Quotes from Bernadette McDonald

To be a climber one has to accept that gratification is rarely immediate.

Let everything happen to you: beauty and terror. Just keep going. No feeling is final. —Rainer Maria Rilke, The Book of Hours

There is no single, correct objective in mountaineering; there are only possibilities. One of them leads beyond the impossible. - Reinhold Messner

What counts are merely the experiences one gains along the way. -Reinhold Messner

one of the most decisive factors enduring a borderline situation is the WILL TO SURVIVE. -Reinhold Messner

If true compassion for others is awakened, you start ignoring your own misery.

I only know that when physical and emotional reserves remain unchallenged, this feeds the spiritual cancer of a life unfulfilled. -Reinhold Messner

A failed attempt on a virgin face of an eight thousander gives me much more than the successful ascent of a known route.

Only secrets can be conquered'- most of all the secrets that lie within ourselves.

The Soviet authorities didn't outlaw climbing completely; they just shifted it from an individual experience, which they categorized as a "relic of bourgeois alpinism," to a collective endeavour that could be manipulated by the propaganda machine.

Physical exertion is the best food for your spirit and your brain.

The american climber Mark Twight, mentor of the Grivel climbing team, commented, "Now every ill-prepared sad sack whose ability falls short of his Himalayan ambitions can get on the radio, call for help, and expect the cavalry to save the day" - on Tomaz Humar's rescue from Rupal Face of Nanga Parvat.

He (Tomaz Humar) doesn't conform to existing standards; he creates them.

where mountains are sacred & where risk & death are constant companions- the Himalayas.

To know a mountain, you must sleep on it. —Tom Longstaff, This My Voyage

It is said that a man is rejuvenated every seven years- that all his cells are replaced. I wonder, does that also apply to his spirit? - Reinhold Messner

As climbers thronged the scope of Everest, the Rupal Face retained its solitude, remaining a formidable oabjective.

Tomaz believed that 80% alpinism was mental and spiritual and that his third eye vision & openness of his mind to the language of the walls were critical

Every mountain has its soul... if the mountain does not accept you & you don't submit to her will, she will destroy you.

In contrast, his parents considered climbing a completely useless and dangerous activity.

Life is beautiful, but only if you live it fully!

Love unto exhaustion, work unto exhaustion, and walk unto exhaustion....The only mortal danger for the spirit is to remain too long without it. The world is made of fire. —MARK HELPRIN, A SOLDIER OF THE GREAT WAR

To be a climber one has to accept that gratification is rarely immediate.