Anne-Marie Flammersfeld

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Anne-Marie Flammersfeld (extreme athlete)

Anne-Marie Flammersfeld is a German ultra runner and extreme athlete. She is a member of the German national team for ultra trail running, the world record holder for the fastest female ascent and descent of Kilimanjaro.

In 2012, She was the first woman to win the Racing The Planet 4 Deserts Series. In that year, she ran 250 kilometres across four deserts – the driest, the windiest, the hottest, and the coldest in the world.

In July 2015, she set the female world record at Kilimanjaro: Starting at the Umbwe Gate, she climbed to the summit in 8 hours 32 minutes.

On the podcast today, we talk about her extraordinary experiences and how she got into ultra trail running and her advice for people wanting to go to the extreme of endurance races and what to do when the pain starts to set in.

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Transcript of our Conversation

Anne-Marie Flammersfeld

[00:00:00] Anne-Marie Flammersfeld: My next guest is an ultra trail runner and big adventurer. She has covered quite a wide range of the world from discovering this thing called the four deserts quite a number of years ago. She suddenly decided to pursue it and became the first German and female to win the competence. On the podcast today, we talk about some of her incredible experiences and delve in deep into the sort of psychology of this sort of ultra running.

We talk about the sort of mindset in which you need to sort of pursue and break through the sort of pain barriers. When times get tough and she gives some incredible advice on the podcast today about how to sort of focus your mind so that you can push through on these endurance events. So I’m delighted to introduce Ann Marie Flammersfeld to the podcast.

Yeah. Thanks a lot. Thank you. I was absolutely great to have you on and really sort of get down into what you’ve done over the [00:01:00] last 10 years and say, because your story. It’s truly amazing from how you started and then sort of got into the sort of four deserts race, which is probably where your sort of big expeditions sort of came from a before.

I always like to start at the beginning and how you sort of how this all sort of came about. Well, how it came about me too, to run through four deserts or two to be, get into these, we’ll try running. Actually it was it was really just a chance. I was, I was not a runner before I met a person while doing just a simple holiday trip in south America.

And there I met a gunner from long way and while doing a horseback tracking through, through the jungle and the forest of WIA at the end of the world and gonna then taught me something about the T’s going to the [00:02:00] Antarctic. Some days later and I said, okay, what are you doing there? Some whale watching.

And then he said, no, no, I’m, I’m, I’m doing a race for desert race, the 250 kilometers to the coldest desert on earth. You have to carry everything by yourself. And I just looked at him and said, what is he talking about? I had actually no idea that there is a longer distance. You can run as a competition, as a race.

Then, then the matter of. And so at that moment I thought, okay, that sounds really, really cool. Maybe when I’m at home, I do some research, but at that moment, I didn’t know what was coming in my future. So that was sort of how it all sort of kicked off there. It was just by pure chance someone had sort of.

Said they’re going to Antarctica and then sort of the research started taking place and the way, yes, definitely. I ran two [00:03:00] marathons before I was a little bit into this running scene, but I was definitely not infected with it running virus at that moment. And I was going for a run or for a job just to, to move a little bit around, but not to run distances level longer than 50 60 kilometers.

Yeah. Wow. And I suppose when, when this sort of all started, because I like, like you say, it does take a while to get that running bug or the running virus. So from the process of doing those two marathons, what made you, what was the sort of kick that sort of made you jump into doing the four deserts or these big ultra endurance races?

Wow. Good question. I haven’t figured out yet. But I can tell you that at that moment, when, when Guna told me about this name, racing the planet for deserts, that there was a [00:04:00] kind of a flame popping out of me. And I felt these enthusiasm at the moment do something what I’ve never done before and never dreamed about doing it.

So, but at that moment there was something. I think when you, when you go around the world with open eyes and an open heart, then these things can come to you. And that, that was that moment. I, I had at that time and so when I was at home, I did this research and I saw that you can run through four desserts, each 250 kilometers.

Self-supported everything is in your backpack. Organize. It just gives you. Well, you have to sleep with 10 people in and no shower, no hotel, no, no chef. You have to cook your own things. You have to carry everything once you, once you want to have during seven days and you have to carry it in your backpack and.

Yeah. So I, [00:05:00] I thought a lot about if I want to do it. And then I saw that you can do four in one year or all four in one year to get into this grand slam club. And then I looked at this club and there was no German at that moment. There were only seven people and no one from Germany. I will do it. I better bring the flag into the German national flag into these clubs and okay.

I will do it. And then it was April and I started with the training for the first race. What worked was in March, actually the next year. So I had 10 months, 11 months of training to prepare to prepare. And in terms of the training for that where you based up in the mountains where you are now, or were you more at sea level?

Because I imagine at in, up in the mountains at altitude was probably a much. Better sort of fitness then you would [00:06:00] have at sea level for something like this. Definitely. Yeah. Well, I, I, I’m born in Germany and very flat it’s more or less under zero. And in 2006 I moved to Switzerland and I’m, I’m really adapted to these attitudes here at 1,800.

And of course I have benefits when I go down and have a raised at sea level. But the training on attitude is more exhausting because I can’t adapt to 90%, 95% of the sea level, but there’s still. That five to 10% liquid leaking that I can’t get into the same performance, how I can do at sea level.

So it is harder training here and everybody who was in on attitude and wanted to train there in the normal speed or normal kilometers per hour knows that it’s suffering of oxygen. Yeah. But of [00:07:00] course, when you go down, then you have the benefits. Yeah. So with that you had 10 months sort of training and the first one of these four desert races, where is it for people who don’t know from the podcast?

Yeah, it is in in Chile, in the Atacama desert, the dry desert on. And then the second one is in in China, in the Gobi desert. It’s the windiest desert, the third one in the Sahara in Egypt, the hottest desert, and then three weeks later the coldest desert in the Antarctic. So you said you certainly get your, a fair, fair, fair share of extremes.

Yeah. Yeah, it is. Yeah. I don’t know. It’s just, yeah, it was really extreme idea to, to do it. Yeah. And with that they all take place over the year. How did you find the sort of [00:08:00] adapt team from the driest to move to suddenly the window? Yeah, well, actually it was every day that was really, really beautiful and nice.

And every desert was unique actually. And to go from the dry to the windiest desert yeah, it was tough, but it was not so tough as to go from. The hottest to the coldest because there were only three weeks in between. And and from the, from the dries to the windiest, they were, was at least nine weeks in between.

So I was changing back to normal and then I went to the. When you started was quite tough in the Gobi desert too, to run always against the wind. Always. Sometimes it came from the back, but normally it was coming from the front and yeah, you had to deal with it. [00:09:00] There was no other choice. You could have sit down and wait for something better, but at least no one was coming.

You had to. By yourself. There was no one who was putting away the wind or the heat or anything else. It was just you and your, your mental your mental thoughts. What was the driving force? How can I say. I’m not sure where abouts in the Gabey desert. It takes place, but we had Ash dykes on the podcast last year and he sort of talked about his, a walk or Trek across the Gobi desert and said that you moments you have just complete silence.

And it’s one of the quietest places on earth so much so that you can just hear yourself almost breathe. Well, not brief sorry, your heartbeat. You can hear your body functioning that say yeah, definitely in all the three desert. It was I’m I’m I’m the [00:10:00] same. I’m I’ve heard the same in the Arctic.

Quite noisy. Sometimes from the pink greens, they were making a lot of noise there. But I mean, in the Atacama desert, when you go out and you, you have the most beautiful night sky with the stars there, and you think you can grab the stars just when you lift up your, your arm. And it was really, really impressive.

And yeah, the silence, the nature, the atmosphere. To be in a place where actually not human being can survive a long time because there is nothing, no water, no shade. There’s wind. This is really unreal conditions. And you have to run to get further.

So with that, I mean, your backgrounds in sort of sports science, sports, psychology woods, that [00:11:00] key in terms of pushing through, in terms of training your mind to sort of go through this. Suffering let’s say, and being able to cope in such extreme conditions. Yeah, of course I, that at the Mo at the, when I started to train, I wanted to prove that what I’ve learned at the university at the squats university if it just if I can do it in reality or if it’s just a theory and so after.

The background of all these training signs and sports science. And so I, I I’ve wrote my training schedule for myself and I’m very flexible because I’m a person I, I, I’m not stuck into today. I have to do 20 tomorrow. I have to do 10 dadadadada. I know that. What I want to do, but I look around in my mind, which trainer today fits for me, good or suits to me or which one I like, maybe [00:12:00] I am today.

I run 20 kilometers. And I seeing, okay, where do I want to go today? What is fun for me? And then I started, and then on the next day I say, okay, today, maybe it’s better when I do a shorter one. Okay. Where can I go? Maybe I run up on the mountain and then go down something like this.

I was sort of saying to that’s the sort of psychology of it. It’s about finding something fun while training to do. Yeah for me. I would say it was the right schedule and this is what I would recommend to everybody who wants to do something like this. First the most important thing is that you really like to do that you really like what you do, that you have fun, what you do, that you enjoy what you do when, when it’s not.

Then it’s every day, every time it’s suffering and then you don’t like it, [00:13:00] and then you’re working against it and it costs a lot of energy and it is better when you start a project. Totally. You don’t have to run a marathon. It’s just also a profession. When your job or a project, it is, you really have to enjoy what you do.

This is my, my, what I really, this is my mission, actually, what I am. And yeah, the second thing is, of course, you need to improve your fitness to get better step by step by step. And, and I was listening to my body a lot and when I felt there was a pain, maybe in my knee, then I stopped the training a little bit.

And then I went to the physio. Then I increase the kilometers per week, a little bit more. And when I saw that it was going on quite well, I was going on and. It is a sensitive mixture of what you want to do and what you can do. And when you don’t listen to your body, then I think you, you can’t perform in a good way.

[00:14:00] Wow. And yeah, I suppose with that, for people listening it’s when you were going through, let’s say the Gabby desert, having the wind in your face, Was there enjoyment still there? No, sometimes not. I’m honest. And I was honest in that always when I suffered and of course it is allowed to suffer and it can’t be every day, a hundred percent smiling and positive energy.

They are crisis, but. I found out that the crisis can come and it can stay for one hour or three hours, four hours. And it’s just, yeah, it’s very, very bad feeling bad. The crisis will go some, some moment it will go over. And this is effect, I would say. The crisis comment and the crisis [00:15:00] goal. Boom, I would say.

And and the most important point I would say is that you recognize the. And on that point, when you’re recognized, then it’s over. But this is the sensitive thing that you, that you really have to step out of your mind and to look from a bath and to see, oh, she has a crisis. Come on, wake up. And then you can perform in your a hundred percent.

When you, when you’re not, when you’re in the crisis, you are maybe 60, 70% and you are fighting against, oh, what is that today? Why can’t I run in my pace? Oh, everything is so boring here. Why am I doing it? All this mindset what’s going on. Then when you listening with a good attention and awareness to these thoughts, this you have to train actually then you can stop it before it goes into the circle, down, down, down, down.

[00:16:00] Yeah, I would explain it a little bit in that way. Yeah. Yeah. Say the idea is that when you’re doing these sort of trips or these expeditions or races, the idea is when you start to feel suffering, you have to recognize that you are. Was that one of the things, one of the main things you were sort of taught in sports science, sports, psychology.

And then from there, you can acknowledge that this is any temporary and that you can sort of move forward from. Yeah, this is one method. Actually, there are quite a lot of things you can do also, for example, to work with pictures in your mind that you imagined something. What, what helps you for example You have to create a picture from a place you really like where you feel that there’s a lot of positive energy where you can relax.

It could be, I don’t know, place at the end, the [00:17:00] nature, the little lake or at the sea or wherever. It must be something where you can relax and where you, when you are. Really positive. And then in that moment, you can just imagine that picture. And then all the positive energy is going from the picture to your body.

And then you feel everything is fine. I am I’m at my place where I can relax and then you still can run, which you stick to in your mind. And it helps a lot to overcome a crisis. So that was one of your main coping mechanisms when the sort of four desert racists sort of put you into the extreme. Yeah, I tried these pictures at the visualization.

We call it and with a mental coach, with a friend of mine, and we did some hypnosis sports hypnosis where I was forced to do, to create pictures. And for example, my, my biggest concern [00:18:00] was that I, how would it be when I’m in this heat, in these extreme hot days? ’cause I, I live here in the Swiss Alps and I normally have six months of winter with temperatures between minus 22.

Yeah. I understand. And then the summer is it’s warmer, but we have maybe between 15 and 20 degrees. So it’s not 30 to 40 degrees. And then I my mental trainer, she said to me, I, that I have to create a picture. What could. And so for that case that I was running in the hottest desert and that I was not able to deal with the heat.

I, my picture was that I would imagine to run through an ice cold snow storm and that I have to feel the snow on my skin that I w here are the snow cracking underneath my feet that I smelled the snow. So I worked these picture with all my five senses. [00:19:00] And then I put it into my mental box. And when I was X, for example, in the Sahara, in the hottest desert, and it was extremely warm and hot, I remembered my picture.

And then it worked and I even got a chicken skin from, from cooling down myself, even to, to thought on, on, on, on that picture of this ice cold snow. Goose bumps. Yeah. Yeah. Wow. And so with those four deserts, you completed it in all of one year and became what the first German, the fastest female is that right?

Yeah. Everything even in general, the first person, the first woman to, to win all four in one year, no woman has since done it before. And did that sort of, and say, did that sort of propel the ideas going, [00:20:00] because after that you sort of, you’d done completed this challenge of the four deserts and did that sort of propel you into thinking of more bigger grander ideas or.

Yeah. I found out that I maybe had the tenant in running long distances, which I, I was not sure that I had it. And so I. I was looking into these calendar of rules for trail running races. And I saw that there are a lot races on all over the world. And, and then I, I looked and I, but it was quite hard to find something not to talk over the top, but to what is not singular, but a little bit different.

But yeah, it was a little bit of a chaos. And then. Actually I started these bottom up climbs project with [00:21:00] two friends. And it was a little bit like when I met Guna this time, it was with a friend, we were in the ski lift and he asked me, do you want to come with me from the lowest to the highest point of Switzerland?

I said, yes, I come with you. No idea from where to where so sorry I live in Switzerland, but I knew that it may be the lag of yoga in in the, in the control test. And but the highest point, maybe the matter horn, but it was the two foot pizza with 4,800 meters, something like this. And yeah, I said, yes, let’s do it.

And then it was so that my two friends that did it with the bicycle because they are more cyclist. And I said, okay, I’m a runner I found out and I will do it by my own feet. And then I did it in five days actually to run from the lowest, to the highest point of Switzerland. 250 kilometers. [00:22:00] Yeah.

And 5,000 vertical meters, something like this. And yeah, this was the start of the bottom-up clients to go from the lowest, lowest to the highest point. And in that year, after the four desert, I also run the monastery. A trail race in the Himalaya, and this was eight days and maybe 16,000 vertical meters and 220 kilometers, something like this.

And yeah, I was really into this running virus from that point on. Yeah, it was sort of the adrenaline that you were sort of getting from these races or these challenges. Yeah, maybe I drawn a lien. Maybe it was the yeah, to, to, to think that I can. Go all over the planet cannot not as a tourist more than an athlete to go from one race to another race and to explore culture, to explore places where [00:23:00] I would normally not go to.

It was more the exploring thoughts more than the adrenalin, actually. It was the driven force. Yeah. But Yeah. I really like to do new things. This is also because why I never did two races twice, so I always did something new too, because I thought, okay, they have so many races, very nice places.

And as long as I want to do it, as long as I can do it, then I go into places and countries where. Yeah, maybe I will never go again, something like this. Yeah. The sort of idea of using, running as a way of experiencing the different countries or different cultures is there. I think it’s a really amazing way to sort of see different parts because you run through plate is probably what she otherwise would never have the chance of explore.

And by doing that, you discover so much more about the [00:24:00] place and yourself and everything that sort of goes with it. Yeah. Yeah. The culture of things and you see places and people and people see you running and they think maybe what is she doing here in my place, but it’s so special. And I always met nice people around there.

And yeah, I’m really thankful for that, that I was able to do it. Did you on your, on your sort of progression from not even a rhino to suddenly doing these sort of epic challenges, did you have any sort of trouble because to sort of go from zero to a big runner, I math it must’ve been quite a transition for your.

Did you have any issues in the sort of transition or not really? No. No, no. It was more that, that my body was reacting quite well. I I was really surprised about this because yeah, no, the [00:25:00] January medicine. They, they tell you, oh, you have to be careful with your knees. You have to be careful with the hormone system.

As a woman, you have to be learned a lot of, like I said, but nothing happened to me. So I think my body can tolerate these distances. And of course, sometimes I have pain here and there and I have to go and see my therapist. And but I would say that. Look at my body a little bit more serious than maybe the general people and that I see when something is not right.

And so the transition from I actually, I think I’m still a normal person but the transition to, to run long distances it was, yeah, I think there was a force in myself. There was this. Yep. Power that wants to come out and to run just to run. Yeah, because you’ve [00:26:00] done, as he said, some of these meeting trips, one that sort of caught my eye, which I found fascinating was your world record Kilimanjaro run, which I have to admit slightly jealous.

There are some times on this podcast when people do something, I’m like, ah, that’s something I really would love to do. That’s okay. Yeah, the Kilimanjaro. It was, yeah, very nice project actually. And I, this was part of this bottom up climbs, seven bullet Kanick summits. And we, with my two friends, we flew to, to Africa, to Tanzania and we had.

I started at the C level to cycle five days through the country to get to the bottom of the forest on the, of the, of the Cayman Java. And then we just walked as normal tourists up in four days on the Cleveland jail. And then I had two days for resting and [00:27:00] yeah, I thought when I started this project, maybe it, it can be that I am, I’m able to do it.

And when I have the power, I will start and just try it. And I had really no good acclimatization. I was cycling five days. At least 350 kilometers through Africa, we came there and then we went up in four days. I was suffering a lot of the altitude and not a good, I’m not good at altitude. Actually it is up to 4,000.

I’m good. But then I really need to have time. And we had no time because we had a really, really tight schedule. But I felt quite good. And then in the morning, two days after I was on the top, I started totally alone in these very, very black dangle. This was my biggest fear actually. [00:28:00] My friends were there at the start and they were cheering me and then I was alone and I was so afraid that I maybe will meet an animal or another person’s suddenly.

And I was just lying my big hat lamb, which is good light. And I was just running, running, running, running, and don’t look left or right. And then I was really happy when the sun came up and I, that my eyes were able to see everything and that my fantasy was not playing any tricks on me anymore. Yeah.

And then I ran up in, what was it? Eight hours, 32, something like that. Yeah. And I broke the, the former record with three hours or, yeah, but when I came up to the top, I was really because I was not, definitely not acclimatized. I was suffering a lot and I, every 1000 meters there was a guy and [00:29:00] he was waiting there for me to, to see if I’m okay.

And. Some water and some bigger warmer clothes closest for me. And then on the top, there was one waiting for me. And I was so slow when I was coming up and I was so slow going down until 3,500 meters. And then I said to him, okay, now I can run again. I was able to run until my friends were waiting for me and.

Very nice that threatened people listening. We’ll probably sort of wonder what sort of, what’s the sort of feeding, like when you’re at the top of Kilimanjaro, because you’ve run up you and what’s eight hours. And if we’re obviously suffering from altitude sickness was to sort of feeling that you’re getting, when you’re up there, did you have sort of time to sort of take in that you’re at the top?

Or were you like right now? I need to get that. When I was on the top, [00:30:00] I just thought I need to get down. And I felt some headaches and dizziness. I, yeah, I was I was not attitude to the sickness or sick but it was more, I, my mind say to me, okay, don’t waste too much time. Just go down. And it just.

A big thing. When, when you, when you come up and realize that you have done it, I mean, the time I was not watching all the time, I had my, my, my, my Garmin and I started the gum and what I was not looking on it the whole time. I actually, I never do it because it’s stresses me a little bit when I when I watch the watches all the time and So when I was on the top, I just pressed it and said, oh, it’s eight hours, 35, 32 minutes.

Okay. And then I realized that, okay, let’s go down. Yeah. And so [00:31:00] when you go to the bottom where there’s people that are greeting. Yeah, my friends were waiting there and all the guides, they, because you, you are not allowed to go on the chemo without guides. And everybody was there with some process caused some pain or was it, I, I can’t some bubbling water, sparkling water, and, and I got some.

Blankets traditional blankets and some flowers. And and then we went back to the hotel and I was so tired and I think I, I got some fries or pizza and two beers and it was just party, I suppose. That’s the one good thing about sort of ultra running or ultra endurance running? Is that after you’ve.

You can stuff your body with whatever you want. It’s one of the guilty guilt guilt-free pleasures you can get in life. Yeah, this is a, this is really nice. And I’m a kind of [00:32:00] person like this, this I can suffer and I can force my body until the limit. And then when, when it’s over, I say, okay, it’s over now.

Let’s have the party please. Well, and so from that, your plan is the seven summit volcanoes, which you’ve already done. And you’ve got three pending or four pending three here, three pending. And when’s the plan to do these three volcanoes. Yeah, well, it’s at the moment with the COVID situation, it’s not so easy to travel and there’s the one in Russia missing the amount elbows, which will be the next one because it’s yeah, it’s easier.

The easiest, one of the three missing ones and the next one would be the one in Papua New Guinea. Yeah, it’s quite far away and a very long trip. And [00:33:00] the last one, I don’t know if it will be possible, but it’s down in the Antarctic, in the, in the code. And it is really expensive. And I don’t know if, if it’s still Make a bill with all this climate change in the world.

If it’s really necessary to fly there and to do something, just have a private project. But yeah, we will see maybe there will be a chance that we can fly with someone who going there cause it’s really, really expensive. And then maybe we will get the chance. Chances coming, like, let me see that midway, but Russia, I would say it’s possible and demand herbalists it’s yeah, it’s calling actually.

Yeah. Yeah. It’s, it’s, it’s an interesting sort of topic that’s sort of come more mainstream is traveling for pleasure. And it’s a sort of difficult one to sort of weigh up, especially [00:34:00] when you’re doing these sort of personal projects. Do you feel it’s become a bit more of a. Topic with you. Yeah, well, it’s just, I mean, these bottom-up claims, these are actually quite, quite nice for the environment because I never use any motor.

I just do it by myself by my own power I cycle I run, but I have to go in a special country to do it. And Yeah. I mean, when I do it once a year, when I fly one time a year or one time in two years, then I think it’s still okay for, for me. And yeah, it’s a, it’s a big question. How are we can save our planet and I think I’m not the person who is who has.

Yeah, who can talk in a, in a good way about it. Yeah. Yeah. It’s sort of one of these, it’s a very sensitive theme and, and everybody has to, [00:35:00] to look on, on him or herself that, how can I save, what, how can I save energy? How, what can I do for myself? And yeah. And flying, of course, it’s, it’s not so good.

Taking the train would be better, but even to cycle would be the best thing. And they have like, from time to time, it is good when you can go out in an airplane to another country to have an adventure. Yeah, yeah, exactly. And have this sort of experience and sort of just see a completely different part of the world to yours.

One of these wonderful challenges we face in the future. Yeah. Yeah. When it’s an in unique challenge when it’s unique and it’s quiet, good plant. Yeah. Yeah, but I think there are a lot of people who are saying, no, no, you can’t go on an airplane anymore, but yeah. A different, different theme. Yeah. [00:36:00] And we’ve with these trips, of course your sports psychology has become sort of a huge part of it.

Because as you say, it’s a lot of the sort of endurance things. It’s more mental sport than actually a physical because you. And what I’ve found over the years of doing these is you can put yourself through so much more than you ever possibly imagined. Have you found that you’ve almost reached your limit, would you say, or do you feel through the future, you’re going to keep pushing it, keep testing it.

Interesting question. I would say that in running, I, I haven’t found my limit yet. I would say I, I, I can go further, further, further. And I would say when there would be a really neat that I had, that I would have to leave my home and to go for, I don’t [00:37:00] know, then I would say I would be able to, to walk or to.

As far as I can go, but I haven’t found my limit yet also in racing unless I’m ill or if there is an accident or something that stops me. But when there is no pain in the body and, well, actually there is a pain in the body, but when it’s not so. Just the big pain like that. It’s a ruin yourself or ruin the part of the body.

Then you can go, you can, when you can’t run, you go, when you can’t go, then you walk. And when you can’t walk, then you don’t know, you slow down, down, down, down until you stop. And the other thing is that with all these races and adventures, I, I learned that there is always. That always comes away. And it is a little bit like this crisis thing [00:38:00] when there is a crisis, I know that the crisis can go and I, I actually, my character always, it was always a little bit like this.

Let’s try it. And I’m, I’m not a person who says, is it possible? Can I do it when I feel that from the inside, this is this inner power or this flow, what to recall it. Then, then it is possible. I don’t know what is the outcome, but for sure, I will. And I laughed to jump into the cold water and then I think, oh, maybe I’m not in the right place yet.

Can I go back? And yeah, something like this. Yeah. Part of the show where we ask the same five questions to each guest each week with the first being on these trips or expeditions, what’s the one gadget that you always take with you.

I always [00:39:00] make a playlist and I always make a playlist with songs I’ve never heard before. These are new songs and they remind me when I’m back. And couple of years later when I hear the song, I definitely know exactly where I was when I was listening that song. So sort of in the Gabby desert, you have your song.

Yeah, I can tell you when I listening to special songs that I was there, that I was suffering and I was all that also in the Atacama desert. I knew that when I knew that after the fifth stage one more was coming and. At least one hour ahead of the second woman, I knew that when everything is going on like this, that I will win it.

And I was going through these tent campsite and I was listening to a song. And when I hear the phone, I, I, I back into this feeling. I can tell you everything. What would, [00:40:00] was there in detail? So what was the what was the song when you’re going through Antarctica? Whoa, Attica. I wasn’t listening to more or less the alternative playlist with snow patrol and Bush and and block party, block party.

Yeah.

Things like this. Yeah. What is your favorite adventure or traveling? I never read adventure and travel books. I got a lot of books. People gave it to me as a present, but I, I never, ah, no, no, I never read it because I want to, to get in my own experiences. So when, when someone says, oh, there’s a book, someone has written about that, what [00:41:00] you are doing.

Thank you, but I want to be fresh when I go into a new adventure for myself, but now I remember that, and it’s quite a funny story that I read a book about hair got hanger hair, got hanger. It’s the first German was on the Mount Everest in 90, 90. And she was then doing the seven summits and I read a book, the first book from her.

Where she was writing about the, her experience and her adventure from the Mount Everest. And I read it in 2002. And in 2019, I met her here in my hometown just by chance because she was here with her new book and she was on a, on a how can you say, on a travel on a journey to present her new book? And I say, Hey God, you go by star.

[00:42:00] And she was, since that we are, we are good friends. Yeah. Yeah. This is a story about adventure books. What about your favorite quote? Cool. Ah, ah, they are a lot actually. Mm, mm. This is maybe from from you know, her, his little girl from the book from us, the link, then the strongest girl on the world, unfortunately.

Acid Lincoln, she’s a writer and she wrote lovely books for, for, for children. And she’s the strongest girl on the world and she say how can I translate it? We, we haven’t done this before and [00:43:00] therefore it will go quiet. Is it right? Translated HighSpot now that’s happened. so it means like we haven’t done this before, so the output can only be positive.

Okay, good. Yeah. Why, why are these adventures important? Because I laughed to explore. I laughed at junior things. I love to put myself into situations where I’ve never been before. I, yeah, I really liked to, to, to see how I react, how, how I can adapt to new situations. And yeah, this is actually my fourth.

Nice. What’s the other one? The other one is. People listening are always keen to sort of travel and go on these sort of expeditions like yourself. What’s the one thing you would recommend [00:44:00] to them to sort of get started. To go to do something like yeah, I mean, I, I, I think I said it before, you have to really want to do it.

You have to really feel joy and passion and these flame of, and to the ASM to do something. What gives you. Positive energy and where you can feel that it comes out of you. So don’t do anything. Once someone is telling you, you have to do it. You have to go there, you have to do this. I think it’s yeah, you, you really have to find your own thing and your own project and it’s not, must not have been That it’s always faster or bigger or something more than someone has done it.

Just create your own project. That’s where you go out of your comfort zone. And yeah, I would recommend. [00:45:00] That you find your way and you’re this kind of like, you want to do it. Like you want a cycle, you want to walk, you want to go in, in a boat. You want to, I don’t know, to go with a parachute somewhere.

You have to find something where you’re feeling quite grounded. Yeah. I suppose with these and like having spoken to a lot of people on the podcast, it’s, it’s about knowing your, why. And by having that and having a strong why means that you can sort of push yourself further and you can tolerate some of these hardships that you go through.

Yeah. And I would say it is I mean, you need to have an objective without an objective, you, you don’t know rather you have reached it or not, but I think it’s really important that you have part time objectives that you are not disappointed when you are not [00:46:00] able to reach the big goal.

And yeah, I think this is also very. Finally now, what are you doing now? And how can people follow your journey in the future? Oh, well, I’m, I’m on Facebook or Instagram. I’m sometimes I’m doing a little videos here from my home hometown. I call them hello from Switzerland and there is kind of funny little videos and yeah, I, I hope that I can go on with my bottom-up climbs.

I. Yeah, since COVID I have done only little things. Yeah, and, and, and then this year I want to go from maybe from, in Greece, from the sea level to the Olympic, to the highest mountain of, of Greece. Yeah, you can, you can follow me on the social media and sometimes I’m writing my blog. Things are coming.

[00:47:00] But I, I like to be more outside than writing and typing something. Yeah. Oh, wow. Well, it’s been such a pleasure listening to your stories and I cannot thank you enough for coming on today. Thank you. It was really a nice talk. It was different to two other ones. Yeah. Very good question. Yeah. Thank you.

Well, I mean, it’s really interesting cause I, I think the sort of your head. You’re the sort of psychology of it and sort of being able to keep putting yourself through those sort of tough situations are hugely important. And thank you so much for sort of sharing that advice to the listeners and everything.

I’ll remember it next time I’m out. Yeah. Thank you. It’s just coming out with, I mean, yeah, I’m, I’m, I’m talking a lot about these things because people ask me always, but Yeah, your questions were a little bit different. Yeah. What’s nice. Yeah. Not the standard ones. Yeah. Well, thank you so much [00:48:00] again.

Yeah. Thank you.

Oliver France

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Oliver France (expedition leader)

On today’s Podcast, we have Oliver France. Oliver France is a British Adventurer and Expedition Leader specialising in guiding groups through remote and hostile places.

Oli France has led teams through some of the world’s most dangerous and least visited countries, including Iraq, Somalia, Yemen, Turkmenistan and D.R. Congo. To date, he has travelled to 70 countries. He has climbed mountains in half of those, including the likes of Mont Blanc, the highest peak in Western Europe, Halgurd, the highest mountain in Iraq, and Nyiragongo, a vast volcano in the jungles of the Congo which contains the world’s largest lava lake.

Enjoyed the Show? Tag me @johnhorsfall on Instagram

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In March 2020, Oli completed a solo and unsupported 16-day 405-mile trek/ski across the frozen length of Lake Baikal, Siberia, the world’s largest freshwater lake, while dragging a 60kg sledge, becoming one of only a handful of people to do so alone.

Oli’s adventures have taken him through deserts, jungles, mountains, and war-torn regions. He has faced spies, interrogators, minefields and arrest, along with avalanches, earthquakes, killer snakes and severe dehydration, all while attempting to complete challenging journeys in remote corners of the world, either alone or while leading a team.

Today on the podcast, we talk about his expeditions and some crazy experiences growing up in adventure. Don’t Forget to Subscribe and Review the Podcast if you have enjoyed it so far. A simple review goes a long way to help the podcast grow and your support means everything.

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Transcript of our Conversation

Oli France

[00:00:00] Oli France: My next guest is an adventurer and professional expedition leader. He has spent the last decade embarking upon Intrepid adventures across the world. In the winter of 2016, he traveled over land by any means and loan from Hong Kong to Istanbul along the 8,000 mile mountainous spine of Asia crossing, 11 countries and climbing 14 mountains in Midland.

His adventures has taken them all over the world. And today on the podcast, we talk about some of his incredible expeditions around the world. So I am delighted to introduce. Ali France to the podcast. Thanks very much, John. It’s a pleasure to join you today. Well, it’s absolutely great to have you on, I mean, you’ve been to so many countries your time traveling has taken you over to 70 odd countries.

You’ve been from Hong Kong test. Ambles Serbia, Iraq, the Congo, and I can’t wait to sort of jump into it. But I always [00:01:00] like to sort of start at the beginning and sort of try and understand how you sort of got into this sort of line of work. All these adventures. Yeah, absolutely. So this has been, this has been sort of a lifelong journey to, to, to get to this stage, really.

And it was, I grew up in a, in a, in a small town in Northern England and was really only introduced to the outdoors at the age of 16. I went on this outward bound weekends and did climbing for the first time. Got instantly. Off the back of that sign up to a three-year university degree course in outdoor leadership which is believe it or not an actual degree.

And really that was the start of it all. And I was just hooked this degree cause gateway. Gave me the opportunity to learn from some of the best instructors in the UK, in the fields of mountain area and rock climbing, canoeing, kayaking. They encouraged us to go off and travel in our summers. [00:02:00] And ever since then, I’ve been trying through, through various means to just forge this, this career and our venture.

And I’m absolutely loving every minute. Well, because I know that you are up in sort of the, sort of around the lake district. Is that sort of the place where you you’re sort of grounding for these adventures sort of happened? Or was it more of a punt somewhere around the world? Flick a map and you’re like, right.

I’m doing that to the. Well, I suppose it was, it was quite a close link between those two, because yes, at the age of 16, I went and had my first experience in the outdoors and got hooked. And then the age of 17, I remember. And, you know, just to give context, you know, managed to fit in a lot of travels in the time since then, Starting now.

I had no idea what I was doing. [00:03:00] No idea whatsoever. And I remember I just passed my driver’s test. So I had this beaten up old car, my girlfriend and I, we went up to try and climb the highest mountain Scafell pike in the light district. I had no clue what I was doing. I was wearing a big thick ski jacket, you know, sweating like crazy.

I even took, took these little collapsible chairs with me, cause I thought, well, where are we going to see. And I distinctly remember going up that mountain, you know, having a horrible time, not knowing what I was doing at all. And yet all these people coming past me look so comfortable and content, and they were breezing along.

They had the right kit and I thought, I want to get to the stage where I’m as comfortable in these harsh conditions as they are. And that was the light bulb moment for me. I realized that I needed to go and do the training, do the. Learn from experts and yeah. Push myself out into more of those environments.

Well the deck chairs [00:04:00] used at the top of scalper pike. Well, we would’ve gotten them out of the top, but we didn’t make it, which is hardly surprising because yes, we, I couldn’t navigate at that stage. The cloud was coming in and it was raining, as I say, that whole thing was a Columbia. But you know, I’m probably not the first person to, to have made these big mistakes.

The important thing is, is figuring out how not to make them again. And so from there he, we always, always a failure. It’s the best way of learning. But from there you, I suppose probably had bigger plans to sort of travel the world. Yeah, that’s right. And that’s right from my time at university, I wanted to get up, get out there, you know, I’d grown up with this Macklin or my, or my bedroom wall and I was obsessed with the world and reading about it, learning about it, reading adventure books [00:05:00] and.

So I went off and worked in America one summer and the next summer I wanted to push things a little further. So I’d led to bits of Arabic. I went out to Lebanon at the age of 19 spent about six weeks out there living with a local family. And that was, you know, that was an eye-opener Lebanon was, was just coming out of a wall.

I was planning to go into Syria inside that that was just all kicking off with the Arabs. Following year, I went over to Gunda that went and did a big gap year after, after university. And I just could not get enough. And things did change though. When I got back into the UK after all of those travels kinda checked my bank account and thought, well, you know, maybe I’ll need to get a proper job at last, like everybody’s been telling me.

And so I did that unfortunate plastic thing of just falling into a job, which I really did an engine. [00:06:00] I was selling kitchens or at least trying to sell them, but I was absolutely hopeless. And, you know, I had that in many ways. It was a great job. The, the wage was good. There’s a nice bonus scheme. I had a company car, a phone, a laptop, you know, I had the freedom to work from home to work on my own schedule.

I have very little pressure from my boss. It sounds like the dream job. Both. I’d never been as miserable in my life because all of this excitement from adventure from travel, it just disappeared. It vanished. And for two years I worked that job completely miserable. And so it got to the point where I realized if I’m going to carry on trying to forge a career in our venture, I really need to do something about it.

And so what I did, I quit my job with nothing else lined up whatsoever. It was [00:07:00] terrible timing. I had a house renovation ongoing. I was just about to get married. I had no prospect of very future work, but I quit the job and decided to embark on probably what remains my biggest and most ambitious adventure to date.

And I plan to journey from Hong Kong to Islam. Alone in the middle of winter, traveling by any means across the mountain, the spine of Asia and climate, at least one mountain in each country visited. And that in the, the start of 2016, that was what I set out to do well. And so from. So that sort of journey.

Was there any, what was the planning like for that trip for Hong Kong testable after you quit your job? How did it all sort of come about from the idea [00:08:00] to the first day in Hong Kong? Yeah, good question. And very much simple concept is point a to point B. And yeah, that’s what I knew that that was the premise of the trip, but then I realized all this there’s so many intricacies to this.

There’s so many different routes you could take different countries. You could go through there’s bureaucratic issues, visa, visas, you need to pick up, et cetera. And of course the big issue is actually trying to raise the funding for it. At a time, when, as I say I was, I was going through the house renovation, had a wedding coming up and I had to quit my job.

So what my focus started to be on was, was fundraising for the trip. So I’d managed to talk ups talking. Some local sponsors got a bit of local newspaper coverage. Worked with a couple of local schools. You know, gradually managed to build up some [00:09:00] funds to such an extent that actually the plumbing took rather a backup.

And so about 10 minutes before I was due to fly out to, or sorry to be picked up to go to the airport, to Hong Kong, I was still, still the thinking in my pants and my underwear in the kitchen. I, in these spokes labels onto my t-shirt and, you know, cramming last items in my bag. So it wasn’t the perfect planning and preparation situation.

But then there I was in Hong Kong, a few hours later with a bag of stuff. With a plan I need where I needed to go. It was 8,000 miles away. On the other side of the continent. I had some basic ideas of, of visas and how I could travel about, but really it was a case of let’s just see where this journey takes me.

I didn’t have exact route in minds. I wanted to be free and open to possibilities to change in plans. And I think actually for this particular trip, [00:10:00] having that flexible approach. Really did pay a difference. And it allowed me to just experience so many things, which I could just say yes to the click of a finger and go off and have these little extraordinary signup.

And. How did they and take it? Yeah. Well, you know, I told you I was rubbish at selling kitchens, you know, probably missile this trip as well, because when she asked me how long it was going to take, I kind of scratch my head and say, Well about six weeks it turned out to be almost four months. So yeah, it w it was it required a bit, some, some difficult conversations, but luckily I do have a very supportive wife.

The, the wedding did go ahead when I made it back some months later on. So starting in Hong Kong, what was the sort of root test and book? Because you are climbing every mountain and every region you went [00:11:00] from Hong Kong into China, and then sort of what down, done a loop down through Vietnam. Back up into China through the Northern parts of Tibet all the way across China, central Asia, and then across over into the Caucasus countries and Turkey to Istanbul.

That was that was the roots. Oh, wow. And so climbing every mountain where you guide it on these mountain trips or where you just go in it. So the majority of the tracks I was doing solo, a couple of them were guided for, for different reasons. So it, Vietnam, for example, was climbing the highest mountains in fancy pan and it’s virtually impossible to get access to the mountain without the local.

