Reinhold Messner, the first person to climb all 14 eight-thousanders without oxygen, arrived in Prague for his final major mountaineering lecture, *The Final Expedition*. Before his evening performance at the O2 Universum hall, he stopped by a press conference at the Smíchoff climbing wall today, where, alongside his wife Diane Messner, he answered questions from journalists and mountaineering enthusiasts.

"Adventure, silence, and danger are an essential part of mountaineering. Unfortunately, however, the wilderness is gradually disappearing from it. Today, you can climb almost any route on your own in a purely tourist-like manner, but true mountaineering begins where no one has ever been before, where it’s a matter of life and death - you either survive or die. Nature is a million times stronger than we are," noted Reinhold Messner at the press conference.

The entire event, including The Final Expedition, is organized by Honza "Tráva" Trávníček and documentary filmmaker Petr Horký: "O2 Universum will be the largest travel lecture in Czech history; 3,800 people are expected to attend - only Hanzelka and Zikmund had larger audiences, but that was back in Czechoslovakia," he noted, highlighting the scale of the project at the start of the press conference.



Due to high demand, the organizers had to move the evening lecture from the original Congress Center to a larger hall at the O2 Universum in Libeň, near the newly renovated Českomoravská metro station.

"Reinhold really loves it here in Prague, so we want to make him happy by showing him how warmly the Czech Republic has welcomed him," added Tráva. 

According to Reinhold Messner, climbing has changed radically in recent years, but we must not forget how traditional mountaineering originated. That is why it is important for him to pass this legacy on to the next generation. "My wife Diane helps me with that. Today’s climbing is beautiful, healthy, and has its own ecology, but it’s not the same as mountaineering," explained the 81-year-old traveler. His wife Diane sees the biggest difference between sport climbing and mountaineering in the fact that performance in mountaineering cannot be measured in any way.



"I would never have climbed a mountain with oxygen, but today my health wouldn’t allow me to do so without it. As a European, I feel a duty to honor the tradition of mountaineering as shaped by its pioneers, such as the British," added the Italian adventurer.

"My relationship with the mountains has changed many times over the course of my life. After losing seven fingers on Nanga Parbat, I could no longer climb as I had before. But high altitudes never ceased to fascinate me, so I undertook ascents of lower peaks as well, for example in Africa or Alaska. But after turning sixty, I told myself that was enough; I started building my museum and telling my story," concluded Reinhold Messner. He received invitations to speak from places like Ukraine, as well as from St. Petersburg, Russia, which he declined.





The project also included a special evening event at Pražská křižovatka, which was reserved for a limited number of business guests, leaders, and public figures. The event was graced by the presence of Czech President Petr Pavel, who had a brief private meeting with Reinhold Messner and then listened to his entire lecture, including the subsequent discussion. The organizers reported this in the afternoon in a follow-up statement after the press conference.

“For me, this is a meeting with a man who has spent his entire life pushing the boundaries of what is possible and showing that people are capable of incredible things—while remaining completely down-to-earth. His storytelling draws you so deeply into the narrative that at times it feels as though you are right there with him at those 8,000-meter heights,” said President Petr Pavel, according to the aforementioned press release.