Quotes & Sayings About Mountaineering
Enjoy reading and share 95 famous quotes about Mountaineering with everyone.
Top Mountaineering Quotes
If we successful, we will enter into the history of mountaineering, we will have the opportunity to its success to sacrifice our colleagues. — Jerzy Kukuczka
Mountaineering is a relentless pursuit. One climbs further and further yet never reaches the destination. Perhaps that is what gives it its own particular charm. One is constantly searching for something never to be found. — Hermann Buhl
I came to win, came as I always do, in order to justify who I am and what I have become; now I don't even know what that is. The rot inside me, the cancer of desire, feels unbearable, now it knows it won't be sated. There's a malignant discontent in there, and without a climb there will be no peace. When - if - I pass over to normal life I know I will drag this feeling with me. — Andy Kirkpatrick
The eight-man expedition was pinned down in a ferocious blizzard high on K2, waiting to make an assault on the summit, when a team member named Art Gilkey developed thrombophlebitis, a life-threatening altitude-induced blood clot. Realising that they would have to get Gilkey down immediately to have any hope of saving him, Schoening and the others started lowering him down the mountain's steep Abruzzi Ridge as the storm raged. At 25,000 feet, a climber named George Bell slipped and pulled four others off with him. Reflexively wrapping the rope around his shoulders and ice ax, Schoening somehow managed to single-handedly hold on to Gilkey and simultaneously arrest the slide of the five falling climbers without being pulled off the mountain himself. One of the more incredible feats in the annals of mountaineering, it was known forever after simply as The Belay. — Jon Krakauer
... where mountains are sacred & where risk & death are constant companions- the Himalayas. — Bernadette McDonald
It's not dying that is the problem, he said. 'Climbing is like a lover, and your wife knows this. Whenever you are together, no matter how much you love your family, your thoughts are only of your lover, of climbing. — Andy Kirkpatrick
How to get the best of it all? One must conquer, achieve, get to the top; one must know the end to be convinced that one can win the end - to know there's no dream that mustn't be dared ... Is this the summit, crowning the day? How cool and quiet! We're not exultant; but delighted, joyful; soberly astonished ... Have we vanquished an enemy? None but ourselves. Have we gained success? That word means nothing here. Have we won a kingdom? No ... and yes. We have achieved an ultimate satisfaction ... fulfilled a destiny ... To struggle and to understand - never this last without the other; such is the law ... — George Mallory
... one of the most decisive factors enduring a borderline situation is the WILL TO SURVIVE.
-Reinhold Messner — Bernadette McDonald
And the point is to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps then, someday far into the future, you will gradually, without even noticing it, live your way into the answer.
Page No. 31, Freedom Climbers — Rainer Maria Rilke
A failed attempt on a virgin face of an eight thousander gives me much more than the successful ascent of a known route. — Bernadette McDonald
It's one of the ironies of mountaineering,' said Young, 'that grown men are happy to spend months preparing for a climb, weeks rehearsing and honing their skills, and at least a day attempting to reach the summit. And then, having achieved their goal, they spend just a few moments enjoying the experience, along with one or two equally certifiable companions who have little in common other than wanting to do it all again, but a little higher. — Jeffrey Archer
The altimeter had been damaged along the way, but the few bottles that we brought along to wash down the ordinary expedition rations were fine. True, a bottle gives only a vague indication of altitude, but can you drink an altimeter? — Erhard Loretan
Like it or not taking risks, by a total commitment to the mountain and the vagaries of the weather, is essential for the greater satisfaction to be derived from mountaineering. — Doug Scott
The rope connecting two men on a mountain is more than nylon protection; it is an organic thing that transmits subtle messages of intent and disposition from man to man; it is an extension of the tactile senses, a psychological bond, a wire along which currents of communication flow. — Trevanian
But this, perhaps, is the enduring lesson of mountaineering: once we've hit our target we are but halfway. Soldier on. — Sebastian Marshall
Profound silence would brood over the valley, even weighing down our spirits with indefinable heaviness. There can be no other place in the world where man feels himself so alone, so isolated, so completely ignored by nature, so incapable of entering into communion with her — David Oliver Relin
