Edmund Hillary Quotes & Sayings

I have discovered that even the mediocre can have adventures and even the fearful can achieve. — Edmund Hillary

On the summit of Everest, I had a feeling of great satisfaction to be first there. — Edmund Hillary

I think the whole attitude towards climbing Mount Everest has become rather horrifying. The people just want to get to the top. They don't give a damn for anybody else who may be in distress and it doesn't impress me at all that they leave someone lying under a rock to die. — Edmund Hillary

Challenge is what makes men. It will be the end when men stop looking for new challenges. — Edmund Hillary

The truth is, I'm just a rough old New Zealander who has enjoyed many challenges in his life. — Edmund Hillary

I think I mainly climb mountains because I get a great deal of enjoyment out of it. I never attempt to analyze these things too thoroughly, but I think that all mountaineers do get a great deal of satisfaction out of overcoming some challenge which they think is very difficult for them, or which perhaps may be a little dangerous. — Edmund Hillary

As a youngster I was a great dreamer, reading many books of adventure and walking lonely miles with my head in the clouds. — Edmund Hillary

I was extremely lucky that I had two great wives. It sounds a bit funny to say that, but it's absolutely true. — Edmund Hillary

Human life is far more important than just getting to the top of a mountain. — Edmund Hillary

It's not a real adventure when you have to pay for it. — Edmund Hillary

No one remembers who climbed Mount Everest the second time. — Edmund Hillary

I've always hated the danger part of climbing, and it's great to come down again because it's safe. — Edmund Hillary

When you're climbing at high altitudes, life can get pretty miserable. — Edmund Hillary

It is not the mountain we conquer, but ourselves. — Edmund Hillary

I think my first thought on reaching the summit- of course, I was very, very pleased to be there, naturally - but my first thought was one of a little bit of surprise. I was a little bit surprised that here I was, Ed Hillary, on top of Mt. Everest. After all, this is the ambition of most mountaineers. — Edmund Hillary

Despite all I have seen and experienced, I still get the same simple thrill out of glimpsing a tiny patch of snow in a high mountain gully and feel the same urge to climb towards it. — Edmund Hillary

Polypro wicks away the sweat. Cotton absorbs it. Ergo, cotton is for suckers — Edmund Hillary

The Sherpas play a very important role in most mountaineering expeditions, and in fact many of them lead along the ridges and up to the summit. — Edmund Hillary

If you cannot understand that there is something in man which responds to the challenge of this mountain and goes out to meet it, that the struggle is the struggle of life itself upward and forever upward, then you won't see why we go. — Edmund Hillary

Take advantage of the years of pioneering efforts. You might find this boring, as the young want to rush head on, as it were. — Edmund Hillary

If you only do what others have already done, you will only feel what others have already felt. However, if you choose to achieve something that no one has ever done, then you will have a satisfaction that no one else has ever had. — Edmund Hillary

There is something about building up a comradeship - that I still believe is the greatest of all feats - and sharing in the dangers with your company of peers. It's the intense effort, the giving of everything you've got. It's really a very pleasant sensation. — Edmund Hillary

Some day I'm going to climb Everest. — Edmund Hillary

Motivation is the single most important factor in any sort of success. — Edmund Hillary

If I'm selecting a group, the first thing I look for is a record of achievement ... If (candidates achieve) in small things, there's a very good chance they'll perform well in big things. — Edmund Hillary

I am inclined to think that the realm of mythology is where the Yeti rightly belongs. — Edmund Hillary

It's all bullshit on Everest these days. — Edmund Hillary

I think Himalayan climbers tend to mature fairly late. I think most of the successful Himalayan climbers have ranged from 28 to just over 40, really. — Edmund Hillary

When I was 50 years old, I actually decided to draw up a list of half a dozen things that I really hadn't done very well, and I was going to make efforts to improve. One of them was skiing, and I really did become a very much better skier. — Edmund Hillary

I am a lucky man. I have had a dream and it has come true, and that is not a thing that happens often to men. — Edmund Hillary

Once I've decided to do something, I do usually try to carry it through to fruition. — Edmund Hillary

When you go to the mountains, you see them and you admire them. In a sense, they give you a challenge, and you try to express that challenge by climbing them. — Edmund Hillary

I think the really good mountaineer is the man with the technical ability of the professional and with the enthusiasm and freshness of approach of the amateur. — Edmund Hillary

I don't know if I particularly want to be remembered for anything. I personally do not think I'm a great gift to the world. I've been very fortunate. — Edmund Hillary

While on top of Everest, I looked across the valley towards the great peak Makalu and mentally worked out a route about how it could be climbed. It showed me that even though I was standing on top of the world, it wasn't the end of everything. I was still looking beyond to other interesting challenges. — Edmund Hillary

With all respect, Sahib, you have little to teach us in strength and toughness. And we do not envy you your restless spirits. Perhaps we are happier than you? But we would like our children to go to school. Of all the things you have, learning is the one we most desire for our children. — Edmund Hillary

Tourism is a very big economic benefit to the Sherpa people, and also, they have very strong ties to their own social attitudes and their own religion, so fortunately, they're not too influenced by many of our Western attitudes. — Edmund Hillary

I enjoyed climbing with other people, good friends, but I did quite a lot of solo climbing, too. — Edmund Hillary

You climb for the hell of it. — Edmund Hillary

Even when you're 50, you can make the effort to improve your standards. — Edmund Hillary

I will come again & conquer you because as a mountain you can't grow, but as a human, I can — Edmund Hillary

I think that a good mountaineer is usually a sensible mountaineer. — Edmund Hillary

People do not decide to become extraordinary. They decide to accomplish extraordinary things. — Edmund Hillary

