Nik Wallenda
I've trained all my life not to be distracted by distractions.
It's Niagara Falls. It's one of the most beautiful natural wonders in the world. Who wouldn't want to walk across it?
There was no way to focus on the movement of the cable. If I looked down at the cable there was water moving everywhere. And if I looked up there was heavy mist blowing in front of my face. So it was a very unique, a weird sensation.
One of the things I enjoy is the challenge of Mother Nature.
I feel like I'm on cloud nine right now.
I'm facing Niagara Falls - the wind and the mist and the dark and the peregrine falcons - and I'm going to stay focused on the other side.
I hope what I do and what I just did inspires people around the world to reach for the skies.
I am so blessed. How blessed I am to have the life that I have.
I'm often very relaxed when I'm on the wire. There may be some tears because this is a dream of mine.
This is something no one in the world has ever done.
That mist was thick. It was hard to see at times. The wind was wild. It'd come at me one way and hit me from the front, and hit me from the back.
I was not scared at all.
I started walking a wire when I was 2 years old, and this has been a dream of mine to recreate this walk.
I've seen the video played over and over, and it replays in my head constantly. To be able to walk in his exact footsteps is an extremely huge honor, and I did this for him as much as I did it for my family to get some closure too.
My great-grandfather, Karl Wallenda, was my biggest hero in life, my biggest inspiration behind everything I do.
We train very hard under windy conditions. I've actually walked a wire in my backyard with 90-mile-an-hour winds.
To do this walk, I believe it's around 2,000 feet, to go from the U.S. to Canada. I would train walking a wire almost 8,000 feet, to overtrain for this.
One thing that I pride myself on is, everything that I do is completely legit. We go through every channel, and do it the proper way.
If you take suede leather and put it on a piece of steel, and put moisture on it, it actually sticks.
Every walk that I do, there's obstacles in the way. There's always somebody or something that comes across negative, but I live for that sort of thing.
One thing that was passed on from generation to generation in my family, over seven generations in 200 years, was never give up. That's the way we live.
It's about carrying on the legacy and doing something I love and have a passion for.
A lot of praying helped me a lot.
The mist was so challenging and the winds hit me, definitely more than I expected. It was definitely those winds, you can't re-enact them, you can't recreate them. Then my forearms started to tense up and you feel like running.
I do everything I do to pay tribute to my great-grandfather.
What I'm doing is a natural wonder. If not, there'd be 150 people behind me on the wire.
If you think you can fall, you're more likely to.
I have never in my life walked with a harness. The weight of the tether, makes it feel like I'm dragging an anchor behind me.
The impossible is not quite impossible if you put your mind to it.
I'd love to come to Australia. I'd love to walk about the Sydney Opera House.
I have permits to be the first person in the world to walk across the Grand Canyon so that's a process we'll start working on. I'd say within three to five years I'll accomplish that as well.
I'm one of those people who always tries to overachieve. I want to do more. I want to do bigger things.
There's weight on me to raise the bar, to carry on that legacy. But that's what drives me. Making sure that no one ever forgets who the Wallendas are.Collection: Legacy
I'm always looking for the next major hurdle and doing something that the world has never seen.Collection: World
I'm often very relaxed when I'm on the wire.Collection: Wire
I respect what I do deeply. I don't get nervous to the point of fear.Collection: Nervous
You don't have to tell me how long I'm on the wire.Collection: Long
What an incredibly beautiful city at night Chicago is. Absolutely beautiful.Collection: Beautiful
The mist was so challenging and the winds hit me, definitely more than I expected. It was definitely those winds, you can’t re-enact them, you can’t recreate them. Then my forearms started to tense up and you feel like running.Collection: Romance