After facing two life-threatening situations on his way up Mount Kilimanjaro, returning home to find his office flooded for the third time meant nothing to Peter Taylor.

The architect had no idea his boilers, security systems and new carpets had been ruined by six feet of water - and he didn't care.

Mr Taylor said the 5,896 metre climb had shown him what really mattered in life.

The managing director of Peter Taylor Associates, in Mill Lane, Uckfield, said: "The whole point of doing Kilimanjaro is that it gives you an opportunity to reflect. So although you spend your time with a group of people, you're very much on your own. You find part of yourself fighting against the other part as you try to motivate yourself to keep going.

"Some of the things that seemed important before I went did not seem important when I got back, material things for example, and I now really appreciate the things you should appreciate, like family and friends.

"I may have been on a physical journey but the biggest journey I have been on is inside my head.

"So when I found the office flooded for the third time this year, it was not the worst thing in the world. A month ago I would have been really upset, but I am quite unmoved now because it's just bricks after all is said and done."

On one occasion during his climb of the highest freestanding mountain in the world, Mr Taylor, who lives in Nutley, had to climb up a 500ft sheer drop and on another he faced a 750ft drop.

The 50-year-old architect, whose previous climbing experience was simply walking in Snowdonia in the Seventies, said: "If I had fallen while climbing up these drops, it would have been Goodnight Vienna. I pretty much knew how dangerous it was before I went, but I was on a mission - I had to do it. It is pretty scary to think that three English climbers died while climbing Kilimanjaro in October though."

During the week-long expedition, Mr Taylor raised more than £4,000 in aid of Friedreich's Ataxia, a charity that funds research into a debilitating genetic disorder that affects one in 150,000 children. A friend of his has a daughter with Friedreich's Ataxia. That friend also lost a son five years ago to the condition.

Mr Taylor said: "The charity is so small, it needs all the help it can get to fund research to identify the gene that causes Friedreich's Ataxia. The condition affects the brain and the control and co-ordination of the muscles. Strangely enough, in climbing Kilimanjaro the main threat is altitude sickness and one of the main symptoms of that is ataxia. Fortunately, this didn't happen to me but it did happen to other people."

Mr Taylor was accompanied by two friends, Paul Russell, a farmer from Eridge, and Chris Parker, an architect from Hull. When he reached Kilimanjaro's summit, snuggled in seven layers of clothing, the temperature was minus 18C, so cold that another climber's plastic overcoat went brittle.

On his descent Mr Taylor was particularly inspired by a blind American girl he met nearing the peak. He congratulated her and as she reached out to touch his hand, he said he instantly felt a surge of energy go through his body. Afterwards he felt so emotional he cried for 15 minutes.

He said: "In a way I must sound like I'm mad, but it was such an overwhelming experience when that girl touched my arm.

"I had done it and I knew it took me right to the limit of my physical capability. But to be blind and complete those last three or four hours to the summit was absolutely phenomenal."

Mr Taylor now has the mountaineering bug and plans to go climbing in Costa Rica with his 16 and 19-year-old sons next year.

He would like to send his thanks to everyone who sponsored him.