The rope I was dangling off wasn’t designed for a long impact fall like mine.It was lightweight, thin rope that got replaced every few days as the ice, on the move, tore it from its anchor point. The...
The next night was New Year’s Eve, and I made a secret plan with Shara to meet her outside the back door on the stroke of midnight.Let’s take a walk, I suggested.Sure. It’s midnight, minus five degree...
The less you see of your toxic friends and the more you see of your enthusiastic friends, the better you will feel about yourself, and the better you will become. So spend your days in the company of...
That New Year I was invited to stay with one of my old school buddies, Sam Sykes, at his house on the far northwestern coast of Sutherland, in Scotland.It is as wild and rugged a place as anywhere on...
Many people find it hard to understand what it is about a mountain that draws men and women to risk their lives on her freezing, icy faces--all for a chance at that single, solitary moment on the top....
In addition to these international climbers, we were supported by a climbing team of Nepalese Sherpas, led by their Sirdar boss, Kami.Raised in the lower Himalayan foothills, these Sherpas know Everes...
If you want it bad enough, you’ll pass.
If I had to sum up what happened on that journey for me, from the hospital bed to the summit of the world, I tend to think of it as a stumbling journey.Of losing my confidence and my strength--then re...
During my time at Eton, I led regular nighttime adventures, and word spread. I even thought about charging to take people on trips.I remember one where we tried to cross the whole town of Eton in the...
Before I climbed Everest, I saved up to make an attempt on a peak called Ama Dablam, one of the classic and more technically difficult climbs in the higher Himalayas. For many of the weeks I was there...
Back in the barracks, those of us still left were white-faced and very shaky, but we were so relieved that the ordeal was finally over.Trucker looked particularly bad, but had this huge grin. I sat on...
The place to start this life journey is with finding your dream.Dreams are powerful. They are among those precious few intangibles that have inspired men and women to get up, go to hell and back, and...
Can you imagine how I felt after Chris had let me drink his last drops of water? Gratitude doesn’t come close.One of the regiment’s toughest, most hardened of soldiers was showing that he was looking...
Any mental flaw, any physical failing will be exposed by the relentless series of challenges aimed at finding your breaking point. Lung-bursting cross-mountain marches through the snow, uphill sprints...
Adventure is unpredictable, and you had better learn to be flexible and to swing with the punches, or you will get beaten - it’s as simple as that.If the adventure is an exciting one, you can bet your...
Benjamin Disraeli
Positive word of warning, though: you might find that once you start eating more of the healthy stuff, your body will no longer like it when you eat the bad stuff.
You’re blessed when you’re at the end of your rope. With less of you there is more of God. Matthew 5, v.2 (The Message Version)
Whether it is the wife, husband, girlfriend, boyfriend, family or friends, so often those closest to us are the ones who get the worst of us. It is as if we feel that they are the only ones we can be...
Through all these times and formative young years, Lara, my sister, was a rock to me. My mother had suffered three miscarriages after having Lara, and eight years on she was convinced that she wasn’t...