More than 264lbs of rubbish was removed from Britain’s highest mountain by volunteers at the weekend.
It was more like Bin Nevis than Ben Nevis after the mountain attracted another 100,000 plus walkers this year – and not all of them rubbish-conscious, apparently.
Ben Nevis – and for the first time other Scottish peaks – were cleaned-up by an army of volunteers on Saturday as they removed the plethora of waste left behind by the country’s highest litter louts.
The spruce up of 4411-feet high Ben Nevis was part of a combined effort to tidy Scotland’s, Wales’s and England’s three highest peaks.
The Real 3 Peaks Challenge took place on Ben Nevis, Snowdon in Wales and Scafell Pike in England.
The event has in the past removed 1.8 tonnes of litter from the popular mountains. This year, alongside the ‘Big 3’ peaks, seven additional areas got deep cleaned too.
Last year a toilet was found on Ben Nevis – and this time litter even included a peanut packet with Best Before Jan 1987 date.
“Finally reaching the car park, we had a chance to see and weigh what we had removed… 21 bags weighing in at 120KGs (264.5lbs),” said the organisers’ report.
“Most of the rubbish we had was small, but very dense. Tissues galore, banana peel, orange peel, bottle tops, tampons and panty liners, sweet wrappers, foil, crisp and sandwich wrappers, plaque, some flags, bits of walking poles (including one whole one ) more tissues, pasta pots, and some very old tin can drinks, mostly just the tops as the bodies had rusted to nothing.
“The most ridiculous find was the chewing gum… one whole bag full this time.
“No toilet this year, but did find (what we think) is a very old small horseshoe, possibly belonging to one of the ponies that worked the path for the observatory.”
This year the clean up also happened on Lochnagar, Cairngorm, Ben Macdui, Ben Lomond, Goat Fell on Arran and two areas of The Peak District.
“When I started the Real3Peaks Challenge in 2013, I was working as a full-time outdoors instructor. Whilst my clients were eating lunch, I decided to pick up some rubbish off the summit of Ben Nevis, as it was looking rather sad. I filled two carrier bags in as many minutes.” said Rich Pyne, founder of the Real 3 Peaks Challenge.
