“After a life spent in the vertical rock faces of the Dolomites and on the world’s highest peaks, and while still a wanderer in deserts of ice and sand, I have set myself the task of passing on my legacy. It is my wish to tell what I have experienced at the furthest points of the globe and to speak of the people who have shared fear with me, occasionally despair and ultimately the euphoria of rebirth. From a hostile world, we brought nothing back but our experiences. And at the end of every journey to the limits, when we were back again among human beings, all we had left was our lives – lives that had been saved and now called out to be filled again, with challenges, goals and tasks. One of those tasks for me is my mountain museum, MMM for short, where I tell what happens to us deep inside when we abandon ourselves to the mountains – to their sublime character and sheer size, to their dangers and mysteries. My mountain museum will ultimately occupy five locations. It will be like a big mosaic, opening our eyes to the values that have been inherent in the mountains of the Earth since the very beginning: timelessness in the face of erosion, dangers feared by all, and the deceleration we all so urgently need.”
Reinhold Messner