And actually, you know, sometimes having those local guys really just have to the experience and it’s something I do a lot of now is, is [00:12:00] employ local guides with, with the expert knowledge because that really can be a valuable, it can help you get it in a tricky situation. Other times it was, it was a case of taking a look at a mountain range.

Say I was in Almaty in Kazakhstan, for example, you’ve got the tier, the Northern part of the 10 child mountains just to the south, just to enormous, massive, huge white snowcap mountains. And I actually met a local mountain guide deck. Got some advice from. They suggested a mountain. And for the next few days I went off and did it and divvied up on a three and a half thousand meter Ridge and just have this extra ordinary soul of adventure.

Certainly wasn’t without its risks, but but yeah, it was your on a wing and a prayer taking, taking big risks, you know, being bold, getting it out in the mountains and trying to achieve that goal. I’d set for me. I think we ha we [00:13:00] had Harrison Carter on last week and he was all the week before. And he was basically saying the, that how valuable it can be to take a guide.

I mean, a lot of the time people think, oh, I need to go it alone because it it’ll be about me, but actually how valuable it is for getting local knowledge about where to go, what are the best bits? And sometimes they show you things. Which you would otherwise miss? This is, this is something which I absolutely agree with.

And it’s something which I stick with now. Personally, I do always, always find a local expert, a local guide, or have some kinds of local support, especially when going into more volatile or risky high risk areas that, that layer of security that they give you. No matter how much research you did. You know, on your, on your laptop, having that local expert, who knows where he can and can’t [00:14:00] go.

Any things that you should be looking out for where your water sources could be, that source of local knowledge, it’s there. You just need to find that person who can give it. And to, to ignore that, you know, you’re going to be making things harder for yourself. And often as you say, it just adds to the adventure.

We can be obsessed with doing everything ourselves. And I certainly was guilty of that when I first got into travel, but the more I’ve traveled yes. Having those local contacts has just proved to be totally invaluable. They’re a good example along that trip where you Along that trip where you sort of, their knowledge became sort of essential.

I’ll give I’ll give one example. I was in, I was into GQ, Stan and I was in capital D two shamba and I was looking for my mountain, my touching mountain across the GQ status full of mountains. I think about 90% of the [00:15:00] country is over 3000 meters. So there’s really no shortage of mountains, but I wanted something interesting.

And I’d read. And in the museum, actually, I just went in there one day and saw this tiny notes about these fossilized dinosaur footprints, which could be found there, this remote mountain village into GICA Stan. And that’s all, it was one sentence. I did some reading online. There was virtually nothing available.

And then it just so happened that that evening I spoke to somebody whose family was from this very remote village. And she said, if you want to go there. I’ll say, come with me the next day. And so we jumped in the shed taxi, you know, we traveled for couple of hundred miles across the country to make it to this to this very remote small settlement in the mountains, went around speaking to the villages about this about this idea of these fossilized dinosaur footprints.

Some people believe me, some people didn’t some said, oh, yes, I’ve heard about. [00:16:00] Ultimately, we we got a few people together and we went off and ventured out into the mountains. After several hours of tracking, we came across this enormous 50 or 60 meter cliff embedded on, which were hundreds of fossilized, dinosaur footprint.

And it was one of the most extraordinary journeys. And without that local guides, without that local expertise, there is no way I would have stumbled across that remote cliff near this near this power of village into Digi-Key Stan. So yes, that can just be a gateway to the really extraordinary next level experience.

Yeah, I completely agree with you. I remember on one of my trips, I was heading across America and heading towards salt lake city and my, at the time, my American knowledge was. Next to nothing. And I was heading to salt lake city. I [00:17:00] stopped off at this place called Jeffery city. And I was at a bar speaking to one of the bikers there.

He was like, where are you going? I said, salt lake city. He said, oh, you don’t want to go. I was like, well, why not? And he was like, you take a detour and head towards sorta Jackson hole. And like, I didn’t know what Jackson hole was at the time. And anyway, from there sort of Jackson lake, the Teton mountains, I went through the mall and it was the most sort of spectacular, one of the most spectacular places in America.

But just by that sort of one chat with the local. Change my entire route across America. And just going, going with local knowledge, I think is so important on some of these trips. Yeah, totally agree. I’d so you sort of went through what 14, about 11 different countries on your route. Some of them probably [00:18:00] quite.

What sort of year are we talking with this? So this was 20 16, 20 16. Cause you’re going through probably cause I was in central Asia three years. Okay. You came through quite some quite closed off countries. Did you have any issues along the way with those countries? So, yes, the big one that Springs to mind is, is when I crossed over into was Pakistan.

And it was interesting because I’d spent, I spent my time traveling through central Asia and, you know, I’d heard whispers of this, this drug trafficking trade coming up from Afghanistan, Afghanistan accounts for about 95% of the world’s heroin supply. And much of that goes up through central Asia. So it’s very sensitive.

For that particular issue led on top of that was Pakistan is a very strict dictatorship. And [00:19:00] so I knew that I had to be careful and ongoing. As I cross the border from Tajikistan, it was, it was late at night. I was the only person crossing the border. I’ve been warned, just be careful in those Pakistan.

And sure enough, as I got into the border, they stumped my passport, then took me into this other room and said, okay, we need your phone, your camera, your laptop. We wanted to look at everything in your bag and we’re going to do a full body search. And that was, that was that for the next two hours. So they scrolled through every file on my laptop.

Looking, looking at my phone, as I say, did a full body search. That seemed to be all going fine. And then in my rucksack, they found my first aid kit, which contains some Co-codamol tablets, essentially strong painkillers and unbeknown to me all, all that perfectly legal in the UK. They’re clusters, an illegal narcotic in those Pakistan.

So from that moment [00:20:00] forward, I was detained as a drug trafficker and, and interrogated for several. Ultimately, I was detained for five days. In those Pakistan, I was taken down to the Afghan border. I was had loads in urine samples taken, you know, there was all kinds of strict measures imposed on me.

Ultimately, I was driven out to this. What turned out to be an ex KGB military posts and they’re offered two options. It was either 30 days in jail or pay a hefty fee. And let’s you say it was the best $500 I’ve ever spent. If you know anything about those back. The biggest bank note is worth about 50 P.

So to get $500 worth, I ended up with a carrier bag full of cash, which I was taken into this remote military outpost to pay my way out of [00:21:00] jail. And so, I mean, it was this crazy story after I paid the fine, I did get my passport back and, and the guard actually said to me, okay, you’re free to leave was Becky’s done now.

Boats. I had no intention of leaving. I wanted to carry on my. Luckily I befriended the interpreter who had been helping me and he helped me to get into a taxi, which took me way up to the remote part of the mountains. There. It was Pakistan and there would, I will carry out my journey. But that was only after being followed by police, having policemen, spy through a bedroom windows.

And ultimately take a 500 mile journey across the country, change in taxes in every town to try and evade the police and get myself out in the country. So that was quite the adventure really? Yeah, so it was, Pakistan stays quite high in my memory. Sure. Here at I’d say, I, I love [00:22:00] this Pakistan when I went, I think it has some amazing people in such beautiful architecture.

But I didn’t get the chance to sort of see the mountainous region, which is something I might look back on. But these sort of adventures sort of took you have taken you all over the world. I mean, you’ve been to over 70 odd countries. And you’re one of your recent ones was in Siberia, probably on a more different, it seems that you quite like the cold and the mountainous regions.

So Siberia was 60 days. Is that 16 day, 16 days walking across the lake up there. How, how did that trip come about? So this was like by Cal, which yeah. Is, is located in Siberia, just north of Mongolia. And it is the world’s largest freshwater lake and every winter because of the extreme [00:23:00] temperatures there, the entire light surface freezes over.

And a couple of years before the trip, I’d seen some images of this ice and it was just extraordinary filled with these cracks and bubbles and formations. I’ve never seen anything like. And, you know, trip inspiration comes from all kinds of different places. But for me, for this one, it was just this image of this extraordinary ice.

And, and so I started to think about a journey there and. You know, as I did my research, I grabbed, I brought Julie through to appreciate the true scale of this lake. It’s it’s just over 400 miles long, which is about the distance from London to Edinburgh. It contains a third of the world’s fresh water.

It’s that big and it’s also a mile deep making it, the world’s deepest lake. So it is just this massive expansive of ice. And I’d heard of a few people going out there [00:24:00] and doing these tracks along the surface of this ice in the winter. And so that was what I set out to do. And so it would be a 405 mile journey.

It will be fully solo, self support. I’m dragging all of my stuff. And in a 60 kilogram yes, which contains the tents, the, my sleep environments, stoves, my few, my safety equipment, everything I needed to survive on that lake for 16 days. And what sort of temperatures are we talking about here? So in the real depths of winter, it can get down to around minus.

When I was there, it was little later in the season. So you tend to wait until around early March when the lake is completely frozen, was still the temperatures. The air temperature was around minus 20 at night. And then when you went up to that day, they often Gale force winds. It it [00:25:00] really is quite cold of there for sure.

Yeah. Wow. And so 16 days without seeing anyone. What was this sort of scene scenery like there for people who are listening, it’s probably quite difficult to sort of explain, but what’s the sort of feelings and the scenery that you have when you’re out alone on this freshwater. Well, the most profound thing really.

And the thing that takes a long time to get used to is just being on the ice. You know, that constant knowledge that if you were to make the wrong step on a particular patch, you could potentially go through the ice. But this surface is like living beast. And you have this island called Vulcan island, which has some shamans living on it.

And they regardless late by Carlos as a living beast. And having spent time there, I can totally understand what they made because it is constantly moving, cracking, shifting, banging. There are [00:26:00] these pressure ridges, which form, which might be, you know, four or five meter high, just jumbles of ice. You get these great big channels of open water, which you need to overcome.

And as I say, you know, even when you’re sleeping in your tent and. On the ice, because I did come upon the ice using ice screws to secure my tent, the ice you’re lying, but your face just inches away from the ice and it is constantly shuttering and tremoring and banging. It really is quite, quite disturbing and unsettling and yeah, no matter how long you that you, you never fully get used to that sensation.

Okay. My life is at the mercy of this at this of this ice underneath me beside the ICU got very, very mountainous area right around the lake, particularly in the Northern parts. And there it is just pristine beauty. I remember one day [00:27:00] often it was stormy and windy, but one day it was beautiful conditions.

Blue sky, no wind whatsoever. Just a nice thin layer of snow on the ice. And I sat down on my pole that lunchtime, and I don’t think I’ve ever heard silence like it because there’s virtually no wildlife up there either. Especially at that time, you know, most of it will be hibernating or migrate away. And it was just total, total silence, nobody around the perhaps a hundred miles.

That was a really special moment. Well, it sounds absolutely incredible. And so food, are you dehydrated food? So you drilling holes in the lake to try and catch fish. Would’ve loved to try that. And actually near a couple of towns, you do see people doing that and they have an amazing setup with these huge tents and wood-burning stoves and plenty of Vulcan.

No doubt, because I was offered some on occasions. [00:28:00] But yes, my, my diet was much more along the, the, you know, the idea of squeezing as many calories as possible into his little weight as possible. So it was dehydrated meals. It was big blocks of cheese flapjacks cooked meats, chocolates, not I would also use sort of meal replacement powders, which are just a quick hit of calories.

So I was consuming around four and a half to 5,000 calories a day. And then towards the end, closer to six and six, six and a half thousand calories. And that will condense down into about a kilo of food. And I budgeted for 20 days. So 20 kilos of food, the good news is, as you go on, your sled is getting gradually lighter as you eat your way through that.

The enormous stash of food. Yeah. And that’s, that’s definitely the best way of sort of doing it, I feel. But I imagine the idea of sitting under a tent, a warm [00:29:00] stove, fishing, must’ve been quite tempting at times. Yes. Yeah, it would have been, it would have been quite a cool little experience. And so from this, this is sort of, what’s propelled you into this idea.

Well, this sort of guiding as your sort of career in the adventure really, hasn’t it, it’s the sort of mini trips. It sort of cemented your passion for the great outdoors. Yeah, that’s absolutely right. So particularly after this big Asian expedition in 2016 you know, I, I’d always done bits of work with other people, coaching and guiding a lower level.

More and more, you know, I, I was tempted to move away from these solo experiences and just share the mountains and the great outdoors with other people, because that, that is really an extraordinary experience in itself. [00:30:00] Seeing new places and new experiences through other people’s eyes, seeing the joy they get from those, those travel experiences and having the privilege of, of being there guys.

And so, yes, I’ve decided to really dedicate myself to. To Toronto achieve that as a career. They took some extra qualifications as a winter mountain leader, and really put my teeth by just getting out there and leading tours and expeditions right across the globe. And they’ve taken me now to 22 countries.

I’ve guided people through right across Asia and Africa including some, some quite unusual destinations like Iraq and Somalia and Yemen. And. And all the time meeting countless fascinating people from all walks of life, from various nationalities. And really now that has become my big passion and something, which I’m very, very excited to get back to in 2022.

Now that this COVID thing is blowing over.

[00:31:00] So Iraq I know that you’ve been there quite a few times. What makes you go back again and again, what is it about Iraq that so appealing? Yeah, I get this question quite a bit, because of course, Iraq is not known as a tourist destination, particularly it’s you know, all you all you tend to read of course, about to rocket, a negative news headline.

And I have found time. And again, when I’ve been to places such as Iraq is, you know, people live in normal lives, starting businesses, having families, that’s not newsworthy. So you don’t hear it hear about it yet. In these countries, you’ve got millions of people doing exactly that. You know, yes, there may be these extraordinary incidents that, you know, the terrible and do happen occasionally.

But you know, if you careful with the right guides, you can avoid that. And Iraq was one of these places that I do [00:32:00] remember having a particular degree of you know, hesitation about going to, you know, you sign up to these trips. In a nice, comfortable living room at home, you know, it’s just answering a yes on an email often or something like that.

And then it’s very different feeling to fly into that country, looking down on, you know, what has been a war torn country for years, but actually what I found very quickly. Was when I got into Iraqi is one of the most spectacularly hospitable kind, generous, warm places that I’ve visited. And everybody who I’ve taken there has said the same thing.

And so, yeah, I do have a real strong connection with the country now, particularly the Northern part, the Northern Kurdish part, where I’ve spent most of my time. But yeah, it’s, it’s, it’s just a fascinating place which breaks down all of those stereotypes. And I did want to try and [00:33:00] push things a little further, which I think I mentioned too before about this idea of going out and trying to climb the highest mountain in Iraq, which to that point that had actually only been done by a handful of foreign foreign climbers.

Oh, God and I there, I think you’re so right with that. See, many times people hear these sort of stories of these countries and they only see one side. And as you say, on a day to day, 99% are just getting on with their lives, doing pretty much what we do on a day to day, get up, go to work. You know, family food, whatever it is, that’s their day-to-day just like us.

But of course, the media sort of quite often portray some of these countries in such a negative light. Yeah, absolutely. And sometimes it is just a case of, well, let’s go and say it for myself and [00:34:00] you know, that’s not soft and the best proof and just seeing something for yourself, making those human connections, which no matter where you go, no matter the language barriers.

It’s possible to build those amazing human connections and to communicate and to laugh and to share stories. Like I say, even if you don’t speak the same language it’s possible. And that for me is also one of the most extraordinary things about travel and your sort of guiding expeditions. What other parts of the world have you sort of visited where you’ve sort of come into such incredible hospitality and the kindness of strangers?

Well, central, Asia’s certainly open there. As I mentioned to GPS, Stan was Pakistan and over the that’s yeah, I would say around us, got to be up there. You know, I I’ve been around, I’ve been on the list for, for years and I know you’ve been there as well. [00:35:00] And all I’d heard from everybody about re Iran was it is the friendliest place you’ll ever go to.

And, you know, it’s hard to argue with that. Having been. Geos this extraordinary warmth from, from the people in the country. And, you know, it’s not unusual to get invited into people’s homes to get you know, offered cups of tea and to, to, you know, constantly be bombarded for selfies. Yeah, Iran is a fascinating and amazing place.

And again, that’s where that separation comes in politics and people, you know, often we, we judge countries based on their politics. But forget about that. You know, it’s all about the people and 99% of people, wherever you go, whatever their religion are good. And, you know, time. And again, I found out to be.

Yeah. I, I had such an amazing experience in sort of Tajikistan it’s Pakistan. I remember in Tajikistan, we were in like the wakhan corridor and for anyone who hasn’t been [00:36:00] there, it’s like two mountains, either side and you go through the sort of corridor. And anyway, we were looking for a place to camp. So went up onto the sort of.

A slightest Scotland at the top. And as we are, they’re sort of unpacking thinking we’re in the middle of nowhere. So me, these kids run out and the father runs out, father didn’t run, sorry, walks out. And we were like, oh God, now we’re going to be kicked off for anything in any way we get sort of chatting and he’s like, come in, come and have supper with us.

You know, don’t pitch your tent there on the rocks, come pitch it on the grass. And we just had the most amazing night. That with them. And, you know, they showed us around, told us where to go. And it’s just these little experiences that you get along the way that make such an amazing experience of travel and everything that goes with them.

Yeah, I couldn’t agree with you more. And sometimes the most powerful word is [00:37:00] hello. It is making that introduction, you know, because we can stare at each other and figure each other out a little bit. And sometimes as cultural differences you know, in terms of how you would approach a stranger, but just breaking down that barrier with.

You know, that can just lead to these extraordinary experiences like yeah. And you’ve also said that you’ve been sort of the Congo Somalia, Somalia is an interesting one because one, I didn’t know a lot about it, but probably for people listening, that’d be really interested to sort of know what, what sort of guided tours or what you were doing over there.

Yeah, so Somalia is very interesting and yes, that is a genuinely unstable place. It’s a very, very tribal country. So you get large expanses of the country, which are controlled by various tribes. In the Northern part, you got the Southern part, which, you know, [00:38:00] you got Mogadishu down there. The capital.

That is without question very dangerous. And I know people who have been there you know, typically they’d have five or six armed guards around them at old times. I’ve not been there and don’t have any intentions of of going there, but open the Northern part. You’ve got Portland, which is again, slightly less volatile and then Somaliland, which is a region.

Yeah. The Northern part, which backs onto the, the red sea. And that’s been a semi-autonomous state for, for a number of years now, the, the trying to get their real recognition as, as a separate country. Compared to the rest of the country is a fairly safe place to go. And it’s got some really fascinating sites.

And so one of the big things was a place called Los Gale, which sits way out in the Somalia desert. You have to drive for hours to get there, but what it is is [00:39:00] this enormous cave structure, which contains hundreds of these prehistoric human rock art paints. And this has actually only been discovered a number of years ago.

And I’ve been out there twice now with groups that there’s also a fishing port that you can go to. But the, this cave is just extraordinary. And for me, it’s, it’s sort of, it’s a metaphor for this idea that often exploration, you know, we think about the poles and we think about the Himalayas and big mountains.

Well, there’s another, there’s another sort of angle to, to exploration, I feel, which is these places which have been cut off for so many generations through war, through dictatorship, which contain these real gems that nobody has explored before nobody’s seen before. And yeah, I can, I can think of a small handful of places just like that.

You know, another one would be the Yemeni island of Socotra, which I was lucky to go [00:40:00] to last year. Just these amazing little gems, which get no tourism whatsoever. Yes. They’re hard to get to. Yes. You need to be careful and take local gods with you thought they are some of the most extraordinary places on the planet.

Amazing. God, it sounds just so incredible. And you’re so right. This sort of idea of exploration. A lot of people put it into a sort of narrow box or a narrow idea of adventure and exploration, but it can be so much more than that. And yeah, it’s just awesome to sort of hear your stories and hear such amazing, amazing stories from such, you know, con misunderstood countries in a sense.

Yeah. Yeah. That’s that is really where my passion lies now is just, just pushing the boundaries and, and try and as hard as possible to forget those stereotypes. Of course, thinking about [00:41:00] safety, safety, and planning for that. Bonnie for a very extensive like boat pushing beyond those stereotypes and getting out to places that most people don’t have willing to visit.

Oh, Ali, thank you so much for sort of coming on and sharing those stories. There’s a part of the show where we ask the same five questions to each guest each week with the first being on the sort of trips and expeditions. What’s the one gadget that you always take with you. Yeah, you might have heard this one before.

This is, this would be my Garmin inReach, which is a satellite tracking device that allows you to communicate with the outside world. It’s got great, big SOS pasta in which you hope never to press, but it’s there. If you need it, I’ve traveled without that and got myself into hairy situations. Well, having that as, as a backup layer, safety buffer to me is invaluable.

And I would recommend it to anyone going out into, into the wild. [00:42:00] Yeah, we, we had one when we went across central Asia. And you can also track exactly where you’ve been and say, it’s also good to sort of show other people where you are at any given time. What about your favorite adventure or travel book?

This is a very soft form because I really do love adventure, adventure books. One I read recently, which is probably not too well known, but I would recommend to anyone is called 438 days by Jonathan Franklin. And it is this incredible tale of survival. It’s without giving too much away a Honduran Honduran guy.

You found himself in Mexico working as a fisherman out in a storm. Everything gets swept over overboard, his motor coats out, and then areas where there’s inexperienced crew mate in a boat with only a little bit of food. [00:43:00] And, and, and this is a story floating across the Pacific ocean for yeah. You guessed it 438 days, but yeah, what an amazing story about survival, I believe it’s going to be made into a TV show or film, but I would fully recommend getting your hands on that book and reading it very inspiring.

I remember that story came out, believe it, or sort of visit and believe it. No. Yeah, I will have to check that book out. Why are adventures important to you? The me, and probably for many people on your podcast, it is just my life because I thrive off it when I’ve had long periods without adventure. You know, I really, really miss it and I crave it and you know, probably the biggest reason, you know, we only have one opportunity.

You know, this thing called life. And so I just want to grab it with both hounds and to just have an amazing rides and to not [00:44:00] have any regrets and to get out there and see how much of this amazing planet as I possibly come. Favorite quote. So this comes from John Milton’s paradise lost, and it is a mind is its own place.

And in itself can make a heaven of hell a hell of a. Essentially, that means that whatever situations we find ourselves in, we can use our own perspective to make that a good thing or a bad thing. A thing that was a really useful thing to keep in mind often in hard situations and in expeditions or.

Yeah, I think yeah, that’s a good one. I like that. People listening are always keen to travel and go on these sort of trips and expeditions like yourself. What’s the one thing that you would recommend for people wanting to get started? The big one is just start, just start. And I speak to so many people who said, oh, I’ve got this [00:45:00] big plan to eventually do this.

And I just need to shuffle some things around, just need to, after this job, I just asked them, if not now, then when you know, just a case of just starting, just go, just go and do something. It doesn’t need to be the biggest, most expensive dream expedition. First of all, just get out the front door, go climb a mountain, go meet some people, go have a micro adventure.

Just start, get stuck into it. Learn things along the way, build your way up. Learn, learn from experts if you possibly can and have a great time doing it, but just start that. Yeah, very true. I think quite a lot of people said that when people just sort of say, oh, I’m going to do this and do that, you know, you just stand there and be like, okay, well, I, I believe you go going through it.

Yeah. Yeah. Make it happen. Finally. What are you doing now? And how can people follow you in the future? So as I say, things are hopefully looking out for 20 to 22, I’ve [00:46:00] got number of trips planned and also very excited to launch my own expedition company, wild edge, where I’ll be guiding people on, on remote and wild adventures across the world.

So please do come say hi at Polly underscore France on Instagram, and you can follow all my updates there and hopefully join me on an adventure some time. And it’s wild edge.com. Wild-edge.org.org. Amazing. So Ali can’t thank you enough for coming on today. It’s been an absolute pleasure listening to your stories.

And as I say, you’ve got quite a number of trips and expeditions lined up for 2022. So we’ll be following along, following your journey and And thank you so much for coming on today. Yeah. Thanks very much, John. It’s been been an absolute pleasure to connect with you and [00:47:00] and had a great conversation.

Darren Edwards

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Darren Edwards (Disabled Adventurer)

On 6th August 2016, Darren Edward’s life changed forever. Whilst rock climbing in North Wales, he was involved in a severe fall that would leave him with a life-changing injury. With a rock section unexpectedly shifting below his feet, he was sent tumbling uncontrollably toward his climbing partner below. The damage he sustained would leave him instantly paralysed from the chest down with a severe spinal cord injury. Yet, as he was prepared for aerial extraction by the Mountain Rescue, he made an essential and life-changing commitment to himself. He wouldn’t be beaten.

He has pushed himself at each stage of his rehabilitation to come back stronger and prove what can be achieved by someone with a Spinal Cord Injury (SCI) and disability. Adventure has very much been at the heart of his recovery.

Since first dreaming of learning to kayak as a way in which he could continue to explore the great outdoors, he has gone on to train as part of Great Britain’s Paracanoe Team, to pioneer adaptive freediving in the UK, and in 2021, to become the first disabled person to kayak from Land’s End in Cornwall to John O’ Groats in Scotland – a distance of over 1,400 kilometres.

He has refused to let the word disability define who he is as a person and is committed to helping challenge the perception of what those with a disability can achieve.

On the podcast, we talk about how the last five years have impacted his life and some of the amazing things to come out of it. Don’t Forget to Subscribe and Review the Podcast if you have enjoyed it so far. A simple review goes a long way to help the podcast grow and your support means everything.

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Transcript of our Conversation

Darren Edwards Adventurer

[00:00:00] Darren Edwards Adventurer: Hello, and welcome to the modern adventure podcast where explorers and adventurers tell their stories coming up. When I had my accident, I had almost this kind of like bank of resilience that I can start tapping into and trust me, I needed to tap into it. I think had I not gone through those life experiences in the buildup to maxed and tested myself and pushed my limits and, you know, push myself out of my comfort zone and grown as an individual, that whole growth mindset kind of staff, if I’d then gone through what I’d gone through and had to overcome a new type of adversity and life’s biggest challenge.

And this is a challenge that, you know, climbing a mountain or going through, you know, selection with special forces reserve. You can quit at any point. You can turn back around the mountain, or you could just say, you know what voluntary withdrawing, I don’t want this enough kind of thing. Whereas with this challenge with a life-changing injury, there’s no get out clause.

There’s no give up because you just have to. [00:01:00] When you have to keep moving forward. My next guest is an adventurer and disabled speaker. Thanks for having me, John. It’s an absolute pleasure. I think you’ve got an incredible story sort of to tell on the podcast today. And one that I sort of feel well, I think probably.

It’s best just to sort of jump straight into it and just start right at the beginning about how this sort of love of adventure sort of came about and what are you doing? Because I know that you were, you were training to become like this sort of army reserve training for the SES having this huge plans and then something dramatic happened that sort of changed the course of your life.

Yeah. Yeah. I guess for me, I almost feel like there’s two kind of like clear chapters to my life. There’s kind of a crux where things really change and life changes quite dramatically, pretty damn quickly. And the sort of the person that I am is [00:02:00] still the same. I’m still someone said to me that a life changing injury kind of strips away your sense of identity and who you are as a person at the time.

I kind of. Worried that that was true. I was worried that I was about to lose who I was as a person. I was always adamant that I wouldn’t change at my heart. I would always be the same version of me, perhaps in a different way. So, you know, growing up, I felt like a little bit of a misfit. I was in a friendship group, which was interested in football and drinking and girls.

And while I liked football and girls, I was never much of a drinker and it wasn’t until I was 17 that I met someone who became my best friend, who, you know, came from an adventurous kind of lifestyle. And with someone that climbed in and wanted to be a Mountaineer and was kind of moving in that direction in his life.

And he really pulled me in that direction as well. He got, kinda gave me a taste of, of what it was like to, to live more adventurously and to not kind of live for the pub and the football pitch and for the girls. Whilst, you [00:03:00] know, the, the, the, the latter still remains an interest obviously, and, you know, all of a sudden.

We live up in Shrewsbury and the west Midlands we’re about an hour and a half from from Snowdonia. So my first kind of indoctrination into this world was going up crib Goch Snowden. And just having this real revelation of this is kind of the sort of person, this sort of lifestyle I want to lead. And the thing that I want to make me me as a person.

So for what would have been nine years, I kind of develop. My skillset and my interest and my love for climbing and mountaineering, you know, moving from just kind of hiking at the start through to traditional rock climbing, sport climbing, climbing in the Alps, you know had the absolute honor and privilege of climbing Mount Blanca in 2014 and going back to climb Mons, Rosa, which is the second highest in 2015.

And. Life was moving in one direction. And one, one clear, well, there were two clear goals in mind. The first of mine was to, to climb in the [00:04:00] Himalayas and it was, you know, probably apologize for the mispronunciation of this, but making plans to go to climb Cheerio in 2000 and what would have been 17. And like you alluded to, I was part of the army reserve and I was going through the selection and training person process for the, for the SES reserve.

And I was two years into that. I’d gone through the select physical selection process, which is known as Hills, which is just physical torture over the mountains of south Wales. And the Brecon beacons, just pushing yourself beyond what you think your limits are and pushing yourself so far out of your comfort zone.

You wouldn’t know how to find it. If someone turns around and said to go back to it, and that was it. And my purpose in life and my drive in life and my, my passion were to achieve these two goals. Kind of had the same elements to them. They were, they’re both extremely challenging and extremely rewarding.

And then life changed pretty dramatically in an unexpected way when I was a rock [00:05:00] climbing in north Wales. So probably about an hour from me in a place called in an old limestone quarry. So really sketchy would probably be the best word to describe it. It’s a real loose rock. And that the slight irony of, of where I had my accident is the crack itself is called world’s end.

Little did I know that that day potentially would kind of represent the end of my particular world at the moment. So it was the 6th of August, 2016. I was climbing with the person that introduced me to, to this world nine years earlier to Matt, with Matt. Sorry. And we’re kind of at the final pitch of what is 120 foot rock face, and I make the final.

Sen and I’m putting my gear in as I go. And I’m stood at the top of this 30 foot section and I’ve made it you know, as far as I’m concerned done Matt’s going to come up to me and we’re going to walk off and go home. The final sort of pitch [00:06:00] was, was a little bit tricky and, and Matt was struggling to get up here.

And we were conscious that he was going on a, on a date that night with a first date, with a girl from Tinder. And she kind of like ticked all these boxes. So he was super key and he was like, right, come on. We gotta go. We gotta go. So I think he was getting a little bit frustrated. He couldn’t couldn’t make it up to me.

So the quickest thing in our heads was for me to quickly rig up an app set and go back down to him and walk off this kind of like middle ledge together and back to the car, which is parked down the bottom. And it was kind of when we were doing that, I was going through the motions of setting up my, my anchor point and abseiling back down to him that.

As I looked down and it’s this sort of thing that you probably do hundreds of thousands of times before anybody listening, that’s, you know, a climber or a mountain there, you stand on the edge and you’re confident and comfortable standing there. But it was, as I was kind of peering over my shoulder and saying something back down to Matt, that was more than likely about the date that night.

And I’m pretty sure it was [00:07:00] I think the word catfish you might’ve been used, I was like, it’s gonna be a catfish. And it was the last thing that I’d say to Matt. And before I know it, the ledge though is on shifted below my feet and I froze, I completely froze. And within seconds, you know, probably a millisecond, my rope started to zip through my, through my BDA device, mobile device.

And I just, it was like being on a roller coaster ride at a theme park where you get that initial. And you kind of get that pit, this summit feeling, but it just kept going. And before I know it, you know, I’m falling straight back down, what could have been a hundred foot drop. But fortunately for me, you know, what probably lasted three or four seconds felt like an eternity.

And in that moment I knew I had such kind of like crystal awareness of everything that I stood to lose. And the kind of the nature of the first time in my life, I was completely out of control of what was about to happen to me. That was genuinely really scary [00:08:00] because I didn’t know what was, what was going to happen in the next couple of seconds.

I land flat on my back on the ledge that Matt has stood on, which has probably no more than six foot wide. And I start to tumble. So I’ve landed on my back. At that point. I’ve broken my back. I don’t know it at the time. I know that I’m in pain. I start to tumble, I tumble through like a thorn, but so I’ve got a scar that runs probably from.

My wrist all the way up to, up to my shoulder. So that was going to insult to injury at that point. And I don’t know it, but as I’m tumbling and I’m about to tumble off this next, next sort of 40 foot section, Matt has seen, seen me Lana’s sprinted over to me. He has rugby tackle me and he’s rugby tackled me on the edge of this next ledge.

So without a doubt at that point, and he’s, he saved my life and stopped me from falling any further. And yeah, it’s kind of those initial seconds of confusion and panic and kind of trying to come, come to terms and understanding of what’s just happened [00:09:00] and probably on that ledge for about an hour before the mountain rescue team turn up and the situation starts to be assessed.

And that’s kind of got me stable and it was in the timeline before mountain rescue turned up. I tried to stand up for the first time and it felt like the whole world hurts kind of like pivot. In the middle of my back, the top half of my body, the top half from my chest up had moved as if it was to stand up.

And it was in that moment that I had this real dawning realization that I couldn’t feel my legs and the brain simply didn’t know that three-quarters of my body existed. And I think in that moment, I realized that I was seriously injured. Until that point, the pain that I was feeling was from my arm, from wrecking my arm as I fell.

So my main concern was the fact that I’d broken my arm or that I seriously injured my arm. I didn’t really think about. The fact that I might have injured my spine, or I had a spinal injury [00:10:00] and we put that initial 30, 45 minute period down to shop and kind of it would wear off and I’d stand up and we think no more of it.

And yeah, probably two, two hours a elapsed by the time the, the coast guard helicopter is there. So obviously we can’t use a normal air ambulance just because of the exposure of the cliff. And that kind of starts a five months journey for me through intensive care being told the next day by surgeons and, and the guide operates on me when I arrived at the major trauma unit as to what I’d done as to get to the level of my injury and the severity of my injury and the very, no, no shit.

Talk in assessment of. My sort of prognosis was that the level of damage I’d broken my back at TSX, which is kind of where your breast bone meets in the middle. And I’d not just really broken my back. I, I, without being too graphic, I’d snap my back clean into, as I landed, I landed on a, [00:11:00] on a piece of metal hex, one of my, one of my climbing nuts.

So the, the force of the impact had been, you know, times by 10 at that point. And I, yeah, completely dislodged my spine. My spinal cord was severely injured and that’s kind of the, that’s the thing, you know, there’s this breaking your back and not affecting your spinal cord. Some people can, and I’ve met people in hospital that came in paralyzed from the neck down and over the course of six to 12 weeks, they rediscover the ability to walk because the swelling on their spinal cord reduces.

But for me, it was such a cold hearted prognosis of we’re sorry, but this, this is it, you know, we’ll know more, but this is, this is you for the time.

Wow. And the sort of rehabilitation of it. I mean, your partner that you were climbing with [00:12:00] cause did you fool, you fell next to him. I, I thought you might’ve fallen on him. Did you fall on him? So I fell probably I think a couple of feet, six foot to the left of him. And, and then he grabbed you just before you could fall off again.

So I kind of, I gave him the, and that’s something that I’ve always remembered is as I was falling, I had enough time to, to shout his name. I think four times, because I was, I was, I was physically letting him know what was happening. Cause he would have had no idea, you know, as far as he was concerned, I’d set up myself to, to come back down to and take my gear out as I, as I was going.

And that was it. So he was, had, he still been clipped into the rock at that point, which he was, he would have seen me land. And unless it unclipped quick enough for you where he’d never would have made it to me because w we’re [00:13:00] talking seconds between me landing and me going off that next ledge

and the, I suppose for people listening, it’s the, the mental strain of coming to terms with your situation. How, how was it in, in a sense. Of having all these goals and aspirations to suddenly being told by the doctor no more. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It was really, it was really tough. I’ll be being honest. I think that first week in intensive care was, was such a blur.

You know, it was kind of like hooks up to a machine where if I was in pain, I could hit this red button and I’d get a hit of morphine. So that first week, and coming off the back of what was I think like a [00:14:00] nine hour surgery was, was, was really taxing on me physically and emotionally. And I really struggled in intensive care being in an environment where you feel so claustrophobic, surrounded by beeping machines, surrounded by people that were going through horrific injury, people, screaming, and all of a sudden, you know, there were no windows.

It was, it was only air-con. I, my body was overheating from, from trying to recover from surgery. And it wasn’t until I think that day four where the, the staff and I think my, my mum in particular noticed that I was really beginning to struggle emotionally, that they wheeled me out of intensive care into like the ambulance bay that was just slept down the corridor just to get fresh air and sunlight and just to breathe for the first time since Bakst and just to kind of like get a few deep breaths in, and kind of reaffirm to myself that I can handle this.

And that was one of the key promises I made myself on the day maxed. And when, when we waited for the [00:15:00] coast guard helicopter to turn up, which was Mike. Rescue was that I promise whatever this was. Cause I didn’t know at that point, whatever this is, I won’t let it beat me. And I really almost gave up on that by day four of intensive care because I was finding it so hard and then wheeled out into that ambulance bay was that kind of moment where I could reaffirm to myself that commitment and just say, you know what?

You do have this. I just needed that, that kind of moment of fresh air sunlight on my skin, just to really take stock and say to myself, you do have this, you know, you weren’t naive to promise it, but it was really tough to be told that I’d have to give up on two. Key dreams. And in a way of living that I built over a nine year kind of love affair with, with being outdoors and adventurous was tough.

But at the same time, I just knew that I’d find a new way of living that life. It wasn’t that I was going to change as a person. It’s just that [00:16:00] the mode of transport might change was the only thing that I thought in my head. We, I have a friend who had similar, not similar a friend of was sort of blown up.

And I suppose at the start, when you come to terms with the situation, you sort of set yourself goals and you sort of use that as your focus and your drive each day, did you sort of have that. Was the idea of like, when you’re in hospital, you’re like, right, I’m going to attempt to try and do this or attempt to do that.

And then that’s your focus. And then your goal and each day is to try and progress progress to this level, whether it’s say minor, you know, like a sort of being able to feel your toe or, you know, being able to take one step, those sort of goals are in your sort of head to sort of push you [00:17:00] forward. Was that a similar thing that happened to you when you were in hospital?

For sure. So they, they said that the first six weeks could could, you know, things could come back and, and you might rediscover some failings. So I was kind of really hypersensitive to if I, if I woke up, could I feel and think, could I try and wiggle my toes? And then I kind of thought we know what let’s focus on, what I can control.

So I’m pretty sure I was the, one of the first people to ask for some weights I was on. So you kind of go into bedrest. So you’re on like a six week bare dress program. And when I say bedrest, I mean, you are in, in bed flat on your back and you giving yourself a six week kind of period to, to heal. And I found that so frustrating because whilst there was like TV there, there was all that going to like, you know, gadgets to keep you occupied physically.

It was so hard just to sit what a lay still. So I kind of one day acid to the physio was like, do you reckon [00:18:00] I can get some weights? And she was like, Darren, you probably misinterpreted the idea of bedrest here, but the idea of bedrest is that you rest. And I was like, yeah, but I’m really, I need to do something.

I’m like, I’m wasting the way. And I was wasting away. I was, you know, I was in the physical shape of my life and. I was watching my body kind of like evaporate rapidly. And so she kind of said, well, I’ll see what I can do. And she came back in one day with a pink, one, kilo dumbbell, or two of them to be precise and was like, this is the best we can do.

And our kind of like very gratefully took them. I was like, okay, perfect. So when she left, I started trying to do like chest press and like, you know, some curls, whatever I could do from, from my like laying down position. And the next day I was like, Amy, I’m so sorry, but is there anything heavier, anything heavier than one kilo?

