JOHN YANG: When adventurers talk about Mount Everest, most often it's about climbing the world's highest peak.

In October, Jim Morrison went the other way, becoming the first person to ski down Everest's most dangerous route.

It was chronicled by Jimmy Chin, a mountaineer and an Academy Award winning filmmaker for an upcoming National Geographic documentary.

Jim Morrison joins us now.

Jim, where did the idea for this come from?

JIM MORRISON, Mountaineer: This is a lifetime of skiing in big mountains all over the world.

And my partner Hilaree and Elsa and I have been working towards this endeavor for a long time.

JOHN YANG: Hilaree, we should note, died tragically in an avalanche on another Himalayan mountain in 2022.

You had planned to do this together?

JIM MORRISON: We had.

We dreamed this up.

Shortly after we had skied a neighboring mountain, the fourth highest mountain in the world, lhotse, right next to Everest, and been working towards getting there and achieving this goal together.

JOHN YANG: How long have you been doing this sort of thing?

JIM MORRISON: Really, my whole life.

I've been trying to make a turn on the side of the ski run as a little kid and in the steepest, hardest, firmest snow I could find and see what I could and couldn't do on my skis.

And it's been my life's passion to climb interesting mountains all over the planet.

JOHN YANG: Climb interesting mountains?

In order to ski down, you've got to get to the peak.

Talk about the climb up.

JIM MORRISON: The mountaineering side of climbing mountains has always fascinated me, but I've consistently looked at it with an eye of how can I climb that route but then ski back down.

Because walking down is not nearly as fun as skiing.

This particular mountain, we climbed a route called the Super Direct on the North Face.

And in history, only five souls have ever made it up this route.

Through a number of attempts, from a whole bunch of expeditions.

And we got 12 people to the summit together.

And then I put my skis on and skied back down.

JOHN YANG: Some of the pictures I've seen, you had a very narrow margin for error.

You were skiing in areas where if you slipped, if you lost an edge, you'd sort of have a precipitous fall.

How did you manage that?

JIM MORRISON: It was hard.

First of all, I was very nervous leading up to this expedition.

I visualized the whole thing.

I trained for it.

And once I was on the summit, I just got very focused and paid attention to what was right in front of me, didn't pay attention to what was below me or the exposure and just made very calculated, careful turns, skied within my ability where I knew I could stay on my feet and not make a mistake.

And turn by turn, I made my way down 29,000 feet down to 20,000 feet.

JOHN YANG: I have no idea what the snow is like up there.

Was that a challenge, what the snow was like, or did it actually help you, or did it make no difference?

JIM MORRISON: The snow was very challenging.

We had a really significant windstorm just before went up the mountain that stripped most of the soft, fresh snow down to what was virtually ice.

So navigating the different terrain of the snowpack, the ups and downs, and the ice that was in certain areas was a real challenge of the descent.

At the same time, there was very little avalanche risk, which made it safe for us to climb and safe for me to descend.

In that regard.

JOHN YANG: You say skiing down, you had to sort of pay attention, make sure you're skiing within your abilities.

Was there a point at which you felt, okay, I can exhale now.

I think I've got this?

JIM MORRISON: Yeah, that point was at the very bottom when I crossed what's called the Bergschrund, which is the crack in the glacier at the bottom of the mountain.

Until that point, it was very intense, and every turn mattered, and I didn't have an opportunity to really let my guard down.

But once I got onto the flat part of the glacier at the bottom of the mountain, I had a true exhale of physical calming down physically and a real emotional release.

JOHN YANG: Talk about that.

What it felt like to actually do this when you know you had done this.

JIM MORRISON: Yeah, you know, this is something that we have been working on for so many years.

We were there three different expeditions trying to get up the mountain, and I had a huge team supporting me, a lot of people around the world pulling for me and helping me achieve this goal.

And to get to the bottom, to have pulled off climbing this direct north face of Everest and then skiing all the way back down was a dream come true and something I felt really connected to Hilaree and sort of honoring her legacy and our life together.

I was just exuberant and ecstatic and really had a hard time understanding how I was going to move forward.

I just felt like I was about to have a physical breakdown of emotion and thrill.

JOHN YANG: Now, you had major knee surgery just in April.

Was there any point this summer when you thought, well, maybe we'll do this next year?

JIM MORRISON: I was pretty committed to going this summer, but having surgery on April 23rd and going to Everest in the end of August was a real challenge.

I worked with a great team of doctors and physical therapists to get me ready and checked all the boxes along the way.

Felt really good coming into the latter part of the summer, and, man, it was quite a first run on a new knee.

JOHN YANG: Talk about checking boxes.

You've done this.

What's next?

JIM MORRISON: Well, there's all kinds of nexts in my life.

For now, I'm going to try to celebrate this achievement and share my story and start thinking about what other mountains there are to ski and what other places there are to explore.

JOHN YANG: Remarkable achievement.

Jim Morrison, thank you very much.

JIM MORRISON: Thank you.