My grandmother I admired even more [than mother]. She was an Irish lady and a very kind-hearted person. She had a lot of talent, she painted extremely well. She was quite a strong factor in my life.

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.

People do not decide to become extraordinary. They decide to accomplish extraordinary things.

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.

I think global warming is a very real problem for our world. I've seen the changes that have taken place in the Antarctic, in the Himalayas, where the natural ice has sort of faded away, and there's no doubt in my mind that we're living in a strange world, a world which is not easy to understand or handle, But there's nothing you can do about, you just have to live your life as best you can.

I still had the same affection for New Zealand as I've always had. Didn't change at all.

June [Hillary] is a very strong influence in my life and particularly now in my ancient years there is no doubt at all: if there's a decision to be made, quite often June is the one who makes it.