Getting to the top of any given mountain was considered much less important than how one got there: prestige was earned by tackling the most unforgiving routes with minimal equipment, in the boldest style imaginable.
Climbs like the Dawn Wall don't come around every day.
What we can do now is contribute to a clearer understanding of what happened that day on Everest in the hope that the lessons to be learned will reduce the risk for others who, like us, take on the challenge of the mountains.
For me the Everest solo was the icing on the cake of my climbs: the highest mountain in the world, during a monsoon, and as far as possible even on a new route, of course without oxygen.
The Dawn Wall is so obviously the hardest big-wall climb in the world, so that was the challenge.
Annapurna was a special situation. It was a lifetime dream to finish that route. When I started climbing the South Face, I really expected not to come back alive.
I think it's possible to climb the Dawn Wall in a single day. No matter what, it would be really, really hard.
It would be really easy to write off the Dawn Wall as impossible. In terms of climbing technique, I'm learning a new language on this granite.
Physically, the Ventoux is dreadful. Bald, it's the spirit of Dry: Its climate (it is much more an essence of climate than a geographic place) makes it a damned terrain, a testing place for heroes, something like a higher hell.
The climbing as a whole is not very esthetic or enjoyable; it is merely difficult.
Meru was the most challenging climb of my life. Not once but twice.
There's intense personal gratification in finding a mountain and becoming inspired by the aesthetics of an unclimbed line on that mountain, especially if that line has been tried by a lot of people who couldn't do it, and you get to set yourself up against the history of it.
What did he say?" Hazel asked. "With the cussing removed? He said he can get us to the top," Percy replied.
Of course I can climb it. I'm practically a progidy in PE," I pointed out. "The question is, can you, Mr Smoker?
