Thank you to Old Westbournian Sam Langmead for taking us all to the top of Mount Everest as our Inspirational Speaker.
Brilliantly, children flooded out of the Millennium Hall after the talk and Q&A session to ask many more burning questions of Sam.
The one thing Sam wanted the children to take away with was: if you set yourself a goal and apply yourself and work hard, you can achieve it. Sam decided to climb Mount Everest and within 3-4 months he was at the summit – through as much mental strength as physical, he told the audience. He talked the children through the stages and camps, the challenges including snow blindness and altitude sickness, the risks and shared lots of photos and stories of the Sherpas who helped him to achieve his goal.
At the end, Sam showed the audience the view from the top in a video he took. He described the curvature of the earth and the euphoria of making it, before undertaking the dangerous last stage of returning to base camp. The Millennium Hall was filled with applause and there were a lot of very keen hands up in the Q&A session.
Thank you to Sam.
