Aron Ralston Quotes

When I climb a fourteener, a 14,000-foot/4,260-meter peak, in the winter by myself, I leave an itinerary and information about where my vehicle will be parked and the name of the county sheriff to contact in case I don’t get home.

Judging by my degradation in the last 24 hours, I’ll be surprised if I make it to Tuesday.

If you want someone to show up and help you if something bad happens, you’d better tell someone where you’re going. And of course I wanted someone to know – but I’d made a choice and it was a choice I was going to have to live with.

I’d fallen in love with a woman but she broke up with me and I was devastated. Six months later, I went into a suicidal depression from the break-up of the relationship, but I resolved to not do what my friends had done. And so I reached out for help.

I was accustomed to being in far, far riskier environments. So I thought going into that canyon was a walk in the park – there were no avalanches, it was a beautiful day and I was essentially just walking.

I limited myself to one shout a day. But I didn’t like the sound of my voice. It sounded panicked, it sounded scared. And I knew from experience you can’t hear more than 50 yards either way down a canyon.