And she kind of said that she was bending the rules, but she gave me a two kilo dumbbell and the same thing [00:19:00] you could so light, you could Chuck this thing across the room with that much trying. So one of my friends works at a gym in a town near me, and I said to him, I was like, mate, I’m, I’m dying here.

Come on. I need some. So he kind of goes away and gets me a four kilo dumbbell from his gym. And to this day, the there’s a, still a four kilos. This is five years later, there’s still a four kilo dumbbell that’s left to kind of like spare there’s one message and I’ve got it. And yeah, so I kind of started to try and do what I could physically to rehabilitate myself.

There was a device that I wish I had a habit. There was a device when I first got hostile, which was you. It was to measure lung function. So as I’ve landed, I’ve broken three ribs on my back and I’d punctured my lung. So my breathing was really labored and my breathing was pretty weak. So there’s a little chamber thing.

It’s three balls and different chambers and you have to inhale and healthy person without trying me, or you now [00:20:00] could inhale and all three would lift. And that would be kind of like piece of piece of cake, really. I was so weak, you know, from a cardiovascular points for you. When I got in that, I could just about wobble his first ball.

And I was trying with all my kind of like, you know, strength to, to do it. And I couldn’t. So every day I was like, yeah, a bit like of women drug addicts. I was like either doing these weights, or I’ll say this very carefully, sucking this pipe to try and lift these balls. And day by day, that first ball got higher up the chamber until it reached up, you know, a couple of days later I’d be wobbling the second ball, first ball, a bit tight wobbling, the second ball.

And it was these little wins and these little kind of like goals, like you say, that kept me in a positive state of mind because I was seeing progress even though I was still laying in bed and I was counting down the days of, you know, however many days left until I could get up for the first day. It was a [00:21:00] long, a long six weeks of lying flat and.

Trying to, to find those little goals, just to keep my mindset ticking along. I think that’s probably really important because it’s very, I think you can almost go one or two ways. You could always give up and say, you know, my lifesaver, or you could set yourself goals and try and go out and pursue them.

And I imagine for people who have the sort of life-changing injuries, you go with one or two ways, but I always was told that it’s like after three months, once it’s all the goals have sort of been set and done and you sort of have to move back into normal society or normal life, that’s where it become.

Yeah. So there’s an expression that they say in hospital. So you’re on the spinal ward for five months, you know, all in all. [00:22:00] They say that you’re going from the zoo to the jungle. So the hospital is dizzy because your fed watered, you looked after you medicated. If anything goes wrong, don’t worry. You know, you, you kinda, you you’re taken care of, then you’re discharged into the jungle because you’re, you’re having to fend for yourself to a large extent.

You have to fend for yourself. You’re going back into a world. You’re looking at it from a different perspective. You’ve never seen the world like you do before. You know, you used to walk around six foot, see amounts and run up here, see a cliff climate, and you go out at four foot, three sat down and all of a sudden going off a curb, which is six inches and going up a curve, which is six inches become like your, your, your new little Minneapolis that you kind of day-by-day, you’re like, right.

Well, if I’m going to fall and, and trust me, I have fallen out and embarrass myself in public so many times by like, you know, just trying to do something a bit stupid, but all very mundane [00:23:00] and I’m falling out my chair. And, and yeah, so that was scary. And, and I’ve gone through my long-term relationship and broke up in hospital.

And all of these little things were like challenging my resilience and challenging my ability to stay resilient. And it was, I think, you know, having. The saving grace for me at that point was the fact that I’d in the nine years in the buildup to my injury, I’d gone through tests and challenges and I’d failed and overcome failure and learn from failure.

That when I had my accident, I had almost this kind of like bank of resilience that I could start tapping into and trust me, I needed to tap into it. I think had I not gone through those life experiences in the buildup to maxed and tested myself and push my limits and push myself out of my comfort zone and grown as an individual, that whole growth mindset kind of staff, if I’d then gone through what I’d gone through and had to overcome a new type of [00:24:00] adversity and life’s biggest challenge.

And this is a challenge that, you know, Climate and mounts, and aren’t going through, you know, selection with special forces reserve. You can quit at any point. You can turn that around the mountain, or you could just say, you know what, I’m voluntarily withdrawing. I don’t want this enough kind of thing.

Whereas with this challenge with a life-changing injury, there’s no get out clause. There’s no give up because you just have to attack it and you have to keep moving forward. So leaving hostile is, was scary. It was scary, really scary because I didn’t quite know what my life was going to look like, but there was one really important thing that I did in hospital that I think got a lot of viral eye-rolls at the time.

Whereas I had like a day off, like a bit like a prisoner, how that day released for for one day. And me, Matt and another of our friends, Harry went up to Manchester, which is about an hour. And we went to a kayak shop and in my head I was like, kayaking is the way that I’m going to live the same lifestyle.

[00:25:00] And a way for me to not feel like I’m disabled and not feel like I’ve got a life-changing injury. So we went up, spent I think 800 quid on a kayak and 200 equip more, all the bits to go with it, you know, saved a bit of money, been a nostril obviously, and came back the next day, triumphant what came back the same day.

And I saw my physio the next day. And I just asked her the simple question. It was like, do you think I could kayak? And she was like, what? In your opinion can somewhat of my injury level, you know, someone who’s chest down paralyzed, could they kayak? And she was like, Darren, I love your enthusiasm. But if I’m honest, I think you kind of need to limit your kind of wheelchair basketball, wheelchair 10 S something with a bit more support.

And in my head, anything that had the word wheelchair in it, I wasn’t interested in because I don’t want to you know, my wheelchair is my mode of transport and that’s it. I don’t want. For a long being in the sports that take my interest now [00:26:00] is sports where you leave your chair at the side and you get in a new row or you kayak or you swim or whatever, that sense of freedom.

So she was like, why you asking? And I just got my phone out and showed her the picture of me sat next to my kayak. And she went, when was this? And I was like, that was yesterday and that’s mine. I just bought it. And she was like, Darren, you know, that, that typical, like disapproving kind of the physio that wants to take care of you, make sure you didn’t kill yourself.

But that was the single most important thing that I did in my injury. Post-injury because it was that statement to myself. And that once again, reaffirming that commitment I made on the cliff that day that I wouldn’t be beaten. So on the 23rd of December, I’m discharged on the 24th of December. I’m in the local swimming pool for two hours and we’ve got our kayaks in the water.

And I probably capsized, I don’t know, a hundred times in the space of two hours because it turns out it’s pretty difficult when you can have my injury level, but [00:27:00] I wasn’t deterred with every capsize with every failure. If you want to call it failure, I was more Stubbornly determined to overcome the challenge.

Did did you have to sort of what’s the word adapt the kayak because being sort of chess down in terms of your glutes and your waist being sort of supportive, did you have to sort of adjust it? So it’s more attached to round your waist in a sense. Got it. So we had to do it, so it was a bit more padded, so it was a bit more connection to the boat.

Had it like a backrest, but the same as the one that my friends had, it was there any difference to them? And that was the appeal. I think in my mind is once we were on the water, apart from the fact, you could tell that one person looks a lot more tense than the rest. And that person was me. Cause I was trying not to fall in.

And then like you use a lot of your neck muscles. So for me, With it being [00:28:00] chest up. There’s a lot of emphasis on neck muscles, on shoulder muscles to do the stability for you. So in a lot of the pictures from that day, you could just see the kind of like tension on my face. And but yeah, no, we didn’t, we didn’t really do anything to it.

So once we were off and we paddle in, you know, in the days that followed in the weeks that followed it, moved from a swimming pool to the local canal and we leave my chair at the side, but jump in and we’d go down for a couple of miles and come back and then, you know, a couple more weeks or months go pass.

And we’re up on one of the lakes in, in, in Wales, near us since not only here. And it was a real, like sweet moment where I was looking back at kind of, you know, the journey I’d been on and, and thinking, well, I don’t really know what’s changed here. I’ve, I’ve lost something that I’ve gained something and I’m not focusing on it.

You could drive yourself crazy. You could completely talk to yourself. I could have talked to myself thinking about everything that I did. But [00:29:00] I just, my brain is not wired that way. And I know that it’s not wired that way because that’s self protection. That’s, that’s me looking after my mindset and that’s me looking after my, my kind of positivity.

So it was much better, much more productive and much more exciting to think about where this journey could go. And for me, that’s something that I, I tried a few things I’d never done before I learned to I started rowing. I tried free diving, which is obviously, you know, scuba diving without the oxygen tank.

Just take a breath and pull down on a rope. And, you know, before you know it, you’re 30 foot under and you’re swimming through a, a wreckage of a plane at night. And even though some of those moments in that moment as. But before I started to panic, I didn’t have enough oxygen to get back to the surface.

It was one of those, well, I never would have done this moment. It’s my life was on a two completely different trajectories, but what’s to say that you can’t achieve the same thing on the second [00:30:00] trajectory what’s to say you can’t achieve the same sense of fulfillment, happiness challenge, excitement. And I was, and it’s been it’s been the greatest adventure of my life has been life.

My life has become one big adventure. It’s really well put. And with this sort of kayaking doing that sort of probably week weekends or something, was this where you got the idea to sort of kayak from John grates to lands end? No, no, no. It’s also the, the idea, the idea. So I, six months after coming out of hospital, so a year after my injury, I went for selection for Britain’s Paralympic hiking.

I kind of just thought, you know what, I’ve seen the leaflet I’m going to go for it. Probably. I’m probably not what they’re looking for. And God knows they didn’t see cocking ability in me because I was the kayaks they use are a lot tidier. So I was upside down once again, this is back to the swimming pool day, one type thing.

[00:31:00] This is in the lake and Nottingham at the national water sports center. And I’m upside down more times than I’m the right way up. And this poor coach is like dragging me out of the water. But with every capsize, I was like, you know, put me back in. And he was like, where you’ve fallen in about four times now.

And I put me back in. So I think what they saw was like this stubborn, determination and resilience, and this kind of, you know, willingness to overcome adversity. So they invited me back for a few more trials. And before I know it, life has become, you know, I’m an athlete and I’m driving over from Shrewsbury to Nottingham three days a week to the national war sports center.

And I’m part of their talent development pathway. So they’re looking at the net. Almost generation of athletes to challenge for Paralympic selection for Tokyo and for Paris and for the ones that follow that. And that’s what life became. Life became moving towards my new purpose, my new goal, which was kayaking with the ambition of qualifying for Tokyo and the kind of heroes didn’t come about [00:32:00] until I failed.

No, I, I, I trained for three years for something and before I can really do anything about it, I’ve, I’m struggling with a shoulder injury COVID comes in, you know, double impact there throws everything and all the uncertainty of what’s going to happen with the Olympics and the Paralympics. And three years of hard work looks like it might have no end result.

And it was in that kind of flux or that, that, that state of flux, where it was going back to controlling like control and all of a sudden, I can’t control what’s going to happen. The Paralympics or whether or not I’ll get a chance to, to qualify. And to be honest, whether or not my injury was holding me up enough that I could even be competitive.

So in that I think this would have been June, 2020. I called up a couple of nights that I’d I’d, I’d met through the armed forces, Paris, no sports team. We we’d we’d met Nordic skiing in, in Norway. December, 2019. [00:33:00] So I called them up, you know, three or four months later in, in the new year. And I said, do you guys fancy doing something epic defense?

You’re doing something really, really big. And the people I called I knew were like-minded. And I knew that just saying that would kind of wet the appetite. And when we were in Norway, we sat around a table one night and we were having dinner and we were chatting about big life goals. So Johnny, one of the lights on the table said that he wanted to go to Antarctica.

Luke was going to be running the world marathon challenge that he was going to be running seven marathons, seven days in constants. And we all went round and it got to me. And I remember saying that for me, kayaking has been the single greatest discovery of my life post-injury and the single greatest thing that I’ve really done and.

I’d love to do something bigger, big, yeah, big expedition, big adventure. I’d love to. And I sort of threw out there as a throwaway comment. I was like, I’d love to fly from London to Gianna groves. There wasn’t any [00:34:00] real rationale or logical thinking to why I said it. So when I called the guys up in, in 2020 in, in, you know, like I say about Jean and I was like, you fancy making it happen, shall we, should we do this?

Should we, it’s never been done by, it’d been done by two able-bodied paddlers experienced sea kayakers. And here is a guy who’s, you know, got a serious spinal high-level spinal injury who has never, I’d never kayaked on the sea. I kayaked on rivers and lakes and you know, that was doing the Paralympic stuff.

But that sprint kayaking, it’s not, it’s not kind of being off the coast and being off shore. And the four guys I was calling up, I knew full well weren’t seeker hikers. I knew that Luke his claim to know experience was 20 minutes on his honeymoon in Cancun. And one of those big sit on top kayaks with his wife.

And, but we all shared the same kind of mindset that adapted, overcome mindset and that willingness to take [00:35:00] on a big challenge and just to figure it out. So before we know it, you know, they’ve all said, yes, and we’re on our first zoom call in the middle of lockdown, number one. And we’re like, right.

What it was, whether it was me leading it, it was me, you know, just find the fact that it was my idea. I’d become the expedition leader or team captain. And it was just a 12 month long problem-solving process of right. Well, how do we acknowledge that we’re all complete novice eco hikers here. And B how do we acknowledge that we’ve all got life-changing injury.

So. Ben had been shot seven times and operations Lucas to do an ID in Afghanistan. Johnny had just commissioned at Sandhurst, had a stroke, was paralyzed on the left side of his body and fought to rehabilitate his body. But we’re still left with a neurological impairment. Carl had a spinal injury as well.

So there’s five non paddlers, you know, probably me had done the most paddling and [00:36:00] five life-changing injuries. Attempting to do something that has never been done by people. And it never been done by team and never been done by anybody with a injury disability have been done twice by real high level.

You know, people that knew what they were doing. And, you know, that’s how kite for heroes was formed. That was how the greatest achievement of my life kind of came into being. And when I told people at the local kayaking club down the road from me, you know, quite a lot of experience, whitewater, paddlers, and sea paddlers, they were saying what well, I think initially they were like, Hey, you mad and B, when you thinking of doing it.

And I was like, well, next year, and it was that classic back to physio in hospital, roll of the eyes. And it was like, Darren you know, I wouldn’t do this for any less than three years training. And I was like three years now. We’re doing it next year. And there we go. Just like that. You’ve, you’ve set your statement and you set your stall out to do something incredible.

I think when you [00:37:00] decide on doing these, the longer you plan, the longer you train while it’s a good thing. And the more sort of you look at, I don’t know, the health and safety, the less likely you are to actually go and do it. Because if you wait up all their sort of, you know, health and safety aspects or all the sort of problems that could go wrong, or all the logistics, and eventually you just be like, ah, this is too complicated.

Like, we can’t do this. Whereas if you go with that sort of slight sense of naivety and just DNA, then that you have, especially then, then you, you can pretty much go out and things will go wrong. They always do. But by having that sort of drive and that enthusiasm for. Then I always think that’s usually one of the best ways of going about it, for sure.

For sure. I think the expression that we use pretty much every day on the [00:38:00] expedition was naive enough to start stubborn enough to finish. That was like the mantra that’s like every time, every time it got like a little bit shit or less, Maybe like lads may even have to start and like someone else to be like the stub enough to finish, you know, whenever I was cold and wet and tired, always like half, four in the morning.

And that’s when we had to start paddling because of the tide times, you know, you were like cursing yourself. But yeah, we didn’t know. We knew that kind of like the rough numbers. So I knew in that first scene, I was like, right. That’s 1,400 kilometers. That’s a distance. That’s the rough distance. I reckon it will take us 35 days.

I reckon, you know, we’re going to be paddling on average 50 kilometers a day. I knew the numbers because I’d like sat there and I’d mapped it and I’d done. I didn’t know anything about tide times or neap tides or spring ties. I was like educating myself, like honest to God. I bought you. This will make you laugh.

But I bought this book, which was like C K. It was like, I actually bought a book called sea kayak because there was like Ronnie to know what we’re [00:39:00] doing. So it was educating myself, educating the team. But yeah, we didn’t really know what we were learning ourselves into really. And then. As part of our like 12 month bill, that process, we brought on board, a guy called Jim Taylor Ross from epic kayaks.

And he is probably the, one of those experienced ECAC is in the UK and, and runs great Britain’s ocean paddling team. And it was him that kind of like he was right. Does, but let’s sit down and look over the map and look over your chosen route. And it was when we were looking over this map and over this route, he was like, right.

I just wanna point out a few things for you here. Any points down about 10 spots and only through. Each spot, the common theme was risk of death, risk of . So you had malt point, which in more infringe means death. So it is quite affectionately known as death point doom bar, you know, the expression, whether the term, the word doom being the key one there there was one in Scotland called the Gulf of Korea.

so people [00:40:00] that know it will know it, and there’s a Whirlpool there, which is 10 meters wide. And if you get your timing’s wrong, there’s a YouTube video of an in my life, lifeboat being pulled into it and like the iron my life, I struggling to get out because the pool is that strong. And he said to me, he was like, guys, if you get this wrong, if you get this timing wrong, you will be dragged into that, sucked down and spat out 10 miles offshore in the IRC dead.

And like it wasn’t much of a morale booster like his, his, his chat about these templates is, but it definitely gave me a better understanding of the kind of, I guess the level of severity of the challenge and the kind of serious nature of it. Not that we weren’t taking it seriously, but like we say, in naive city, there is a little bit of yeah.

Even perhaps, yeah, I suppose it’s also mitigating the sort of big risks and looking into that, I mean, you sort of, [00:41:00] as you say, it’s good to go over a sense of naivety, but when doing, especially by sea, you definitely want to know exactly where, where you can mitigate. Yeah, for sure. And we did that, so we kind of, you know, the, the plan evolves week by week, initially it was going to be right.

We’re doing this no safety boat. We’re just gonna. Yeah, doing it on our own improve in. And it was that I think there was that stubbornness and that perhaps overcompensation of someone with a injury, trying to prove that there’s no limits kind of thing. But as we brought Jim on and we learned more about what we’re actually taking on the kind of the real, like seriousness of this challenge, we made that those mitigation.

So we introduced the safety boat kind of thing, and we knew that we’d have a safety boat there. If anything went wrong and thank God we did because there were days where things did go wrong. And if we didn’t have the safety boat there, Jesus would have been a completely different scenario. And we knew that to mitigate some of the risks of coastal [00:42:00] paddling, we use the expression that deep, deep waters, our friend.

And by that we meant that we did the majority of our paddling 5k offshore. So we were five kilometers, you know, away from the cliffs, five kilometers away from tidal races that could. You know, screw us over if we got it wrong. So whilst all of a sudden you feel like a very small object in a massive sea of blue with waves and swell, we were a safe distance away from the tower and cliffs that, you know, that the Cornish coastline is bright coastline for a reason.

It says history of, you know, catching people out. So we kind of thought that the safest thing to do working with Jim to formulate the plan was to, was to stay deep and stay as far away from the cliffs as we could, without going too far into the Atlantic ocean, obviously. And on that journey where you, because you’ve got where were you sort of staying where you sleeping and [00:43:00] BMPs where you can’t Wildcat?

So, so we were all prepared. So we were, I was up for camping. I was like, I thought it’d be brilliant, you know? But know on the beach. Yeah. And the reality of it was, I think, you know, the. The attrition rate of our bodies and especially like everybody’s injuries flared up in different ways. So mine, precious orders were actually the biggest thing for me.

So when you can’t feel you, you bomb and you sat down for long periods, salt, water, sweat rub, you know, you really need to keep on top of it. Because for me, I was petrified that within the first week I’d have a pressure sore, and that would be me off the expedition. Johnny, you know, the kind of like knock on effects of his stroke have been that when he’s cold, wet and tired, his body starts to shut down, neurologically his body shuts down and, and we saw it happen.

So from an accommodation point of view, we made, you know, we, we kind of put those mitigations in place where we actually would treat ourselves. So we, we had the luxury [00:44:00] of Travelodge supporting us and we’ve kind of used some of the travel lodge accommodation up the country just to get a warm bed, hot shower.

Admittedly, we weren’t in some of these beds for very long because by the time. Got off the water, got our kit sorted planned for the next day, gone through a team briefing. You know, by time, like I’d led the brief in and then done the planning for the next day. I might not be getting my head down until 11 and then we might be up at four because we’re on the water at five.

So it was a lot of quick turn around. But yeah, I think having, having some way to have a warm shower and get our heads down and, you know, just to appreciate the fact that we weren’t five grizzly paddlers, we were five guys trying to push themselves so far out of their comfort zone and achieve something that had never been done before.

And we’re trying to make a statement for what people with disabilities can achieve. And there aren’t many people in the event in the adventure community that have got disabilities, there’s just, you know, there’s not many of [00:45:00] us kind of thing. So we were doing it. We were flying the flag for, you know, injury and disability, adventure.

Wow. And where have you sort of coming out? How long did it, how long, how long did the sort of expedition take? So we, we we’d banked on 35, right. And we’d banked on 50 kilometers a day. And then day one, we hit 50 and we were like, sweet. It can be done. We can do this. And then day two, we hit 55 and we were like, damn, we’re getting good at this.

You know, and the process and the machine, like the, we were getting slicker at our drills in terms of just our timings on and off the water from day one, within 10 minutes of paddling, I capsized and I in my head that like invoice of the inner critic that we all have in the back of our heads was going over time because I was, you know, I, I was feeling the pressure of, of leading it.

I was feeling the pressure of showing that [00:46:00] I was a competent, confident paddler and 10 minutes in I’m upside down. And the safety vote is kind of coming in and it’s like, all right, dad, should we get you out? You know, so we were in Dublin kayaks and I turned it back up and I was like, no, we’re getting back in.

So like it took three attempts to drag myself back onto the cockpit and to get my legs. In first two occasions, we flopped back out the other side, but I was just so determined to prove that we could do it. And so for me personally, every day was a struggle. But those first couple of days, with each day, I got more confident and more relaxed, which is a huge bit of paddling and dealing with the waves.

I was trying to fight every wave and try and fight every bit as well. So I think as we all went through that process, the first day we were all nervous. People were sea sick. If people weren’t sea sick, the other person was throwing up because you were next to somebody who sees that if it was the second puke and there was other stuff as well, And, but with each day that when we ended up clocking out more miles and we were hitting about 60, [00:47:00] 65 kilometers a day, we were extending our paddling window to about eight hours on the water, eight hours of physical paddling.

So I think a weekend, we were three days ahead of schedule. And we were only yet. We said to ourselves that we’d made the decision that we don’t only have days off if weather permits, if weather meant that we couldn’t physically paddle, or we could just see it on ourselves. If we needed a day, we weren’t going to talk to ourselves and we could see when everybody was struggling.

So we did have a couple of days and before we know it, it’s day 25 and we’re at the Northeast coast of Scotland. And we’re one day from John and roads. And I mean, I know that I’ve just condensed 26 days of expedition into, into about 30 seconds there. We were absolutely like flying as a team. And we were learning to not try and fight the weather and fight the wind, fight the waves.

We were learning to run with the waves. And there were days where, you know, your average paddling speed is probably eight kilometers an hour. And there were days where we were catching waves and we [00:48:00] were surging at like 20 kilometers an hour. And there are days where I felt like I was getting thrown out the back of a kayak and my backrest was like fully straightened.

And I was like riding this wave and scream. And as we were doing it and just having the time of our lives, and there were a couple of days, so we hit a hundred kilometer days. We were paddling for 11 hours and we were just like, right. This, everything is perfect. Everything is going our way. Let’s keep paddling.

Let’s try and like maximize progress as much as we could because there were days where things didn’t go well. There were, there were a couple of days where things really could have gone wrong and, you know, we had to make a decision to cut things short. There was one day where an idea of mine. Instead of following the coastline round, Northeast England into the Southwest Scotland, we could straight line it from the coast of lake district all the way to north, south, Southwest Scotland, to a place called Kirkcudbright, which is not how you pronounce it as Scottish kind of correct to us when we were there.

But I don’t want to try and say it properly cause I’ll mess it up even more. [00:49:00] But what we had was an 80 kilometer crossing across the RFC that could save us three days worth of paddling. So it was one punchy ambitious day. And I, you know, it was a calculated risk, but in my head I was like, we should do this and we can do this with the safety boat.

We can do it. So we’re in the middle of the cross in about 40 kilometers in and we’re in the middle of the RS. And visibility’s okay. Not great, but over the course of the day, we’re about halfway through the day, halfway there, the visibility is dropping and you can just see it minute by minute, coming closer to the point where we’re probably down to about 10 meter visibility, CMS, and all of a sudden, w we’ve got no awareness of there’s various crossing.

Cause you’ve got, there’s a middle of a busy shipping lane and there was a decision to be made as to whether this is safe anymore. We’re using the safety boat is the kind of point of reference and the safety boats ahead [00:50:00] of the kayak. And it’s trailing the safety boat. And because we had five paddlers with four paddling seats, we were rotating like who the paddlers were for the days.

So. Myself, I’m on the safety boat at this point. And I’m sat next to Chris. Who’s our rib driver, safer driver. And Jim’s behind me is a safety advisor, like I said, and we’re looking at the screen in front and we we’re trying to make a decision as to what do we do? You know, if we were to cut and run now, where are we going?

Because we’re 40 K from Belfast, 40 K from here, 40 K from there. And it was, while we were looking at the screen, we’d lost, you know, awareness of what was going on behind us. And it wasn’t until I think one of us turned round and we turned around just to see a wall of gray wall of missed no boat, no kayak.

So I jumped on the radio and I was like, Darren, Luke mate, can you, can you see. Can you see the boat and just gave it a couple of seconds. Nothing came back and I was like, Hmm. Okay. And I [00:51:00] was like, Darren, Darren, Luke, Darren Cole, mate, just comstat can you, can you let us know? You can hear me and all I was expecting backwards, like yep.

Can hear you. Or, you know, just any indication that they, they could hear us. Cause we didn’t have visibility on them. We couldn’t hear them. And we couldn’t communicate with them. And as the seconds tick by, and then minutes started to tick by, we cut the engine on the boat and we just sat and waited and thought, if we sit here, they’ll physically catch up with us and they’ll they’ll we’ll we’ll see them.

And then the minute it started to tick by, and we’re probably about 15 minutes in now, I’m panic. You know, I’m feeling a huge way of pressure at this point because we’ve got a boat missing in the middle of the RFC. And a lot of things could happen here. A lot of scenarios could unfold and we can’t control them.

So we ended up turning the boat round, going back down our previous line. And we go back for about five minutes just thinking that maybe they’ve capsized and, and we’ll see what happens, pick them up and nothing. And we were trying to [00:52:00] the whole time trying to get in comms with them on the radio is nothing.

And we’re just really deciding what is the next line of escalation here? What do we do now? Jim’s got his thoughts. Chris has got his thoughts and we need to make a decision and just through pure good fortune as we’re coming back up to where we cut the engines. Originally, we see a really faint gray kind of like blob of Hayes coming through and we vomit over and it’s Carl and Luke and we’re like, you know, so relieved, just, they didn’t know.

We were trying to get in contact with them. I was like, Lance, so you’re not getting anything I was sending through. And they were like, no. And as far as they were concerned, they thought that they just lost us slightly. And they were following us through the mess. They had no idea, but what they’d done a bit, like when you walk in a desert, you’ve got one dominant foot, they veered off left and we don’t only seen them again because they were so disoriented in the mist.

They’d done a full loop and we happen to intersect them at the point where they’d come [00:53:00] back on our line and had that not happened. Had they not done a full loop? Had they just done a kind of a slow Slovenia? They could have ended up, you know, in, you know, degrading conditions in the middle of the IRC and God knows what it could have happened, sort of thing.

So there were a couple of days where things were, were less than ideal, stressful. By the time we got back to shore back to report, there was like a huge sigh of relief. And then there were days where everything went brilliant and we put crews in families, a dolphin swimming alongside the kayaks. And there were moments where there was one day when we were paddling through one of the locks in the Northwest of Scotland.

And I was like really pushing myself to keep the speed up. And I was just in the zone. I was in the, I was, I was in my element and as we were paddling, there was just this real lovely realization that nothing in my life had changed. I was still exactly the same person. I was the day before my accident [00:54:00] to four years, four and a half years later.

And I think it was the first time I really, really felt it in my heart. I really kind of, you know, it, wasn’t just telling myself that I was still the same person I knew I was, I have this. We’ll like fuzzy feeling ass sounds a little bit kind of cliche, but that nothing had changed that I was still, I’d never lost my sense of identity.

Cause I was still the same version of me pushing my limits, doing stuff that was adventurous and being outdoors. What a story it’s just a, it’s just an incredible, just an incredible sort of feet of, you know, you guys going out and sort of showing that there’s no limits to what you can achieve and no matter what happens to you in life, whatever tries to sort of bring you down, you can always sort of rise up and, you know, Achieve, [00:55:00] whatever you sort of set your mind to it, you have this sort of very strong, positive mindset and you know, this sort of growth mindset in a sense, do you, I imagine you probably had that even before your accident, but even now, is this hugely important to you?

Yeah, for sure. For sure. And it’s, I think it’s something that we’re all born with. I think we all have this innate ability to be resilient but much like any other muscle in our body, you can train it and you train it and by failing and you train, you train it by trying, you don’t always have to achieve like the, you know, for me not achieving my kind of like goal of qualifying for the Paralympics was a failure and it was a huge failure and it was, yeah, it was hard to take at the time.

But off the back of that I learned and I put into action. What. Yeah, the momentum I built up over three years into something that would be my greatest achievement. And I think if we’re not resilient, our first failure [00:56:00] is often our last failure because you then don’t put yourself into some of the most resilient people.

I’ve met kids and it’s because kids, aren’t scared of trying and failing kids. You know, as, as, as you’re in that kind of phase of your life, you’re constantly learning to ride a bike, falling off, learning, to ride a bike, falling off a little bit less. And you’re, you’re constantly doing things for the first time and doing things for the first time often means not being great at them.

And then we become an adult and a lot of us get into a comfort zone and we know that we can play tennis to a certain level of play football to a certain level. So we stay at that. And when we don’t push ourselves out of our comfort zone. So I think I was so fortunate that in a buildup to my accent, I’d embrace.

Failing and, you know, everybody that rock climbs or mountaineers will, will agree that the first time you try something is not often the time that it succeed, you succeed or, you know, or it goes as well as possible. You have to [00:57:00] learn to overcome a particular crux or move or particular pitch of a climb or whatever it might be.

And I just took that same mindset into my injury and kind of, you know, accepted that I’m going to be doing a lot of things for the first time again now. And that is still very much the mindset I left with. I’m not, I’ve learned to not be scared of failure. I’ve learned to control the, the voice of doubt in my own head.

I think everybody probably everybody’s their own worst critic. And I don’t think you can ever turn that off. I’ve never been able to turn that voice in the back of my head off. And like I say, Day, one of the expedition capsize, and 10 minutes in that voice was very much in full force because it was trying to say told you, you can’t do this.

Somebody, you know, this hasn’t been done by someone like you before, because it can’t be done. And I’ve just learned to say, cheers, but I disagree and almost to enjoy proving it wrong and to kind of [00:58:00] say, well, I’ll tell you what I’ll show you. So I think being resilient has been the biggest asset to me, overcoming a life-changing injury and being able to achieve the things that I’m setting myself out to do.

And the thing with the exhibition, we didn’t even know there was no guarantees. We weren’t going to succeed. So we could be having this conversation today. And I can say to you that on day 20, we, we, you know, we had to cancel it because we were, we were at our limits and we can achieve it. But I know that because I’m a resilient person and I have a resilient mind.

I wouldn’t let the failure of the expedition den, any future plans.

Yeah, I I sort of agree. It’s and that’s probably led quite nicely to your next expedition that’s happening next year or what you’re training for the [00:59:00] moment for P for people listening. What, what is, what are you aiming to achieve from it? So off the back of the back of the hiking expedition, a couple of doors open, and one of which was to do the Wellmark and challenge.

So for those of you that don’t know that’s to run seven marathons in seven days on seven different constants. So the first one being in Antarctica, and then you bounce. Day one from Antarctica day to South Africa, day three, Perth, Australia, and you bounce from constant constant, and you do seven American seven days.

Now, less people have done this than a climbed Everest. I think the number that have done the world Barton challenges is like 180. So it’s kind of, you know, it’s got that exclusivity, which has always kind of sounds quite good. And importantly, for me, it’s never been done by anybody with in a wheelchair it’s never been done unsupported by anybody with a disability.

So there’s another kind [01:00:00] of nice element here of being able to prove. What someone with a disability can achieve. Now, I’m not entirely sure how wheelchair plus snow and ice is going to work in Antarctica. So I’ll let you know, could still be stuck there like 20 hours later, but I’m pretty sure I’ll get myself around the marathon distance, but so that will be in it was originally scheduled for February 20, 22 cause a COVID it’s now been pushed back to November.

So I will throw myself wholeheartedly into lots and lots of, lots of miles in the wheelchair in the new year. Another one close to my heart, which will be earlier in the year will be in may, will be two to row the English channel in, in memory of my father who died in September this year. He’d struggled with mental health for good couple of years.

And COVID really, really, really impacted him as it did a lot of people. And he sadly took his own life in September this year. So I kind of wanted to do something. Yeah. [01:01:00] Would be in memory of him and could be a way of raising money for the mental health charities that supported him towards the end. So I think trying to control what I can control and do something positive from what is a negative to be resilient, to, you know, the passing of my dad and to do something in his memory.

So we’re going to be rowing the channel and I’ve put together a team of eight people that have each gone through their own mental health journeys that have lost people as a result of mental health or have gone through that themselves and pull themselves back from the brink. So we’re going to be in, in may 20 strains to Rowan the channel for mental health charities and going for the world record time, of course, which is three hours 51 currently.

So we’re going to go for three hours 50. That is the joke, but I am semi-serious about it as well. And yeah, that’s, that’s the first thing and that’s, that’s a real, a real personal one for me for next year has got a real emotional connection to. [01:02:00] So it’s adventure with a real purpose of, of, you know celebrating the life of, of my dad and also helping others to hopefully make sure that people get the help they need and they don’t end up in that position.

Cause yeah, mental health is tough. Well, hopefully you know, you can use that drive to get the world record. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Well, every, every stroke would be with a bit more vigor because of that. Yeah. I’m so sorry to hear that. As I say mental health is definitely something which affects, I don’t know anyone who hasn’t known someone or themselves is not affected by.

And it’s probably in the last few years with everything that’s going on almost become worse and worse. Yeah, no, I agree. I agree. I think it, you know, for, to use the analogy of filling up a glass [01:03:00] of a glass of water, you know, you’ve got your third of your cup full because of work stress, third of your cup full because of financial pressures.

And then it’s not, it doesn’t take much more to, to keep adding to that glass before you’re overflowing. And if you don’t know how to deal with that, or you don’t have the support network to help you deal with that, it can seem quite desperate. And for, you know, for people like my dad, I know that his mental health meant that he saw himself as a I don’t know, it’s still a bit raw to talk about, I guess, but, you know, he saw himself as a drain and he saw himself as almost like a liability because of the way he was feeling.

So, yeah, yeah. Tricky one to talk about. Well, I think it’s a very exciting about this the sort of adventures that you’re doing. And as I say, hopefully [01:04:00] everyone listening can sort of follow along and support it. And I mean, it’s been such a pleasure listening to your stories, and as you say, you speak so well.

And so passionately about, you know, overcoming adversity in the last sort of five years with everything that’s gone on. And yeah, so, I mean, there’s a part of the show where we ask the same five questions to each guest each week with the first being on, you know, your trip and adventures. What’s the one gadget that you always take with you.

Okay. Yeah. Got it. Got to we, we had already one of the 360 ones on the front of the kayak and the expansion. It was good. It was, it was a little bit of a novelty purchase, I guess, but yeah, some of the footage that we got from that I think, and so much of so rubbish itself, promotion, [01:05:00] I’m so rubbish at social media, but you kind of in the modern world, you have to capture it to prove you’ve done it and to spread the word.

And especially when you’re trying to achieve something bigger than yourself. So when you, when we were trying to like champion what injury and disability meant in terms of the limits that you don’t have, we had to document the thing to, to prove. And so kind of like put people up there to show, you know, what could be achieved if, if you’ve just had a stroke, like Johnny did five years ago or whatever it might be, or you have some form of life and you, so, yeah.

So so some way of documenting the adventures, I think is the answer. What about your favorite adventure or travel book? Just so before the film came out, I’d read beyond possible by NIMS 14 peaks, which has obviously was then turned into 14 pizza Netflix. So I read that book when it first came out and was in all of that.

I know it’s a, probably a bit of a popular choice at the [01:06:00] moment, but that book really inspired me and I, and I read that before we went on the expedition. So the whole idea of nothing is impossible. I think stuck in my brain for the duration of the expedition. Why are adventures important to you? I think there’s so many bits to this.

Isn’t there. I think for me, adventure is like a way of life and I’m sure you share that. And everybody that listened to share that it’s just a way that we want to live our lives. And it’s a way of living a fulfilling life. And for me, it’s, it takes both boxes of physical and emotional maintenance and recovery.

So for me, I’m still very much going through my physical recovery. I know it’s five years after my accident, but I’m still getting myself to where I want to be. So adventure gives me that and it gives me those emotional and psychological ticks in the box that mountaineering and climbing used to do.

[01:07:00] So I think the biggest tragedy of my injury would have been letting it, letting it stop me living an adventurous life. That would’ve been the real trauma that would’ve been the real loss. So not losing that has been the most beautiful kind of positive from my extent. So the adventure. There’s been a part of my life for, since they were 17 and continues to be despite being disabled.

I’ll say that with the old,

yeah. I saw the video that you put up or you walking up the steps the other day, which I imagine was a huge win. Yeah. So steps become like a mortal enemy when you’re in a wheelchair, because there might be two steps into some way and you’re like cursing yourself out. I’ll generally throw myself on the, on the floor and get up the stairs.

If I want to, if the [01:08:00] reward is worth the effort, I’ll still do it. But I’m incredibly fortunate enough to have something called a ReWalk exoskeleton. Which is a very futuristic robot that you strap to your body. And it comes up to just below my ribs and you can walk again and you learn to walk by moving your body weight and the robot and the exoskeleton reads what you’re trying to do.

So you have to try and walk. It sounds a bit bizarre to say that when you can’t move your legs, but you have to try and imitate the way that you would shift your body balance and it replicates the movement and walks for you. And it has a stair setting, which I’ve not been brave enough to try for about two years, cause I’ve just had visions of another fall.

I’m kind of done with falling now, but I kind of built up the courage to, to give it a go. And yeah, only what two weeks ago I was stood at the foot of a staircase in a, in the local leisure center. The [01:09:00] physio behind me and started climbing the stairs for the first time in five years. And it wasn’t until we were halfway up and then he was like, right, should we turn around and go back down.

I turned around to go back down and all my God, I had the shock of my life. I was like, just stay as he used to look this scary, the stairs, always the low this and yeah, growing up was fine. So I’m going to, I’ve made a throwaway comment. So my partner, there’s, there’s a joke and serious at the same time that in next year, I’d like to see if I can climb the shard in the, in the legs, do the, to the staircase because that’d be it.

I think that’d be quite a powerful thing and do that for charity as well to find out if that’s feasible at all, but I’ll throw it out there into the universe and hopefully we’ll make it happen. I’m sure. Well, I will happily join. Join you in that one. If you need some company,

I to say, what about your favorite. So it’s by Stephen King and it’s you can, you should, and you [01:10:00] will. So a motto to live by for if you ever have an idea. So climbing the shard, you can, you should, and you will. So it’s a, it’s an awful thing to say though, because it just, you just get yourself into so many different kinds of things.

