Cuilcagh might be the height of some of our mountain climbing ambitions, but one Co Fermanagh man is going above and beyond in his pursuit of the Seven Summits of the world.
Shane Boyd from Enniskillen conquered Aconcagua, the world’s highest peak outside of the Himalayas, last weekend and has plans to one day climb Mount Everest.
Shane, a former local soccer player and now living in Australia, says the trek to the top of Aconcagua took 16 days and he felt relief when he made it to the top.
“It was an unbelievable feeling, we were all struggling at the last bit,” he told MyFermanagh.
“It was a great relief to tell you the truth, there were a lot of boys who were ready to give up.
“We had a couple of experienced heads in the team that just kept us going, it was a great relief to get up there and get the Fermanagh flag up.
“I was a happy boy then, it was such hard going. You have to dig deep just and tell yourself to keep going and put one foot in front of the other.
Sitting at just under 7,000m above sea level, Aconcagua is one of the Seven Summits of the world, and Shane says there were moments he can’t remember due to the altitude.
He added: “At times it feels like you are drunk. We were just talking about it last night, there are bits of it that you can’t even remember.
“It’s hard to explain but you just blank out half the time, but eventually we got there.
“Once you see the top and the whole team celebrating it’s a very happy moment.”
The Co Fermanagh man will travel to Nepal in five weeks time to spend time with a team preparing to scale the ultimate peak of Mount Everest.
The 42-year-old added that was the first step in the process of climbing the world’s highest summit, and that he was keen to make up for lost time due to the pandemic.
“I used to play football back home but when I came to Australia I didn’t have that any more, so I took into hiking and then mountain climbing.
“We had booked all these things over the last two years but it had just been delayed and delayed due to Covid.
“I’ve got three out of the seven summits of the world done now, and we are going to go to Everest base camp now to see what it’s like to go up with them.
“I’m not ready for that at the minute, but that is the start of the process to get your experience up for the big one.”
