#128: Haruhisa Watanabe

渡辺大剛

Kosciuszko · Completed 2004-06-12

Japan · Male

Born 25 Aug 1981 · Died 26 Dec 2012

Early life

Haruhisa Watanabe was born on August 25, 1981, in Mori, Shizuoka Prefecture. He attended Iwata Higashi High School. In his second year there, he cycled alone across Japan one winter, from Shizuoka through Shikoku to Okayama.

He studied photography at the Faculty of Arts of Kyushu Sangyo University in Fukuoka. There he joined the mountaineering club and began climbing seriously.

The 7 summits

Watanabe reached the summit of Kilimanjaro in September 2002. That climb set him on course to attempt the 7 summits.

He climbed Aconcagua in February 2003. He reached Elbrus and Mont Blanc in June 2003, and Kosciuszko the following month. A 2003 attempt on Everest was abandoned before the summit, after dehydration and high winds.

In January 2004 he climbed Vinson Massif in Antarctica. He returned to Everest in May 2004 and reached the summit on his second attempt.

He completed the round on June 12, 2004, on the summit of Denali, then still called Mount McKinley, in Alaska. He was 22 years and 292 days old. His round was reported at the time as the second-youngest completion of the 7 summits by a Japanese climber; see our leaderboards for current standings.

At a press conference afterward, he said he wanted to leave mountaineering behind and next look at the Earth from outside the atmosphere.

Later travels

After graduating, Watanabe worked as a researcher at Kyushu Sangyo University and continued long-distance travel. He was booked through lecture agencies to speak publicly about his expeditions.

He also took up long-distance cycling, including winter rides through remote regions of Russia.

Death

On December 26, 2012, Watanabe was cycling through the Kola Peninsula in Russia's Murmansk Oblast, during a winter tour of the region. He was struck by a car and killed near Kandalaksha, about 300 kilometres from Murmansk. He was 31.

The driver was a 56-year-old man who was not intoxicated; Russian investigators opened a criminal case for negligent homicide. The Japanese embassy in Moscow confirmed his identity through his passport and a Kyushu Sangyo University student card found among his belongings.

In September 2013 a memorial to Watanabe was erected south of Kandalaksha. It takes the shape of Mount Fuji, a mountain he had often climbed, alongside a stone inscribed in Japanese and Russian.