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

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

I was a dreamer when I was at high school and even primary school. I used to dream about doing adventurous things.

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

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

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.

Boredom has always been a problem.