Mountain-climbing

Perhaps Ed Veisters is the real most interesting man in the world. Climbed Mount Everest five times, without supplemental oxygen. Also made an appearance in the movie Vertical Limit and the IMAX film Everest and wrote a book about K2.

I find inspiration here for symbolic mountains of my own, but here's what Ed has to say about the real deal. When first he tried Everest he had to turn back, because of weather. Here he describes his first successful climb to the summit:


It was twenty degrees below zero. The unforgiving Tibetan wind whipped around me, covering the footprints of my passage - a constant reminder of the challenges that lay ahead amid the rock and snow. I scanned ahead, following the outline that defined the massive shard of glistening crystal. Everest. It stood taunting me once again, spectacular crown sharply defined in the ethereal sky.

...
(snip)

Now, after years of preparation, I was back at base camp and ready: well trained, prepared, focused. I'd visualized that final stretch of the summit ridge over and over. The summit had shadowed my dreams, my thoughts, everything. It would be the most difficult part, I knew. When climbing that high without supplemental oxygen, time races on while forward movement is slowed to a crawl.

Days passed. Days of numbing cold, incessant winds, and constant work. Nights of almost no rest, sleeping in tissue-thin tents and down-filled sleeping bags. Endless hours of plodding up a vertical mountain ...until finally, I was once again three hundred feet from the top. I stared at the summit. A pattern emerged: one determined step, rest, a dozen breaths. Another singular step, rest, and more breaths. I focused on reaching closer landmarks. Each step became a goal within itself. And then almost miraculously it seemed, I reached the top.

Ed Veisturs