Yes, we had made and excursion into another world and we had come back, but we had brought the joy of life and of humanity back with us. In the rush and whirl of everyday things, we so often live alongside one another without making any mutual contact. We had learned on the North Fae of the Eiger that men are good, and the earth on which we were born is good."(p.126) — Heinrich Harrer
Maybe mountaineering shouldn't be considered heroic at all, since the whole effort is 'useless' and in no way to be compared with sitting down at the wrong lunch counter in the early-sixties South, or going into battle. Nevertheless, situations arise in the useless enterprise of mountaineering that present people with choices, that make emotional and physical demands that few can meet. — Robert Roper
The fact that I am still alive, when so many friends and others climbing the 8000ers have died is humbling ... It is only death that has stopped many mountaineers from achieving the full tally of 14. — Alan Hinkes
We cannot overlook the importance of wild country as source of inspiration, to which we give expression in writing, in poetry, drawing and painting, in mountaineering, or in just being there. — Olaus Murie
All my life, I have never felt as happy on Earth as when I'm getting closer to the sky. — Erhard Loretan
In all my wild mountaineering, I have enjoyed only one avalanche ride; and the start was so sudden, and the end came so soon, I thought but little of the danger that goes with this sort of travel, though one thinks fast at such times. — John Muir
Mountaineering is one of the most difficult sports - we are away from routine life for days, living in tents, and it requires high degree of physical and mental strength. — Samina Baig
For me, the value of a climb is the sum of three inseparable elements, all equally important: aesthetics, history, and ethics. Together they form the whole basis of my concept of alpinism. Some people see no more in climbing mountains than an escape from the harsh realities of modern times. This is not only uninformed but unfair. I don't deny that there can be an element of escapism in mountaineering, but this should never overshadow its real essence, which is not escape but victory over your own human frailty. — Walter Bonatti
For me, making films is like being on vacation, it's a nice walk. But theatre is like mountaineering. You never know whether you're going to fall off or make it to the top. — Isabelle Huppert
In no other pursuit is the best or the worst in a man brought out as in mountaineering. An old friend of civilization may be a useless companion on a mountain. — Frank Smythe
As one veteran Russian pilot dryly told me:We have to be very careful flying in the clouds. Around here they are full of rocks. — Alan Hinkes
Inner harmony is the prerequisite for any climber who seeks to push the frontiers; without it he should give up extreme mountaineering.
-Reinhold Messner — Bernadette McDonald
Because it's there. — George Mallory
K2 is not some malevolent being, lurking there above the Baltoro, waiting to get us. It's just there. It's indifferent. It's an inanimate mountain made of rock, ice, and snow. The "savageness" is what we project onto it, as if we blame the peak for our own misadventures on it. — Ed Viesturs
Mountaineering is a complex and unique way of life, interweaving elements of sport, art and mysticism. Success or failure depends on the ebb and flow of immense inspiration. Detecting a single rule governing this energy is difficult - it arises and vanishes like the urge to dance and remains as mysterious as the phenomenon of life itself. — Wojciech Kurtyka
Mathematical study and research are very suggestive of mountaineering. Whymper made several efforts before he climbed the Matterhorn in the 1860's and even then it cost the life of four of his party. Now, however, any tourist can be hauled up for a small cost, and perhaps does not appreciate the difficulty of the original ascent. So in mathematics, it may be found hard to realise the great initial difficulty of making a little step which now seems so natural and obvious, and it may not be surprising if such a step has been found and lost again. — Louis J. Mordell
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
Abundant choice doesn't force us to look for the absolute best of everything. It allows us to find the extremes in those things we really care about, whether that means great coffee, jeans cut wide across the hips, or a spouse who shares your zeal for mountaineering, Zen meditation, and science fiction. — Virginia Postrel
What counts are merely the experiences one gains along the way.
