I can't retire from life. I love life too much and I cannot wait to start the day.

I met Picasso when I was a kid. I turned one of his drawings down which would be worth £37 million now. My dad wouldn't talk to me for a fortnight.

I've become quite a serious explorer: I've been to Everest three times; I'm the oldest man to reach the North Pole; and I've just been to the lost world of Venezuela.

The greatest danger in life is not taking chances. There are so many negative people wanting to grind you down, but you can't let them. If people say you are mad, you know you're on the right track.

Wishing kindness and compassion to all living creatures.

The misapprehension about me is that I am some loud, rampant maniac. I am actually very pensive and quiet.

There will be no funeral! Before I get too old and ill, I'll go to South America and live among the Pemon people and meditate. When the time is right, they can throw my body into the volcano.

I fed my Yak on my spare Cadbury chocolate 21,0000ft up Everest. It was a blonde, very sweet female Yak. I made it my pet after that.

In the news this week, the polls continue to slide for Gordon Brown and some people are saying he's dead and buried. But I think the opposite - I say GORDON'S ALIVE!

I'll never retire. The new millennium is the age of adventure as far as I am concerned. I'm going up a volcano and off into space.

My dream is to own a Hockney - I'm a Yorkshireman, and his vibrant colours are a good example of how the north-country people are vibrant and colourful.

It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife.

Happy is harder than money. Anybody who thinks money will make you happy hasn't got money.

The presumed causes of Americas troubles can be summed up simply: the evils of unlimited competition, and abuses by those with economic power.

I don't like the word 'alcoholic'. I like to think of myself as an advanced drinker.

The language of truth is simple.

The world is a sacred vessel. It should not be meddled with. It should not be owned. If you try to meddle with it you will ruin it. If you try to own it you will lose it

I feel that movies are gifts that come to you, and there are no accidents in what you end up doing.

What God may have enabled me to do is but a repayment of debt, and he who repays a debt deserves no praise.

Don't give up the search for happiness because you're afraid of getting hurt.

If all you can do is crawl, start crawling.