I really haven't liked the commercialization of mountaineering, particularly of Mt. Everest. By paying $65,000, you can be conducted to the summit by a couple of good guides. — Edmund Hillary

My mother was a schoolteacher and very keen that I go to a city school, so although it was fairly impoverished times, I traveled every day to the Auckland Grammar School. — Edmund Hillary

I have been seriously afraid at times but have used my fear as a stimulating factor rather than allowing it to paralyse me. My abilities have not been outstanding, but I have had sufficient strength and determination to meet my challenges and have usually managed to succeed with them. — Edmund Hillary

My relationship with the mountains actually started when I was 16. Every year, a group used to be taken from Auckland Grammar down to the Tangariro National Park for a skiing holiday. — Edmund Hillary

I believe that of all the things I have done, exciting though many of them have been, there's no doubt in my mind that the most worthwhile have been the establishing of schools and hospitals, and the rebuilding of monasteries in the mountains. — Edmund Hillary

Adventuring can be for the ordinary person with ordinary qualities, such as I regard myself. — Edmund Hillary

When I was climbing, I built up a close relationship with the Sherpa people. — Edmund Hillary

I can remember when I first went into the Himalayan area way back in 1951. Money, for instance, was not important at all to the local people. But now, finance has become just as important to them as it is to us, and this is a change maybe not for the better. — Edmund Hillary

The explorers of the past were great men and we should honour them. But let us not forget that their spirit lives on. It is still not hard to find a man who will adventure for the sake of a dream or one who will search, for the pleasure of searching, not for what he may find. — Edmund Hillary

Life's a bit like mountaineering - never look down. — Edmund Hillary

If the going is tough and the pressure is on, If the reserves of strength have been drained and the summit is still not in sight, then the quality to seek in the person is neither great strength nor quickness of hand, but rather a resolute mind firmly set on its purpose that refuses to let its body slack or rest. — Edmund Hillary

If I wished to do something, even if I couldn't find anyone who wanted to make the effort with me, I would go out solo climbing. I did find solo climbing very challenging and a little frightening. You knew that you were completely on your own, and you had to overcome all the problems and possible dangers. — Edmund Hillary

I was definitely very much a country boy. — Edmund Hillary

I'm sure the feeling of fear, as long as you can take advantage of it and not be rendered useless by it, can make you extend yourself beyond what you would regard as your capacity. If you're afraid, the blood seems to flow freely through the veins, and you really do feel a sense of stimulation. — Edmund Hillary

Ever since the morning of May 29, 1953, when Tenzing Norgay and I became the first climbers to step onto the summit of Mount Everest, I've been called a great adventurer. — Edmund Hillary

I have never regarded myself as a hero, but Tenzing undoubtedly was. — Edmund Hillary

There is precious little in civilization to appeal to a Yeti. — Edmund Hillary

Everest you won't change, but I will get better ... I will conquer you. — Edmund Hillary

Becoming a 'Sir' is slightly uncomfortable at first, although it is a considerable honor. It is amazing how quickly you become accustomed to it. — Edmund Hillary

Good planning is important. I've also regarded a sense of humor as one of the most important things on a big expedition. When you're in a difficult or dangerous situation, or when you're depressed about the chances of success, someone who can make you laugh eases the tension. — Edmund Hillary

Environmental problems are really social problems anyway. They begin with people as the cause and end with people as the victims — Edmund Hillary

You don't have to be a hero to accomplish great things
to compete. You can just be an ordinary chap, sufficiently motivated to reach challenging goals. — Edmund Hillary

My most important projects have been the building and maintaining of schools and medical clinics for my dear friends in the Himalaya and helping restore their beautiful monasteries, too. — Edmund Hillary

I realised a little bit to my astonishment that I can give a lecture for a thousand people, and there will be this tumultuous applause, so, you know, I have the feeling well, it can't be all that bad. — Edmund Hillary

Mount Everest, you beat me the first time, but I'll beat you the next time because you've grown all you are going to grow ... but I'm still growing! — Edmund Hillary

Nobody climbs mountains for scientific reasons. Science is used to raise money for the expeditions, but you really climb for the hell of it. — Edmund Hillary

Many people have been getting too casual about climbing Everest. I forecast a disaster many times. — Edmund Hillary

It's not the moutain we conquer but ourselves. — Edmund Hillary

Geography was not furthered by the achievement, scientific progress was scarcely hastened, and nothing new was discovered. Yet the names of Hillary and Tenzing went instantly into all languages as the names of heroes, partly because they really were men of heroic mold but chiefly because they represented so compellingly the spirit of their time. — Edmund Hillary

I don't regard myself as a cracking good climber. I'm just strong in the back. I have a lot of enthusiasm, and I'm good on ice. — Edmund Hillary

I hate being called an 'icon.' I just don't like it. That's all there is to it. — Edmund Hillary

I was scared many times on Everest, but this is all part of the challenge. When I fell down a crevasse, it was pretty scary. — Edmund Hillary

I like to think of Everest as a great mountaineering challenge, and when you've got people just streaming up the mountain - well, many of them are just climbing it to get their name in the paper, really. — Edmund Hillary

With practice and focus, you can extend yourself far more than you ever believed possible. — Edmund Hillary

Strong motivation is the most important factor in getting you to the top — Edmund Hillary

I have enjoyed great satisfaction from my climb of Everest and my trips to the poles. But there's no doubt that my most worthwhile things have been the building of schools and medical clinics. — Edmund Hillary

I think it all comes down to motivation. If you really want to do something, you will work hard for it. — Edmund Hillary

Nothing can replace courage, a resounding motivation and that little bit of luck. — Edmund Hillary