and creator of the program On the edge of the impossible, again on an island that he loves like few other places in the world, despite the fact that in 35 years he has been practically in all the moutains”. And he sentence: “We are before the number one of the mountaineers who, in addition, has filmed it and has told everything.”
Álvaro will sign copies of his latest book Everest 1924. The Irvine and Mallory Enigma. It tells of the odyssey of these English pioneers who are believed to have reached the highest peak in the world, but they disappeared ». Pedro Millán also highlights the presence of Eduardo Martínez de Pisón, a teacher of geographers at the University of La Laguna and an “octogenarian humanist.” He does not forget “ours” such as Javier Martín Carbajal or Antonio Ramos Villar (La Orotava, 1956), a “unique and unrepeatable” mountaineer, who receives a tribute. The island mountaineers claim sustainable tourism in the island geography on their International Day. And always.