Every time I have an idea and I say that quote in my head, I’m like, damn, I’ve got to do it now, then

say yes, a bit more. Yeah. People listening, always keen to travel and go on these grand adventures. What’s the one thing you would recommend for people wanting to get started? I think not to be daunted by how not to be afraid of starting with something small, you know, when you, you kind of set yourself a huge challenge, it can, the ultimate goal can look quite scary.

So if you on day one of something and you think I’ve got 35 days of this, it suddenly becomes a lot more daunting than if you break it down into your smaller segments and you [01:11:00] kind of like compartmentalize it a little bit. So for me, you know, my adventures to start with when I was living, my new chapter of life would look so mundane now, like kayaking around the swimming pool was the epitome of adventure for, for day one of my life post hospital.

Whereas if I was to go and do that, now I’d be bored. I’d go and do laps around the pool and be like, all right, sweet. Should we go and do something else? Kind of thing. So not to be put off by making a small statement and letting that small statement be, what was the expression that the hardest step is often the first is that it’s taking the first step basically.

Yeah. Is often the hardest step. So not to be. You know, and a lot of people do like these couch to 5k A’s and stuff. Don’t they, and that, and probably the scariest part of a couch to 5k for someone that’s never run before. Hasn’t, you know perhaps looks after their [01:12:00] physical fitness, is, is that very first run.

So if you want to be adventurous and live an adventurous life, start small and grow from there, don’t try and do something like a guy came from London to join groups before you’ve kayaked in the local swimming pool is the takeaway there. Yeah. And I imagine for anyone does the sort of couch to 5k, if you can get past the first one, I managed to go for the second run because even like myself, nothing, nothing worse than when you haven’t done anything for a month or two, and then go on this run.

And you’re like almost having a heart attack almost, you know, grabbing every bit of oxygen you can. And yeah. Say it is just taking those small steps that make a huge difference.

And finally, what are you doing now? And how can people find you and follow you when you next? Go on this big adventure? Yeah. So couple of things, I guess, [01:13:00] website, first one, www.darrenedwards.org.uk, coz.common.co.uk with taken sadly. So dot all that UK seemed like the next best thing on Instagram.

Darren Edwards, underscore adventure. Same on Facebook and yeah, I will. Despite being rubbish at social media attempt to keep all of those up to date as much as possible. Well, we’ll put a link of them in the description below so you can follow him and got it. It’s just been such a pleasure listening to your stories, Darren and I cannot thank you enough for coming on today and please you know, go check them out and yeah, we look forward as we look forward to following your big adventure in the future. [01:14:00]

Rob Pope

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Rob Pope (Ultra Endurance Athlete)

On today’s Podcast, we have Rob Pope, he is an Adventurer and Ultra Endurance Runner from Liverpool, England.

In 2016 Rob Pope embarked on an enormous journey, running across the United States (and beyond) to raise funds and awareness for causes he believes in – Peace Direct and the World Wildlife Fund. His journey took him across the nation FIVE TIMES, covering over 15,700 miles and resulting in several records (including a Guinness World Record) and many more significant milestones.

On the morning of 15 September 2016, with a fresh Gump haircut and a red jacket made by his girlfriend Nadine, Rob set off on the first of 422 days of running in which he traversed the US from Mobile to Santa Monica, onwards to Death Valley and more.

Then on 29 April 2018, the run was over. He’d exhausted 33 pairs of trainers, crossed 43 states and reached the ocean five times. He’d eaten his way through enough hot dogs, ham salad and Dr Pepper to fuel an army. He had covered over 15,000 miles and on the Podcast today has enough stories from his time across America.

Don’t Forget to Subscribe and Review the Podcast if you have enjoyed it so far. A simple review goes a long way to help the podcast grow and your support means everything.

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Transcript of our Conversation

Rob Pope

[00:00:00] Rob Pope: Hello, and welcome to the modern adventurer podcast coming up and Sonia, and I’m like, Nope, no, makes I’m British. Just me raising sharp with anyway. Good. Cause I got planning. He just pulls out this like 10 inch butcher’s knife from behind his back and I’m just like, oh my God. You know, I sort of wondered if I’d ever get shot, but I didn’t think I’d have to get fileted.

Thanks for having me mate. Well, it’s an absolute pleasure and I so excited about this podcast because you are the first person to recreate the Forrest Gump has sort of story and it’s sort of just unbelievable how it sort of all came about. And I, what I love about it is the sort of humble beginnings and how it all started.

Before we sort of jump into that, I always like to start at the beginning sort of try and get a better understanding, but how did the sort of love of running sort of come about. [00:01:00] Episode, always ruin this as long as I can remember some of my first memories of school sport work when I was in juniors.

And then I really, really don’t know why this happened, but everybody was wearing a a school running share, which is white and blue. For some reason I was wearing a Ford t-shirt and they came from maybe it was like an air Lisa to bear attempt to get sponsorship. But since I was only seven, I doubt it.

And then yeah, like, so it just, despite the British weather and, you know, the fact that cross-country usually involved extremely short shorts and, and sort of not getting warm again until Monday morning. So I just really liked it at school. And if my school had seniors for the start, it was either that or rugby so out, but I think it was.

Because for a lot of people who sort of do these big sort of trips, sometimes it’s like, they’re absolutely exceptional. And sometimes they just want the thrill of the adventure [00:02:00] for you. Your marathon time is slightly ridiculous. It’s two hours and 27 minutes, which for anyone listening, who doesn’t need that is seriously quick for a marathon.

I’m hoping to actually have, have a go at rage against the dying of the light, AKA middle-age and next year, and trying to see if I can beat that. Cause now they’ve got all the fancy shoes out. I am. I figured I may as well have at least one pop with the rocket boots. So might as well try well before, before the body slowly breaks down.

Exactly. And so I, from the sort of start, I knew that your sort of big running journey sort of started in Australia because you’re a. You’re a veterinarian. Is that right? Yeah. Yeah. And you sort of working out in Australia and you had this incredible, incredible story about how you almost got to the Olympics [00:03:00] for a country.

I know you’ve been from, it was a, it was a bit weird. Yeah. But I was more than happy to switch sides. So, so much, so obviously the ashes is happening right now and likes to have all my legs to bear of cricket and of inmates are like absolutely mortified, but there’s a bit of me that sort of is rude for us.

I was at the the boxing day test once. And I think I saw like Mitchell Johnson run for the hatchery. And I was almost off support Australia, one that wicked to fall. But yeah, I lived there for about three years. And I joined the local athletics club. Cause I figured it was probably a, you know, way to meet mates quickly.

And I’d never really done that. Let’s cook thing in the UK. Mostly just because I generally like running it on my own. But I figured so yeah, meats could join a football team, but I was probably getting better old to [00:04:00] recall from any injuries and yeah, got a lot better and got selected to run for Victoria and the Australian Madison championships, which is passed at the Sydney Monmouth.

And you know, they’ll do wider events. So start at the front and after a near disaster and I suffer from very sort of. Nervous, shall we say bowels and I am before any marathon. I usually will nail a couple of Imodium to make sure nothing bad happens. And I was spent the first hour before the race at the actual cause running round, like a load of pharmacies, trying to see if I could find any Immodium ad to borrow $5 from the head coach of athletics Victoria.

And but it was all right. And I got to the star and I cracked on with the main guys. And I think I was in about eight as I ran over the Sydney Harbor bridge. And it felt like I was just all alone because the guys [00:05:00] had dropped off the front and that, yeah, it sort of struggled actually in the race, but mines to come 10th overall and every day they’re Kenyan or Japanese.

And so, you know, I knew about the Australian championship thing, but I was only considering being, you know, hopefully Victoria we’ll get a team. And so I was hoping that nobody had fronted me was Australian. And then when I saw like the list and the coach said, like I was Australian champion, I was just like, you know, I’m an Australian race.

And he said, it doesn’t matter. You’ve been here long enough. And yeah, so I got nice, shiny gold medal. And later on that day, got a phone call from the head of athletics Australia. And he said if they had a few guys away from the race, which is probably the reason why I was champion and who tried to get the qualifying time and if they didn’t, would I consider running for Australia at the Olympics?

And I was just like, absolutely. Yeah.

[00:06:00] British citizen down the train. Oh yeah, no to right man. Nice. If I hadn’t been there, I haven’t been out there now, still with the ships on the Barbie. Cracking a few tinnies is England wicked tumbled.

And so did you get the call up to the Olympics in the end or what happened? I didn’t know. Like I think I think I was fifth in line by the time they did the selection. And so I, I’d never, I’d never known if fair, what would have happened to two of them would have got injured, but maybe they would just took the top two anyway, but yeah, I should have sent some hell’s angels around to the houses and there, I either caused an injury or said that maybe they should pretend that an injury.

Good. And so after that, you obviously came back to the UK, where did this idea of recreating Forrest Gump [00:07:00] come from? So the idea that. In some sort of embryonic form for, for a while because of wants to run across the Medica for about 10 years, by the time actually started doing it. And of course, when you’re looking at routes, you know, you know yourself, you’ve done one of the classics from New York to San Fran, or that probably is the classic route to run across America, either from San France, New York or, or LA to New York.

And so actually thought about going from long beach in California to long beach in New York. But while you’re looking at these roots, of course, the specter of forest Gump is always there because if anybody talks about rent across the medic, the inevitable line is like Forrest Gump. And so I was looking vaguely at the route, not because I thought about doing it just because I like to fight about procrastinate and stuff.

And so if I can avoid doing something useful by looking at something frivolous. [00:08:00] And so I knew fully that this route that he done, there’s like five times across the Medicare 15,248 miles. But did dream about doing it. And it was only sort of after the Australia experience, because I thought sort of well, you know, I live in Australia now.

Why not run across Australia rather than medically? It’s a similar sorts of size country. And I bought a jogging stroller that was going to use state to carry all my gear across, but it never quite happened. And then a job opportunity came up in the UK that basically forced my hand to come back. But when I did come back, it wasn’t the opportunity I thought it was.

And so both me and my other half and the Dean, like we decided to quit the same job. And we had a bit of time on our hands and it was only actually probably now I have even more time to procrastinate and I saw on the. [00:09:00] Man completes Forrest Gump ruin. And I, for the first time ever, I was like, just absolutely go to the about it.

And I didn’t know why, but then I just thought, well, let’s have a little look and I read it. And then he’d only done the second leg. So I say only, you know, this is still air from Santa Monica through New York and then all the way up to Maine as well. And so that’s like, you know, 4,000 miles, but still he’d not done the first, third, the fourth, the fifth.

And so I just pretty much looked at the Dean and said, we’ve got to do this because if somebody else is thinking, you know, feeling the same sort of disappointment right now, and somebody else’s planted it. And I thought, right, let’s, let’s go from there. And I think we saw that around February and then I think we booked flights a couple of months later.

And then that was it. Yeah. We, we ha I, I suppose it’s sort of the. Important with some [00:10:00] of these things, especially when it comes to sponsorship is becoming, being the first person to do it. We’ve had Sean Conway on we’ve had mark Baymont on the podcast who both done, you know, world first. And they do talk about the importance, especially when it comes because no one remembers the second person.

It’s always, it’s always about first, first or the fastest, but the first is usually, you know, the most well-known in that sense and, sorry. Yeah, I was going to say the one thing is, is with something like this, you know, you mentioned that the first there’s a decent chance that it will be the, the only one because, you know, sort of some night, this it’s so big and, you know, survey, you mentioned sponsorships.

That didn’t really help me mostly because I I, you just from definite [00:11:00] confirmation of we’re going to go to go in, I reckon must’ve been one of the quickest turnovers in adventure history, certainly a record in terms of scale, to planning of it, you know, sort of the, you know, the scale dwarfs, the amount of prep that went into it.

So yeah, no sponsorship for me. And the one tip I would give anyone if they were going to do this would be American to be independently wealthy. Yeah. I, I think I think a lot of the times sponsorships, especially if it’s your first one, they didn’t know who you are. They don’t know if you’re going to make it.

And unless you have a track record, They’re very, what’s the word reluctant to, you know, put their hands in their pockets and say, oh yeah, yeah, here it’s here’s some money go do it. Because as you say, but I mean, he plays, especially when it’s a lone Wolf, you know, because you, you know, you, you’ve got no idea [00:12:00] of the, maybe if you’ve worked for that company, they’ll just go, oh no, no.

I know Rob he’s absolutely sound. But then like my proposition, like I did actually spend a good bit of time writing letters to like I loaded the fortune 500 companies in this. And I only got three replies back, I think from the hundred there I said, and only one of them you could tell it actually bred and it was just sort of going, yeah, this does sound really awesome.

It’s just, yeah. Again, not enough notice for it, you know, but because the proposition was so ridiculous is recreating something that doesn’t even like officially exist or certainly not in real life. They probably thought, well, if his propositions that insane, there’s every chance that he’s insane. And I’m not sure if we could trust him to be an excellent ambassador.

Now I hope that’s a bit different, but yeah, after COVID was a new adventure in terms of funding because you and [00:13:00] Nadine went out to start it, how did that all sort of come about with the funding? So we had money that we’d sort of saved up for a deposit on a house. And so that basically became a.

Payment. Well, you know, on a secondhand sort of Mo that we sort of gambled on being able to sell at the end that hopefully get that money back. Cause we got such an old one, I thought sort of all the deeper depreciation had happened, but it didn’t quite work that way. And so, yeah, w w we’ve got some money back, like I think we got just doing the half of it back, but yet it’s still not a lot.

And then of course running expenses on the way, but by the time I’d sort of you know, got to New York, probably I was sort of already out of that particular pot. And then I was reading some other sorts of pots that I had which were far [00:14:00] smaller in size. And the Dean had already had to have gone home at this point because we, well, we just didn’t have enough money to survive drive in the RV so that.

The Australian jogging stroller came out and that was in the middle of Tennessee. And that took me another 8,000 miles. It’s hell. Or we did get sort of an reunited and the Dean and I, and Jenny, our RV by the time we got back to mini and Minneapolis, because I didn’t really fancy the wild loss of North Dakota and Montana on my own.

So on one of the times I had to come back to replenish my visa pretty much. It’s like work 24 7 to just say, right, just got to have support on this top bit. You know, if only I could have either a little bit of look at my shrimp company, it would have been a lot easier. So, I mean, for people who, you know, maybe.

Watched the Forrest Gump film a long, long time ago, [00:15:00] or have a sort of, not the recollection of where abouts did you start from? Where does the sort of Forrest Gump journey. So I started in mobile Alabama. Now there’ll be some people who are fans of the film, just getting a, what it didn’t start from Greenberg.

Well, if you’re real hardcore fans of the film you’d know the Greenberg doesn’t exist, they just made it up for the film. And then, so I tried to, I looked around for leather to suitable locations that may be the middle of Alabama. You know, so I think there’s a Greensboro in Alabama, but in the book, forest is from mobile, you know, and that’s an exact, you know, sort of, and Winston green, the chap who wrote it, he was from mobile as well.

And so that was also I think, 26 miles away from bipolar battery. So Maurice and away from where the logo is from. So it was a no brainer for me. And I found the house that looked pretty much like. Well, [00:16:00] the ball’s in house and the film’s called the Mitchell brag, Manchin immobile. And I started my entire room with three miles from there to the hotel we’re staying at, then the next day began in earnest.

Wow. And so to start with, you were with Nadine and Jenny. Yeah. Well, at the very start, we didn’t even have Jannie surveyor. We flew to Houston. W we think we got a mega bus to new Orleans, and then we hired a car and drove his T-Mobile. And so we we don’t, when we go to Houston, we’ve looked at, we sort of late, you know, we put our name down for that RV, but then we hire a car that hotel that from mobile to new Orleans.

And that was a sort of a lesson in the fact that we couldn’t have gone like that for the whole trip. It’s pretty convenient and cool, but yeah, it’s such a money drain. And then we got the bus back to Houston and then Dean got into Janney [00:17:00] and we give it away, you know, all, all 31 foot of it. Wow. And so you went from Houston and then, so what’s the sort of route from there goes.

So yeah, like Texas said itself was, was an adventure, you know, sort of if somebody sort of, you know, listens to this, just go, oh my God, it looks at this and they’re like that. But you know, there’s no way I could run across the Medica. Well, first of all, You probably could, if you thinking about it, probably good or at least war.

But Texas is so great because you always get the whole of America in that sort of a, you know, 893 miles that I did on the, on the first leg from Beaumont, which is in the far east. And it’s all sorts of, you know, swamps and values. And then you go through like the mega cities, like Houston and Austin, you know, two very different cities in Texas, one’s or oil, and then one’s whole tack.

And you [00:18:00] know, where there’s a protocol was Democrat. And then you go from Austin, you go up and say the hill country, and then it changes the oil country and then the desert and you get the Guadalupe’s ma Manson’s national path, which is absolutely gorgeous. You pop out and it’s just desert all the way to El Paso then, which is an unbelievable city in itself.

And so from there, it was desert all the way, pretty much to to LA. So New Mexico, Arizona, Joshua tree, national park. And then I got some, my first ocean in Santa Monica on the PA, which if you know the film, that’s where forest reach the ocean for the first time. And Sydney’s had gone that far in food.

We may as well turn around and keep on going. And I did that. I went up through death valley, you know, so then went right to the middle of another nip of Texas. Again, I think it was only 400 miles to this time. And then yeah, through Tennessee went up to the big [00:19:00] city. So started off sort of Washington, then Baltimore Philly, Boston, well, New York, Boston, and where I did the Boston model.

And then up to Maine, which is the famous lighthouse where Barkley had finished his run that sort of, you know, let the fire and the, my bum to get going. And from there, yeah, I turned around and went to Chicago at, to have a little break then to replenish my visa and came back. And then we had north across the top and then down we reached our third OSHA cause nobody knows where forest reached his third ocean because you see it on a map, but it’s not named in the film or showed.

So I went to a really cool place called Bandon on the, on the Oregon coast. It’s just a lovely little seaside town and followed them the coast roughly down to Santa Monica, a little bit further inland. They went through odds to run through all the redwoods cause thought that’d be pretty amazing. It got to San [00:20:00] Francisco and the Dean had to go home again because of there some news we’d received.

And then for me it was the fourth leg and that took me to the, you know, the classic Midwest America. Yeah. Nebraska, Kansas, Colorado and the beach, my fourth ocean in South Carolina, which is actually where they did most of the filming for forest Gump. So I ran through some of the locations, including the bridge sort of, sort of even managed to hit the ocean sort of where they filmed the Vietnam scenes.

And after that, it was just the final leg. Amazing. And for, I mean, God, I mean, that’s sort of covering all my site 15,000 miles, just there sort of how to sort of condense that. But I found in America. That it all sort of like how different that say California is from like Nevada that each state has their [00:21:00] own thing.

And like the people in the Midwest are just unbelievably kind. Did you have that sort of similar situation all over again? Yeah, for sure. You know, in terms of geography, there can’t be a country in the world that sort of matches it. You know, it’s a very, you know, you got, you’ve got bigger countries, but, you know, they just don’t really have that sort of ranging climate, you know, the 3d shape, the land.

And then of course the cities or paths had so much history, especially music and film history so that, you know, you’d be running through these locations. And then you’ll, you’ll feel like John Wayne one minute and then like seven, it was running through LA and you know, the huge storm drains. And like, I actually saw this like garbage truck that was driving down one of the storm drains and a half expected to see young John Connor on his bike, riding up the side.

And yeah, like the, the people you mentioned the Midwest and stuff, cause [00:22:00] it’s not the sort of part of America that a lot of people would have. You know, instead of you don’t tend to get many people, some in, through the air, the Wyoming tourist brochure book, you know, your apps should, because there’s just so much to see there, you know?

Yeah. It might not be the, the famous stuff, but you know, you get it and, and it’s unspoiled as well. It’s particularly nice to travel through it really slowly because yeah. Sometimes if you are on the planes and you would drive in there and you think, oh, this is really boring. There’s nothing to see.

That’s going to do an 80 mile an hour. But if you’re doing a you know, five or six, then you get to see lots of, lots of cool stuff. And of course, yeah, people will stop and ask if you’re okay, and then you’ll be in towns and people come and sit next to you in a cafe. And the whole half, a nice day thing is, you know, You would tend to, I think there’s always the British notion that it might be a bit contrived, but it isn’t, you know, when people say have a nice day, they actually intend that you go on and [00:23:00] enjoy the rest of your waking hours, you know, at the same, the next day as well.

So you can’t help but feel welcomed there. That’s for sure. I think some of the best stories sort of happened in like, let’s say the Midwest for me, you know, so many times you’d sort of stop in a restaurant, you’d be eating and you’d be like, well, where down that road is, do you think there might be a place I could stop and cam, and then the waitress would be like, oh, give me one second.

And then five minutes later, come back and go, oh, come with me. And then she’d suddenly introduce you to a group of people. Who’d be like, this is the guy speak to them. And then they’d be like, oh, we saw your bike. We, you know, we saw what you were doing. Come and have a beer with us, sit down and then they give you a place to stay.

They feed you. And then the next day they sort of send you on your way and you sort of think that’s a sort of one-off, but it happens again and again and again, I mean, he must have found that doing what you’re doing [00:24:00] it’s to the point where sometimes you would like, you’d have nothing lined up and you just go into a bar and of course you would never liked sorts of like go in there and the doors and go I’m here, everybody.

Yeah. I know what’s going to happen. Simple. You go in there and you think, oh God, I really hope someone’s gonna say, come and stay in mine tonight, rather than get in the freezing cold tent. You know, bro, it happens so often. And like, I would always like plan about three days ahead. Cause you know, you couldn’t really do much more than that rarely.

And you will look, are there any cheap motels likely to finish? No, not today. What’s the weather going to be like it’s too cold to carry. Are there any couch surfing contacts, you know, 70th, if there weren’t, you’d be like, right. And my fail safe, which are net my emergency break glass was post office lobby because the state see quite often have them open 24 hours, really remote places, [00:25:00] people work sort of crazy hours.

You know, people in America work so hard. We mode where it worked just going back on the grind, but Lisa Americans just like work way harder and they sense to really enjoy it. So they’ll go and they’ll pick the post up at three in the morning on the way back from a shift. And they almost had a a straggly bearded Englishman on the floor of the lobby, but it never happened because I would just go into a place and sit down.

I’ve never asked for that. But I would just, you know, people would ask me what I’m doing, and then I’ll say, I’ll run across America where you stay in tonight while I was going to see if I could camp around the back of the restaurant, or if anybody you anywhere. And they’d be like, nah, don’t worry about that.

Like you can go and stay with John. Yeah. It happened so much. And, and I suppose, like I remember doing my sort of research before I went out and, you know, they sort of said, oh, well, you can go knock on doors. You could [00:26:00] probably wild camp. Is that sort of what you did as well? Wild camp and knocked on people’s doors.

Yeah. I didn’t really do huge amounts of wild camping apart from sort of open the north because. Even in the rural areas, you know, there’s still quite a that you know, that down south, there’s still quite a lot of people about. And the one thing is like, people are very, very protective over their land.

There’s no right to roam over there. I was speaking to the American ultra and a John Kelly who lives in the UK at the moment. And he is just like blown away by the fact that he could just go and run across a field, you know? And he’s just said, you can’t do that. The states. And then I met a guy called Chris who was walking across America and I was with the Dean and Jenny at the time.

And he had literally. Just completed his last solo day in Arizona. And he was going to get crude all the way into California. And I said, where’s your camp? And he said, yeah, I’ll just knock on people’s [00:27:00] doors and, you know, and sort of ask if we can camp in their yard. And so the first day I was so low, I, I think I’ve just got a little bit excited and I left it way too late and it was like dark.

And it was like, you know, proper laces of midnight black. And then I knocked on this first house and the guy answered the door and he, you know, he was just like, no, you can’t. And I was just saying that subsidy you know, cause you’re not going to walk you. And then I knocked on another one, a few doors down and then based there was no answer for about a minute.

And then suddenly the blinds switched to this fellowships, like who is it? I’m like. Rob from England

because yeah, once you say like, oh, it’s Rob Pope. It is just, I don’t know. No, Rob Paul go away and well he didn’t say anything else until I’d walked way down his drive. Cause he wasn’t coming out and then nanny [00:28:00] opens the door and he’s like, what do you want? And I told him that I was like, what I was doing, what I was doing is four.

And I was looking for somewhere to stay in. Cause I put my tent up in his garden now, like obviously a medic is don’t even use the word garden. There should have been yard. So I probably confused him even more. And he’s like, if you got any weapons on you and I’m like, Nope, no makes I’m pretty sure. Just me raising sharp with anyway.

Good. Cause I got planning. It just pulls out this like 10 inch butcher’s knife from behind his back and I’m just like, oh my God. You know, I sort of wondered if I’d ever get shot. I didn’t think I’d have to get filleted. And I just said, mate, don’t worry about it. I’ll just be on the way. And he was like, well, call my wife and see if you can camp behind the local store.

And so he goes into the house, comes back out, certainly not had it. Didn’t have enough time to make that phone call and he goes, so, okay. [00:29:00] I trust you, come in. And I’m just like, oh my God. And then it goes in and he’s like, you’re home. And I was just thinking less fortunate. I’d seen his little girl and, you know, once I went through the door and it just looked like there was a, a, you know, very normal family scene there.

I thought, oh God, there’s no chapter with anybody screaming from below or anything like that. And he only cooked me dinner. Like he knows to be fed me, watered me. And then he let me stay in his his camping trailer as well. And so again, you know, it’s one of these things. Fair enough. I, two hours previously, I thought I was going to get third, but it worked out really well.

Good. And, and for, for your sort of trip, I mean, you were there for, well over a year. Yeah, let’s do the 422 [00:30:00] days of running. So and I didn’t, I didn’t have days off. There were a couple of days where I, I didn’t run nice. I lost. I lost four days to injury, five days to food poisoning and a, and a couple of days when the RV had broken it, we needed to get it serviced.

But apart from that, it was running every day. How would the legs and the fine, yeah, they slip. I have to sort of, I’m surfing a lot tighter these days and I’m than I used to be. And I’m having to do a lot more sort of self care. And I’ve been really bad at it these last two weeks, because I’ve actually been running really well and got excited and not been doing my stretching and my yoga.

And then I just got, I’ll do it next time. We’ll go for another run before a DB stretch here, and then they can make miles into a, into a run. And I just got, I’ll do the stretch in it a bit. Well, I cope that’s survived. [00:31:00] And in sort of the comparison, because you were there for over a year with the visa situation, you said sort of six months.

So what did you have to leave the country or pop up? Yeah, like my first one, because go into Santa Monica, of course, as we mentioned before, never done anything like this before. And so I had no real degree of confidence that I would do all five legs. And so there was no way I was going to go down to London and spend money on the big visa.

When, you know, I could have literally got to Santa Monica and God, I hate this more than anything, you know? And so I did the 90 day visa and then when I got there and it just sort of, right, this is definitely, we’re definitely going to continue. I came back to to London, got the six month visa and then had a Backhouse of Ben that got me all the way to Chicago and I had to go back and then renew it again in the UK.

Then that got me back to South Carolina. And then it would have got me to to the [00:32:00] actual finish if I didn’t have my bonus Paul’s, which was to see the birth of my daughter, which was the news. I alluded to an air San Francisco, I, the DNS to go home. Oh, wow. She had to fly back for that, obviously. Yeah.

Well, the thing is actually, I actually didn’t have to I could have finished the whole run and probably been back about five days before the birth. But obviously with something like this and it’s going on and it was hard, you know, sort of, I’m not going to be about the Bush there. It was really hard enjoyable as it was in, in the majority.

But you know, sort of, it wasn’t just hard physically. It was hard financially. It was actually hard mentally, but I didn’t really realize that. I was just sorta thinking that my mental hardships were due to the financial and the physical things. And so, but it was [00:33:00] actually sort of the growing realization that they’re finished would mean nothing to me because the Dean wasn’t going to be able to be there.

You know, she was there for like just under half of the whole thing and sacrificed a huge amount of self. And then of course we now have likes to have a little girl on the way and she wasn’t going to be able to see it. And so at the very least I’d have been irritated at, you know, in the poor board out for dinner when I was telling people my anecdotes, but the very worst, I think I’d have been really selfish, not to have included them there.

And so I got to a point it was about 200 miles a short at the finish just, just before Flagstaff. And I decided I though I’d already gone past the distance that forested rent at that point. Every time I went home, it was a gamble because there was no guarantee I was going to be allowed back into the country and it was getting pretty hairy.

So when I came back after South Carolina, [00:34:00] I really thought they weren’t going to let me in. And yeah, I, I flew back and I thought, even if I don’t get to come back, I’ve still done the Forrest distance and had a heck of an adventure, but we got back in and like three weeks after bee was born, she had a passport.

And we did the London marathon on the certain day and flew to flew to Vegas on the Monday to head back to Flagstaff. And then we did the last 200 miles to. Wow, God, that’s amazing. And in terms of the sort of difference between Nadine being there and on your own, how, how did the sort of, how did the sort of dynamics work in terms of like sometimes when you go with someone else, this sort of experience is completely different when your own, because you have to sort of force yourself into social situations.

You have to sort of speak people, otherwise you become almost insane in your own thoughts. [00:35:00] Why is that? How I was very lucky by chance to have those two separate experiences, because if, if I had my way, the way I sort of envisaged it, the dream scenario is we go out, we take the gamble, we buy the RV, we get to send some money.

We go to Santa Monica, we bumped into Tom Hanks, cinnabar. He just goes, oh my God, this is incredible. I’m going to put you onto my friend who will sponsor you. And then we went across the country and it was great and it was super easy. But cause that never happened. And I w I was then slowly sort of flung into the, into the wilderness, pushing a three wheeled stroller, like sad that the Dean was going home, but also really, really nervous because I tore my quad about five days before she was due to go, which was just like, not the ideal breath.

And yeah, when, when we were together, they said we, we did [00:36:00] talk to people because. I am the naturally sort of sociable type. And I would make sure that certainly, you know, we would go out and we were, I remember having an unbelievable night at the bar called crazy hours just to the east of, and new Orleans.

And this place was like, cheers. If anyone remembers the series saying, Boston’s like, cheers, but like with a Cajun twist and we got pretty Mullard in there. We only went in there to get like sort of a, a, you know, a single beer. So we could just basically park in their car park overnight. And of course that be attended to a lot more.

And when you’re running, it goes straight to your head. And these people were great, but they were, that was the source of the exception, the going out. But when you’re on your own, you’re not, it’s not the you’re not seeking social engagement, but sometimes you do want to retreat into your shelf. But you’re forced to socially engage because otherwise you are just one person on your [00:37:00] own in the middle of this huge country.

And you will basically probably I still maintain that. I wouldn’t have got across the states if it wasn’t for the American people, you know, and that, which has got a very forest message about it, you know? And so I was so glad that in the end that it didn’t work out the way I planned it, because the story is definitely better for it.

Yeah. I think that is as I say, it’s not the destination, it’s the. Yeah. Yeah, for sure. And I always think that with a lot of these trips is you go from a, to B and that’s always the intention, but actually the stories and the excitement always happens in between. And the sort of destination is usually pretty underwhelming.

You’ve sort of done it. You’re like, Ugh, relief. But, but you have these stories to sort of tell for years and years. [00:38:00] There’s very rarely a marching band to a signal, your arrival, to your destination, you know, and the firework display. So you imagined that you might have it going off in your head, but you know, usually it’s, you’re just there and there’s tourists taking their own photos.

And you’re just like, I’ve just done this. I’ve just done this. And then we, of course you didn’t say it because that would make you look like a complete girl, but but you want them to just go, wow, have you just gone across America? Just go about it is so true. You, you are sort of fair and usually on a beach on your own.

And you’re like, yeah, I remember when I, today it’d be like a heat wave throughout the entire time. And then I got to the beach, it was cloudy. It was freezing cold. I was on this beach on my ain and I was like, Oh, great. The home really just want to get out of here.

Everybody loves an anticlimax and that’s why you’ve got to enjoy the actual, you know, the [00:39:00] process of getting there anyway, because if it was just, you know, if you forgot all that, now there’s about, I mentioned the torn quad and earlier I mentioned the Boston marathon. Now my original plan was to well, it wasn’t an original plan, but it’s formed on, on the way out.

And I thought, hang on. Like I managed to persuade Boston to give me a, an entry to the mammoth and they tasted it wasn’t cheap, but I thought it’s just gonna, it’s going to be such a good experience that it’d be worth Devin. And I thought if I get on my toes, I can actually run and arrive to Boston on the start line, you know, actually get there for the day at the most.

And then I tore my quad, which put me about sort of them. Well, it was two days a complete. And then I was walking for a good three or four days with tiny bits of run-ins thrown in. So maybe delayed me by about five days. And I still could have put my, put the foot down and got there maybe on time. But then I was going to be going through [00:40:00] all these cities like Steve, you know, like Washington DC, and I wants to run at the Rocky steps, but I wouldn’t have been able to do any of that.

And if I was obsessed with this donate, eh, destination, at that point in time, I would have got and again, nobody had been bothered because they were all there for their own Boston marathon experience. So now it’s just thought, why does that rush? You know? And so I got, as far as New Jersey, And the local runner picked me up and we drove to start Boston.

And then I eventually would travel back and resume from New Jersey. But even just that journey, w w w where there, the guys solid, that makes sense. It was a story in itself. And so, you know, you shouldn’t get obsessed about the figures and, and timescales because they’re very, very important. The only people generally give a monkeys about some arbitrary timescale or a raw I’ve got rive on July the fourth.

It’s only you, nobody else. Really? It goes, oh, [00:41:00] July the fourth. That’s nice. Yeah. I think we’ve spoken a lot on the podcast about how no one cares. Yeah. May maybe mark Beaumont had to stay on his schedule that like, because yeah, 80 days was a fairly figurative thing, you know, you have to make sure he got there, you know, and obviously, yeah, yeah.

The data’s spare. Cause he could have spent some time on the beach. I don’t think he was in the mindset to do that though. No, it probably would have cramped up. He probably would’ve cramped up and that would have been it it’s okay. Yeah. No, I think that’s literally what we said. Like no one cares and they should make mark Beaumont

because you are breaking a sort of time record. But if you’re not, if you’re running across America or cycling. You know, down in Africa, mark, Beaumont’s probably broken the records. So unless you’re going to try and beat him, which I think when we had him on the podcast, he was sort of speaking about how he’d get up [00:42:00] at 4:00 AM on the dot he’d be on his bike.

And he had cycled pretty much till 10 or 12 o’clock at night nonstop. And that in terms of a sort of adventure, it’s not really, it is an adventure in itself, but you don’t, you miss all those moments with the P fortunately he he’d had the the one where he did it so low as well. So he actually doing both of them.

So he can, he can tick both boxes for, Hey, read my th th the record that I add to beat was of course, Forrest ran for three years, two months, 14 days, and 60 and hours. At that I smashed that. That’s why everyone wants to hit. So forest completely there, mate. So for like Ben, because he finishes, where does he finish?

He finishes like in the middle of nowhere and then just turns around again, I think I’ll go home [00:43:00] 1 63 highway, 1 63 in monument valley, just over the border in Utah. And then that’s where they survive or, you know, dreamt to finish it. But I didn’t really think that I would have the opportunity to finish there just because, you know, you know, it talks about that.

The kindness of the American people being late, the ginormous in get me across. I think look played as big a role as, as anything, you know, I used to have like, you know, tore my quads and I was, I was walking and making progress two days later, you know like food poisoning. I had the, I was almost on the verge of going to hospital and, and calling it quits and I managed to get away with it.

And then just like so many, like little near misses on the way that that could have, you know, been been I don’t sort of already want to think about and too much, you know I had like a huge 18 Wheeler, [00:44:00] Tennessee Jack knife in front of me and basically came to a stop about 30 foot, you know, sort of away from Anna.

What about absolutely no chance. And so I just stood there and probably looked really cool to the driver as he was screaming. But I didn’t feel cool. Cause that’s sort of interesting because this sort of diet that you must’ve had throughout, was it sort of nut bars and chips? It was basically, so we had donuts chocolate certs, Yvette loads of Dr.

Pepper, because you’ve got to stay in character and then yeah, they still have loads of fast food. I, I had to sort of get, do the fast food read generally just because it was cheap. And and when I was having my breaks, I didn’t want to be like heat noodles of at the side of the road and everything like that.

It would have been like probably cheaper. And again, if it had done that book, it would have just become so [00:45:00] mind numbing. And quite often I would use food as my little, you know, the worm on the end of the fishing pole to sort of make me go a little bit, eh, you know, further that day, let’s say for forget here, I’ll be able to have like this specific burger or, or, you know, A nice, really nice hot dog at this gas station.

Certainly when I was going across Utah there was a bit where there was no services or anything for like 70 miles and a new, there was a gas station and gas station usually always means hot dogs. And I was like, oh, most recent. I was obviously like Miraj is like in the salts. Yeah. And that one had got there that hot dog was suitably priced for somewhere that’s in the middle of nowhere, but I didn’t care.

And for for the end, you were sort of there in Utah with Nadine and the kid. Yeah. Yeah. And maybe get some other people as well. Yeah. Yeah. And [00:46:00] then B, B a S a B E. And yeah, at least we, we named a sort of a, well, I say we named the Dean named when we’re at Idaho and we didn’t know that it was going to be a girl at that point in.

And and so she was actually going to call B leaf as in the sunshine on Leith sung by the proclaim. And it was really quite freaky because I had a day when I was either hoes, like Scotland on steroids, and I was sort of obsessing over the proclaimers and best slates the song comes on and I play it over and over again.

And then I come in and tell him the Dean, and she’s just like, that’s really weird. And I was just like, why is that weird? And she used to start because if we’re having a ball yeah. Wants us to call and belief. And I never even had that as a name, apart from the place before. So yeah, that was my only regret would be, was a girl cause like that it’d been a great backstory, but yeah, [00:47:00] when she told me she was going to call it B I wasn’t openly sure about that to start with, but I love it now.

Good. And as you say was, was a feeling like we it’s sort of slightly underwhelming, you’d sort of been back for so long and then suddenly you had two weeks left, I suppose you probably just wanted to the sort of feeling of wanting just to get it. Not rarely nice to them because it had gone on for so long and sort of, and, and everything was going fairly well at this point.

And so it was like such a ginormous goal. Like I remember they used to, they’re speaking sort of you’ve gone across America before. And they said like, he spent like the first 90% sort of almost like wishing it was over. And then the last 10% desperate to Clore it back, you know, sort of an ad for it not to be over, but it was one of the rare occasions where the climax wasn’t an anticlimax.

I had a good few of them, but [00:48:00] to be honest, I almost every ocean for me, like w w was always nice to have a good one because there was always going to be something else. So it was still, yeah, it was like a mini celebration, but it didn’t have to be like grand like so much. So like sort of. I could equate in Chicago cause it’s like my favorite Mexican city and I’ve always wanted to visit there and I saw got no money sort of, and I’m injured.

So to have, you know, maybe it’d be great to quit here, but then it was always that sort of being in monument valley then surveyed, you know, doing the bit for my team charities, world wildlife fund and piece direct that drove me on and I got to the end and I got to deliver the line. And then I got to turn around and with Nadine sort of being there, it seemed too good a time as any looking at it or did an engagement ring from a little in Brooklyn that had it posted to Flagstaff and it all came together.