-Reinhold Messner — Bernadette McDonald
I just love all this,' Walt says. 'The sights, the smells, making the effort and pushing yourself and getting something that's really hard to get. I'll fly on a plane and people will look out the window at thirty thousand feet and say, 'Isn't this view good enough for you?' And I say no, it's not good enough. I didn't earn it. In the mountains, I earn it. — Mark Obmascik
Climbing has taught me many lessons, one of the most important being, just how ever-present death is. Having faced death a few times now while climbing, has made me realize that I have no fear of it. — Mekael Shane
He wasn't a great man, but he had a great life. — Jeffrey Rasley
[In mountaineering, if] we look for private experience rather than public history, even getting to the top becomes an optional narrative rather than the main point, and those who only wander in high places become part of the story. — Rebecca Solnit
My mind is in a state of constant rebellion. I believe that will always be so. — George Mallory
Er, I say, are you going to be able to get me out? — Eric Shipton
For the stone from the top for geologists, the knowledge of the limits of endurance for the doctors, but above all for the spirit of adventure to keep alive the soul of man. — George Mallory
This was my introduction to mountaineering, and clumsy indeed were my movements as we moved off. — Jan Morris
Admittedly, man is small and insignificant in nature's scheme; but he is part of it. And are we to think less of the man who exposes himself to nature's forces than of him who just delights in looking at her, safe from dangers and tempests? Even those ridiculous earthworms know that an icicle can "sneeze"; but they have learned by obervation when and where it happens, and will do their best to avoid the danger with clear-eyes alertness and which they owe to their own daring. They are not deaf; they too hear the mighty voice of the mountains, but they understand and interpret it in a different way from those who enjoy it so passively and with such self-satisfaction. — Heinrich Harrer
As de Saussure said, risk-taking brings with it its own reward: it keeps a "continual agitation alive" in the heart. Hope, fear. Hope, fear - this is the fundamental rhythm of mountaineering. Life, it frequently seems in the mountains, is more intensely lived the closer one gets to its extinction: we never feel so alive as when we have nearly died. — Robert Macfarlane
John Wayne never wore Lycra. — Ron Kauk
It's a tough lesson: There is no summit that comes before you expect it. — Mark Obmascik
The solitary ascent of the Dru had the immediate effect of expanding the horizons of my ideas about mountaineering. It made me aware of possibilities well in advance of the times, which were characterized by very restricted methods. This was how the superb pyramid of K2 surfaced once more in the list of my projects. But I chose K2 as a way for giving concrete form to my new concept of mountaineering: to climb the second highest mountain in the world solo, alpine style, and without oxygen. — Walter Bonatti
People ask me, 'What is the use of climbing Mount Everest?' and my answer must at once be, 'It is of no use.'There is not the slightest prospect of any gain whatsoever. Oh, we may learn a little about the behaviour of the human body at high altitudes, and possibly medical men may turn our observation to some account for the purposes of aviation. But otherwise nothing will come of it. We shall not bring back a single bit of gold or silver, not a gem, nor any coal or iron ... 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. What we get from this adventure is just sheer joy. And joy is, after all, the end of life. We do not live to eat and make money. We eat and make money to be able to live. That is what life means and what life is for. — George Mallory
Only secrets can be conquered'- most of all the secrets that lie within ourselves. — Bernadette McDonald
They say you can't do it, but sometimes it doesn't always work. — Casey Stengel
Life's a bit like mountaineering - never look down. — Edmund Hillary
I assure you it's harder to battle human stupidity than to do battle with mountains. Mountains, after all, have holds. — Erhard Loretan
The unknown is so inflammatory to the imagination because it is an imaginatively malleable space: a projection-screen onto which a culture or an individual can throw their fears and their aspirations. Like Echo's cave, the unknown will answer back with whatever you shout at it. — Robert Macfarlane
As time went on, I did campaign to lighten the character a little bit, to introduce some romance into the episodes, outside activities, horse riding and fencing and mountaineering. — Patrick Stewart
too young to live, too old to die — Jeffrey Rasley
I think there are so many activities going on, like mountaineering. You know, you would pay good money not to have to do that, and yet there are people racing out who want to spend their spare time clambering up rocks. — John Cleese
There is no single, correct objective in mountaineering; there are only possibilities. One of them leads beyond the impossible.
- Reinhold Messner — Bernadette McDonald
My mountaineering skills are not important to my best photographs, but they do add a component to my work that is definitely a bit different than that of most photographers. — Galen Rowell
The roller-coaster is my life; life is a fast, dizzying game; life is a parachute jump; it's taking chances, falling over and getting up again; it's mountaineering; it's wanting to get to the very top of yourself and feeling angry and dissatisfied when you don't manage it — Paulo Coelho
The american climber Mark Twight, mentor of the Grivel climbing team, commented, "Now every ill-prepared sad sack whose ability falls short of his Himalayan ambitions can get on the radio, call for help, and expect the cavalry to save the day"
- on Tomaz Humar's rescue from Rupal Face of Nanga Parvat. — Bernadette McDonald
Mountaineers are one of the few groups to celebrate before the finish line. More mountaineers die on the descent than on the ascent. — Susan Oakey-Baker
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
Working on the summit of Mauna Kea was comparable to working on the hospital pulmonary ward with sick people sucking on oxygen cylinders. — Steven Magee
I like the mountains because they make me feel small,' Jeff says. 'They help me sort out what's important in life. — Mark Obmascik
Rob Hall was, without doubt, the most competent guide in mountaineering. — Jon Krakauer
The mountain decides whether you climb or not. The art of mountaineering is knowing when to go, when to stay, and when to retreat. — Ed Viesturs
In 1977, I climbed a fairly difficult mountain for the first time, which was Mount McKinley, in Alaska. I climbed the so-called 'American Direct Route,' which was a route straight up to the top. I really enjoyed it. Through such experiences, I learned that mountaineering wasn't just about height. I found that different routes have different charms. — Tamae Watanabe
mountaineering offers you a chance to learn about yourself by venturing beyond the confines of the modern world. — Ron Eng
... I only know that when physical and emotional reserves remain unchallenged, this feeds the spiritual cancer of a life unfulfilled.
