Toowoomba teen sets sights high on Everest challenge - ABC Local

By Sam Burgess

Posted May 06, 2013 11:57:14

A girl from Toowoomba on Queensland's Darling Downs aiming to be the youngest Australian to scale Mount Everest, will this week prepare by climbing Australia's 10 highest peaks in just 24 hours.

Alyssa Azar, 16, plans to climb the world's highest mountain next year.

Before that, Alyssa will take the A10 challenge, climbing the 10 highest mountains in the Kosciuszko National Park.

She says the daunting task will provide her with the mental toughness needed to tackle Everest.

"The goal for that is to hit them all in under 24 hours," she said.

"The reason we're doing that is more of a mental challenge in preparation for my Mount Everest climb in 2014.

"We'll be going all throughout the night and basically no sleep and seeing if we can do it non-stop."

She says she has more mountains to climb before she attempts her record-breaking Everest climb.

"We've got two major trips on later in the year as well - Mount Manaslu, which is in the same mountain range as Everest and it's 8,100m," she said.

"It's the eighth highest mountain in the world and that's to get the feel for expeditions and being in high altitude.

"Straight after that we go to Argentina and I've got a climb of one of the seven summits, which is Mount Aconcagua."

Topics: people, toowoomba-4350