Quotes by Edmund Hillary

About Edmund Hillary:

Sir Edmund Percival Hillary was a New Zealand mountaineer, explorer and philanthropist. On 29 May 1953, Hillary and Nepalese Sherpa mountaineer Tenzing Norgay became the first climbers to reach the summit of Mount Everest. They were part of the ninth British expedition to Everest, led by John Hunt. Hillary was named by Time as one of the 100 most influential people of the 20th century.
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z

Life's a bit like mountaineering - never look down.

Edmund Hillary

If you cannot understand that there is something in man which responds to the challenge of this mountain and goes out to meet it, that the struggle is the struggle of life itself upward and forever upward, then you won't see why we go.

Edmund Hillary

When you're climbing at high altitudes, life can get pretty miserable.

Edmund Hillary

The truth is, I'm just a rough old New Zealander who has enjoyed many challenges in his life.

Edmund Hillary

It is not the mountain we conquer but ourselves.

Edmund Hillary

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

Edmund Hillary

The Sherpas play a very important role in most mountaineering expeditions, and in fact many of them lead along the ridges and up to the summit.

Edmund Hillary

Many people have been getting too casual about climbing Everest. I forecast a disaster many times.

Edmund Hillary

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

Edmund Hillary

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

Edmund Hillary

Once I've decided to do something, I do usually try to carry it through to fruition.

Edmund Hillary

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.

Edmund Hillary

There is something about building up a comradeship - that I still believe is the greatest of all feats - and sharing in the dangers with your company of peers. It's the intense effort, the giving of everything you've got. It's really a very pleasant ...

Edmund Hillary

I believe that of all the things I have done, exciting though many of them have been, there's no doubt in my mind that the most worthwhile have been the establishing of schools and hospitals, and the rebuilding of monasteries in the mountains.

Edmund Hillary

Take advantage of the years of pioneering efforts. You might find this boring, as the young want to rush head on, as it were.

Edmund Hillary

There is precious little in civilization to appeal to a Yeti.

Edmund Hillary

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.

Edmund Hillary

My mother was a schoolteacher and very keen that I go to a city school, so although it was fairly impoverished times, I traveled every day to the Auckland Grammar School.

Edmund Hillary

If I wished to do something, even if I couldn't find anyone who wanted to make the effort with me, I would go out solo climbing. I did find solo climbing very challenging and a little frightening. You knew that you were completely on your own, and yo...

Edmund Hillary

I think my first thought on reaching the summit- of course, I was very, very pleased to be there, naturally - but my first thought was one of a little bit of surprise. I was a little bit surprised that here I was, Ed Hillary, on top of Mt. Everest. A...

Edmund Hillary

Adventuring can be for the ordinary person with ordinary qualities, such as I regard myself.

Edmund Hillary

Author Bio

  • NameEdmund Hillary
  • DescriptionNew Zealand beekeeper and mountaineer
  • BornJuly 20, 1919
  • DiedJanuary 11, 2008
  • CountryNew Zealand
  • ProfessionExplorer; Philanthropist; Beekeeper; Ambassador; Diplomat; Autobiographer; Mountaineer
  • AwardsKnight Commander Of The Order Of The British Empire; Order Of The Garter; Padma Vibhushan; Polar Medal; Order Of Gorkha Dakshina Bahu