-Reinhold Messner — Bernadette McDonald
hI was following through on the mountain commitment from my younger days, and it's always a nice surprise when the newly minted adult doesn't disown the child he once was. — Erhard Loretan
Keeping in mind the old mountain adage that the longer you take to set up your bivy site, the shorter the bivy you have to endure, we ended up taking two hours to dig the snow cave. — Erhard Loretan
It is said that a man is rejuvenated every seven years- that all his cells are replaced. I wonder, does that also apply to his spirit?
- Reinhold Messner — Bernadette McDonald
There was a shepherd the other day up at Findon Fair who had come from the east by Lewes with sheep, and who had in his eyes that reminiscence of horizons which makes the eyes of shepherds and of mountaineers different from the eyes of other men. — Hilaire Belloc
Mountaineering is the art of getting up mountains by foot and occasionally by hand, and though the climbing is usually emphasized, most ascents are mostly a matter of walking(and since good climbers climb with their legs as much as possible, climbing could be called the art of taking a vertical walk). — Rebecca Solnit
Difficult struggle in mountaineering is our rise above himself, is the voice of freedom. — Wojciech Kurtyka
[M]ountaineering as a sport both emanates from and addresses itself back to (and back against) the normal patterns of middle class life. One of the dominant discourses of mountaineering [...] positions it critically against "bourgeois" existence, even as the sport demands the resources made possible by such an existence. — Sherry B. Ortner
A healthy person that uses medical oxygen to perform their job on a daily basis should expect to eventually become a sick person. — Steven Magee
Those who travel to mountain-tops are half in love with themselves, and half in love with oblivion. — Robert Macfarlane
Like an entirely cloudless sky when one is going mountaineering ... — Marcel Proust
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
Nothing to mountaineering, just a little physical endurance, a good deal of brains, lots of practice, and plenty of warm clothing. — Annie Smith Peck
And a realization for Skinner, she still has his scarf, inside her mountaineering jacket, red wool at her neck. Some meaning there related to the kiss, but in a code he cannot unscramble. A tether is what it feels like, his scarf around her neck, preventing either of them from falling off the mountain alone. — Charlie Huston
Mountains are both journey and destination. They summon us to climb their slopes, explore their canyons, and attempt their summits. The summit, despite months of preparation and toil, is never guaranteed though tastes of sweet nectar when reached. If my only goal as a teacher and mountaineer is the summit, I risk cruel failure if I do not reach the highest apex. Instead, if I accept the mountain's invitation to journey and create meaning in each step, success is manifest in every moment. — T.A. Loeffler
Classic mountaineering grows out of a traditional romantic imagination. Its heart is the feeling, its path is blood, sweat and tears, and its restriction is God. — Wojciech Kurtyka
Most of the time I am sunk in thought, but at some point on each walk there comes a moment when I look up and notice, with a kind of first-time astonishment, the amazing complex delicacy of the words, the casual ease with which elemental things come together to form a composition that is
whatever the season, wherever I put my besotted gaze
perfect. — Bill Bryson
Getting to the top is optional. Getting down is mandatory. — Ed Viesturs
In a civilization of wage slaves, where people seek to survive more than to live, mountaineering is an enigma. — Erhard Loretan; Jean Amman
One of the differences between us was that Marc wanted very badly to climb the Eiger, while I wanted very badly only to have climbed the Eiger. Marc, understand, is at that age when the pituitary secretes an overabundance of those hormones that mask the subtler emotions, such as fear. He tends to confuse things like life-or-death climbing with fun. — Jon Krakauer
There are only three sports: bullfighting, motor racing, and mountaineering; all the rest are merely games. — Ernest Hemingway,