So I had a little thing in reserve to make sure that it [00:49:00] didn’t end up in an anticlimax unless you called married life an anticlimax. Yeah. Marry joke. Well, at least you guys say it’s definitely one that you will remember for the rest of your life. That sort of makes. Yeah, it could have been, it could have been there remembered for a different reason if she had just said no, drop this.

Isn’t what I want. Oh gosh, I don’t know. and finished. So I don’t have this memory. Yeah. Well, I just don’t need to get a new pair of Nike Cortez, put them on and then just gone for maybe then it would have done the three years, two months, et cetera. Amazing. And, wow. And so after that you sort of came back.

So this is what year, 2016, eh, that was 2018 then. Yeah. So started in 2016, sort of. That was a, yeah, it was April, 2018. She started to get hot in the desert. When we came back, [00:50:00] we got out at the right time. Give me one sec. I just need to check.

Oh, wow. Well, I mean, it, it’s just the most incredible story and like the most incredible adventure as well. You’ve sort of been up and down. Did you have a particular favorite state? Because you’ve been nor fan self? I can’t comment on the south, but I love the north and they’re very different from what I hear.

Th th they’re different, but similar, you know, like the, the states just, you know, it is a bit crazy that we see the politics there at the moment, but like, It’s unsurprising that there is that sort of argument because even California and Oregon, you know, you’ve got San Francisco and Portland, but then in between it so super, super rural, but you [00:51:00] know, like, I don’t know why that I preferred the remote bits or the built up bits, you know, sort of cause you, you get different stories in all of them, but like I do have a real soft spot for Tennessee because that was the state when I went solo for the first time.

And I didn’t have any expectations of Tennessee apart for the fact that I got told the whole load of packs of stray dogs there that probably Savage me. And I didn’t think Dolly park was going to come out and run any miles would be so so it wasn’t really anticipated any great measure, but that was when I sort of maybe started to get the inkling that things could be all right.

And they, you know, I, there was just like an, almost like a little tidal wave. Of support that happened after I got a really cool news article and, you know, people will shake their hands and it’d be a $20 note in it. And then I’d be like, oh man, I can’t take that. And they’d be like, I think the word you’re looking for is thank you for that.

Fair enough. You know? [00:52:00] And and it’s a really beautiful state, but then, you know, I’m saying Tennessee, and then I’m just thinking, oh God, like of, you know, like Washington was really cool. And then, so his main, and then like, you know, going through like death valley and, and Nevada, I would certainly encourage you.

Haven’t been up north or you definitely need to do a Southern one. And so or I reckon the root of my like first leg would have been really, really cool to, to do on the bike. You know, you don’t even get many Hills, you get to cross the Rockies at the lowest point, you know? Yeah, exactly. I remember cycling up the Rocky.

So there’s actually the Rockies one that difficult to cycle up. Believe it or not. That’s all very gradual. It’s actually the, I suppose, right. The north it’s not too bad. Is it, you know, sort of it’s when a, decided to do the, the really evil bit in the middle of Colorado, I saw that gets smashed by snow as I was going through Wyoming, I was looking to my right.

And that was just [00:53:00] sort of seeing that it’s just that so glad it didn’t go that way. For me, it was, I’d sort of been told because my, at the time, when I went, my American geography was pretty poor and say, they’re like, oh, well, one shore over the Rocky. It’s all down here to the sea. And then you get into like Nevada and then you’ve still got the Sierra Nevada.

It’s the same waste. I’m not even going to share how much it was, but it was horrific cycling up. It was like comfort. I used to have to like stop drag my bike up. And I went up like one of the, like. Oh, in comparison to the others, like the TMS and it was brutal in comparison to the Rockies. Yeah, I did. I didn’t expect that in the bar at all.

And the one thing is it’s less severe for a runner than someone on a bike, especially a loaded bike. So I do feel your pain, retrospective love. [00:54:00] Well, I, I think there were many times where I was on my bike. Do it very glad that I wasn’t running. So it swings and roundabouts down Hills. Yeah. That’s always a joy.

Well, Robbins worst thing for me was having the stroller and like my brake slightly roped. And so I would generally disconnect them. And then I would forget about that when I was going down like a massive hail and then suddenly I’d find out it’d be like doing like sub five minute miles on legs that were not capable of doing sub five minutes.

Oh, well, yeah, it’s just, it’s just an incredible and say probably Tennessee is your favorite was what’s our, a good story other than the M one, but you had to go no, the, the near murder. Well, the, there was one of the actually sort of is probably my favorite story that did didn’t make the book. It was a really [00:55:00] cool town called Cookeville and probably no one’s heard about it, but it’s sort of in between Nashville and Knoxville, it’s where we store Jenny when and the Dean had to go home and I was approaching cook for that day.

I was with Australia and I knew there were like huge storms on the way inside. I ran past this like really like sort of, you know, almost like it wasn’t a shack, but it was a fairly small modest where the board. And there were two little girls like the play and out in the front yards. And so they rushed and got the daddy and said, can we give them an apple and an energy drink?

So they came out, they gave me that they were just really nice. We had the chat. Then I went on and this is a old role in fields, but knew I could feel this storm. And I basically got to the RV place. And my plan originally was to actually just put some stuff into the in, in CRV, take some stuff out that I now knew I needed to be so low and then go and get some food over the road [00:56:00] and then probably stay in like one of the motels there.

And so I went over and tried to get out of this storage yard, but it was a weight activated gate and I couldn’t get out there. And this is just as the heavens absolutely opened. So could see all this fast food. And I was just like, oh my God, I’ve got nothing in Australia. But then I went back to the RV.

And even though there’s no lakes to power, we still have gas. And it was like noodles and stuff that was left over there. So I ended up having this site romantic dinner for one, and that sorts of entity in sorts of would have been involved with. But and then I got a message from from Steve and the dads of these two little girls.

And they were just like, all my girls are really worried about you. They was just like, he does got an umbrella donate, daddy’s got umbrella donate. And that was just like, even at that age, it’s just, you know, the kindness was there. And so I went to sleep that night and sort of you know, in, and in the bands and the RV, like sort of free stay, which is great.

And there wasn’t, it felt like I [00:57:00] wasn’t breaking any rules if I couldn’t get out. And then obviously the pet that was still smells in the Dean’s hat and still Fiat, I was like, Why is this made the book? This is romance too many good stories. That’s the thing, that’s the problem. It’s a, usually so many sort of talk about, well, I think actually, you know, when you say that, like with Tennessee, that’s why that story didn’t get in because lights that the editor was just like, man, I’m doing it.

And just saying, this really nice thing happened, then this really nice thing happened. And this really nice thing happened. You need to have ups and downs, like tendencies, like a rocket ship to Mars. Is this just a story of amazing times? And the unit for every good story has a conflict along the way.

Exactly. And I did get chased by that pack of stray dogs, but they did, they didn’t get, get me never, never the fun has been chased by a bunch of straight Oaks. [00:58:00] Yeah, no, it’s probably even worse when you’re on a bike as well, because if you just haven’t gotten enough speed and then, you know, you run the risk, not only of.

Coming off the bike as well. I was going to say it’s probably worse for you running because it’s, you’re trying to outpace a bunch of dogs. Yeah. But I can just, I would turn around and shout at them. And I, this one actually went for me. I just basically wheeled my stroll around and says the dog like bounced off the side of it.

They just thought, you know, it was quite nice to have that there. And then that, then I could have reached my pepper spray. And if he came again, he was going to get that. But he never did. I think he thought better of it once you show your dominance. Exactly. Well, Rob has been such a pleasure listening to your stories.

There’s a part of the show where we ask the same five questions to each guest each week. With the first being on the trip, what was the one gadget that you always had with you? [00:59:00] Wow. The one gadget and stuff. I was, it would, it would’ve been my MP3 player for sure. And so one of the saddest days on the trip was when it stopped working.

And I looked down to see like what songs should have been on. And it was the Smiths. Heaven knows I’m miserable. Now, if it was, if it wasn’t for music, I think I might’ve actually gone insane. Yeah. I, I always find the music along the way. Always helps because you spend so much time alone with your thoughts and sometimes that’s good.

Sometimes they have a sort of time to sort of run away. And so actually having music sort of listened to also probably speeds up your running. Exactly. I had a rule that basically if AC DC ever came on, I wasn’t allowed to walk. So it would always happen at the most inopportune moment, like at the start of a massive hill, [01:00:00] but you know, sort of it certainly got me going, that’s always a good one.

What is your favorite adventure or travel book? So I, yeah, I thought about this, the one that maybe got me sort of thinking about the sense of the adventure is quite strange one it’s because it basically isn’t about a person’s adventure. It’s about a dog’s adventure. And so be call of the wild by Jack London.

And so it’s the story of like, sort of like a, a dog that is. Almost kidnapped to become a sled dog and then has like, this is a crazy, sort of a traumatic life in the wild. So it’s at north to the edge of a medical Yukon, you know, and it didn’t get that far north, but I did leave San Francisco from a bar called the first.

Which is where Jacqueline actually broke that. But in terms of human adventure, yet the first book [01:01:00] and probably the most sensitive well-read adventure book I’ve got is actually mark Bo monster Maddie cycle, the world. And I, I kicked myself when I met him. That sort of, I didn’t actually take the copy for him to sign because it’s so well thumbed, he would have known that I’ve read it and said it wouldn’t actually really the place to sign it for.

When you were in San Francisco, did you go to a, the Bubba, Bubba shrimp? I did. Yeah, like, so I, I I’ve been to the one in San Francisco, the one in Vegas, the one in New York. Hey, you went all to the Orleans. Yeah. And the one in Biloxi as well. So there’s a, there’s a few more than I have ticked off yet, but.

The good thing was, was a, in a couple of them. I did get free feeds as well. Oh, that’s quite nice. They must have loved your story. Exactly. I’m like cousin, they quite often will have somebody who comes around and we’ll ask you questions on the film while you’re having your dinner and stuff like that.

[01:02:00] There was, there was quite the air, the face off in the new Orleans one where the only one I fell down on was my show key knowledge of the west presidency chronology. So I think that would probably get us all. Yeah, exactly. Well, I think it got forward out five, which is probably more than most. What why are the sort of adventures important to you?

Yeah, I don’t actually think they are and, you know, sort of I enjoyed sorts of the adventure but it was the, the right thing at the right time for me and I am keen to do more things. But generally sort of the adventure, the sorts of, I want to go on isn’t necessarily for me, it’s, if I can do stuff that is good for my charities, then that, then that is great.

You know, step one would be not the thing. I want to be a cog in the thing that [01:03:00] sort of helps. And I am able to do this kind of stuff, like run a long way, and now maybe I’ve got a bit more of a presence. It might even be a bit more sort of, you know, useful for these guys. And so, but I think sort of the, has to be an adventure and every one of us, you know, you don’t necessarily need to spend all your life adventure, but I think everybody would be far richer spiritually, if they did the experience or the ultimate freedom of the, whether it’s the road, the trail, the mountains, the desert, you know, that’s one of the good thing about magic is you can experience sorts of all of it.

There’s also a little bit of a safety net by the fact that it’s so very civilized on the whole, you know, so you don’t necessarily have to go, right. I’m going to do an adventure. What, what, what am I going to do? And then some through, you know, sort of they’re the big Almanack of adventures and go I’ll have that.

Cause usually the adventure will [01:04:00] fund you. You just have to be ready to accept the adventure when it happens. Very nice. Yeah. I think what was I going to say? Remember I had on the tip of my tongue completely forgotten.

What about your favorite motivational or motivational? What is your favorite sort of quite travel motivational quote? I think this probably will be quite appropriate for, for people who travel adventures because remember adventure. Our only adventures if they are adventures, you know? So if you plan something to the nth degree, the adventure aspect is sort of, you know, then, then it becomes a holiday.

You might not think it’s a holiday because you’re really tired doing something. But if nothing’s left to chance, you’re not going to get the same sorts of [01:05:00] excitement. So it’s a quote from my granddad, which is you die. If you worry and you die, if you doubt. So why worry? Very true, worry about the things that you can control rather than things you can’t exactly, you know, and then just get on with it.

Yeah, that’s a, that’s a good one. And finally people listening are always keen to sort of travel and go on these sort of big grand adventures. What’s the one thing you would always recommend for people wanting to get stuff. Stop putting obstacles in the way of your yourself, you know, actually achieving something, you know, sort of, it’s really easy to find excuses and excuses.

Aren’t the, the bad thing that the continually made out to be. But if you find that sort of one of your excuses disappears from view, so invent another one to take it to place. Just like sort of, you know, it’s a bit like sort of, you know, shooting down the ducks in a fairgrounds, you know, [01:06:00] sort of once you’ve shut one off, don’t put another one there, cause you’ll never win the Teddy at the end.

Otherwise that’s pretty good. And finally, what are you doing now and how can sort of people follow you in the future? You’ve got a new book coming out. There it is. Yeah. I don’t know how that got there. Yeah. So yeah, becoming forest is out from all your major bookshops and online and everything like that.

I’m trying to get people to ask their local independence to shop it, to stock it so we can keep the high street alive and all that. And so the book actually comes out on February the eighth in the states and I’m aiming to actually go back out and get myself back to monument valley it stand at that point where sort of I did, or to those famous words and then turn around and keep on going baby to one final lotion.

Ah, very nice. And it’s out in the UK at the moment. It’s [01:07:00] out in the UK. I came out in October and sort of and it’s seems to be getting really well received. And remember it’s, you know, there’s something for everybody and it’s not just a running book. There’s enough for the runners in. But it’s people who are fans of adventure, general American cultures, that’s of, you know, the American people, you know, amazing sorts of travel landscapes.

So very nice photos of that. And of course, if you’re like Forrest Gump, there’s a lot, there’s a lot of forest wisdom in there, which I occasionally hope to share it on their social media as well. So you’re more than welcome to follow me on there. She’s run roadblock, Rob LA. Very nice. Did he take quite a lot of research watching the film over and over again?

Oh, for sure. Yeah, they sort of, especially the, the actual seven minute run and scene, like I’ve probably seen that brilliancy maybe 200 times now, you know, just trying to work out exactly where bits, where if I was doing filming, [01:08:00] you know, so I wants to try and recreate that scene. But you know, I don’t think you can fail.

Just love the film once you’ve actually seen. And you know, in a year when Shawshank and, and pulp fiction, where it’s contenders in the Oscar race for it to have one shows, how good is it would probably be on over Christmas. It always is nice. Very good. Very good film and well for, for people listening and people watching, we’ll put a link to your book in the annual social media, in the description below, say, click on it and have it just in time for best book ever fat.

Have it just in time for Christmas. Oh wow. The timing. Perfect. Well, Rob, it’s been such a pleasure listening to your stories and I cannot thank you enough for coming on today. Thanks so much for having me, mate. It’s been a lot of fun. Well, that is it for today. Thank you so much for watching it. [01:09:00] And I hope you got something out of it.

If you did hit that like button and subscribe, if you haven’t. And I will see you in the next video.

Harrison Carter

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Harrison Carter (Adventurer)

Harrison Carter is an Adventurer and Reptile Conservationist who has travelled around the world studying snakes and other reptiles. His adventures have recently taken him to Guyana on a month expedition looking at all kinds of snakes.

The team he took travelled through dense rainforest in unforgiving terrain, so bad that his colleague had to be sent home early. The rainforest is a harsh environment and today on the podcast Harrison Carter tells all about his journey and what his future expeditions may hold.

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Transcript of our Conversation

Harrison Carter

[00:00:00] Harrison Carter: My next guest is an adventurer and reptile conservationist. He has some incredible stories today on the podcast. And today we talk quite a lot about his amazing expedition down in Guyana, where he was out in the Amazon rain forest one month looking and studying reptiles and specifically snakes on the Pocus day.

We talk about snakes and how he wants to sort of change people’s perceptions and make sure that snakes and humans can coexist in the future. So I am delighted to introduce Harrison Carter to the podcast. Thanks, John. Thanks so much for having me on it’s really nice to get on and have a chance to talk about the journey and something that for me has been quite a long time in the making.

So let’s have a quick chat. Well, it sounds like quite an incredible journey. You are a reptile, conservationist and adventurer, and a couple of years back, you were out in Guyana. In the jungle during this incredible trip [00:01:00] before we get into that specific trip, let’s talk about how. Because most people, especially when I sort of found you and looked at your Instagram and saw the huge amount of pictures with you and snakes would probably freak most people out.

But for you, this is what you love to do and say, how did it all start? No, that’s the, I think that’s the question that everyone who works in snakes gets asked first, like, how did you get started in this or what’s wrong with you or both? I think, I think for me growing up, always around wildlife in the countryside and stuff, like I knew that animals were going to play a really huge part in my life.

But I’ve always been attracted to different things. And for me that was scales and I think, you know, snakes particularly interesting for me. I, I still find it fascinating that you know, something with no ears, no arms, no legs can be so deadly and so effective at kind of killing things. [00:02:00] I mean, they’re obviously really Pressy.

I think that snakes are actually. H a huge animal taboo in, in kind of societies, we have it now. I mean, they’re embedded in like our social language, snake, you know, someone who’s a snake or whatever, it’s, it’s a common discussion point equally. There are on all modes of our fashion clothes. They just, future range, features snakes all over.

It is the thing that is all around us divides opinion. And I’m not, I’m not sure we talk about them enough. And for other reasons, it, we can go on to later that there was having a real significant impact in terms of snakebites across the world. So, yeah, I think there’s an awful lot though. And I think there was, there was a difference from what everyone else was interested in, this kind of took me down that path.

And then also international travel, which really stapled that passion into something that was possible. And I think once you actually get close to an animal and once you, you can see it up front and have an interaction with something. It will embed something [00:03:00] in you different to any kind of good photo or image was the experience when you’re actually there.

It just hits you and makes it impossible to forget. I think ’cause, you’re, you’re from the UK and UK, I would say, you know, it doesn’t have many snakes running around, running around is probably not the right word to describe them. So in terms of your younger years, when you were sort of get into it, was it sort of traveling abroad or was it just sort of looking at them in books and on TV?

Was it that sort of path that sort of took you down in this sort of love affair with. Yeah. I mean, I think if you are growing up in the UK and interested in reptiles and people will say, and rightly say to the UK has a fantastic range of reptiles, which we do. But they are not as cool as exotic reptiles for me.

[00:04:00] They’re not as medically significant. They’re maybe not as Presley almost well as diverse or as big or as a very small subset. And so yes, that has been my charter trying to pick and catch a thousand grass snakes or common adders, which are the UCAS, any venomous snake. Yes. Our, that number’s next, quite significant.

Like, absolutely. It’s the only animal I think that’s put Steve back and hospital is a UK common either. So they, they really are interesting in terms of how potentially significant they can be. But. In terms of what state, my passion. It, it wasn’t actually domestic reptiles at all. I think like most of us, we grew up watching really great personalities on television.

So the likes of Steve-O and even a bit more theatrical and the Austin Stevens, south African guy, and of course, UK, we have Marco Shay who remains a bit of an idol to me now. And it’s doing more kind of purposeful hyper, hyper logical work [00:05:00] in his, in his current position university wolves.

So it was really television. I think which captured captured me as a child. I think most children are captured by that. And then as I got a little bit older, maybe. I don’t know, six to six to 10 books became more relevant. And of course not literature is such more great photos and imagery, books snakes.

I mean, for example, what there’s one photo. So in a, in a book that I’ve got at home I think it’s one of Mark’s original snakes of the world books. And there’s a picture in the of a west African Gulbuddin Viper. I don’t know whether you’ve seen one of these before John, but essentially they’re this massive Viper and species and the longest fangs of any snake in the world.

They’re sort of, they can get up to sort of seven foot, six foot long, massively fast. They have a head like a Labrador and there’s this food. So in this kind of swamp land in, in Western Africa, I can just looking at this photo and thinking like, [00:06:00] there’s no way that’s actually an animal that, that, that just looks so uncomparable.

And I have nothing to position that against. And I think that that sparked a real energy sparked kind of rope. I haven’t assumed one. Yeah, it’s kind of on the bucket list, but it sparked a lot of other travel quite a poignant moment as well. I mean, obviously to work with snakes, it’s important to point out that you don’t have to handle them.

In fact, some of the most effective kind of people that I’ve ever seen working with snakes, very rarely get that hands-on just through understanding the body language of the snake, you can position it in a way. And so that, you know, even if you’re working with one of the world’s most deadly snakes, it’s completely safe.

You don’t actually have to get that close, but you know, when you’re a child, I think people want. You know, feel more of a real connection to something. And I, you know, I, I do like I’m handling, handling the snakes in a safe way, but of course I can’t wait to get my kind of hands on and feel that relationship.

And when I was, I think, nine, I went [00:07:00] to my parents who are not really animal people. They definitely aren’t familiar with reptiles. And I said, well, you know, guys, I really either want my first name or I want a PlayStation. And, and there was so against me having a PlayStation, they bought me my first name.

I think they thought it was a bit of a fad, oh, this will happen for a few years. It’s a thing. And then it’ll move on. You know, and then 14 years later on site talking to you about following a career and talking about snake conservation and human snake conflict. So maybe not a fat after all. Well, great fat as it is.

And so with with this adventure that you did, I suppose, because you’re still at university studying, was it very much. This trip was planned for when you’re at school, in terms of you had this idea and you were keen to pursue, or was this something sort of done through the university? I think for me, I guess [00:08:00] just closing the gap between 10 and where I was taking those strip, which was at the end of my undergraduate degree university of York, I had been amazingly lucky to, to kind of be exposed a lot of international travel in the tropics to work with snakes.

And I think that at the risk of maybe overstepping the mark, there are always opportunities to go and work with animals. There are always raised him from my perspective of maybe raising the funds to go, whether it’s through amazing grants or whatever it may be. For me, I got very lucky, you know, hands up.

I have people in my life that were traveling to places like that, like a tag along and learn from. And so by the age of. 21 I’ve been to shoreline corrupt, large number of times, which is obviously what I learned most of my venomous snake interaction skills. And then from that, I use that as a chance to get to Bali and work on [00:09:00] conserving king cobras in Bali for a good period of time with the body repertoire rescue and then manage the, kind of the capture and release of these large African rock pipe in South Africa with Canungra reptile censored, and all of these things are fascinating to me.

And I was building up in my mind experience with not just different species, because that is one thing whenever you’re dealing with snakes, it’s only ever a problem because they meet humans. So actually you have to really consider how are you working with the human as well. And I, speaking of different cultural skillsets The big area, the obvious area for me to go to being the Amazon, you know, about how cool snakes and reptiles are there in general.

And I’d never been to south America. And I’ve been really slaving away for my undergrad. My, my parents never went to university. And so when I, when I went to uni, I was kind of so concerned that I would be the world’s biggest failure that I ended up just working really, really hard and kind of putting that above social things.

I still played hockey and had fallen and one talents, but it was, it was a work thing. And so when I got to the end [00:10:00] of my three years, I was thinking, well, what kind of celebration could I have, what kind of trip can I do to Christen the end of the first period of, of kind of my academic career in that sense.

And for me, it was going to the Amazon in some shape or form, and I’m going, I don’t want to just go and do a trip that everyone else would do because no, one’s really gonna care about snakes and this approach, I guess it’s important to bring in my previous experience because I developed a real level of.

Confidence really arrogance in terms of, I know what I need to go and how I need to get there to have an experience that I actually want. And I can remember going kind of searching up Guyana as being the least travel company in south America. It has some of the most untouched jungle part of the guy on a shoe or like a real, this, this is the place to go and find cool stuff.

And I was looking at, are there any cool pre-planned trips, adventure setup or whatever? I just couldn’t find any that I thought were interesting to me. [00:11:00] Cause it’s expensive to go and it was gonna be like a once of a lifetime. And I’ve also started down the barrel of going back to work in London as a management consultant.

So it was a bit of like I really want to make a special trip that I’ve, that I, if it doesn’t all work out that I’ll remember forever. And I can remember just going to the local cafe, printing out a map of Guyana and circling things and just drawing lines between bits that I wanted to go and do different habitats, different environments, different people, different species targets.

And that’s kind of how the, how the trip went up. It was very much a read of, I think the only travel guide written in Ghana is still the last published date was 2014 or something. So that’s, you know, amazingly out of date. So like emailing all emails would that automatic replies on men, there’s no phones.

And it was just ultimately a lot of human trust. And I guess being relevant I remember when we’re thinking about traveling through, going on and how you’d make it through all of these red pens. Initially, we thought, well, we’ll just run some kind of a four by four and just drive it. [00:12:00] And then a bit more reading, you realize actually that road and wet season is, is partially a river.

So by us not going to be a thing that’s not possible. So immediately you’re like, well, I’m I going to have to hire a plane? Like, what does that look like? Because you know, in the way that we think about hiring a plane, that’s only the bond bill that would do that. How does a union student in the airplane turns out and go, I’m wonder it’s like hiring a plane is the least fun thing that you did that day.

Like you just call up a guy and said, I want to get here. And he’s like, we fly on ABC dates. The price is X, Y, Z book it and go. So there’s a lot of bucket and go kind of, I guess, energy there as well. Well, and this was, this was your first big sort of adventure into the sort of jungle and the jungles, like an incredibly hostile sort of place at times, especially for the sort of uninitiated or the unprepared.

How did you sort of prepare for it? What it was, it was a weird one [00:13:00] for me, because I felt like with years spent kind of insurance, shoreline jungle with all the news jungles. I was kind of aware I use that kind of really honestly, because I don’t think anyone can say. I’ve been to one jungle. I can do them all.

I think if you’re lucky enough to have jungle experience, you know, that they’re all unique. The time of year makes them unique. Their habitat makes them unique, the different plants and the way that you find value in a jungle, which is everywhere is unique. But my, my real preparations didn’t really think about me.

I also took for the first two weeks when I best friends from university and he’d only ever been on holiday, kind of in central Europe with his family before. And I remember him saying, oh, I really want to come on the trip. And I’m staying tomorrow. You know, I promise you that for the first two weeks of the trip was what he stayed for.

And I went deeper and he went home, you know, you’ll, you’ll see amazing things. This will be. Proper trip. But here’s a, here’s a list of things to buy and has left this kind of, you know, [00:14:00] realities that are going to happen. And so most of my thoughts were about how I can plan it for well, how, like how we can kind of make it fun, how it can make it importantly, make it safe.

And I think when you’re thinking about trips, sort of like this really remote, you’re not near hospitals as you are two, three days away. It’s not about, oh, I’ve fallen over. I’ve cut myself. I don’t want it guys. I’ll just go back and I’ll get myself sorted. Cause that’s just not how it works. In reality, you’re ultimately stopping a, a proper trip.

You’re stopping an expedition, so it’s selfish to get injured essentially. So there was so much planning around how we could bubble, wrap everyone ultimately on this trip, which we were surrounded by pointy things, thinking things and biting things and moved from that. So I had an amazing moment of realization when actually I landed in Guyana and I plan to do this documentary as a challenge to credentialize myself, to do a career.

Something I really cared about, which was what’s ultimately storytelling [00:15:00] about the snakes and about their environments. I realized that I had a new camera. I’d kind of figuring out what shutter speed and aperture was on the plane over a, I bought a new microphone that I hadn’t been plugged in. And I had even considered what I’d be like in the jungle.

I mean, things hit your head. Like, are you going to be any good. And I can remember holding the camera in front of my face, trying to do an opening segment for child artists felt like the world’s biggest asshole, you know, like you, you’re going somewhere as very, I mean, also I don’t really blend in, in the tropics, you know, I’m a white guy with red hair.

I am a tourist. There’s kind of no way of blending in feeling like a local. And so when you’re surrounded by local guys and girls who live in that environment, you’re talking about there, well, they were looking at you, like, what do you have to say about this place? Get us on the camera. And in many ways they’re right.

Actually. And I really tried to get them on camera as much as humanly possible, but whether it was embarrassment or, you know, [00:16:00] English speaking school that didn’t end up happening, but you do really have to think about what you want to achieve and your own skillset, like definitely ever look that improperly in the planning and the planning of others and have to just kind of whip through and learn through and make mistakes of which there were just many fortunately small, but many mistakes.

I think when you sort of start recording, you know, your trips and adventures and, you know put yourself in front of the camera, it’s incredibly difficult. And actually it takes so much practice. I remember first starting and, you know, I would spit, you know, I’m sure people are like, well, you’re terrible now, so I wouldn’t even worry about it.

But when I first started, I just remember looking at myself and I think I sent to a friend who’s like, my God just. You know, you’re here. And I was like, I, I think it was a trip across [00:17:00] Europe and I was sort of almost starving myself. So I wasn’t in the best frame of mind in terms of, if you’re hungry, you don’t exactly want to be like, Hey, I’m so excited to be here.

Cause you’re just hungry and just brings you straight down and I’m ready. You’re quite slightly depressed. And it’s just like, my God, you look just miserable. And I was like, well, I was kind of miserable. It was authentic, but that’s the thing it’s actually portraying that. And as you say, when you went out and it’s also knowing what you want to shoot.

Because otherwise you are just shooting for the sake of shooting thinking, oh, I’ll get that. And then I’ll get back to her. I mean, I still have so much footage from one of my trips and I was just shooting for the sake of shooting. And then unless you know exactly what the story, I mean, the story can change, but knowing exactly what story you want to set out, you will just constantly have your camera be like, oh, that looks cool.

Oh, that looks cool. But actually you are, what’s the [00:18:00] word you’re just shooting aimlessly. And then you get back. You’re like, Hmm, I don’t know what to do. Yeah, I think that’s that, that’s that phrase, isn’t it. I was kind of conscious about it when I went in the jungle called being a busy fool whereby you’re constantly shooting and constantly talking and it feels like, oh, I’m the man, but actually you, you kind of get nothing because you’re missing the point you to answering the question.

And it’s tough because you set your own question. So when you see something it’s amazing, it doesn’t fit your question. You’re thinking whether I can just shift it if I’m going to adapt it. And sometimes you can. And I think that’s probably a good thing, you know, like having a flexible scope where you can, something amazing pops out.

I mean, I hadn’t planned to find a harpy Eagle on the trip and we found one on week three. And so that became an interesting thing to talk about because it’s so incredibly rare. And if you have to tighter scope, then you miss that out. But to loosen people that national you’re talking about, like what was the point of the whole documentary?

And if I’m being really honest, I probably had a bit of that. I think most people probably even [00:19:00] professionals still have that. Because if, if you are being. Presenter, the producer, the director, the camera mom, and the dog’s body, you know, all of those hats, you’re just wearing too many. And all your ideas get blurred and mixed, and then you get frustrated and then you add in things like you say, I’m hungry.

I haven’t slept. I’m getting better. And by every single living thing in the jungle my mate, isn’t having a very good times. I’m miserable. I haven’t found any snakes. I’m staring down the barrel of the gun had been a complete failure. All these things happen, which make you just a bit a book.

That’s the, that’s the amazing bit. I think I about expeditions. It’s how, how kind of, well you deal with things going wrong and rolling with the punches. Cause you definitely do get hit in the face. Yeah, it’s very true because in the jungle you are going that sort of in 30 degree heat, almost a hundred percent humidity, and that brings up.

[00:20:00] Many problems in terms of not being able to dry your clothes and you get this sort of, I don’t know what the technical term is, but rot, incense, your skin is just constantly wet. So it starts to rot away in a sense, how did Wil and yourselves sort of deal with that for the two first, the two weeks that will and yourself?

Yeah, this is like this, this is a very direct question. I should probably go and chat well before this goes out, because it involved me probably embarrassing him and probably talking about an area of slight scuffle between both of us. But I guess there are a number of things to talk about here in a number of routes, important pieces.

So, number one, if you are traveling as to what other young, 20 year olds, both guide, doesn’t have to both go out there properly. More applicable. Like you both want to feel like you’re the expedition leader. And [00:21:00] it’s a bit of slot don’t tell me what to do because I’m my own Bubba. And I know that you’ve got all these plans, but I’ll, I’ll manage me and you manage yourself.

And you just can’t afford to do that really in the jungle. I know that we’ll have bad feet in any case. I is a big runner and so that his feet are an area of weakness for him when it comes to resilience over kind of performance. And for the first two weeks, we were traveling from the Northeast of the Southwest.

We went basically staying at research centers, one in the jungle one and and kind of the on the periphery of the jungle where the jungle make the Savannah. So a nice kind of hybrid habitat. In kind of the floodplains then down right into deep savannas. And we’re always staying somewhere with a, with a roof for the first two weeks.

And I think that it’s very easy to make a mistake that even though you feel like you’re in a home or you feel like you’re in the civilization, actually, if you zoom out, you’re in the middle of the jungle is in the mum built house. [00:22:00] And all of the rules apply that if you were also staying in the middle of the jungle, that I did two weeks later.

So powdering kind of armpits private areas, things that rub every night, feet critical, don’t do that. And you get splits and you can’t walk. If your feet go over and you have to go home, that’s kind of insure what happened to well after two weeks. And if you don’t, if you don’t do it, that kind of ruins the trip as well.

I mean, I think I answered the question a while ago which says, oh, who could do a general. Expedition, I’m kind of all that. Anyone can do it. I mean yeah, there’s a certain base level of fitness requires a base level of mental resilience requires a base level interest required and then the time available, which sounds silly, but I think there’s actually amazingly relevant because it takes so long to plan one of these things that it properly.

But for me, what, why would you want to go and do this if you didn’t really love it? You know, I mean like the jungle is a horrible place to be if you don’t want to be there. [00:23:00] And it’s my favorite kind of environment on earth, but unless I love snakes, I wouldn’t be there, but I’ll be by the beach.

Like you joking. I it’s fucking horrible. So unless you’ve got a real reason why I can’t think of anywhere, worse to be, and I think, you know, with us going through that early stage in terms of managing what the environment will do to you. There was a couple of like brothers who fight syndrome going on.

But previous experience for me, I knew, I knew the reality is even if you don’t, your skin doesn’t feel that work, you follow the same procedure about through keep really, really clean. And I think that’s another misnomer about the jungle plus, oh, you must be dirty the whole time. And like in many ways you are like in many ways you’re completely filthy.

But in other ways, you know, the importance of keeping clean is absolutely paramount. You know, if, if you’ve got a cut and you are crawling with crap, then you’re in big, big trouble. Cause infection just happens at a cataclysmically faster rate than it would do as normal. [00:24:00] And mosquito bites, it must be to stop biting your feet and they come red raw.

You combine that with kind of loose skin and splitting and you combine that again with like muddy ground and maybe your boots start, you know, leaking a bit. I mean, it sounds like hell, doesn’t it really? But the truth is if you, if you prepare yourself properly, it’s as amazing, fun, amazing fun. Where do I sign up

exactly at the end of a very short queue, I think is the answer to that. Yeah. Wow. And so we’ll had to sort of go after the sort of two weeks by choice. Yeah, w we’ll only had two weeks of a break from work and he’s back in London. Again, I am banking as I was working in banking and he was always going home after two weeks, but I think in reality [00:25:00] I think he was kind of done.

He, I don’t think could have gone two more weeks. Without any of the comfort properly into the Bush for the, for the next two weeks, we just had hammer. We didn’t take any food, a water. It was just, you know, pure survival stuff. And everything that you learned in the first two weeks became amazingly real.

There’s nobody who could have done that. You’d have to gone home his feet. You couldn’t walk towards the end and he’s missing out on amazing trips. I’m missing out on nighttime. Snake walks early mornings. Nate walks afternoons, snake walks. If you can get a theme, that’s makes an important trip, but quite a few snakes.

Yeah, quite a few. But yeah, he, he was always going to go home, but would have had to have gone home anyway. So in Guyana, in the jungle, I think for people listening, what sort of reptiles were you seeing? You know, you, you hear about these giant anacondas these Goliath tri Angeles, [00:26:00] which are horrendous when you see them.

I mean, they are so big and there are thing of nightmares what was sort of insects and reptiles, where you’ve seen on a daily basis. Well, I think this is a really important point because I think people talk about the Amazon on their thing. Well, as soon as you go in, you’ll see all the stuff. And the truth is I spent the month turning over every single rock, every leaf, shimmering up every tree and found relatively little.

And I think there are a number of reasons for this, like the first being sensationalism of the jungle. I think we’re very good at that. You know, I’m kind of in the west in terms of, if you go into the jungle, there’s always massive spiders or massive snakes. And do they live in the yes, they do green Anaconda.

You know, my main reason for going was to find the world’s heaviest bodied, snake Goliath, birding, trench that I wanted to find whilst biggest tarnish. Yeah. A hundred percent. That’d be amazing. And actually amazingly Dov style as well, if you can position your [00:27:00] interaction properly a whole host of other snakes, like somehow south America’s most deadly snake.

The fertile Lance, I mean, fortunately, ironically, but fortunately found a few of those, which was amazing. Then obviously the Bushmaster, I mean, biggest snake in the Western hemisphere and they call it the silent death in the jungle, because if you get hit by one of those, you’re not getting hit by anything else.

And a whole host of other things, then bullet ants, I mean, Number one on the lesser, how to ruin your day has been bitten on the ass by, but no one wants that to happen. So, so there are a whole, whole host of things, but I think the truth is, and one thing that I’m really keen to communicate is you can go in for jungle out.

You see none of these things. And whilst trying to look for them I was absolutely forced to go in the worst time of year to find anything cool, which is wet season. So my uni degree finished in may, may June time. And I was starting a job as management consultants in London, in September, which left me with approximately three months [00:28:00] to try and film something that could hopefully change my career and, and realize a dream of talking about this weird stuff.

So you’re pigeonholed into a three month window where it’s all rain and when it’s all, and it’s tougher for you to be there because it’s miserable. All the ground is muddy. Infection, risks are much higher. The water is dirtier. Things are harder to find because if you think about. The way that the jungle book has kind of, I guess, in one way, very obvious the other one quite counter-intuitive if it lots of water you thinking everything’s going to be out, especially from a repertoire perspective, being active, maybe there’s there’s breeding going on.

Maybe there’s a lot more frogs around. And so that would encourage predators to be a bit more active towards frogs. But the, the kind of the truth is it’s not the Amazon, which is all kind of fairly low level where we, where if water is rising, then the habitat for the things you’re looking for is increasing.

And [00:29:00] so there is a bigger space with which these same animals can live and it’s becomes harder and harder to find them. Cause they just live all over the place. By contrast, during the dry season where, you know, water is the single source of life in the jungle, things will congregate to the water. You don’t have to look for them.

You look for the big water and then wait for them to turn up. And it definitely happens. So you can go into the jungle and never find, never find a thing. If you’re really lucky you can come across some of the world’s most amazing snakes which definitely the reason why we went there got incredible.

We had Lucy shepherd on the podcast and when she was describing about Bushmaster snakes, it was her sort of experience of the. You could just tell the sort of fear that she had when she heard that sort of whistling sound coming on. It was one of complete fear and just the way that she described it, that [00:30:00] whistling sound was just on another level and trips.

That’s the, that’s the critical piece. If you’re bitten by a snake in the jungle and it’s, you know, the Bushmaster or fertile lands and that the venom bite it, cats you in flashed and that’s the end definitely of the trip and, you know, with potentially much more significant implications for life, of course.

And I mean, we were really unlucky quote unquote to not find a Bushmaster cause I, I looked high and low, mostly low being terrestrial snakes, but high and low in the active sense. I think this is kind of where it’s interesting being in a jungle expedition space, but also being a snake guy, is you, you, in some ways it’s usually beneficial because all of the fear around snakes, you can, you can manage.

I mean, if snakes wanted to buy a task, but will be dead [00:31:00] in, in, in short, I mean, India, wouldn’t be a thing. There’s so many snakes there and if they all have, they’re all, they’re automatically significant. Srilanka, wouldn’t be a thing. There’s no antivenom really in Sri Lanka. I mean, snakes don’t want to.

