Grania Willis's priorities when she arrived home from Mount Everest on Sunday night were to get a good meal, of champagne and chips, and to get to her hairdresser early yesterday.
Looking a little thin but nonetheless beaming, she said that reaching the summit of the north face was one of the "most emotional moments of my life".
The first Irishwoman to have summited the technically most demanding north face of Mount Everest, she said there were times when she thought she might not get the opportunity to leave base camp and make the ascent to the summit.
"The weather was so, so bad, we kept delaying and delaying. But we did get there on the 8th of June. And it was very, very emotional. It was just such a great achievement and my sponsors have been so wonderful so it was great to be able to give something back to them."
She left Ireland for Katmandu on March 30th but bad weather delayed the final ascent until the first week of June. She said there were "a lot of games of cards" and they also celebrated her birthday on May 14th. "We had a party, and I can tell you, Bob Marley's No Woman No Cry is seven minutes long and dancing to that at high altitude, well it's great acclimatisation training."
Asked if there were times when she felt like turning back she said: "When I saw my first dead body." At 8,550 metres, she came across the body of Slovenian Marko Lihteneker.
A spokesman said she was well on course to raise the target of €200,000 for The Friends of St Luke's Hospital and the Irish Hospice Foundation.
Donations to the Grania Willis Everest Challenge, Permanent TSB, Blackrock, Dublin. Bank sort code 99-06-44, account 86877341.
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