RICHMOND, Va. -- You may know that Sir Edmund Hillary was the first person to climb Mount Everest and you may think his reasoning was because it's there.
That was actually said by George Leigh Mallory who was part of the first attempt to scale the mountain.
Others like James Whittaker, Tabei Junko, Reinhold Messner and Peter Habeler all lay claims to some sort of record associated with the world's highest peak.
Perhaps you've never heard of them but maybe one day, you'll know the name, Ella Wiatt.
Most 14-year-olds are getting a backpack ready for school. Ella, on the other hand, gets hers prepared for an entirely different adventure.
"Some of my friends think I'm crazy for doing this but I enjoy it so I just want to keep doing it," Ella said.
Ella has taken up mountain climbing and not just the kind where you hike a trail to get to a summit, although at first, that was part of the appeal.
"I really liked just being outside and especially when you're at the summit, the view is something you never see here in Richmond," Ella said.
Ella began climbing at the age of six, traversing the peak at McAfee Knob in the Appalachians. It was originally her father's idea and she needed some extra incentives on those early journeys.
"When we did McAfee Knob, I had to coax her up the mountain with M&M's and I remember when we were coming back down, she wanted me to carry her. I said I'll stop as much as you want to stop, but I'm not going to carry you," John, her father, said.
That was eight years ago. Since then, Ella keeps looking for bigger and better mountains to scale.
To date, her largest conquest has been the 10,700-foot peak at Mount Baker in Washington state. Her conquests made the Instagram page of her school at Maggie Walker, giving her classmates more of an insight into just what she was doing.
"I don't think they realized how much I did because it was a picture of the summit and I don't think they realized how hard it was to get there, but they definitely understood that this was more than just a hike," Ella said.
During the pandemic, Ella would load up her gear and hike up and down the 30 stories of her dad's office building downtown.
She has thus far mastered the balance in packing her own gear, between having what she needs and not overloading herself to the point of exhaustion.
"She's the one that has to maintain her training regiment and put the work in and I give her credit for doing that. She's the one that put the pack on with the weight and did the things that we needed to do," John said.
"I'm better at managing my food, my water, my pack. Two years ago, my dad did a lot of it for me, packing everything for me, making sure I was drinking and eating. This year, I'm better at managing my own things," Ella said.
Like any other avocation, Ella's progress has not been without its challenges. When she summited Mount Washington in New Hampshire, the winds were just below what could have blown her clear off the mountain.
Her dad has never been fearful for his daughter's safety, but he has noticed when she's pushed close to her physical and emotional limits.
"I've seen tears well up in her eyes a little bit and I can tell she has to work through some mental blocks. My standard response is, you don't have to do this and this rock isn't going anywhere," John said. "Nine out of ten times, we push through. When she achieves the summit or whatever it is, she's always happy that she pushed through."
"I was shaking. We were trying to walk but the wind was kind of pushing me. It was below freezing temperatures. But I just had to get my mind straight and focus on making it to the top or just focus on going forward instead of all the things that could go wrong," Ella said.
But that is part of the point of this process.
Ella's climbing has helped her out in her other sport, tennis, by teaching her exactly how to handle pressure and figure out problems on the fly. These lessons should also help her out well beyond her high school years.
"I never like to give up. I never like to leave things unfinished. In mountain climbing, when I learn grit, I've used that so much, not only in tennis but in school and every day," Ella said.
"Those lessons can be applied to school work, sports, how you handle relationships with friends and family. This is something she'll be able to hold onto for the rest of her life. This is a good life lesson for her," John said.
Ella's next planned challenge is Mount Rainier in Washington which is 14,417 feet. Her dad has already done it and the extra challenge is that it's still an active volcano, the largest in the cascades.
We asked her if Everest is on her list and she said no.
Not yet, anyway.
