Sir Edmund Hillary's Ashes Cast Into Sea

Wellington, New Zealand
Associated Press

February 29, 2008

The ashes of Sir Edmund Hillary, the renowned adventurer who conquered Mount Everest in 1953, were scattered into the sea by his family Friday in a private ceremony off his native New Zealand, an associate said.

The shipboard ceremony fulfilled the wishes of Hillary, who once wrote that he had spent so much of his life in mountains, he preferred to be buried at sea.

(See photo gallery: Sir Edmund Hillary, a Life in Pictures.)

The humble beekeeper, who climbed the world's highest peak in 1953 and also led expeditions to such far-flung locales as the Ganges River and Antarctica, died in January at age 88.

New Zealand Prime Minister Helen Clark joined Hillary's wife, June, and his two children for the ceremony, said John Lister, chief executive of the Spirit of Adventure Trust. Hillary was patron of the youth trust.

The ashes were scattered from aboard the sailing vessel Spirit of New Zealand in the Hauraki Gulf near the northern city of Auckland—Hillary's home for much of his life. (See New Zealand map.)

The family requested privacy for the ceremony and only about 30 guests were on the ship, Lister said.

"Too Many" Mountains

In his book View From the Summit, Hillary wrote that he did not want his final resting place to be in some crevasse on a mountain, observing that he had "been down too many of them for that to have much appeal."

Instead he wanted his ashes to be "spread on the beautiful waters of Auckland's Hauraki Gulf to be washed gently ashore" on the beaches near his birthplace.

"Then the full circle of my life will be complete," he wrote.

Hillary devoted much of his life to aiding the Sherpa mountain people of Nepal. His Sherpa guide, Tenzing Norgay, reached Mount Everest's 29,035-foot summit just behind Hillary on May 29, 1953.

Britain's Queen Elizabeth II, who knighted Hillary for his achievement and later named him a Knight of the Garter, a rare honor, is to hold a private memorial service for Hillary at Windsor Castle near London in April.

Copyright 2008 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

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