Tokyo, Aug 10: A Japanese expedition equipped with sensor-activated cameras and led by an amateur cryptozoologist is heading to the Himalayas hoping to track down the abominable snowman. Seven climbers will spend six weeks in Nepal trying to capture images of the legendary humanlike creature also known as the Yeti, several thousand meters up the world`s seventh-tallest mountain, the expedition`s leader, Yoshiteru Takahashi, said today.
Takahashi, a 60-year-old construction company employee who climbs as a hobby, is on his second Yeti hunt. He says he found humanlike footprints made by a "rather large animal" in a cave about 4,600 meters up Dhaulagiri on a previous expedition in 1994.
"I want to find out what made those footprints," Takahashi said. "They definitely didn`t belong to a bear." The expedition plans to "ambush" the elusive creature, which Takahashi believes is some kind of primate, by setting up about 15 cameras that are automatically activated by infrared sensors.
Takahashi described his expedition, which has no backing from Japan`s academic community, as "just bunch of climbers" who had all seen unfamiliar footprints on past ascents of the Dhaulagiri range.
"I don`t consider this a mystery," he said. "The Yeti exists - I just want to figure out what kind of animal it is." Bureau Report