Getting to the top is optional. Getting down is mandatory.
Ed Viesturs
Getting to the top is ...
Quotes from the same author
Mountains don't kill people, they just sit there.
Ed Viesturs
K2 is not some malevolent being, lurking there above the Baltoro, waiting to get us. It's just there. It's indifferent. It's an inanimate mountain made of rock, ice, and snow. The "savageness" is what we project onto it, as if we blame the peak for our own misadventures on it.
Ed Viesturs
The mountain decides whether you climb or not. The art of mountaineering is knowing when to go, when to stay, and when to retreat.
Ed Viesturs
Early on May 23, 1997, from 28,500 feet on Everest, I witnessed the incredible shadow of the mountain, the penumbra, forming to the west as the sun rose behind me. The full moon from the night before was still visible. The bluish cast of the atmosphere can also be seen.
Ed Viesturs