Kill humans, you know, they can’t eat us. So what’s the point. So they, they will look to hide from us at every given opportunity. Now, of course, in the jungle, it’s slightly different where you are all going right to their habitat. You’re, you’re walking through all of that spaces. And, and I think the truth is what, what is what will said to me when he first came to the jungle, he was like, I can’t believe how dirty it is.

Like, you know, I think Western production of the jungle is that the, the jungle floor is, is quite easy to see in comparison to where the trees and the bushes start. But definitely in west is, and there’s a good two for the foliage. And the truth is sneaks like the borough. They get preyed on a lot by birds.

And so you could be walking through a big open space foliage, you walk through nice little gap and then it could be a Bushmaster in there and it hits you on the foot. And there’s no [00:32:00] matter how good you are with snakes, there’s no way of protecting it. So I, I can totally understand. Lucy’s kind of.

I guess trepidation about coming into conflict with a Bushmaster and it’s something I hadn’t really considered because we had a couple of guides or I had a couple of guides to help carry bags and support on the trip for the last two weeks. And we made it really clear at the start of the trip, but the reason why I was there was to go and find snakes.

And the number one we’re in the jungle is no one goes alone to do stuff because you get lost. If you get lost in the jungle. I mean, I wouldn’t wish on anyone to be perfectly honest. I think everyone who lives there has a period of being lost for a few days. And oftentimes it doesn’t end very well.

Sometimes it, you know, you come back to the, or you never ever do it again. And so when we were out in the jungle and I wanted to go out on late night, snake walks or early, early mornings networks, because most of the cool stuff there is not. So that’s really how you might find target [00:33:00] species like green Anaconda, fertile lands Bushmaster the guys were, you know, really hesitant to actually come.

They’re like, I don’t want to go, I want to stay here. We’ll keep looking at the fire or we’ll keep look at the camp or whatever. And I found myself in a really weird place where at the time, and I think it’s important to reflect on this. Like no food, no water haven’t found too much pissed off, hungry, tired, all the rest of it.

I thought I was getting really, really frustrated is the honest truth. And I wasn’t the best version of myself. I’d normally go and quite a holistic thinker and consider it for people. Which I think is really important for jungle expedition in fact could be more so than any other kind, but I mean that the tension was building so much.

But then I remember when we had this particular one night where we were out on the water because one thing that you can find in wet season quite well are the arboreal snake. So it was nice to live in the trees. So your Amazon tree bow has been. Probably the number [00:34:00] one snake that we found on the trip, you guarantee a siting every single night, they’re non venomous, that they’re between three and six foot, fairly skinny, nice, great big tea, which is fascinating to have a look at.

And there are some photos that I can share off or to those teeth. We were along on the river, we had not Alemanian boats and we’re kind of chugging along. We saw a big snake in the tree. I said, let’s pull it here. I’ll just quickly get it down and have a quick look. And I think I sort of had a bit of a busted jaw, so I wanted to go and see what we could just do something to maybe help a little bit would it, what would the snake and it was amazingly defensive.

We’re kind of really biting was unhappy. This is so normal for kind of most snakes that you might find at night, they’re out hunting, you coming up and you got a big tort jar. And it’s all, I mean, imagine it’d be most terrifying thing if you’re a snake, but you can commonly interact with them.

And we have this good exposure. I can’t be in trouble with a snake comedy, pulled it off calmly had it behind the head cause it was distressing for the [00:35:00] snake to have been free handled. And all the guys were on the boat. The two, you know, Damien and Harry, who were the members, the two guides. And when they saw that interaction and then they saw the snake relax because we are all relaxed and then they had a nice, you know, I don’t even hold the snake.

We spoke about the snake. We spoke about what it means to their culture. What, you know, why I was interested in that. We had a complete momentum. In the whole trip it seemed like suddenly they were interested in finding more. And I couldn’t tell whether that was because they suddenly had confidence in me.

Which is a thing I think, you know, there must be lots of people coming in from the UK or the us, or non-native people with reckoning there, you know, good snake people and they see where it’s a little bit spooky and it’s a bit you know non-com and unplanned, but. For us think like that they saw that in me that it was going to work well that we had a calm and consistent approach to [00:36:00] interacting with potentially dangerous animals.

Or whether it was the crew that actually never seen one or wanted to see one up close in you know, with a purpose of just understanding and interacting with. But after that it was like, I couldn’t keep them down. I mean, it was, oh, we think we might have better luck if we maybe go this way up the river.

And I’m thinking, yes, energy, like a hundred percent, let’s go. I tried to hold them back whenever I found a snake, they were getting so close that before I said, well, you can come a bit closer and this they’re like 10 meters away. You can come back close to kind of see and learn from the specifics. And towards the end, it was like, well guys, you’re quite close.

Like these things do go from zero to a hundred very quickly. And I think that was, that was great for me because yes, we, that helped us find snakes. More people make lighter work, but I mean, even irrespective of the project. I care about breaking down misconceptions around snakes. And I think maybe that’s quite easy to do people in the [00:37:00] UK who don’t face a very real and very negative interaction with snake often quite regularly.

But if you can change the opinion of someone who, I mean, as I found out later maybe lost their life to a snake bite and people in the village die annually from snake bites. If you can change their opinion or at least spark an interest, or, you know, maybe challenge an assumption, I mean, you, that speaks to real power.

And that’s something that, you know, I, I won’t forget that interaction and I think that’s really, what’s inspiring a lot of the work that I’m doing now and the look that I’m hoping to do going forward. Yeah. It’s sort of giving them an under giving people an understanding of, of what you do really.

And that’s why it sort of matters, say much of, because I imagine people listening to this podcast, I would probably say. 50%, probably more would be terrified if they saw a snake come into their [00:38:00] house. In fact, I’d say it’s way higher. Yeah. I reckon that’s the way. I think that’s the fun thing about snakes is cause I would look at that exam question as a hugely positive thing.

Because if you’re afraid of something or if you’re intra, you know, excited by something, snakes have a unique ability to interest people. I mean, I think that it’s quite rare that you’d find someone impartial to snakes, you know, they’re either on one camp or the other and if you’re on one camp or the other, then you are exerting feeling towards a thing.

So kind of talking about them I think it’s quite great in terms of getting an audience. I mean, number of times I’m at dinner and we’ll end up talking about snakes because even if people are terrified or really interested like it sparks conversation and people find it interesting. And in terms of the state coming into your house, I think had probably a scary actually.

I think like wondering is the kind of working with snakes that I [00:39:00] quite enjoy. I, maybe this actually goes back to before, so I’ll kind of go slightly off, off tranche and talk something slightly different. But when I was learning about how to interact with snakes and Sri Lanka kind of dealing with snakes, there is not like a, a job.

Isn’t a single person who would set up a shop and go and do a thing. It’s like an obligation per region. The family takes on the ownership of of managing capturing of snakes from someone’s house or from their farm lands. And it’s a very tight community. It’s passed down generally from father to son and so forth.

And so I went to this local. Sort of, they call them snake doctors, but I mean, essentially it’s like your local snake conservationist. And I said, listen, I’m really interested in learning more about handling these snakes. And of course you, you say things like that when you’re younger, because you, you want to get the cool photos.

So, I mean, if you search hard enough on my Instagram that are photos, I’m not particularly proud of in terms of putting out there for the whole world to see [00:40:00] like handling Cobra, if we just your bare hands. I mean, when you’re young, it’s exciting and you’re pushing the limits and you’re pushing the boundaries, but you know, that might inspire reckless behavior and therefore expire, you know, inspire problems and that the opposite of what anyone wants to do the opposite of definitely what I want to do.

But I think when I went there and I said, I want to handle the snake. I was very quickly put in my place which was amazing. You had the, kind of the chance to do that. And he said, you know what? You’re not touching any snakes until you understand that before. I thought I did. I was on behavior. I mean, I, as you said, I’ve had snakes of my own, my whole life.

I’m a complete you know, addict in terms of watching interactions, whether it be YouTube or public documentary or film, or however, it’s trying to transcribe that, listen to that. If you’re going to do this here, you have to really switch on the body, but the body behavior and my favorite species of snake and the whole world is the spectacle Cobra, the true Cobra, nausea, nausea and [00:41:00] they have Diane Ally’s big sort of round peoples.

And that makes them interesting to work with because they have an extra sort of sense, as we all know that states have got generally bad eyesight and on a relative scale, that’s true. But some states have better eyesight than others. And in this case, these brown pupils they, they do pick up images and shadows and spark their attention.

So actually when, when you see. You know, someone like me picking up a venomous snake with their hands, you should look at it and say, this is probably coming from insecurity and it’s probably the wrong thing for them to be doing. But another takeaway would be was probably a reason why I did it actually was you can, you can manipulate their body language.

If you really understand their behavior, you can do this. It’s also, I think for me that the pinnacle of understanding a snake is when you can have a quote unquote safe interaction and that entirely reckless and dangerous fashion. And of course there are some states where you can kind of do that, [00:42:00] where then I might argue you shouldn’t do it with any, and then there are some which in my mind, you definitely shouldn’t do it with because they are amazingly unpredictable.

And that probably go for a long line of vibrant species, nocturnal, very erratic heat, sensing, pets. It is impossible to know exactly what they’re going to do, but within a certain scope, you can really see behavior. And so when kind of coming across these stakes in the jungle, flipping back to the application It makes the interaction really safe.

And if you can make the interaction really safe, but feel very real for people. I think that’s what inspires me perspective. And I, when talking about snakes, there’s often a lot of false information put out about snakes cause it’s it’s sort of myth based like snakes chasing you, which, which doesn’t happen really innocent in a very small rare subset of interactions.

Equally kind of I mean, people have a [00:43:00] whole list of states. I mean, from working in Africa, I think I’ve heard all of the local towns about snakes. But for me that the most important thing to kind of really pull out from kind of a snake interaction is not to really tell people which is really counter-intuitive.

Because if something is real for them, then it is real. In that sense. And I think where a lot of people in my shoes might go wrong and they’re much better than me at doing this. I’m sure, but I’d say, oh no, that’s not how to think about it. We think about it like this. And that has some value because you’re offering a different perspective, but the truth is if they really believe something, no matter how ridiculous it sounds to you, you have an obligation to treat that as real for me.

And so what I’ll try not to do is say, oh, that’s wrong on this stage. Think about it, but show them something which would lead them to suggest that their assumptions are incorrect. You know, don’t [00:44:00] tell them that it’s hot, take off your coat, just show them that it’s warm and not take it off by themselves.

I think, you know, to achieve real change that that’s where we have to sit. And that’s kind of what I was trying to show to Damien and Harry on the boat was, you know, you can think what you’d like about snakes, but here’s a case study that might force you to just at least think about what your assumptions are or bias.

Yeah, it’s, it’s, it’s amazing. And as I say, for, for people listening, it’s been an incredible sort of story that you’ve sort of done over the years in trying to change sort of behavior and assumptions about snakes. It’s quite, it’s interesting because on two hands you could say either a big problem or not really an issue with tool.

You could say the for the number of next on planet the likelihood of having a bite or a fake interaction, there’s nylon zero. And that’s kind of true, you know no party wants the [00:45:00] interaction. You know, you’re not getting most people aren’t going out looking for them. So that’s generally fair.

On the other hand, of course if you happen to live in a rural community across the tropics, where I sneak them more likely to come into your house, even if it is unlikely, Size of audience, you are going to get a gross number and 130,000 people each year die of venomous snake bites. I mean, that’s so significant.

I mean, I remember looking at the news earlier this year with regards to coronavirus deaths. And I think we don’t, you know, the right action. Isn’t one, death is not just a single number. You know, the impacts are huge. Like I remember thinking in the UK where we’re having all these cases and deaths and it was getting to about 30,000 and politicians are talking about how this was the end of the world and all of our resources should be going into this to change it.

And they are right. And you know, what an amazing job, all of that was, but with 140,000 deaths happening each year and snakes and having no change been really been seen over the previous [00:46:00] years, I can’t help, but think that this is a ginormous neglected area of real importance. And of course, when people look at the snakes and they say, oh, well, super unlikely.

And that kills 130,000 people each year on the ground spectrum of a 7 billion population in the world, that’s quite insignia. Well, they’re also maybe not considering and some do, but generally don’t is the people that they tend to buy. It tend to be rural workers in fields. I tend to be the male of the house, which tends to be the breadwinner in the family structure.

Now, if that person is bitten by the snake and dies, that’s the no income coming in for their family, which has a thousand knock on effect, which have a huge emotional financial safety considerations. But even if that person survives, I mean, it is very rare for someone to survive without a lasting physical wound.

Maybe they lose a hand or they lose the use of a [00:47:00] hand. Maybe they. Whatever it’s that first or something, then maybe they then can’t work in the field and then losing income. And then all this stuff. I mean, and we’re in a wonderful position in the UK that we’re having so much attention on mental health.

And that’s a huge thing that I experienced really bad mental health and the jungle, which we can talk about in a sec. But you know, we’re at a level where we can really address those as significant concerns. We’re not even talking about the mental health implications from being bitten by a snake. I mean, I can only imagine, imagine going to work each day in a field where you don’t know every foot position you partake, where every hand position you take, that could be your last day.

And what if you actually survived a bite and you have to go back and work there at an exact same place with a new prevention kit. I cannot understand why people aren’t more interested in this and more kind of more keen to prevent it. And so I think that’s, that’s a big [00:48:00] level of interest for me and that’s, what’s driving a lot of the work and my master’s work next year is going to tackle exactly this insurance.

Yeah. I suppose, I suppose for most people it’s, it’s sort of based around where these countries, where the problem is because in quite a lot of countries like the UK, that probably isn’t so much of a problem. But in places like Sri Lanka, Guyana and where snakes are hugely prominent, then I suppose they probably need to tackle this more head on.

Yeah, definitely. So I agree with that and it, and it is country on country. And you know, it’s not the UK should be doing more to help. What is maybe a very specific country problem. But on the other hand as, as potential devil’s advocates that look at a country like Australia, you know, they have nine of the 10, most venomous snakes in the planet.

I think they’re registered about [00:49:00] one death per year, or maybe even less than that. I can’t get the statistics, but almost that they’ve completely fixed the problem of human snake interaction, which is still a huge crossover. And it’s because they have an incredible antivenom program, which is. A significant contributor to which is the let me see Australian reptile part.

I mean, unbelievable guys based in their Sydney, it was have amazing infrastructure airplanes, which will fly in someone being best. And by delivering a mistake in the middle of the desert and in central Australia. And there’s a load of work with regards to prevention and how to interact with snakes.

I mean, I think even Margot Robbie was talking about when she was young, having to deal with snakes, coming into a house with, you know, with her mum or something. And it was a humorous incident with a partner in the broom. But the point is, yes, maybe it’s a shrunken problem. Yes. Maybe it’s an India problem or Indonesia problem, or actually it’s the whole of an Asia problem because, or south American problem, but it is important for countries that have sustained.

[00:50:00] To, to share lessons learned. And it’s important even for countries like the UK, where we haven’t got a problem like this to offer a valuable outside perspective. I mean I’m British guy and I hope there are other British guys and girls watching this that you know, feel inspired to have a go at trying to do that bit and to hold it, to help help solving this.

You know, I really think that now wanting to beaches of, of how small the world is whether through technology is, is the potential for really cross national and cross capability solutionizing is, is really there. And it’s so important that we do that. And so yes, whilst it is maybe a national issue maybe an international response would be the real story.

Yeah, well, it’s been, it’s just been incredible listening to your stories and I can’t thank you enough for coming on and sort of tell us all about it. I mean, there are some [00:51:00] things, as you say, that you’ve brought up, that I had absolutely no idea about, and it’s certainly changed my sort of perspective on snakes and reptiles.

And I’m sure a lot of people listening, it feels the same, but there’s a part of the show where we asked the same five questions to each guest each week. Oh, great. Gone. With the first being on the sort of trips into the jungle, what Steve, one gadget that you always take with you, it’s going to sound ridiculous, but my diary that’s a good one.

I. Being a storyteller, wanting to be a storyteller. I always feel like you’re, you you’re hit by the problem of relativity when you’re in somewhere amazing for more than a week, everything becomes normal. And the important pieces of the story to pick out and to reflect on and remember will blend into, oh, well, this can’t be interesting because we have lunch every day.

So surely no one’s going to want to care about [00:52:00] that. And you come home and tell someone what you’ve been doing and the bottom half of their jaw falls off. And so for me, I think I’m writing in my diary every single day, when I’m there reflecting on the things that I’ve done in a fairly fact based where you haven’t got to put on your opinion, just we did this and this and this.

When you get home, you’re thinking, wow, actually we really did do an incredible job, but we face some real novel challenges. And for me, I think I mentioned earlier kind of with my mental health side of the things, I find myself in a place in the jungle where I wanted my whole life to get there. I want to, I mean, I had posters of green Anaconda for Lance Bushmaster on my wall as a child.

And then when I am there, I missing. What’s that about? That’s that whole thing is totally ridiculous for me. I’m in thinking half of me is thinking, pull your socks up, gave yourself. It’s just a little bit tough. It’s a bit hungry, a bit tired. And on the other hand, I’m thinking, well, this is actually a fantastic thing to reflect on.

And I remember writing about that and thinking about why and and how and how that was impacting my behavior on things. I think actually [00:53:00] for me, a diary kind of keeps my head in check. And for me, you know, in the jungle, if you keep your head in check and you can find solutions to the other things.

Amazing. What about your favorite adventure or travel book or a favorite adventure travel book? I actually hate reading which is, I know ridiculous given that I’m at university and reading is a big part of what I do. But I don’t know. It also a bit kind of obvious in terms of beating down the drum, but one of the first books I read.

Front to back in about two days without stopping. I think it was Levinson woods. First book about walking the Nile. And you want the trip’s ultimately not successful in terms of a physical walk on the NAR because of the wars in the South Sudan. The way in which he spoke about the, the formulation of the project which I thought was interesting from a management perspective, but also.

The doing and the hardship and the resilience [00:54:00] blended in with the realities and the people along with which you meet. And it’s the people that I find incredible. And I find it really inspiring and I’ve taken a lot of those lessons into the things that I try and document, because I’ll always go somewhere and look for the snakes or go somewhere.

You look to hit a goal, but I always come home and talk about the people which is always surprising for me. And I think probably surprising for my friends and having that recent. And I think that will, the notebook is now bestseller and widely read. I mean, what a fantastic baseline to go from. If you’re interested in following a career in the space to learn from someone like Eleven’s, then this must be an amazing, it’s an amazing experience.

And kind of what makes them book well, did he sort of, I say about the people in, when you go to these countries, Well, I think he has this long relationship with with a guide that he has there. And I think most of us might think about to expedition is doing it [00:55:00] without a guide or how could you call it real expedition if you’re doing it with a guy who has all the answers to local problems.

And I think you break that down really well. And I, I forgotten chapter name now. Maybe the company in a second, but they’re going through the countries and really, you know, war torn areas. I mean, historically, so like Rwanda now having an amazing recovery and you know, all these places and yes, guidance got all the solutions for, you know, how to navigate cultural, liquid level cultural scenarios.

How to maybe find a Bush food. Obviously extra strength is always valuable on expedition trip, but then you also see Levinson’s value coming through to the guide and, and together it’s this cross cross-functional skillset. And there’s this amazing interaction where I think the guide meant to leave levels and at a certain point, and he was meant to go for a stretch by himself [00:56:00] or find a new diet.

I forget now. But, but they carried on going together and I think that’s the power of an expedition as well. And, you know, two people form this amazing bond through hardships and resilience. I think I thought that was a really touching story. Nice. Why are adventures important to you? I think adventures are important to everyone.

I guess that the crux of that depends on your definition of what an adventure is. For me an adventure is testing something new. Essentially in whatever way that could be. And for me in going on, or it was a new environment it was new snake species. It was a new challenges in terms of jungle survival.

And they’re important for me because, well, the short answer is they never meet to grow. I believe in a growth mindset. I think that we roll with the punches valuably [00:57:00] and the venture forces you to take some punches but equally forces you to roll with them. Because if you don’t roll with them and you get stung with a strong punch to the face, you can’t afford to sit down for too long.

So I think it healthfully puts you in a position of growth within a scope of excitement. And I think that’s, that’s how we should face challenges with optimism. Good planning and yeah. Very nice. Then he could have said to set it any Besa. What about your, one of my best friends from school, a guy called Monte scale.

So he’s recently finished runner-up and the British amateur golf. And you know, he’s the most amazing sportsman. I’m so lucky to have him as one of my best mates. And he had a lot of publicity around his golf because, you know, unfortunately lost the amateur at the end, beaten by great golfer and led shepherd.

But giving up a sizable advantage [00:58:00] now, most people will take that really heavily and it will impact them through their life. Maybe at least in the short term, Muncy with the strength of his character, uses it as a motivation. And he sent me this quote the other day, which things are Teddy Roosevelt.

The man, man, I won’t like the whole thing, cause I can’t remember it. And B it’s about a paragraph long. Maybe you can Google it. And the crux of the quote is you know, be the person in the room. Deb boldly. And when things go wrong, at least you, you have gone somewhere where you want to go. And it’s better to be that person, maybe someone sitting on the outside criticizing who won’t know what it feels to really be in that arena.

And I, and I think that that puts a lot of things that I get concerned about Interscope in terms of, you know, what does failure look like? What are people’s judgments or assessments, or he won’t get there, or he’s not this or that? I think as long as I’m in my [00:59:00] Rina then I’m playing the game that I want to play.

Good things will, will come out. From that, I think it’s important that we play get off the sidelines and to get involved. So I think what a great quote to inspire engagement, really good. One people listening are always keen to travel and go on these grand adventures. What’s the one thing you would recommend to people wanting to get stuff.

There are a number of things. I mean, you could approach that question a thousand different ways. But I think to, to kind of hit it on the head, really nail down your purpose. I think for, for most things, if, if you have a really strong, why. And that’s really clear for you, whatever that is, where it’s the perfect beach holiday, or you want to find the world’s biggest, you know, constrictor or a thousand different other objectives.

You know, you really know your why then you put it with a better idea of how you want to get there and what you want from it, who you want to work with, how much money you might need to raise, which is an important thing not to [01:00:00] overlook. I think. It might also just have the gumption to give it a go. I mean, I can’t tell you all of the times that on this trip, like I’ve completely failed at something and we didn’t get a chance it’s been too quick and too much fun, but you have to maybe it’s fine.

Send some money up front to people and take a big leap of. In human behavior in an era of what, where you haven’t got any phone signal you, you might have to compromise your security or safety criteria to kind of get somewhere where you really want to go. But a lot of the time all of these questions in whatever way they manifest themselves, leaves you in a position where you have to make a decision and decisions are often really difficult.

Even in, you know, the UK we’re in the worst case, no, you can always call a friend and get some help, but especially in the middle of nowhere is, is massive. And if you have your purpose, if you have your why for me, that often acts as a really good guiding principle for making [01:01:00] my decisions and whether that’s a no often more important than a yes.

My, my, why will get me there. So really think about that. Why challenge? I think your staff to make that as specific as possible, but you know, maybe more directive than prescriptive. And then. There’ll be other challenges of course, but, but you know, that should see you through, I think I’m going through those hurdles.

Amazing. Finally, what are you doing now and how can people follow you in your future expeditions or adventures? Well, I’m currently studying for my master’s at university of extra down, down in Cornwall, the Penrhyn campus, which is an amazing place to study. And next year I’m currently going out for funding for a three month expedition to Sri Lanka.

I think talking about snake bite prevention and managing that human snake conflict there’s a lot of talk about antivenom. [01:02:00] There’s a lot of talk about how we would save someone after a bite. There’s surprisingly little conversation about how you can prevent them in the first place where preventatives are actually really effective and quite cheap.

Equally like with any kind of product design, going back to my consultancy day, you would never design, I don’t think a successful product by telling the consumer what they want. You would always really go and listen from them. Understand the specific problems. I think they’re often different to what the maker or the solutionize or would assume.

So I’m trying to shine through and I’ll document all of this on my Instagram page about going to these rural communities in Sri Lanka interviewing the people who are facing this deadly interaction on a day by day basis and really see where their problems sets. Do they happen at work?

Are there a specific time of day? Is there a specific kind of problem? I mean, are they afraid? Are they not afraid? [01:03:00] What are the solutions that they’ve tried to put in place before? And haven’t worked, for example, people would have say, oh, I can’t just wear boots. And I thought it was a fair assumption and like I bought her boots about five years ago and took them all that.

And people didn’t want to wear them because they would say, well, if I wear these, I’ll get blisters every single day of my life. And if I don’t, then I might get a snake bite once in a blue moon. So just speak to the power of actually understanding what the user wants. So you save on energy, save on wasted capital, save on you know, a whole load of inefficiencies and actually deliver real solutions.

So you can follow me on my Instagram page. And hopefully there’ll be some more conversations coming up soon. I’m also giving a talk for the world, extreme medicine site in a few weeks time. And I’ll put the link for that in my Instagram page as well. I mean, well, we’ll put the, put the link in the description below for people listening.

And Harrison has been such a pleasure listening to your stories and I can’t thank you enough [01:04:00] for coming on today. No problems. Thanks so much, John. No worries. Well, have a great day and we’ll see you soon. Sounds good. Well, that is it for today. Thank you so much for listening and I hope you got something out of it.

If you did hit that like button and subscribe, if you haven’t already and die, we’ll see you in the next video.

Isaac Kenyon

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Isaac Kenyon (ECo ADventurer)

Isaac Kenyon is an Eco-Adventurer who has cycled the length of the UK with a twist: he cycled on land and used water bikes to cycle across the sea, allowing him to include the Orkney Islands and Isles of Scilly in their journey. It was the first of its kind extended version of the John o’ Groats to Land’s End cycle. It took him two weeks to complete, cycling up to 100 miles a day and ascending twice the height of Everest.

The team he cycled with was documenting innovative regeneration projects and the degenerating impact of human tourism and urbanisation and, at the same time, exploring the outcomes for their physical and mental health.

On the podcast today, we talk about his adventures and dive into why he started pursuing these sorts of adventures. We talk about mental health and how nature can be the cure

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Transcript of our Conversation

Isaac Kenyon

[00:00:00] Isaac Kenyon: Hello and welcome to the modern adventurer podcast coming up. Yes, it was great. But then when I came back from them, I was bombarded by it all, especially off the Atlantic row. So 40 days of no communication like that. And you just literally talking to your friends on this boat and looking at the sea for 40 days, you come back and is absolutely so overwhelming.

Turning your phone back. My next guest is an eco adventurer who has done some incredible trips over the years from swimming, the length of the English channel to Rowan across the Atlantic. On the podcast. Today, we talk about some of the issues that have arisen over his time, pursuing these adventures from mental health issues.

That is what led him into this incredible way of life and how he speaks on the podcast about the importance of getting outside an intimate. So I am delighted to [00:01:00] introduce Isaac Kenyon to the podcast. Thanks, John. Thanks for having me very excited to have our discussion. Well, it’s an absolute pleasure and you’ve, you’ve just done this incredible trip, which has just come out at the Kendall festival.

I was absolutely fascinated by this sort of process one, because you went from the Orkney islands to the Sealy Isles, but also when you see the pictures of you peddling over water, I was definitely quite intrigued before we, before we sort of get into that let’s start at the beginning and how you got into this sort of line of work and these adventures.

So a long time ago, I was at university and I was studying. I wanted to be a paleontologist at the time. And then my life changed a little bit and decided that maybe the drastic park inspiration wasn’t quite for me as I was doing geology. And I got more interested in energy and energy things. And there was a lot of field trips and that there was [00:02:00] a lot of work behind screens and a lot of indoor work as well.

Something that I wasn’t quite used to. So. At school used to have your PE lessons, your breaks, and that was kind of it. You had your one hour lessons at university. You’ve got so much coursework to do with firemen. I was just indoors all the time and I had a bit of, a bit of a quarter life crisis. I would call it and where I just started having really bad mental health, really bad and high levels of anxiety.

And I wasn’t quite game to grips with what it was and I wasn’t reaching out. Being the guy, you know, we’re quite bad at asking for help when we don’t feel great. And we kind of just tough it on, I have a, quite a tough family like that, just get on with it sort of thing. And it just, it made things worse.

And I started going out sides because my head was racing and I couldn’t think properly and just walking in woods and it was kind of [00:03:00] my Nate, like a bit of natural. Like a prescription from nature for me, where I was able to get away from distractions notifications and just be with myself and just hear the birds, see some squirrels, things like this.

And it was really, really nice. And I was doing about 10, 15 minute breaks like that all the time. And I just got kind of addicted to doing that. And if I tie this in now to my sporting achievements, I was always a swimmer and have been a swimmer for a long time. My mother got me into swimming when I was 10 years old into a swimming club, because I had such high energy and are not a great person to have indoors for too long.

I just have to get out this energy somehow. And usually it was to do sports. I just got thrown in a swimming pool for about 27, 28 hours a week. And then when I got to universe. I was stopping my sports because I was doing my coursework cause [00:04:00] at half time for the sport. Cause I was trying to get these grades and I was stuck in doors and it just was not healthy.

And so I was swimming maybe two or three times a week and I got to a stage where I was just like, I just need to, I just need to combine these outdoor breaks and sports together. And outdoor adventuring outdoor sports came from that really a bit of a realization that it was needed for my mental, mental health.

Ah, the first adventure that I did was swimming the English channel and I did it in a relay. So it wasn’t just me on my own, but this was a massive step for me because it was the first time where I had that immersive feeling of nature, where it was pushing my boundaries mentally, physically, and immersing myself in an environment that was unnatural to me.

I’ve been in a swimming pool for so many years. And when I signed up to swim the English. It was a team led, instigated it all say, oh, all of us had never [00:05:00] really done anything like this before. And I just got this team together to just less try and, and push, push our boundaries and see, see if we can do something great with our swimming.

So we were all swimmers. Why don’t we try and do the English channel swim March came when we decided it was March and we decided to do it that. And we had the funds, the university would back us. So we got funding from the university to do it. And our first training session was down in a lake, just outside of university.

And I went on line trying to find lakes or places, open waters places. And I didn’t really know much. I ended up getting on this. Like I think it was a nudist website of where you can go to swim quietly naked and no one will find you, but it’s for free. Right? So as students, we were so stingy, we’re looking for a free place to swim.

So I would Everyone does this sort of [00:06:00] this directions, that this new, a new district, but hopefully they weren’t there, but we, when we got there and it was our first swim and it was in March, jumped in Nively for the website on the English channel, says, do two hours and you should be fit enough to do it.

We thought that two hours as soon, that’s fine. We also call soon as we can do that, it was freezing. It just completely shocked us. We were nowhere near prepared. And we all came out in a really bad way about state and that kind of opened my eyes to, wow. There is a whole new world out there and it’s dangerous at times and it kind of felt real.

And I felt like I’ve really hit something that maybe I can’t do or something like this. So I got drawn to it. And from that point it really helped me throughout my university years to. Have a focus and get myself away from the screens. So I was using the training as a way to do that and innings channels to do that.

And then I guess this [00:07:00] outdoor adventure lifestyle has come from that bug of pushing my boundaries, getting used to the challenge, getting used to doing things outdoors, and it felt really healthy and natural because you’re, you’re in nature on the water line. It’s amazing because you can see special creatures and biodiversity that don’t usually get to.

And it’s just very peaceful. The water’s just splashes of water. It’s very good for mental health. And yeah, I had that sort of balance from that. And I also found in those states when I was doing a challenge, like the English channel, which led to other things I’ll go on. I was in a state of conscious in mind where I was just thinking about nature, mindfulness.

Pretty much just took my mind away from everything and cleared everything out. Like just all this junk that was in my head. And I guess they call it flow it scientists and things. Call it flow. I talk about in my Ted talk and this, this, this thing where my performance [00:08:00] increases as well, I feel like I’m on top of my game.

I also feel really happy and I’m just, just enjoying the moment sort of thing. And I’m not thinking about anything else just being there and I don’t get it anywhere else. Just in these sort of outdoors places and challenging. You know, hike sometimes, but I don’t seem to get it when I’m on screens or I wouldn’t definitely not get if I was in this podcast right now.

So yeah, so it was, yeah, it was right. Interesting. And that’s how it all began really jumping into the water and in immersing myself. And then from now I got the bargain for, okay. Let’s try a big hike. And I climbed a mountain. My first mountain was Mount Kilimanjaro and that was pretty amazing. I look back on it.

And if I was to do it differently, I would do it unsupported without Sherpas. Just to add that element of off your own steam. And then after that, I signed up to row across the Atlantic ocean, which was a really big step. That was where I [00:09:00] think. You have to really love outdoor challenges and things.

If you’re going to sign up to do something like that, it was absolutely massive for me. Huge step and 40 days out. See I’m in a tiny little rowing boat in a team of four. The two hours on two hours off was quite quite something to adjust to the M two hours on two hours off was two hours of rowing and two hours of body maintenance for feeding yourself, navigation, all of these things.

And it was on sleep as well. You have to try and find sleep. And that, that was where I think it all started the swim and then going through different journeys. And then once I was on the Atlantic, I actually realized a bit more clearer purpose. And that’s, what’s led to this latest adventure, which is, I would say is the culmination of finding my true ambitions and what I’ve really wants to do in life.

And so it’s taken a long time to get there, but I [00:10:00] feel like I’m finally there and the outdoor challenges was, are just journeys. Take me through sort of a, a thinking process. And now I feel like I know where I’m at, took a long time. Well I didn’t know where to sort of begin with that. I mean, what’s the sort of timeframe from your first challenge, swimming to where we are now.

And so the first challenge I did swimming was when I was 2021. So about six, six years, six or seven years. Yeah. So I’ve done a few things in, in those. Good. And I suppose if starting from going back to the swimming, jumping into that lake for the first time, and that sort of really hit home about open water, swimming, swimming in the cold because you swam the English channel without a wetsuit.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Without a wet suit. That was, that was [00:11:00] the the added layer of challenges there. Did you, did you, did you wrap yourself in goose fat? Yeah. So when I first researched it, there was a lot of discussions that will keep you warm, or it’s just. Reduce the salt friction. I did run myself in goose fat and it didn’t keep me warm.

It just reduced the salt friction. So after that I went, I went back on the blog and I was like, it doesn’t keep you warm.

This is a myth. Yeah. And see, I mean like that. That trip sort of propelled you into, as you sort of say, taking your time from a sort of dark place, as you said at university where you. Struggling mentally to sort of, I don’t know, stare at [00:12:00] screens to sort of loss of concentration. I think everyone listening can sort of relate to that you’re on your screen and then suddenly 20 minutes goes and suddenly you forget what you were actually just about to do.

And I think even now it’s probably almost getting worse and worse. And is that the sort of motivation that you’ve had over these past years is that with these challenges. It’s the only time you feel yourself getting into these states of flow as you call it this sort of moment of total consciousness.

Yeah. These challenges, they are, they are for me some of the best times where I can really escape or as I’ve gotten better at understanding my needs, I’ve noticed that, you know, I just needed to be away from technology. For extended periods of time and I feel a lot better. But I know that’s not important.

That’s pretty impossible in [00:13:00] society to do that. Cut yourself off from everybody on this, come her meal, something that’s not like for me, that’s not quite ideal. And so what I do is I try to break up my days with training, which revolves around no technology, nothing that gangway. And again, I stay at balance cause I found a lot of it is a buildup, so it builds itself up.

So I suffer from like panic disorder and anxiety, which is basically I create all these arbitrary worries in my head. And then I start panicking about them. But a way I can reduce all these worries and the stresses is by reducing the stresses around me and constant notifications. Always online, interacting and things like this.

This just adds another layer, a huge layer of stress on people, emails having to respond to emails instantly because [00:14:00] there is no excuse if that makes sense, because it’s all instant communication nowadays. So you, if you, if you avoid it, you always know it’s there. Once you’ve seen it, you notice that it’s like, it’s like being in a room of some.

And that token T and you’re just trying to not say anything and ignore them, but you, you can’t, if they’re talking T that’s how it feels like with emails and these things. So it’s just an added layer of stress. Our trust, try to break free from, and I just find a couple of hours, Hey, a couple hours there, it breaks it all up and makes it a lot easier.

Looking at TV screens is all like, really so much. And it just opened my eyes to, I need a balance. I need a purpose like this, which is very important. And then I was thinking even deeper as to what really do I like and what do I need in life when I was on that boat, because you have so much time to think, to think about things.

[00:15:00] And I realized that if you took nature away and we started being just in a concrete jungle, every. What would happen to my mental health? So we’re going down a route now with so much more technology than ever before. So much more human intervention activity in green spaces, outdoor spaces, blue spaces, so much more infrastructure, so much more population, bigger towns, less and less wild open spaces where just one goes to clear that.

How does one clear their head? I mean, there’s ma there’s meditation, but I don’t think meditation London works so well when you’ve got all the cars and beeping on a truck. Do you know what I mean? It’s a. That’s where I start. That’s where the next adventure really came in in the, the big, why was like, I’ve just like we have to preserve these spaces.

They’re so important for physical mental health. [00:16:00] And that’s where the pedophiles came from. I think I went off on the tangent then led to something else, but I hope that was good onsite. No, I, I completely agree with you. I, I studied landscape architecture and I remember when we were designing a hostile.

Just a sort of place where patients can go. And originally it was sort of designed in a more sort of plastic planting and everything, but studies, what sort of shame that when people interact with nature in itself, real trees, real plants that they get better a lot quicker. And I think, I remember seeing that, you know, human eyes, he’s more shades of green than any other color because we.

Originally through evolution we’re in and amongst the forest, the grasslands everywhere. And so to take that away in such, in relative short pie in a [00:17:00] relatively short space of time, in comparison to our evolution, it’s going to do huge effects on the mental health of human beings. Yeah, well, it’s designed on which to be communicative interactive creatures.

Movement movement was a big thing. When we were migrate migrating, we never used to stay in one place. This is something that we’ve made ourselves having a home and just staying in one place. That wasn’t a thing we, we do need to keep moving. And, and that’s why there’s a, what is this thing about the travel bug?

People like traveling all the sirens, they’re just feeding their inner, inner Chimp, I guess, or in a, in a person who just needs to keep moving. It’s just a natural thing that we do. And, and that’s actually quite difficult because. Nowadays. I mean, last week we had PIP Stewart on and she, we were talking about sustainable travel and of [00:18:00] course we’ve people are now saying, well, we shouldn’t be traveling as much with globalization.

Again, it’s going against human instinct to sort of move. And the idea of saying, oh, well, you can’t travel. There because of this or that. Where do you stop it? Is it, well, you can’t really leave your city. You can’t leave your country. You can’t leave your continent. You can’t leave this. It’s sort of where, where is the line?

And having a sort of travel podcast, I’m more encouraging people to venture out and explore. But of course, with that comes its challenges. Three plane travel. Yeah, plane travel. The the only solution I see right now is changing the way we feel planes and changing the way we build planes to be sustainable.

Right now there’s carbon offsetting, which you can do, [00:19:00] anyone can carbon offset their travel, but it feels a bit like a bit like a cop out a bit. But also how do you get from one country to another? But that was, that is a bit of a luxury years and years ago. We never used to do that.

I think some people were road. Yeah, sustainable travel was such an interesting question. That’s where we’re going with our project next. How do we, how do we get from places a, to B in the most sustainable way? What solutions are there? What climate solutions are there right now and what can we do to speed up the way we change our travel?

