It's not a real adventure when you have to pay for it.

I don't spend a lot of time thinking about dying, but I like to think that I've - if it did occur - that I would die peacefully and not make too much of a fuss about it.

I will come again & conquer you because as a mountain you can't grow, but as a human, I can

I've often thought about that and the only suitable member to join me on that climb [to Everest] was George Lowe: he was strong, a good man on a mountain, with a great sense of humour, and I liked that. I think George and I could've done that together ... I've probably never told George that.

It is not the mountain we conquer, but ourselves.

It's all bullshit on Everest these days.

I would like to be remembered for the schools and hospitals and bridges and all the other activities that we did with the Sherpas. Unquestionably, they are the things I feel that were the most worthwhile of everything I was involved in.