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.

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

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

I still think have this deep desire for our Himalayan Trust - that we raise the necessary funds, that we do all the things that the Sherpas want us to do, and I would like to see us working together with them on these projects. Even though I'm old and decrepit I still have this strong feeling that I would like to carry these things out if it were still possible.

We shared a philosophy together [with June Hillary]. We believed very strongly in the welfare of helping other people, particularly the Third World people.

I have no desire to live anywhere else but New Zealand. I've had the good fortune to travel widely around the world, but New Zealand is home - and I like to be here. I'm proud to be a New Zealander.

I was definitely seriously affected [with wifw and daughter deaths], no question, but I learnt to devote myself to the things that we'd been doing for years and years and slowly the pain drifted away.