Huw Kingston, whilst claiming to be Welsh, was actually born in England, something for which he has never forgiven his Welsh parents! He moved to Australia in 1991 and at least now lives in Wales: southern New South 'Wales' with his wife Wendy. Huw has had a long interest and involvement in environmental issues as well as a passion for the great outdoors. He has spent over 30 years enjoying travelling by human powered means in wild places across the world. This included a longstanding love affair with the Indian Himalaya and journeys across it by ski and foot. In Australia, Huw completed the City2City project; 25,000km of walking, skiing, mountain biking, river and ocean kayaking linking each of Australia's State Capitals in a series of 7 journeys. Each journey followed the most interesting and challenging human powered route through mountains and deserts, along rivers and coasts. More details on City2City can be found HERE.
Huw has trekked, ridden and skied in many countries across the world including Mongolia, India, Timor, Pakistan, Uganda, Botswana and many more.
Huw has run Wild Horizons for the past 21 years ago. Wild Horizons is a multi facetted business with its common link being the outdoors. Wild Horizons run some of Australia's best known and most popular mountain biking events, organize cycling and ski tours and consult in various areas of the outdoor adventure world. Visit the Wild Horizons website here www.wildhorizons.com.au.
Huw is a regular contributor to a range of magazines in Australia and elsewhere on outdoor topics. He has also been a copywriter for a large number of catalogues and brochures primarily in the outdoor adventure world and is a member of the Australian Society of Travel Writers.
In the environmental arena Huw's strong belief in real action as a driver of change led him to bring about a number of successful initiatives. In 1991 he conceived and launched 'Don't Bag The Environment' at Paddy Pallin outdoor stores. This initiative, still going 20 years later, saw 10 cents put towards a selection of environment campaigns each time a customer refused a bag for their purchases. He made The Highland Fling (an annual mountain bike marathon event attracting some 2000 riders) into Australia's first Carbon Neutral cycling event and first bottled water free event.
In 2009 he was the initiator of Bundy on Tap, making his small home town of Bundanoon, Australia's (indeed the world's) First Bottled Water Free Town. This created huge worldwide interest with the media across the world picking up the story. Bundy on Tap in turn has led many individuals and communities to question the madness of bottled water and to look at turning back to the tap. For details on Bundy on Tap see www.bundyontap.com.au.
Huw has received a number of awards including being named one of Time Magazine's 25 Worldwide Responsibility Pioneers and the 2009 news.com.au Green Hero. In 2010 Huw was awarded the Sharing Citizen prize, judged by a grouping of European Cultural Organizations promoted by the Council of Europe and in 2011 he was awarded the Peter Rawlinson Award from the Australian Conservation Foundation (ACF) which recognizes outstanding contribution to the environment.
No comments:
Post a Comment