I’m getting closer all the time.

When I was an idiot high school student, as opposed to being an idiot adult, I used to drive very fast.

I had one experience on the ice-fall with Tenzing. We were actually descending after having been further up the mountain, and it was getting close towards dark so we wanted to get through the ice-fall before darkness fell. We were roped together, but I was rushing down ahead in the lead. About halfway down there was a narrow crevasse. I guess it was about four feet wide, but just a bit too wide to step across. On the lower lip was a great chunk of ice stuck against the ice wall, and we’d used that as sort of a stepping stone to get over the gap. I came rushing down the hill without thinking too carefully. I just leapt in the air and landed on the chunk of ice, whereupon the chunk of ice broke off and dropped into the crevasse with me on top of it. It was interesting how everything seemed to start going slowly, even though I was free-falling into the crevasse. My mind, obviously, was working very quickly indeed. The great chunk of ice started tipping over and I realized, if I wasn’t careful, I’d be crushed between the ice and the wall of the crevasse. So I just sort of bent my knees and leapt in the air. I was still falling, but now I was a couple of feet clear of the chunk of ice. Time really seemed to pass even though I was falling clear, and I realized that unless the rope came tight fairly soon, I would come to a rather sticky end on the bottom of the crevasse. Up top, Tenzing had acted very quickly. He had thrust his ice axe into the snow, whipped the rope around it, and the rope came tight with a twang, and I was stopped and swung in against the ice wall. The great chunk of ice just carried on and smashed to smithereens at the bottom of the crevasse. Then really the rest was what I would have called a routine mountaineering matter. I had my ice axe and my crampons on my feet, so I chipped steps in the side. I was able to bridge the crevasse, and I worked my way up to the top and got safely out. I wouldn’t have said at any stage, because it all happened so quickly, fear really didn’t have much opportunity to emerge. My only idea was to get safely out of this unfortunate predicament. And of course, without Tenzing’s very competent mountaineer’s response, I certainly wouldn’t have made it. But once he had stopped me, then I was able to, using the techniques of mountaineering, to get myself safely to the top again.

Nearly crashing into a train on one film, almost falling out of a hot-air balloon on another, narrowly avoiding getting knocked over by a taxi …

Compassion, resourcefulness and resilience form a rounded good person. So that’s what I’d like to leave my children and grandchildren.

Resourceful, resilient and compassionate.

Whenever things seem absolutely terrible, to see that you’re alive and that’s all that matters.

It’s my snoring that keeps Loreto awake!

Becoming more physically active.

When I was climbing I was absolutely happy. I can use a climbing wall, but that’s not the same as real climbing.