Things like incentives and government governmental work streams. What w what can piece things together so that we can have a scaled up solution. And so there are there’s loads of different ways of sustainable travel right now, but a lot of them are a bit far-fetched. Some of them are quite difficult, physically, you know, you’re asking some, some new, oh, [00:20:00] it was just psycho everywhere, but you’re going to ask an older, you know, 78 year old to cycle on a bamboo bike or something.

All going to happen. It’s gonna happen. Yeah. So how we, we need to think of different ways we can, we can do that more public transport. That is great. That’s a great idea. Then you need to think about how we got into not disrupt the environment as we build these massive railways or build these huge scale infrastructure projects for allowing public transport.

So. There’s a lot too to think about. There’s a lot of compromises that need to be made. And with that takes a lot of courage. And I think for us to move forward in a sustainable travel, we’re going to have to take some risks. I know we’re going to have to make some mistakes, but that’s how we always learn.

I mean, if you don’t make a mistake, You’re not learning anything. Are you really? Yeah. A lot of people learn them, learn inventions and make some [00:21:00] incredible things. From the first mistakes they made. The only thing is can we make mistakes that are going to detriment us and the environment so badly visor reverse.

This is currently we are making a huge irreversible change. So I feel like any form of courage or doing something differently, can’t be as bad as the trajectory we’re going on down now. Anyway. So let’s experiment and try new things. What trajectory are you sort of referring to? So in climate change right now, our trajectory is currently on course for being a bit.

To us versus nature and we’re going to win, which we have been for the last a hundred, 200 years. So what we need to do is kind of change our trajectory to be in partnership with nature or co inhabitants rather than us versus nature. So be really nice to, to see if we can start [00:22:00] change, changing our society, to be.

With not next to her against and the way we do that is everything that we do, our sustainable travel, the way we live, the way we interact, the way we expand as a population, what we consume, everything needs to be in cohabitants and fair, equal if we can. And it does. That starts the trajectory that. I have in mind.

I wonder if anyone else agrees with that. I hope they do. But yeah, that, that, that’s what I was getting at. Are you sort of referring to sort of term by. Well, that’s a cool term. I’ve not heard of that one before. Can you explain that one? Bio-mimicry is where you design based upon nature. And so, and so you copy nature’s way or design into how you design things.

That’s a architecture [00:23:00] and the landscape was sort of as one, rather than a building and a garden, let’s say it’s almost the garden and the building in and amongst one another, that’s definitely one aspect. And then also regeneration as well. So re regenerate generating. So as we create food for ourselves, we also, we take a lot from the planet.

So how can we regenerate the foods for everyone else, for the rest of my diversity, not just us and how can we reduce the space of the amount of food that we need. So that takes when we grow our food, it takes up a lot of space on the planet. How can we reduce that? And things just being a bit more with nature in that sense.

So we, every everything we do, we do take at the moment most of it. So how can we do everything? So that’s more of a give and take. Well, that probably moves sort of nicely on to your recent pedal [00:24:00] for parks trip, which you went from the Auckland islands to the silly Isles. Yeah. Yeah. How, how did this adventure start?

So on? The Atlantic has says I had lots of time just thinking about what matters and green spaces was really important in it. Because I was thinking about it was very selfish. It came from a selfish, I would like mental health health support and nature is how I get it. I want to protect nature. And then I started thinking unselfishly and thinking about, well, I can’t be the only one who thinks like this there’s gotta be others.

So I started asking people and everyone was saying, it’s so important for themselves too. And then I realized this is a big. Change that we need we need to start thinking differently behavior change. And I think that our whole idea was to protect and preserve our green spaces in the UK because the concepts of telling people this is how it should be done and not being yourself is a bit [00:25:00] hypocritical.

I started researching green spaces and outdoor spaces in the UK and how it’s changed, how the landscape changed. How, how has our biodiversity changed? I found some horrific facts that are just not really mentioned too much. I’ll mention some now they are quite staggering, but we are one of the least by diverse places in the planet on the planet.

Sorry. And that was a massive shock. Yeah, UK is so not by diverse. It used to be very biodiverse is not anymore. It’s one of the worst and a hundred to 150 years of. 80% of the UK was forest and now stands is 20%. So in a hundred years, we’ve lost 60% forest. Half of the UK was Forrest. The half has gone.

Like that was staggering. And [00:26:00] I was, I was really, really kind of wow. The pace, the pace. So in my lifetime, if we continue this pace, could all forests be gone? I think there’s a turning point though, happening where it’s sort of probably like population growth where it’s going to sort of peak in 2040, and then drop off very quickly as more.

Developing countries sort of become more urbanized more or less and less people will be having children. I think it’s the same in in respect to how people are sort of adopting where forestry, I think the UK is looking at planting. I didn’t know a million trees or something in the next 10 years.

Well, they are, they, that was a tree planting scheme. 15, 20 years ago, we had a massive government scheme to plant tree. And they didn’t manage the tree. So a lot of them have [00:27:00] died. So there was millions and millions of pounds spent hundreds of hundreds of man hours spent. And these trees are all died because no, one’s managing them from like inception sapling up.

So that’s just another thing. But we have reacted to these facts. That’s the main thing. So yeah, 60% has been lost. Staggering fact, one of the things that made. Really wanted to do something for green space, national parts to talk about restoration. How can we scale these things up? But we still haven’t obviously done the actions yet properly because the results are still, still the same.

We’re still, still depleting. So until it starts reversing, then, then you know, the job is done. So we had I guess an idea. Well, I had an idea. To do that on the Atlantic rose to do some sort of big green initiative of such like a, an adventure that had a bit more meaning behind it, a bit more purpose behind [00:28:00] it to do of green spaces, mental health that was the stop.

And then a friend of mine wanted to do a challenge. And I was basically at this point I was kind of drawing up plans, maybe we’ll just cycle and see what he’s environmental projects and he wants to do. So then he joined based on that, just the adventure part. And then another friend of mine, Alex, in the team, he joined just pretty much, very soon afterwards on the concept of mental health was really important for it.

Outdoors and nature was very important for his mental health and he wants to do something to preserve and protect it. Highlight the projects and actions that people can get involved in to do that. So that was kind of the inception really at that point. And then we devised a route to connect as many projects as possible, which we re researched [00:29:00] that we’re trying to make changes or shift the way we do things.

And we just called them climate solutions for now. They’re just solutions to, to improve our sustainability in the. And that that’s, that’s where it all came about. And the route was from the Orkney islands in bursae the Northwest point. And then we cycled to Alda silly. And the reason why we had the islands included is because they’re quite interesting places to be for various different sustainability and circular economy.

Discussion. So in Orkney, it’s one of the best places for experimenting with new energy types, wind and solar, incredible wind resource, incredible sea title resource there. And also it’s a place where pretty much, most. All forests has gone and they have, I think [00:30:00] 0.01% forest left compared to what used to be like.

And that’s been a lot to do with agricultural land and at a big population. So that was an interesting place to include. And then the Alva, the all is a silly, have a really interesting organic farming approach. Way of circular living, where they are producing their own foods and produce trying to produce their own electricity for the island to be self-sufficient.

So it was like a, I guess, an almost an off-grid island from the UK and is how, what they’re doing there. How could that be scaled up across the UK? Is that possible? And so those were two islands and then we connected those islands with a bit of adventure bit of, bit of exciting water bikes They are really interesting devices.

They’re just spinning bikes on floats and they’ve got a propeller, vast attached to a belt drive chain, and you can go about three to free to free knots or say across water. [00:31:00] They’re not very stable. So you do need really good conditions, but we use that as a way to get across, to try and keep it as a sustainable journey from just cycling all the way through.

And then we had loads of different climate solutions on mainland G. We visited six national parks out of the 15. And we are two weeks only to do this project because to do the sea crossings or motorbikes, there’s a neat tight, which is a really low tide where the tide is not that strong. And you need, you do need that.

These bikes would definitely not make it on a high tide or a strong tide. And what the first top one up in Orkney is called the pendant first, that that stretch of crossing has a tide of 50 miles per hour at times. So that, that really, you really need to go on the right right day for that and the right time.

And the neat tides were really important. And the neat tides were two weeks roughly between each other, from the one in the north, which was the Orkney [00:32:00] crossing to the one in the south from Nan’s ends to the ALS. So there wasn’t a lot of time on land to get there. So there was a bit of a timeframe to get to, to land’s end.

And we did it Oz in 12 days. And so, yeah, that was the why the, why was less highlights climate solutions to try and improve and give them a bit of a raised profile against the negative noise that was coming on with climate change. Drive people to support those projects so that we can grow as a, as a society in a, in a sustainable way.

And that will help everyone’s physical, mental. That, yeah, that was it. Well, I think for people listening, because this was their meat into a documentary, that’s just come out at Kendall mountain festival. And I suppose for people who are interested, how did the sort of sponsorship [00:33:00] go? Yeah, the sponsorship was very tough and so.

If you think about the duration of the project happens 20 19, 20 20 when the pandemic struck. So all of the, the whole project needed to be self-funded. We didn’t have big backers or anything like that. So what we needed to do was get people aligned with what we were trying to achieve here. So.

Brian’s and some, some sort of organizations and things to see if they would sponsor us money to, to, to produce a film like this and be part of this project. And it was quite hard at the start because marketing budgets were just getting caught, left right. And center because people just had no idea, even if they had staff next year and what was happening COVID was just wrecking everyone’s finances.

Yeah. We were asking people for money at that time. And [00:34:00] I mean, that’s, that’s a really hard time to ask people for money. But we did manage to convince and get people involved in our project. Fat. This really needed thing. The pandemic, as we all know, has opened people’s eyes. How important outdoor spaces have been like people being locked inside during lockdown, outdoor space has been so important for them to escape.

So I think that resonated. And that’s one of the main messaging of our film is that, you know, we’re highlighting these climate solutions, we’re doing this hard adventure. We’re cycling to meet all these people to highlight what they’re doing, which are incredible things that can help preserve and protect and regenerate these green spaces, which are important, not just for biodiversity, but for you as people, you know, mental health and physical health is so important.

So yeah, we managed to get some convinced and then eventually momentum. Built from there. It was quite hard of course, and even getting a film crew involved because obviously they have no idea if this would go [00:35:00] ahead, because they might not want to get involved because there’s no funding or because of COVID things canceling.

So it was quite a difficult project to manage alongside full-time work. So it was a one hell of a journey. So if anyone needs sponsorship tips or whatever I’ve got, I’ve got. One of which is make sure you’re very clear on your why and make sure that your, why aligns with other fields. Why before you ask them for money, like if there, if this is a brand and they’re doing something completely different to what you’re doing and they’ve, they’ve been focused on that.

It’s highly unlikely. They’re not going to support you. So don’t get like that reject. And take your own board is probably because you weren’t aligned. So think about people who are aligned with you and, and your mission, your goals, and also persistence as [00:36:00] well. When with sponsorships just like sales pretty much in businesses, right person, right time, right moment.

And. You can only be right person, right time, right. Roman, by taking the action to, to, to, to reach out. Sometimes, sometimes you get organic stuff. People could find out about you and Nick. Oh, I’d love to back you. I heard about youth from this, but I, most of the time is when you’re starting a project from scratch.

Like this it’s very much you’re reaching out. And how, in terms of preparing training, was there much done for us or was it more on the sponsorship? Started off a lot heavily on sponsorship because you’re thinking, do I need to get myself physically fit for this? If it’s not going to go ahead. So there’s a lot of that.

But I was very much with the team saying, just be ready. Let’s just, let’s just go with it. So the first [00:37:00] time we tried to do the trip was canceled because we didn’t get the funding in place in time. So then we pushed it. And COVID also at the same time strike where you weren’t allowed to move between counties.

At that point, we had all trained for it and we were all physically fit. And then suddenly we’ve got to wait. Another eight months really happens and you start having those doubts. So what I was just trying to just get the team to do is just keep yourself as fit as you can during this campaign. When we’ve got the money, we’ll do it.

We’ll get it done. And so, yeah, we were training quite hard throughout the weeks doing pretty much long cycles, maybe sometimes six, seven hour cycles on the weekends and then short ones over over the week after and before work and things like this. And then doing gym and rehab rehabilitation. Sort of stretches and stuff at [00:38:00] house, open up your back and kind of improve your posture on the bike and things like this.

So we were doing a lot of that for six, seven months on the lead, up to the sitters getting a sponsorship, but we just didn’t know how long we’d be doing that for, because we just don’t know. We didn’t know until like very much the month before that this was going to go ahead. So it wasn’t like it’s happening in June.

It might happen in June, but the government look everything up and some sponsors might put out because of the government locking everything up. So it was very much like be ready for any movement. So a bit of a complete head. It, yeah, pretty much. It was like, It can happen at any point, let’s just be ready for it.

Nice. And I, cause I watched a trailer and it looks incredible. How was it sort of taken at the first? So Kendall, we had [00:39:00] really good feedback. So Kendall mountain festival it’s focused on outdoor adventures and sustainability and social social films. And w we, we felt that we were kind of. Talking to people who are of our, who are like our tribe.

They do a lot of people do similar things to us trying to highlight environmental awareness campaigns and doing outdoor ventures, but trying to be sustainable at the same time. So that we had, there was a lot of people there who were very much, you know, in our space. And we had some great, great feedback saying was really well done on the tight budget and they enjoyed the film.

It was both informative and entertaining and venturous at the same time. That’s what we wanted and we wanted it to be a bit full provoking. And a lot of people said they were questioning things that they do and questioning things around them. And that, that, that was literally the ambition of the film.

So yeah, I, I think it, it was accepted quite well and we’ve [00:40:00] got a good reception from there and we also have had discussions with distributors about maybe scaling up. So the film itself, when you do watch it, it’s got six interviews. We actually shot 26 interviews, but we only chose six of the 26th because we only had half an hour to show an entire adventurous journey and fit in interviews at the same time.

So we’re looking to do a series out of it an educational series, if we can just need to get financial backing for that. We’ve got the first page and the content so short, it’s just getting it all put together again. Anyone listening, come say hi. Good. And another thing I sort of looked at was on your website, you talk about the power of yes.

Y for people listening. Can you sort of [00:41:00] explain what this message is about? The power of yes. Is quite an, an interesting. Three letter words, cause one, it can get you doing things that you really, really enjoy and Intuit can also take you down the wrong route. So yes can, yes, it can be good and bad at the same time.

But I’ve, I find that when you kind of understand the things that you love. Really do like, and you’re not just doing it for the sake of doing it and you’re not just doing it because it looks cool because someone said, it’s cool when you’re not just doing it because you’re, you’re, you’re not just saying yes to it because you’ve been obliged to say yesterday, you’re actually genuinely thinking this is something I genuinely like to do.

And I really would get a lot out of it. That’s a really powerful. Yes. And that was a yes. That I was probably not really doing much when I was in my younger years. So during, during you know, school and going into university, I was just [00:42:00] saying anything that would fit me in a group or would get me through my education.

And it was kind of like, I’m just saying yes, because I don’t really know what I’m saying. Yes. Why am I saying yes to doing this degree? Why am I saying it was very much like, it’s the done thing. You should get a degree. You should do this to these high levels. And then I realized I really enjoy outdoor sports and green, the green spaces and nature is really good for my mental health.

So I just started aligning my life around yeses, fat, supported that. And it’s just been really great since by wish I need a lot of a long time ago. So yeah yeah, saying yes to some things that may be. On your thing or isn’t something that you really, really would enjoy. And it’s just, you’re doing for aesthetics or you’re involved because someone [00:43:00] told you to do it.

It’s not necessarily always the best. I know you’re in, if you’re in a workplace, you have to say yes sometimes because honestly, you don’t get paid if you’re not going to do it. But there are instances where you can push back and say, no, that’s not my thing. But they are, there is a bit of a yes bug, but you can get from saying yes, and then it can lead to things that you never fought.

You would go down. So when I said yes to doing being’s channel, I would never read it. Have opened up my eyes to a whole new world of living a way of living that just, I was in a, such a state mentally and physically just terrible. And I said, yes. And that just changed my life. And it was, it was a simple, simple act that I could have said no to, because I’m like, why would I do that?

I’ve always found in a pool. That’s where my competition. But that opened doors to things. And then I said yes, to rowing across an ocean. And then from that, [00:44:00] I was able to actually spend 40 days thinking about why she cared about. And then from that, I was able to come up with this and big journey and adventure and highlight climate solutions, which is so important.

And it’s a really good purpose. So there was a, there’s some really powerful yeses that can come. Just from your inner, like this, this is right. And then there’s going to be some yeses, which is stay on the screen again, do this again. Do do the same old, same old again that you don’t enjoy. And you just keep saying yes to it, and then you just get more and more upset about it.

So there’s, there’s two ways. Yeah. There’s this is quite powerful. I think it’s one of the most powerful words in the world. Yeah, I th I think it was so interesting about your story is how something so good came from something so selfish in a sense of you decided to do this, to [00:45:00] benefit yourself, but at the same time, it’s beneficial for so much more, so many more people.

Yeah, it started, it did start off as a selfish. The slight swimming’s channels. Like how do I push myself? How do I get myself out of this mental health state? I mean, I was just thinking, get me out of this head, basically. That’s what I was thinking. I just need something to contain me away. So it was very much like that.

And then realizing that there’s so many other people who are in this boat, same boat, who could do this sort of sought support. It then becomes unselfish because you’re then sharing your learnings, sharing ways, helping people to do it. You know, one of the guys on this trip, he had really bad mental health.

And he’s now on, in a best of state from doing outdoor challenges with myself and others doing this stuff. Yeah. It’s side of selfish and change is just that. How you say how you say that, but it’s I think it, I think it was. [00:46:00] I don’t know if it was lucky that it’s quite something that helps other people, otherwise I would come across as really, really selfish.

But I, yeah, I think, I think if I was just pursuing it for money, it would be a different thing when it, so you know, I’m just doing, doing it just to help, help, help the world in some ways. Are you a lot more discipline now on sort of social media on your phone turning notifications off? Oh, I’ve got no notifications on my phone.

I did that four years ago. So the only time I’ll know if someone’s messaged me is if I go into my phone, go into the apps and stuff like that. I don’t get the buzzers anymore, which I used to cause I used to be working, doing something hiking is that buzz distracts everything. So now it’s on my own accord.

And with social media, one of the [00:47:00] devils of it is it’s one of the fastest ways to interact with people. So if you do want to get a message out there, which. To help people in some way, some of the quickest ways you can do that is using social media. So I use it differently to how I used to use it. And I use it as a way to spread message like a, like a purpose and a message to get people involved and connected with the causes and stuff like that.

So yeah, I use it in that way more than anything else at the minute. Nice. Well, I think it’s been such a pleasure listening to your stories. Yeah. Thanks. Thanks to you. For having me on the, on the show. I hope people get connected and want to want to find out more about how they can get involved in, in, in this world.

Well, absolutely. There’s a part of the show where we ask the same five questions to each guest each week with the first being. What’s the sort of one gadget that you always take on these trips with you? The one gadget I always take [00:48:00] on trips and outdoor trips. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. So probably.

Some sort of warm, claves like some sort of warm thing, because I find that when I’m outdoors all the time, swimming, hiking, I’m always, I always will get colds. It sounds. Th things, keep me warm, like a warm jumper or something like that. Because even in the summer you go for, I go for a run and you get the cold sweats afterwards sometimes, and that’s not good.

So yeah, something like that. That’s not very exciting. I always want to be like, oh, lucky duck or something. I’m not sure. A high-tech jumpers. Gotcha. I suppose. Yeah, maybe. Yeah. Maybe something like this. Yeah. Okay. What about your favorite adventure or traveling? Favorite adventure travel book. Yeah. Yeah.

Well, I’m terrible at reading. I have dyslexia. So it takes me about a million years. I found that when I was very young [00:49:00] reading, Harry Potter took me way too long. But yeah, I do. I do. I read sort of audio books more so like audio, audio things, and the best, the best book fat. I think I was, I was reading, I was given a long time ago was born survivor from bear.

Grylls is a bit of a. And I don’t know if it is actually the book that is inspired me or just him, but I just, I just really like his ethos about doing these adventures and things he does to promote gang young people outdoors, and I I’m pushing boundaries and things like this. I just, I just think it’s such a how do I describe it?

It’s something as needed. People like him just getting people inspired to get outdoors like that in, in his way it touches people. I think it resonates with people and yeah, he does it quite well, [00:50:00] especially our scale. And that that’s pretty impressive. Cool. And why are adventures important to you? We sort of covered that over the podcast, but, but for the sake of the five questions.

Yeah, adventure is important for physical, mental health mainly and get gang that sort of, that benefit where I can’t get it from anywhere else. That flow that state of flow, that feeling of mindfulness, that feeling of in your own head, just enjoying the moment, hearing the birds, just being there.

That’s why I do it. Nice. Favorite Quate I’ve got a new one. Go on then go on then. So that Kendall man’s festival what’s that 14 peaks. Yup. Yup. I love, he says giving up is not in the blood man. I just [00:51:00] love that. Cause I’ve been in so many instances where you just feel like you’re so done. I’ve pushed myself so hard or.

Oh, I’ve been working so late on some projects and I’m just like, nah, can’t give up, let’s get this done. It’s not in the blood. So yeah, that was from NIMS. But actually I think a, another really great quote, if I’m allowed to do two, I took a walk in the woods and I came out to live in the trees. That was a really big one for me.

That quote, that quote was I think his name is Justin, Justin trio or something like this. I, if you type in, I took a walk in the woods and I came out to all of them. Trees you’ll find out who write that one, Justin Trudeau or Justin chiro. I think my true, I, if I can see if I can get out of. As in the Canadian prime minister?

No, I don’t think it was him. It was someone before [00:52:00] I’ll try and get off. Now it’s a, something that I’m not very good at is remembering the names. It’s never been my thing, but yeah, that, that, that was really, really important for me because that came here we go. I’ve got it completely wrong. Henry David farro Pharaoh.

All right. Yeah, that was true. I sure. I thought it was fairy. And that, that quote was really important because that was where I started escaping from screen time at university. And I was taking those short breaks in the walk. And that, that, that resonates with me so much. Just breaking up my life a bit with some nature.

Okay. And people listening to always keen to travel and go on these grand adventures. What’s the one thing that you would recommend to people wanting to get started? Oh, okay. Get started in traveling and, [00:53:00] well, it could be. An adventure or travel can be anywhere in my, in my view, it could be just outside where you live or it could be really far-flung get flight, go, go for a jungle and stuff.

My desk I would always recommend using your assets to get the best sales, your travel trip. So sometimes it’s really nice to just go blatantly to places. And then sometimes it’s quite nice to have sort of vague idea where you want. And what you want to do. And so I try to advise people, if you have the options, research, these areas, please do.

You could go blindly down, down the wrong street, or you could go blindly somewhere. That could be dangerous. If you had research, you would have avoided. So yeah. Always research where you’re going and that you’d be actually really pleasantly surprised what you can research, just where you live.

Interesting [00:54:00] historical facts, history, places, interesting walkways that you’ve never fought. You go to some bits of nature that you couldn’t find before. Yeah. So yeah, that’s how I advise it. Just if you can do bit research before you go. Perfect. And finally, what are you doing now? And how can people follow you in your future adventures?

Great. So I’ve just started a community interest. We call net climate explorers. And so basically it’s just great. It’s growing the, the campaign, the impact campaign pedals of parks, but we did the adventure for the cycle and the sys climate solutions. We’re looking to scale it up and do a bit more speaking and create other forms of content, other documentaries series and things like this.

So that that’s what we’re working on now, right now, the, the website is pedal for parks.co dot. But it’s going to change your prime explorers. Look, Crudo your care at some point in the near future, but I can’t put a time frame on it [00:55:00] when it be some point in December. But yeah, that’s, that’s, that’s where you can find out about.

But in the meantime, I have a website that has links to all of this too. Isaac kenyan.com. And you can find that more about the adventures I’ve been on. Some, some blogging materials and things like this videos and content in a strain and a bit more back from explorers. But yeah, that’s what I’m doing.

Amazing. Well, I think it’s been such a pleasure and we’ll leave a link in the description for Isaac’s website and Instagram handle and everything. Thank you very much, John. Yeah, they’re really great questions as well. I really enjoyed them. Well, thank you so much for coming on and I think hopefully everyone’s enjoyed listening to your story.

And I’m sure we look forward to seeing you on your next big adventure, wherever that may be. Cool. Well, thanks. So thanks [00:56:00] Isaac. Take care. Well, that is it for today. Thank you so much for listening and I hope you got something out of it. If you did hit that like button and subscribe, if you haven’t already and die, we’ll see you in the next.

Pip Stewart

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Pip Stewart (Adventurer)

Pip Stewart is an adventurer, journalist and presenter. She believes that connecting with people and the great outdoors is good for the soul and seeks to tell stories with heart.

In 2013, she cycled home from Malaysia to London, covering 10,000 miles and 26 countries in a year on her bike. In 2016 her adventures took her on a 3,000-mile cycle, boat and plane journey exploring Brazil and Peru to raise awareness of the environmental issues in the region. She documented the deforestation of the Amazon rainforest with adventurer Reza Pakravan and its devastating effect on the indigenous communities.

Then February 2018, she teamed up with fellow adventurers Laura Bingham and Ness Knight to take on a world-first – paddling the entire length of The Essequibo, South America’s third-largest river, from source to sea.

On the Podcast today, talk about these adventures and the struggles that occur when doing these expeditions. We talk about the future of travel and the responsibility of travellers with a platform.

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Transcript of our Conversation

Pip Stewart

[00:00:00] Pip Stewart: Hello and welcome to the modern adventurer. Coming up PIP, you know, what you’re doing is remarkable, not least because it is neo-colonial and racist. And then you know, that that’s, that’s a hell of a message to receive. My initial reaction was very unhelpful. It was sort of one of like a classic white fragility, tears and embarrassment and, and the worry that people were going to see me.

And what I was doing is racist and feeling their pain. It, it really brings it to life in a way. You know, we can talk about deforestation from the comfort of our homes and then check and scroll through Instagram. But when you’re like, oh my gosh, you know, you’ve actually lost your dad, your family at risk every single day.

And I think that for me was just really woke me up to the issue. My next guest is an adventurer and journalist. She has done some incredible adventures over the years from starting from absolutely nothing to deciding to cycle from Malaysia to London where her adventure. We [00:01:00] discuss some of these incredible trips that she’s done down the years and have quite an honest and Frank conversation about the sort of future and travel and how one should be more responsible in the way we sort of communicate in exploring.

So I am delighted to introduce PIP Stewart to the. Thanks for having me, John. Nice to be here. Absolutely pleasure. Well, it’s so great to have you on, as I say, I have followed you for many, many years, and to get you on the show to talk about some of your adventures is just amazing. But before we sort of jump into your adventures, I always like to start at the beginning and sort of talk about how you got into it and the sort of early, early stages of your adventure career.

Yeah, well actually like many of the guests on your podcast, it was a complete accident. Really? I had a bit of a false start in business. I used to work innocent drinks, like selling smoothies into schools. I quickly realized I was a bit shit at this [00:02:00] and I sort of left before. I was sacked to be honest, John.

And essentially I knew that I loved travel. I knew that I love meeting people and I was sort of looking for a way to make taking out a year to sort of reconsider what I wanted to do. Look legitimate to my parents mainly. So I applied to go back to university to do a master’s in journalism. But in Hong Kong, So I thought, okay, cool.

I’ll scratch that. Travel itch. I’ll get something. Out of it potentially. And it turned out I absolutely loved journalism and I loved sort of being in Hong Kong and, and learning from my, my colleagues. And, yeah, so that sort of started this whole interest in, in travel and telling stories. And I suppose from Hong Kong, my partner, Charlie then got a job in Malaysia and he’d followed me from London, Hong Kong.

So I thought right. Probably time for me to go to Malaysia. We stayed there for a couple of years and [00:03:00] then ultimately he suggested cycling home. And at this point, you know, I wasn’t, I’m not like you, I’m not an athlete. I’m definitely not an athlete adventure. But I found myself saying sure, like, yeah, why not?

Let’s cycle home. And at the time I didn’t put much thought into it, John. I just thought, okay, well, if I can sit at my desk from nine to five, I can probably sit on a bicycle. The reality is, as you know, is somewhat different to that. Cause we didn’t really train at all. The first time I sat on a fully laid in bike was as we were leaving quite an impor and I was like, oh my gosh, like what have I.

I think three weeks in had a complete panic at the side of the road, we’d barely hit a hill. And I was like, I can’t do this Charlie, like three, my bike down. And then, yeah, eventually he said something to me that has stuck. And I’ve used an, every other adventure, which is, you know, this is not a physical journey.

This is a mental one. And I think he was a combination of things on that trip that really sort of [00:04:00] kick-started this desire to have more of a quote unquote career in this space because I realized. Traveling slowly and by human power. Yeah. Uncover so many interesting stories. You go to places that perhaps aren’t covered by mainstream media.

And I just loved it and it T it ticked a lot of boxes and I still came home, had no job whatsoever. I had a slight panic whenever. Prices in London are expensive and I needed to pay the bills. So I managed to get a job at red bull as their adventure editor, and then slowly things started to snowball from that, because I’d done that big journey.

Other people that approached me to say, look, we’re, we’re looking for people to do other journeys with. And yeah. So when people say, how did you get into this? It’s a complete accident. It was finding something that was interesting in stretches, interested in following that up. And then it kind of snowballed from there.

I think it’s so interesting. As you said about the physical and mental, like it’s a [00:05:00] mental journey because so often. When you start these, you sort of have this idea that you need to be really fast. You need to push yourself. And when you take a step back and actually take your time and immerse yourself in the situation you find, you uncover so much more.

Absolutely. And I am a huge fan. I think the world is split between team fast and teams slow, actually. And I’m funny in camp team slow because. Yeah, I do think when you slow down, you definitely immerse yourself more, as you said, and you kind of. Ah, get a deeper understanding. You have more time for conversation.

And actually now when I travel, one of my favorite things to do is just situate myself in a coffee shop, find where all the old men are hanging out. That’s usually where I go to, like, they usually have the best coffee and then just chat and, and really that’s like, yeah, that’s just magic, really slowing down and really getting under the skin of a place as far as you can, as, as a traveler.

Yeah. [00:06:00] I remember, I think we were speaking to Jody Stewart on her. Five or something four or five. And he said, unless we basically speak that, and this should break in a record, no one actually cares. If you travel from Malaysia to London in 101 days or 150. It doesn’t matter unless you’re mark Beaumont, who we had on and you’re doing it around the world in 80 days.

No, one’s going to care. And actually to that point, John, no one really cares generally about like, and I think that’s the thing. It’s, that’s where we’ve got to find meaning and enjoyment in our, in our own lives. Yeah, exactly. And for people listening, I always, I always try and tell them that this is the way to sort of go if you’re going down this route, because in your mind, you’re always thinking I need to push myself.

I need to slightly suffer. We had Elsa Kent on the podcast last week, and she was talking about the same thing that she sort of needed to go fast when actually always at the end, there’s always a slight regret of [00:07:00] maybe if I just taken my time and slowed down. That, would it be more opportunities? Yeah, I th I think that’s really insightful because actually it’s, it’s the same thing in life.

Isn’t it? Like, why, why are we doing, I don’t think we often stop and question, why are we doing what we do? Why are we rushing to these things? Why do we want to do world first? Why do we want to do these grand trips? And I suppose if someone who has. Done some a lot of it comes down to sort of insecurity doesn’t it insecurity a desire to prove something I think probably, and you know, better.

Cause you’ve probably interviewed a lot of people in this space, but I feel like people either running from something or to something and perhaps a bit more honesty about that and actually a lot of what you can achieve doing grand adventures could also be achieved through like therapy and discussion and a bit more introspective thought, but.

Yeah, I it’s, it’s just one way to sort of understand yourself, other people in the world around you. Isn’t it. And I personally love it. [00:08:00] Yeah, I, I, as you say, because I think, you know, we’ve spoken to nearly 46, 47 people on this podcast and there is a sort of theme around it. Or, you know, when we had Emily Scott on an episode nine, she talked about sort of, she was generally unhappy and sort of wanted to pursue and probably identify as similar with you or myself.

It’s that either. Your time at work, where you’re constantly thinking about something else and you want to sort of go out and prove yourself. And by going on these trips, you sort of feel like you need to push yourself a bit further. And as you say, it’s that sort of mental, which can be sort of used to channel in a really good direction.

Definitely. And I think a lot of the journeys that I’ve been on, it definitely be motivated by fear and it comes down to. Sort of fear of not fully living that sort of like, what am I doing? We get like one amazing precious life. How am [00:09:00] I using it? And it doesn’t have to be, and this is what I’m coming to understand.

It doesn’t have to be these grand adventures. It can just be at the risk of sounding like a crazed hippie, literally just looking at the undecided. Because my gosh, they’re beautiful. And yeah, I think it is about that. It’s just about finding what works for you guys, finding out what gives you meaning and purpose, and then trying to live a bit more inline with that, whether that’s traveling or whether that’s like, you know, going for a swim on the beach, say during your first trip, going, as you said, London, Malaysia to London, and that was with Charlie who is now.

Boyfriend long suffering partner about 13 years. And so when you were doing it and sort of starting out, what was the sort of, as you say, you’d never done anything like this. What was the sort of, as he said, the sort of mental, it’s a mental game rather than a physical one. But for you who had never done this, what was the sort of [00:10:00] feelings like when you were sort of getting ready, preparing for, I mean, what are you talking five, six months?

Well, literally in this case it was like, should we do it? Yes, let’s do it basically. So we knew that we wanted to go home and we talked about maybe going back over land, but by trains and things. And I think there is something to be said for setting yourself a big, hairy goal. You know, I think I wanted to be.

And this is where I think we need to be careful. I, that point, I think I wanted to be the person who could say I’ve cycled halfway around the world. If I’m honest, it was ego ego talking. What I realized when I was sat on the bike was that I had to be the person to cycle off around the world. And I had to put the effort in and, and saying something because you want to appear a certain way and doing something is very different.

And I definitely feel like these journeys have humbled me. So. To answer your question about what sort of emotions I was going through. There was excitement at doing something incredible and [00:11:00] Harry that I wasn’t entirely sure I could achieve. There was a lot of fear like, oh my gosh, we’ve got to do this.

And then also, as I mentioned, you know, three weeks, There was a lot of embarrassment because I told everybody I was going to cycle from Malaysia to London and there, I was barely able to get up a hill and I’m like, how? And then the self negative self-talk starts. Right? It’s like, whoa, why did you think you were capable of this?

Have you seen yourself? You fight for, for you like to eat cake, your art is super padded. You know, all this like negative chatter that we all have that kind of prevent us from doing what we really want to do. All that started up. And so. The beauty of adventure is that it just pushes you to all sides of yourself.

There are times when you’re like, oh my God, go me, look at me, go like that feeling of pride and confidence. And then as you know, as well, you have the unbelievable lows. They’re like, what am I doing? Like, this was a terrible idea. How did I think I was capable of this? So I think that that to me [00:12:00] is what I love about adventure, because it’s not all.

Positive. And I think that reflects life in so many ways. You know, we are pushed down our throats in life. Like it’s all about happiness. And I think that’s slightly misleading because I think this constant focus on being happy inevitably makes us more unhappy because actually, maybe we should focus on the wonderful range of emotions that we feel as humans.

And if we can accept that we have these bad days and accept that we have amazing days and just take them for what they are. It sort of becomes easier to deal with and ultimately ironically, you become happier for it. So, yeah, I think that that’s, to me, like what I loved about the travel was the lows, as well as the whole.

I think, I don’t know it’s the same if you, because let’s just say a very sort of similar first trip was a big cycle ride. Having gone from nothing to a big cycle ride, it was the first three weeks, which were the most [00:13:00] painful, the most sort of draining on your boy. And it was probably similar to you. And that’s, if once you get past the three weeks, then it’s just a sort of slug of every day stay clean, but your legs of sort of getting used to it in the first three weeks.

Well, I remember sort of being in, I was going across America and I said, I’d done very little training for it, but the first three days it was fine. And then suddenly your legs just stiffen up, getting off your legs, feel like jelly. Like you kind of walk, but then suddenly I think on like the second week or third week, It was all gone.

And then from there it was not playing salient per se, but you had the strength and the stamina to kiss, keep slowly building up and your legs were always just getting used to it. Now. I think that’s so interesting, isn’t it? Because actually, I think before I did this sort of journey, I looked at people who had done crazy journeys and I [00:14:00] thought, God, like, I’m not like you, there’s no way I can do this.

And actually. I think everybody could do it. If they, if you can sit at a desk from nine to five, you can sit on a bike or you can sit in a kayak or it’s just about kind of gritting it out a bit. Isn’t it. It’s pushing through that day through when you’re like, oh my God, my legs. And I think if you do that for long enough, then suddenly these things you grow and you develop don’t you.

Yeah. Cause we were also speaking, like when you on these sort of trips day to day, it’s pretty much the same. You just get. Cycle eat cycle, sleep, repeat. And so that like a day job, that’s your job as it is. You’re just going through the motions again and again, and seeing incredible things along the way.

Absolutely. So simple. And that’s the other thing the other secret of adventures is you don’t have to worry about all the other stuff, the admin and the to-do list. It’s like, if you can wake up, keep yourself alive, go to bed. Like that’s a successful [00:15:00] day. And I think there’s something really beautifully simple about that.

And actually I realized that when my, my journey in Guyana kayak, Jedi, which I’m sure we’ll touch on soon, but yeah, it was just beautifully simple and suddenly. There’s so many benefits to technology and I love it. We wouldn’t be able to speak now, but equally we are bombarding ourselves with more and more stimulus and we are part of nature ultimately.

And I think when we strip everything away and we allow that quietness to come back into our lives, it does, it does shift a lot of things and it does bring up a lot of things that maybe we wouldn’t notice in our otherwise busy and hectic lives. I sort of found it like a sort of form of meditation when you’re cycling.

I don’t know, on a street road for six hours straight because that’s all, that’s all you’re doing is just looking ahead cycling. You’re thinking of nothing else other than what’s ahead of you. And it is that sort of form of meditation where you’re just sort of so absorbed in the now and not thinking about anything.

[00:16:00] Yeah. And just the spinning of the legs and it’s, it’s just, yeah, there, when you get into that flow state, it is just magic, but there are also days where you’re like, oh my God, what am I doing? Like, I don’t want to strap myself. Where’s my next food coming from, like all of that. Yeah, there are those moments, especially when it gets to dusk and you haven’t found a place to camp.

You’re like, oh, this could be interesting. I’d say, how long do they take you to get from Malaysia to London? It took us 13 months. So to your point about slow travel, like Charlie he’s tall lanky. Very much a cycling build. If you like, I’m, as I mentioned, five foot four, and like to eat cakes. So I think I inevitably slowed him down.

But ironically he said he wouldn’t change it. So that was a 13 month journey came back home just before Christmas. All very exciting. And then the reality of, oh gosh, like we need to pay bills and get a, get a job. So yeah, there was a fight.

[00:17:00] And from that trip what were the sort of lessons do you think you learned because they see amazingly, you and Charlie are still together after such a long and probably quite intense trip. Well, you literally see everything John mez, like the romance, the mystery shall we say has gone. But there’s something beautiful about that as well.

That kind of sense that, you know, someone and you got those shared stories of being like, oh, do you remember when we did this? And I still think if we can survive that together, we can pretty much get through anything. So yeah, I would highly recommend it as a test of a relationship. It’s it’s, it’s like a good indoctrination so to speak, but yeah, it, I loved it.

I really loved it. I wouldn’t say. And what were the sort of amazing stories that you still tell each other 13 years later? Well, we narrowly escaped being blown up in Tajikistan, so we accidentally camped in a field of mortars. And we only realized this cause we sort of cycled pushed up. You know, you’re saying like looking for somewhere to camp.

