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New Zealand was lucky to have a man like Sir Edmund Hillary as an icon to aspire to, a fellow climber has said.
Mountaineer Guy Cotter has climbed Everest four times and is a director of Adventure Consultants - a mountaineering guide company that lead expeditions to Everest.
Speaking after news of Sir Edmund's death in Auckland this morning at the age of 88, Mr Cotter said the man who first conquered Everest had used his achievement to help others.
"I think what is great is we're given the opportunity to celebrate the life of a mountaineer that finished the right way and that is dying of old age," Mr Cotter said.
"A lot of our Sherpa staff that we work with today are recipients of the services that he and the Himalayan Trust put in place," Mr Cotter said.
He said when Sir Edmund first went into the Khumbu on Everest reconnaissance in 1951 he saw people who were extremely poor but friendly and forthcoming and wanted to give something back to the people of Nepal.
"The efforts that he went to, to go around the world, talking and using his Everest summits - not to help himself but to help other people - is amazing," Mr Cotter said.
He said he recalled seeing Sir Edmund for the last time at a talk in Dunedin two years ago.
"We sat and had a chat. One of the great things about him was that he was always very humble and he was always prepared to sit down and have a chat with you. He was probably quite relieved to talk to people who didn't want to ask him about a single event that happened 50 years ago.
"He was aware that the assent of Everest in itself in some respects was probably a selfish accomplishment and he turned it into something a lot more which he needn't have done. But he did. He was basically lucky. He was the right man in the right place and had the right drive and the right strengths but he did something with it," Mr Cotter said.
He said New Zealand mountaineers had always lived in Sir Edmund's shadow but it was the best shadow to live in.
