Because no one has ever viewed Mount Everest from Mount Everest

I have probably read every available book about Mount Everest and I brag about bumping into Göran Kropp and Renata Chlumska in Kathmandu, a few days after they reached the summit together in 1999. I am so fascinated about people who are willing to push themselves to accomplish summits like the world's highest. They are prepared to lose fingers and feet, getting frostbite, develop edema and quite a few never make it down again. All of that to fulfill a dream of viewing the world from it's highest peak; exhausted, cold and hopefully euforic. I would like to be a person who does those things, but the truth is that I would never make it. I would find millions of reasons not to or to quit before I reached base camp. And is the right place viewing Mount Everest really from Mount Everest?

Aoraki, or Mount Cook, is the highest mountain in New Zealand. And we decided to hike through the valley all the way to the glacier lake. It was a beautiful trail along the valley with rippling rivers and alp vegetation. We were happy that the rain never came, but the clouds looked like miniature typhoons and the winds got madly strong every now and then. Three suspension bridges had to be crossed and on the side of the mountain the snow was almost turquoise in an avalanche-scary way. 

"From a mountain as high as this one," he said to himself, "I shall be able to see the whole planet at one glance, and all the people..."

The Little Prince - Saint-Exupery

We never planned to climb that mountain and this beautiful valley might not be the place from which I can see the whole world and all its people. But I saw my first glacier lake full of icebergs ever and had the best person in the world with me. We didn't aim for the summit. Mainly because no one has ever viewed Mount Cook from Mount Cook...