Q: Do you have a moral obligation to rescue a stranded climber?
A: Yes I feel a moral obligation to rescue a stranded climber. I feel a sense of brotherhood with any fellow human, and why should I not help if I am capable or in the vicinity? I have gone to the rescue of many people throughout my climbing career and always would if needed. I’ve gone sometimes when the climbers were unaware they needed help, and several times just in the nick of time did I get there. I have swarmed up rock unroped quite a number of times to save someone, or kids, splayed out and about to fall. 

Q: When is it okay to risk your partner’s life?
A: Never. 

Q: Why get up in the morning?
A: Because life is ready to unfold its wild variety and blessings, and who knows what great miracle, what new friend, what idea, is at the door? Each day is precious, not to be wasted. 

Q: What's the saddest thing you've ever seen?
A: It always has grieved me when a person, perhaps especially a young person, loses his or her life. I’ve had to rescue people who did not survive a fall. With better instruction or a more careful attitude, had they not been caught up in the no-guts-no-glory mentality, had they realized how precious their lives were, had they better understood the dangers, had someone loved them enough to set an example of mastery and artistry, and shown them how, and that it’s ok, to protect even the easiest of climbs, where at any time a hold can break off suddenly and unexpectedly, they might have gone on to enjoy beautiful lives. When they died, so did all their potential progeny to infinity, an incomprehensible thing. 

I stopped being a hero, in terms of bold and dangerous leads, about when I heard of the little girl above Boulder who stepped onto the first hold, slipped, bumped her head, and died on the spot of a cerebral hemorrhage. I remember Ed Webster’s dear friend Lauren, and how they unroped on the easy rock at the top. Somehow she fell, maybe pulled off a hold, and died. I remember Diana Hunter, who unroped on the easy rock at the top of a big wall in Rocky Mountain National Park. She slipped, pulled off a hold, and fell hundreds of feet. People have scoffed at me at times for staying roped on easy ground. I do it because too many people have been lost to that grim specter of the freak accident. Life is for the saving. 

Q: What would your best friend say is your strongest personality trait?
A: Above all, I believe, I have a good heart. But friends might also say my dedication and determination are my strongest suits. Someone could argue it is my sense of the art, beauty, and mystery in things. All are related. I work hard at whatever I’m focused on. 

Q: What's your favorite: bouldering, sport climbing, traditional climbing, ice climbing, gym climbing, or alpine climbing? Why?
A: I have been a rock climber of all sorts, a disciple of Gill’s, a partner to Robbins, Kor, Pratt, Higgins, Kamps, Barber, Bachar, and others. I was doing big walls in Colorado and Yosemite in the golden era. Overall, I suppose I have loved most the short, moderately difficult climb. Some have thought of me as a crack climber, because of difficult cracks I’ve done. Others know me to be a good face climber. My most difficult boulder problems have been delicate face climbs. In later years I have given most of my attention to short climbs, even to repeating those easier climbs that were frightening adventures for me as a youth. When Bonatti and I shared the spotlight at the British National Mountaineering Conference, we hit it off right away. I think he sensed I had done all those climbs with him, in imagination, when I was a young boy.