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

I never talk about being leaders and all the rest of it. I can only remember one or two occasions in my life when I actually issued orders, and I felt thoroughly miserable after doing it.

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.

I had never experienced anything like it before and I don't think I have experienced anything like it since [on Ruapehu]. It was my dreams coming true in a way, and from there on I tended to become more of a doer than a dreamer.

I always, I would say, make sure that in my presentation I'll have what I want to do. I try and make it so interesting to my companions that they want to go, too. I don't have to twist any arms or make - you know - any great challenges available.

I have the challenges sort of already there and as a consequence my companions feel a considerable desire to do this, too, and they feel very put out if they are left in the cold, so there we have it. We have me who has lots of ideas and then we have a very good team who wish - who are persuaded almost - to take part in these challenges.

Despite all I have seen and experiences, I still get the same thrill out of glimpsing a tiny patch of snow in a high mountain gully and feel the same urge to climb toward it.