[00:18:00] Pushed out by X off the side of the road, on the Pamir highway, which Tajikistan had a little river running, but like between Afghanistan and to GQ, Stan. And so over the decades, there’d been a lot of mortars sort of sent backwards and forwards, and we gingerly put our bikes to the side of the road and try to look for somebody to camp and suddenly.

Oh, my God. There’s an unexploded mortar about yay. Big. So we kind of wheeled our bikes back back onto the road really slowly and carefully cycled on a bit. It was getting really dark and we just had to set up camp. So we found what we thought was like a safe area. Set up our 10 and the next morning as I went to take my tent peg out, look down and there was another massive mortar, which we just narrowly scope sleeping on.

So yeah. As soon as we got to the Capitol, we basically went yeah, by the way, there’s a couple of mines in this particular area that you or unexploded mortars you might want to look at, which was possibly the most hairy moment of the trip, but it was all fine. [00:19:00] Survived. It. And then just, you know, other things like being invited into a wedding and it was Becca Stein, you know, we’re sweating smelly, you know, that like vinegar smell that you get when you sweat it too much and your clothes haven’t been washed, you know, just pulled into a wedding, like vodka shoved into our hands.

And and it’s just, it was amazing. And I think it was the people like it’s, it’s so cliched, but. Connection. And for me, that’s what travel and adventure is about is connection. Whether it’s with yourself, with other people or the world around you. And I think I came back from that journey. Just realize it.

Having worked in traditional media where there’s a, there’s a little saying that if it bleeds, it leads, which is a horrible expression, but I was very disillusioned covering news. You know, it was it’s, it’s not the most uplifting shall we say. Whereas when you’re actually going out and meeting people in the world, you realize actually 99% of people are blooming amazing.

And mainstream media just focuses [00:20:00] on the kind of. Well, the sensational stories. And it just, it just gave me a whole new perspective on the kind of stories and the kind of storytelling I wanted to do. Whereabouts was that, was that sort of down the sort of wakhan corridor or are we talking a bit further on exactly that corridor?

Amazing such beautiful place. Oh my God. Isn’t it. It’s just, yeah. And for anyone who’s not been, I would definitely recommend checking it out at some point, but. It just is otherworldly. Isn’t it? You feel like so insignificant, you got mountains sort of rising up and you’re going down this pass and the stars at night are just bonkers and I loved it.

I absolutely love. Yeah, horrific terrain, they force, oh my God. Yeah. If you’re cycling, you know, get ready to bring a puncture, a packet and a it’s very bumpy. So you spend your whole time just like bumping up and down. But you’re shaking when we were there, we saw so many [00:21:00] cyclists and. There they rate had gone from sort of 70, 80 miles down to about 10 or 20 miles every day, while they’re in Tajikistan, traveling slowly, you see what’s another slow day, 4,000 meters above sea level going up.

Very steep. Rugged terrains would love it. Like bird, definitely like bird. And so you came back into came back to London and you were pursuing journalism owner. You’ve got the job with red bull that sort of led to more. Sort of ad people sort of asking you to go on these adventures. And was that the one where you were cycling across south America with

Yeah, that’s exactly it. So I was, I was in red bull’s office and I was, I got an email notification about this guy called Raza packer van was looking for someone who had cycled [00:22:00] and was also interested in the environment. And I thought, oh, that sounds really interesting. So I sort of dropped him a note.

Yeah, I’m interested. D-Day he was also looking for someone with TV experience that I’d been working as a news anchor in Hong Kong. So I just dropped him a note. We met up for a drink. I really, really liked him. He got on really well. And ultimately he said, yeah, do you want to come join me? And his plan was to travel along the trans Amazonian highway in Brazil.

Well Brazil through Brazil, but into Korea as well. Looking at deforestation and how it impacts people on the ground. And essentially we ended up doing that and it was a fantastic trip, but it was also unbelievably heartbreaking. And you realize, especially now at moment, the environment’s like very much a front of mind.

Exactly the global impact of what we consume and what we use and how it impacts all of us really. And I hadn’t really linked before that [00:23:00] trip, what I was consuming to the source. But you know, when you’re cycling past burning forest and you can smell it when it’s such a visceral experience, when you got the smoke in your nostrils and the dirt of the road and your lungs, and you suddenly think.

This is because I, you know, want a beef burger and this land’s been cleared for cattle ranching or Palm oil, or and that was pre. Eye opening to say the least, and then talking to peoples whose family members had been murdered through illegal logging and, you know, gut wrenching stories of gold mining and mercury poisoning.

And, and suddenly I’m like, whoa, okay, this is a much bigger issue than I’d ever really kind of considered or thought about. So that was a journey that had a purpose. And I think, you know, our purpose when I recycling back from Malaysia to London was, you know, we needed to get home. It was a very much an a to B type journey.

And then this journey with Reza was [00:24:00] different again, because it was an adventure with purpose. And I, I definitely took a lot from that as well. And it’s something that I’d like to continue to, to do more of because I found that quite meaningful. What was the cycle? How long were you sort of say clean for?

So the whole trip was three months and it was a mixture of sort of cycling the highway. It was a mixture of taking small biplanes and then inevitably, cause it was a filmed thing for TV you’d you’d spend time in the, in the van as well. It was it was different again, cause it wasn’t like everyday on the bicycle going a to B it was very much like purpose driven.

Like we need to interview these people. I’m telling the story through the mechanism of the bicycle, so different again. Oh wow. And so, and with that, I mean, as you say, you’ve heard some of the may sort of gut wrenching stories and this sort of, cause you’re spending three months sort of on and off with him.

How did you find. We were speaking a lot on this [00:25:00] podcast about the partner that you pick going on these trips, because they incredibly intense at times. And if you can sort of tolerate, because as I said, quite a few times as last week, we had Elsa and she was saying like, when she did her trip, she was encouraged to get a partner to come and do it.

And I always say, you’ve got to be very specific about who you pick and. About the sort of relationship you have, what was the sort of difference between Reza and Charlie in a sense of you didn’t know Raza before you went on this big trip? It’s, that’s a really interesting question because with Charlie, you know, it’s unconditional, you know, you can have a bad day and it can be like, ah but when you’re getting to know somebody, it’s, it’s the whole different dynamic, especially doing a journey that’s physical and long and long hours.

And I’m happy to say Reza is now like a brother to me, and I love him to bits. [00:26:00] But what was fascinating is that inevitably when you spend 24 7 with someone, little niggles will come up and with the best will in the world, whether it’s your, your absolute life partner or whether it’s someone you’ve just met, there will be a little bit of tension and.

I think, well, I’ve come to realize doing more of these journeys, especially not just this one with wrestler, but also one I did with last night and Laura Bingham was it conflicts do arise and that’s not necessarily a bad thing. It’s just, how do you handle them? And actually on the kayak journey, we went to see a a psychotherapist before we set off or a psychologist, not, I’m never sure of the difference to roles, John.

And one thing that was really handy was he said, you know, make sure you have a common. So, if you have a common goal, the chance of conflict is dramatically reduced. And I think that came up on the trip with Reza is that he was trying to speed. He’s a speed cyclist. You know, he’s broken world records for cycling fast.

I am at the other end [00:27:00] of the spectrum say, well, then we had a common goal of producing a documentary that the mechanism of getting there was somewhat different. So that inevitably did cause a little bit of like, But equally, I think that really made me realize that as someone who will actively avoid conflict, you know, if you are meant to be friends with someone, you can have a bit of conflict and you can resolve it and you can be friends.

And that was really powerful for me. To realize it just cause you, you say a bad or crossword, it doesn’t mean that’s the end of. Very nice and three-month journey. I mean, I, I don’t want to sort of ask you to sort of tell some of the stories that you probably saw and heard from there. But maybe, I mean, can you.

Oh, right. They found that it sounded, it was pretty, pretty intense as in the arguing, or just see, I meant like the stories from that [00:28:00] documentary, some of the gut wrenching stories that you were sort of talking about and some of the, maybe stories of hope and joy. Well, I think that was a, that was the thing on this trip.

You know, we were going into very remote areas and looking at how communities are dealing with deforestation. And we met this one lady called Diana. And unfortunately her father had been murdered trying to protect the indigenous land, which, which his family lived on. And she’s now a campaigner kind of campaigning for indigenous rights to, to the land, because basically it’s been shown that when indigenous people have land rights, the deforestation.

Greatly reduced. So that’s one of the major ways that deforestation can be reduced and just sort of talking to her. You know, you can hear these stories, but when you’re, when you’re looking eyeball to eyeball to someone, when you’re hearing and feeling their pain, it, it really brings it to life in a way [00:29:00] that, you know, we can talk about deforestation from the comfort of our homes and then check and scroll through Instagram.

But when you’re like, oh my gosh, you’ve actually lost your dad, your family at risk every single day. And I think that for me was just. Really woke me up to, to the issue. And then also the solutions we met so many people who are like putting GPS detectors on trees that have like a microphone in which will alert communities to any sort of noise of a chain store.

And you think, wow. Okay. There’s some. Cool tech solutions to this problem as well, or people trying to farm in it in a more sustainable way. So there’s, there was a lot of hope there too. And I think that I came back in one sense, going, oh God, everything is screwed. The end of the world is here already.

And then on the other hand, I was like, well, actually, no, there are a lot of really amazing people working really hard on solutions. So we’ve got to kind of focus on the hopeless. I [00:30:00] think it’s also quite a bit sort of just coming out of cop 26, which one hopes we’ll show share a bit of encouragement towards.

So I hope so. And I hope it’s not too quick Gretta, but blah-blah-blah. I hope it’s just genuinely meaningful change because yeah. It’s so easy to say, oh, this is a governmental thing, and this is business things. But actually as individuals, we can all kind of look at what are we consuming? What’s the source of it.

And on masses, like real power and the purse. So I think it needs to be concerted effort, individuals, businesses, and governments kind of all pulling together to, to, to avoid conflict, find one common goal, which hopefully is to like, not shaft the planet. So yeah, we live in hope and I suppose your trip from there was that.

This sort of, when you saw it and saw south America and sort of places around there, was that your sort of encouragement to go back to [00:31:00] Guyana? Well, I came back from that trip and I was obviously, I think anyone who loves to travel and know what I mean by like the whole itchy feet thing, you know, when you, when you’re stationary for too long, it’s like, ah, I need to get out.

And it just so happened that I’d met this lady called Laura Bingham at an adventure festival called campfire. And she rang me up one afternoon. I was, I think I must have been post-lunch at red bull, you know, when you’re like slightly in that post-lunch slump in a bit of a food haze. And she said, you know, how do you feel about doing a world first kayaking journey sourced to see by river?

And I think, I must’ve thought float down a river, pina colada in hand, you know? So I, I essentially agreed to it having to do. Like very little kayaking in my life. The only time I’d kayaked was in New Zealand. And I hated it. I thought it was a rubbish sport. Can understand why anyone did it, but anyway, we sort of trained for six months in the darkness of winter in Wales for a hot humid Amazonian expedition.

[00:32:00] And it was, that was a journey. I think that has changed me like no other I got quite sick off the back of it. I got leishmaniasis, which is a flesh-eating parasite. Had to have chemotherapy on my return to try and get rid of it. You’ll never entirely sure if it’s gone. But in a funny way, it was also one of the best experiences of my life because the journey was incredible.

I’ve definitely. Yeah. I think there’s a lot of good you can do with that as well, because talking about doing these journeys and stumbling across stories, I found out that leishmaniasis the disease I got, you know, it’s a neglected tropical disease, second biggest CA parasitic killer after malaria.

But most people who get it are poor and live in remote areas. So there’s not much sort of awareness raised about it. So sometimes I talk to the point we were making early. You know, life, hands, everyone, all sorts, you know, you don’t know what cards you’re going to be dealt and it’s like trying to make the most of the [00:33:00] card you have been given.

So yeah, I think that was a journey that woke me in many ways. So to say, And I mean, that, that, as you said, that was a sort of world first with Laura and NES. And when we, when you spoke recently about the psycho therapists, same sort of common goal, obviously the common goal was to get from source to see was that in the quickest time possible, or was that we have a sort of further purpose of looking at local communities, speaking with them.

Yeah. So this was a fascinating journey in the sense of the goal was sourced to say world first. So that, that was, that was the goal. But within that, you know, you’re going from pristine Virgin forest at the source to the Atlantic ocean. And it takes in the breadth of the communities along the way. We sort of, we did it in conjunction with the Y Y community, which are the community [00:34:00] closest to the source of the river.

And we had five guides with us going to the source and then two guides joined us for the journey to the Atlantic ocean and. What we saw and witnessed on this journey. We’re sort of that slow creep of humanity going from this beautiful untouched wilderness to passing gold mines. You know, we can no longer drink the water.

We couldn’t wash in it because of the mercury that’s used to extract the gold can make you very sick. And it was really interesting seeing the impact of humanity on our environment. And, you know, we pass one at the second biggest open pit mine in, in the, in south America called oh my mind. And around it, you know, you’ve got sort of sparse trees where the dense rain forest had once been.

And you’ve got like Capuchin monkeys clinging onto their last bit of land and sort of seeing that and going God. Okay. Wow. I know what’s further upstream. I don’t know what’s coming downstream, but it really. [00:35:00] We felt the journey of that river, that so many people call home. And I think it was a really interesting journey in that regard.

Well it’s with the three of you, well, five of you going all the way and there was just kayaking the whole way. A team hiking to the source. And I say hiking to the source, you know, a good movement during the day is four kilometers. So you are literally hacking your way through dense primary rainforest.

And, you know, in that section, we went to see the helicopter rescue people before we set off and they said, look, we can, we can absolutely rescue you, but not in that particular bit, because we need an area for the rotator blades in order to be able to land. We essentially knew it was shafted in that particular section, if something went wrong.

And that was when, you know, I nearly sat on a deadly snake. [00:36:00] Unfortunately I got my foot stuck between a log and a vine and I was wildling it for about, you know, must’ve been a minute and a half or so. And then from Jaime, Laura goes, oh my God. There’s a snake and that she two inches under my bottom was something called the laborious snake, which is known for its fast swift and deadly attacks.

Next thing I know, Jackson, one of our guides is machete debt to death, and I just looked at Jackson. I’m like, you know, Why did you kill a snake? And you just stepped back at me and said, well, pep, if I didn’t kill the snake, it would have killed you. And then whoa, you know, that is a moment where you are fully confronted with your own ego and your own insecurities.

And I think that really changed the whole trip for me because, you know, I’m suddenly going to sleep like panicking. I was having night terrors. I couldn’t, I couldn’t settle my spirit because I’m like, I just want to run home. I just want to go home. And in that moment, [00:37:00] I kind of realized, you know, you can’t change your problems, but you can change your reaction to them.

And I think one of the bravest things I did on that trip was sort of open up to my teammates and say, guys, I’m really struggling here emotionally. I don’t know how to deal with. And suddenly rather than sleeping on the edge of the team, like it I’ll hammer in my hammock. I would suddenly be put in the middle and then a fire would appear when there hadn’t been a fire at night before.

And I think it was little thing like that that really sort of made me appreciate the environment, appreciate how small we are in the grand scheme of life. And actually not being top of the food chain was very, very humbling. And then also technology, you know, suddenly. Only being able to access tech.

When we physically wanted to, we had set up a, like a satellite system and it was called a began. And anytime you could see open sky sorta point up to the school. And I realized on that journey, you know, tack is so in control of me, like I was feeling this urge to check social [00:38:00] media and having had a Jaguar come through our camp.

I can absolutely say that the feeling of getting a notification or an email ping is not dissimilar to when a Jaguar comes through your camp, you know, obviously it’s heightened, but we are zapping ourselves day in, day out with these low level threats. In the jungle, when the threat goes away, you can relax a little bit, but in, in sort of urban life, We can’t because they’re constantly there.

So as all came back from this journey with a new appreciation of not just life, but how to sort of like maybe use tech to enable life to be that little bit better rather than like, it controlling me in quite the same way. Wow, that just sounds absolutely incredible. And this was a long journey with nurse and Laura.

And were they the same? Did they have their own sort of, I mean, all of us, all our teammates, like Ramelle for example, he had a [00:39:00] new baby. He had a baby the day before we set off, he didn’t even know the name of his child. You know, for, for the YY community guiding is one of the ways to earn money. And he decided that that’s what he wanted to come and do.

So I think we all had our individual battles and struggles and Laura, especially because she had an eight month old baby at the time. And this is, this was the most dangerous thing I’ve ever done. You know, on a daily basis, we were encountering scorpions snakes. We were paddling past 18 foot Cayman. You know, I, I picked up a neglected tropical diseases, you know, could he off my face essentially?

So it’s like, whoa, it was, it was one of those journeys where I think everybody struggled to varying degrees. I was also like we would belly laugh daily. So to that point about adventure, you have the highs and you have the lows. It was, I’ve never felt more alive in some senses and I’ve never felt more on edge.

[00:40:00] Did you say you like you didn’t laugh or you did laugh? I know we did. Every day we would belly laugh. We would how we laughed. I mean, just some of these situations. And I think that Laughter is such a good tool just for coping generally, isn’t it. And there was such joy in, in that bond as an, you know, anyone who’s done, like a team thing knows like there, there is a real kind of bond that happens when you spend time with each other, like for good and for bad, you know?

But yeah, you kind of, we left his family ultimately and you know, I’ve seen far too much of those ladies to be other than. Got it sounds such an amazing trip. And as you say, this sort of bond that you have at the end of that is just incredible. And the stories you can probably tell for years to come.

Okay. I think one of the really important things that I took from that trip, that it was the role of travel and the ethics of travel and who’s [00:41:00] traveling and why, and what’s the impact and it was something. But I hadn’t really thought about enough before if I’m honest, John, you know, as a white privileged traveler from the global north where the platform, you know, however small I received a message on the journey from someone I really admire and respect on Twitter and it was a direct message and they said, PIP, you know what you’re doing is remarkable.

Not least because it is neo-colonial and racist. And then, you know, that’s, that’s, that’s a hell of a message to receive. My initial reaction was very unhelpful. It was sort of one of like plastic, white fragility, tears, and embarrassment and, and the worry that people were going to see me and what I was doing is racist.

And then I kind of really thought about the comment a little bit further, and I realized, you know, what actually is someone who has traveled and someone who has had the privilege to travel. I haven’t thought enough about it. And actually by putting up selfie after selfie, or by [00:42:00] only presenting a country through my image and my lens, that is a form of neocolonialism and that is racist.

And ultimately I came to realize on that journey, you know, there’s so much about the work that I’ve done previously that I would do differently. And I’m, I’m really genuinely sorry for how I presented myself on social media. Through that expedition, but it was, it was a really interesting learning that, you know, we can be well-intentioned, but we can still unintentionally hurt other people around us.

And I think it’s just something I wanted to raise because I don’t think enough of us in the adventure industry and necessarily aware of it if we’re white travelers and I think it’s something that’s super important. And I think it needs to be discussed because yeah, it’s uncomfortable to, to think of yourself as your, all your actions as being racist, but quite often, we all, we all without intending to be.

Yeah, I think it [00:43:00] sort of depends. I know Benedict Allen, he was on the podcast when he came back from Papua New Guinea, he was accused of being racist. But as he said, when he travels his. Hello, understanding his his whole concept to travel. It’s about learning. It’s about going to these cultures and learning from them.

It’s not about going in and sort of, you know, taking P well, whatever it’s about sort of learning from the different coaches and seeing that your way is not necessarily the right way or the only way. And as you say, he was just accused because he was in a Papua New Guinea try. And because of him being a white male, I think the guardian came off to him saying that what he was doing was a form of colonial exploring back from a Victorian age.

As you [00:44:00] say his intentions were just to go and learn. Yeah. And I think this is, this raises an interesting point that maybe I think w travelers need to think about more generally is like, why have we been welcomed into the communities that we’re going to? Is there an exchange of knowledge? Like, and, and I, I think this is, I’m not articulating myself brilliant.

There definitely needs to be. It needs to be not a one way thing. It needs to be an exchange. And we need to make sure that we are actually welcomed into countries because I think that’s, that’s the thing about colonialism, isn’t it it’s like previously people would just go into a country and say, oh, what can I, what can I learn?

Or what can I take? Whereas there needs to be a new way of thinking and a new. Discussion around this. I think so, as I say, I’m not articulating myself brilliantly, but I do think there needs to be an awareness on the part of the traveler about. [00:45:00] Should I even be going here at, for example, our expedition, you know, should, should I be doing a world first in a country?

That’s not my own. There’s a, there’s a whole load of ethical questions that have definitely come up for me as a result of this journey that I hadn’t thought enough about. And I’m still trying to, as you can probably hear still trying to puzzle it all out, but I definitely think the conversation needs to be.

Do you think that when Laura being bought it to you, her idea was a world first, but it was more also about, you know, learning because by going to Guyana, you’re learning about their way of life. You’re learning about their communities, their people, and, you know, let’s just say. You’re not welcome you. If you go to the community and you want welcome you, at least.

Well, in this particular incident, you know, we had to get permission. We had to like clear it with the government, like every [00:46:00] state actually on every journey it’s especially important to like, get all the right kind of clearances. But yeah, it’s it’s when does learning become exploitation? I think that’s the key thing it’s like, yes.

It’s, it’s fantastic. And I think that’s one of the benefits of travel. Like. There was so much we can learn just, and that’s one of my favorite things with favorite quotes actually is everyone can teach you something. But it comes down to, is this exploitative in any way? If yes, we need to reevaluate.

I think what I came to realize is that actually social media can exacerbate that massively, you know I was guilty of posting selfie after selfie or to selfie and I wish I hadn’t. And so yes, in that sense, I think the message that I received was accurate. I think. Unintentionally. The way I presented Guyana probably was through a neo-colonial lens.

And for that I’m [00:47:00] genuinely sorry. Did I intend to do it? Absolutely not. And it’s just, it’s just made me really consider. You know how to travel going forward. And I think, you know, and we talk about it often, but like, you know, w when you take a photo, make sure you say, can I take a photo, you know, have permission.

And it’s just kind of the general courtesies. Of the ethics of travel, which you know, that go beyond just having an adventure. Cause it’s good. Fun. Yeah. February tree take it. Someone took a picture of me in Australia. I feel pretty uncomfortable. Exactly. Exactly. So I think it’s, it’s just coming down and being like a decent human being and I’m thinking a bit, bit deeper, which may be I, I neglected to do and.

So do you think it was just by pasting that social media on social media, the way you’re representing that you, that you found troubling? [00:48:00] I think travel itself. Is problematic. I mean, there’s some wonderful benefits to it. Like, like you were saying about learning and and I definitely, and I love it as well.

Like it’s, it’s, it’s good for connection and it’s good to bridge, understanding and foster understanding, but it’s also, it’s also got its dark side and I think we just need to. Check in more regularly, like as to what the motivation is here and what is the impact and how, how are we impacting the country and people that we are lucky enough and privileged enough to be going.

Yeah, I, I th I think that’s very true. I think, you know, with flying and everything, you need to sort of, you know, look at about why, but I will say thing that by traveling you open up, you broaden your horizons and you open yourself up to all sorts of new ideas and new new [00:49:00] experiences in a sense of. If you just confine yourself to an area, that’s all, you know, it’s like if you live in a cardboard box, that’s all you’ll know.

And by going out and exploring, you get to know these new communities, you know, a different way of life. You know, that your way is not the only way. And the other ways you become very narrow minded in a sense. This is the only way it should be done. And this is the only way to go. Yeah, no, I, I totally get that, but I think in a, in a globalized world, and I’ve, I, I want to get, I’m not arguing against this point by this.

It’s an interesting sort of discussion to sort of have, but I, I think in a globalized world that there are ways to get outside of that. Definitely. And I think that was the main takeaway from this trip. Is it just, it just made me reconsider. You know, that the ethics of travel, [00:50:00] no fair. Very, very true.

W C sorry, in terms of sort of going on there, it’s sort of like what you sort of say more of a VR type situation, or are you saying, I think, I definitely think there’s a place for travel. I think it’s brilliant. And I think people should still be doing it, but maybe we need to be doing it less and we definitely need to be.

Considering who’s profiting from the travel. You know, if you’re saying traveling to a country, you know, is it, is it a local tourist tour operator that you’re using or is it a foreign tour operator? In which case you, you want to be trying to put money back into local pockets, you want to make sure that tourists are actually welcomed in a place.

And yeah, I, I, I, I appreciate the irony of saying this is someone who’s traveled and who hasn’t thought about it enough. But yeah, I’m kind of just, just raising it as something that I wish I had thought more about. NA very true. I mean, a what’s it next [00:51:00] summer thing. The plan is to do a documentary with about eight others looking at sustainable tourism.

And so going to different communities around Europe, looking at more sustainable ways of travel in those sorts of communities. And in terms of, rather than then they’re in this sort of social media age, when I didn’t know a sort of big travel influencer puts sort of tag of this place, suddenly let’s just say rainbow mountain in Columbia.

Is it rainbow or Peru suddenly this place, which had no tourists suddenly is now, you know, on every social media, swarms of tourists, gay that to have their picture taken on rainbow mountain. And it’s is that sustainable for the future? You know, you’ve seen Thailand cut off beach [00:52:00] access to tourists so that the coral reefs can regrow.

It’s sort of looking at different aspects about how sustainable tourism can be more managed in a sense. I want to watch that, John, that sounds amazing. But nah, I think you raised a really interesting point and as you say, yeah, there are times of course, when you are going through and you are, you do have that sort of unused uneasy feeling of, am I, what am I doing here?

Or what am I here for the right reason? And I, I think, listen to that, you know, if this is a sense of unease and it’s a gut feeling that maybe something’s a bit off, but you know, we’re, we’re not perfect humans, Zoe, we all cook out. We all make mistakes and we all learn and grow from that. So I think, you know, we, we can, but kind of try and.

Of course well, as being such a pleasure, listening to your stories, there’s a part of the show where we ask the same five [00:53:00] questions to each guest each week with the first being on the sort of trips and expeditions that you do. What’s the one gadget that you always take with you? It’s not so much a gadget, but it’s a diary.

I keep a day a daily diary. So yeah, well actually I suppose in that sense, it’s my iPhone. Cause I always want my diary on mine. Ah, very nice. Yeah. I think that’s really important. I know on one of my trips three years gay, I, I always try to lash out sort of filming it. So I was sort of trying to capture different parts, but also writing it down, always key.

What’s what’s your favorite travel or adventure book? I’m going to cheat a bit on this one. Because. Travel is echoed in life. Like I mentioned, and I think, have you, have you heard of the poetry pharmacy? Oh my gosh. So if you haven’t checked out, I really recommend it. It’s I love poetry. And for each emotion, [00:54:00] there’s a little poem prescription.

So if you’re feeling like happy, there’s a little happy poem there or anxious or whatever the emotion is that you’re feeling. And there’s a, there’s a, a poem for that. And I just love it because. Yeah, I think there’s an insight and a lot of wisdom. You don’t have to have traveled through countries, traveling through life and, and that I love, I love that little bit.

And why are adventures important here to, to our point earlier that everyone can teach you something? And I think, yeah, like as we grow old, we, we refine our way. Very true. Very true. And what is your favorite quote or motivational quote? Well, I would say everyone can teach you something. Towards the end, when we were paddling to the Atlantic ocean, I find mantra really powerful, and I was going, you can do this, you are doing this, you can do this.

You are doing this to every paddle. Stroke is a headwind was battling us. So yeah, what are those two? You can [00:55:00] do it. You are doing it, or everyone can teach you something. The feeling like when you got to the mouth of the. The river, the river. It was funny. I’d say it’s like, we turned up and I’m like, I can see where we get a finish.

And then we had the blooming headwind. You had your huge waves cause we’d hit the Atlantic ocean. And I remember John just seeing this pink house on my right for what felt like hours. I was just like really paddling and I wasn’t moving. I was like, Aw. And level. It’s a point where I’m like, we are not going to make this.

And then finally we get there and ask our fixer on the ground. It’s set up like a banner to welcome us back, which had disintegrated into the sea. We stopped outside a fish processing plant, so it just stank of shrimp. And then I finally got out my boat. We’ve got all the media from Guyana lined up.

I managed to slip land on a groin panel, whacked me on the head. I mean, it was just, it was classic clubs. Yeah. And yeah, it was, it wasn’t the most finish. Let’s put it like that. We’re [00:56:00] using like a traditional. So we did a mix. So not on the way to the source. We used a traditional dugout canoe because it was, there was so many like obviously the river narrows and we didn’t want it to get, we had inflatable kayaks, so the remainder of the journey, and we didn’t want them to be punctured.

So we sort of did a mix the first bit, getting to the source, see that traditional. And then the inflatable lightweight kayaks for port arching around rapids and waterfalls later on in the journey, which were individual. So we had that nice dynamic between being in a team in the canoe and then being in individual kayaks for the remainder of the journey.

Amazing. And so when you S did you have family there at the end or no, no. No. So it was it was just the media and then we packed up. Hi kayaks and put them in a taxi and went back and it was, yeah. A strange sort of finish, but you know, usually they’re always quite underwhelming cause you kind of pick it up and then you’re like, oh my gosh, I’ve been dreaming [00:57:00] of a bed for three months and now I’m in a bed and I’m like, I want to be back in my hammock.

And yeah, the hotel had run out of food and it was just like, what are they? Things where you’re like, oh, this is not how I imagined our night of celebration together. Yeah, it is what it is. People, people listing are always keen to travel and go on these sort of big grand adventures. What’s the one thing you would recommend for people wanting to get started, ask for help and have a sense of humor, because I think ultimately if you’re new at something you’re going to be a bit rubbish.

Right. So just get used to the fact that, you know, you’re a bit rubbish and just crack on. Like, I think the, the biggest question I would say is ask yourself what would happen if I didn’t do that? And I think that’s for me where the fear kicks in. It’s like, actually, I’ve got more fear of not living my life.

Like I want to, than I do by doing this big, hairy goal. Very nice and PIP for people listening. How can they sort of follow you and find you on your sort of big adventures? Well, I’m on Instagram and [00:58:00] Twitter at PIP Stewart. I’ve just written a book about the guy on a trip called life lessons from the Amazon.

So you can, you can read that. Yeah, kind of see, see, I tried to take each chapter learning about the trip, whether it’s like happiness or appreciation or conflict and tie it to stories that happened along the way. So yeah. Check out the book if you’re so inclined, is that an illustration or is that a sort of diary of the.

So it’s a mixture of both. I said she had set a diary, but I’m trying to tie the stories in, because to our point, right at the beginning, often people don’t care about these journeys, right? John, no one gives a monkeys. And it’s often like, what can I learn from this trip? So I wanted to bring the, I hate to use the word wisdom, but more like the lessons I learned along the way.

So people can kind of use them in their own daily life. So a mixture of lessons and, and stories to illustrate those lessons. Very [00:59:00] nice. Yeah. Well, you can probably probably a perfect time coming up to Christmas now, hatefully. Hopefully. Well, we’ll leave a link to the book in the description below, and you can check pear pal to Instagram and all her social handles and PIP.

I just thank you so much for coming on today. It’s been such a pleasure listening to your story. Oh, likewise, John and I really hope, and I can’t wait to see this stuff. Yeah, well, it needs to get off the ground first. Sounds really good. Well, thank you so much. Thank you, John. Well, that is it for today.

Thank you so much for listening and I hope you got something out of it. If you did hit that like button and subscribe, if you haven’t already, and I will see you in the next video.

Elsa Kent

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Elsa Kent (Explorer)

On today’s podcast, we have Elsa Kent. Elsa Kent is an explorer and speaker of Environmental education.

She set off on a 1000+mile journey from John O’Groats to Land’s End, with two horses, in aid of environmental education. She grew up on a small family-run farm in South West Devon, riding horses before I could walk and always being obsessed with all forms of nature.

This incredible journey involved a temporary bridge built in front of her by Highways England as to avoid a seven-mile detour and navigating the busy roads. It took the trio 64 days of riding to make the journey, which totalled over 1,000 miles.

Today on the podcast, we talk about his life growing up and how he got in these incredible adventures and the stories of his trips, the kindness of strangers and much more.

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Transcript of our Conversation

Elsa Kent

[00:00:00] Elsa Kent: I am delighted to introduce Elsa Kent to the podcast. Welcome Elsa. Thank you so much. It’s great to be here. Well, it’s an absolute pleasure to have you, and as you say you, a couple of months ago, got back from doing this incredible expedition across the UK, which is something I haven’t really seen done before.

One, because I thought it was a complete hassle and a complete minefield to take horses from one end of the UK to the other. Before we sort of jump into that, probably the best place to start is about you for people who don’t know you, but also how you sort of got into all these adventures. Okay, God.

So. I’m Aliza. Look at my AA and Melissa I’m 23. And yeah, I’ve grown up. I grew up on a little farm in Devin and always rode horses since [00:01:00] like before I could walk. And it was sort of something that I needed to be able to do to help out on the farm. And so yeah, when I was really late and I suppose I’ve always been really fascinated by venture and always been really keen to just do all sorts of weird wild things.

And so when I was. Really really little, a friend of mine had written around the world, a guy called James Greenwood for 10 years. He wrote the whole way around the world on horseback. And so I remember distinctly him saying to me, coming back from south America and he brought back this beautiful felt embroid waistcoat, and he gave it to me and he just coming from this man who’d just written the whole way around the world.

And I remember looking at the waste code and being like, oh my God, you are so cool. I’m going to do that one day. And I think I was literally about two at that point. And so, yeah, I think even since then, it’s kind of [00:02:00] been in my mind that. A long horseback journey is on the cards. And so this is just chapter one, I guess.

And it’s just finished and it’s a little bit weird now. Yeah. Hopefully the first of many. Yeah. Yeah, I think so. I think, yeah, the from here, God, I know where we’re going to go next, but there’s definitely more things in the pipeline. I imagine for people listening to sort of the idea of going from land’s end to John and greats, Johnny, Johnny, grace, land’s end.

We have horses where you always quite into horses growing up or was there something yeah, yeah, no, totally. I mean, I’ve, I’ve tried to kind of pull myself away from the horsey world quite a lot because it’s quite far removed from, or it’s become quite far removed from what I see as. [00:03:00] My kind of horsey, well, do you know, which is like much more about writing for a purpose?

You know, I used to always look at books of gauchos and, and people riding in Mongolia and people doing amazing things on horses for, for a reason. And that was why I learned to ride was for a purpose to help out on the farm, round up the cattle. And, and now in the UK though, you know, horse riding is just become for many people and I’m not against it at all.

You know, if it makes people happy, then absolutely crack on. But I think it’s become this hobby that is quite prim and proper and expensive. And you’ve got to do things in a certain way. And you know, we, we do a lot of riding around in circles going nowhere, and these animals have evolved. To, to walk long, long distances and to be used, you know, they’re such amazing animals to use.

And so it feels like such a [00:04:00] waste to have animals that just like we have a huge obesity crisis, not only with humans, but with horses in this country, because they’re not being used in the way that they should be. And so I feel really sad that we’ve lost that culture here because it used to be a really rich part of British culture to use horses for a reason to travel.

You know, it was the main form of transport for a really, really long time. And, you know, using them on the farm, using them on the land and at war, even just these kind of aesthetic bill ornaments that we keep and we brush and we cover them with fluorescent pink. God. Yeah. So for me, this journey was a kind of a rekindled.

Using these horses and actually seeing what they can do. And it made me realize how amazing the things are that they can do, but to get an idea or like this, how did it also sort of come [00:05:00] about? Do you know it was, it wasn’t, there wasn’t a huge amount of planning at all. It was quite off the cuff and and I kind of, it all sort of started and I didn’t really realize that it was starting and then I’m there kind of doing it.

And it was a little bit weird. But it came about because I’d come back from Kenya, which had just been registered. And I had a gap between I was still working, teaching online for the school that I work at in Kenya. And, and then I realized that I’ve got you need to pause.

Okay. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. That’s fine. Cool. So, so yeah, I came back from Kenya which was red listed and I had a gap between that and my master’s starting. And so I thought, right, what am I going to do? I’ve got a couple of months and [00:06:00] knew I wanted to do. I mean, there’s so many reasons why, but I just had a gap and thought, what am I going to do?

And I think from somewhere deep in my memory to do with James and that journey and realizing that the gap was kind of just about right to do that, like the journey and feeling like I wanted to tap into UK culture and geography and looking at all of that, it just kind of fell into place. Happened God.

And I know as you said that, like with some of the best adventures, it’s always very loose because you have to be sort of very adaptable. We have a lot of these adventures and sort of the planning that went into the journey was sort a few weeks, few months, or I think it was literally. About two weeks. I mean, I went from going, okay, this is an idea.

And chatting to friends about it and family and them all going, [00:07:00] no, that’s not going to happen. And then that just fed me in this kind of feeling of, okay. Yeah, it’s going to happen. And then, I mean, there was so much that needed to happen. First I called James and said, I’ve got this idea. What do you think?

And he said, well, okay, Christ, like he’d written the whole way around the world. And he, he came back and said you know, after 10 years of riding everywhere in hundreds of countries the most scary thing scarier than being chased by the Taliban in Afghanistan was the roads in the UK riding on the roads in the UK.

And so he said of all of riding around the world, the UK was the hardest. And so he said, there’s no mean feat during this. But you’re going to need two horses. And so I got, I had kind of horses that one of them’s great Rosie but she’s a bit old, she’s 17 and sounds going, oh God, is she gonna make it?

You know, she’s scan on a bit. And, and [00:08:00] so James said, no, you’ve got to take two. And then the theory behind that is it’s much easier on the horses because you’ve got the second one who has nothing on its back. So you’ve got everything on your, you yourself or your kit on the one horse and then you’re leaving the other one.

And whenever this one gets tired or you feel like they’ve done enough for whatever reason or there’s something. Like a loose shoe or something, you can just transfer everything onto the second horse and so thought, oh God. Okay. So I’ve got to find a horse that is going to work for this. And that’s a whole process in itself, finding something that’s got an amazing naked body and confirmation and ability to really work hard and not break.

And then a brain that can take a changing environment every day and loads of different stimulation and remain cool. So finding that was, was a [00:09:00] challenge. But we got there and found summer and and then we had our team and then very quickly we pieced together all this kit and set off and it was started.

And what was the feeling like as a sort of start line up in John Graves? Do you know at that point. Up there. Totally hadn’t hit me. What I was about to do. I’d just driven up spent three days driving up and you know, you’re driving. Cause we drove all the way from Plymouth. So the whole way we were driving, I was like, I gotta ride this.

And it took three days and I was like, oh, that’s pretty. That’s pretty far, you know, but did not hit me until after a couple of days. Well, like early on when I was unfit, the horses were unfit. You know, your kit’s still very clunky and you haven’t really got your groove on at all. And even 10 miles at that point feels like a really, really long way.

Like before this trip I’d [00:10:00] never written, I don’t think I’d ever written 10 miles in a day. Like people have said to me, you know, have you done all this training? No, haven’t done anything. You know, just, I’ve just got the right horses. They’re relatively fit. We’re just going to see what happens. And we’re going to learn on the job and go at their pace and build up that way.

So I had no idea of the concept of what a mile feels like, you know, just I’ve written all my life, but not in that way. And so, yeah, it was a very steep, very steep learning curve. The first, the first week. And James had always said to me, if you survive the first five days, you’ll be fine. You know, 90 said, 90% of people say they’re going to do these things.

And then they don’t do them. And of the 10% that do these things, 90% of them screw it up so badly in the first five days that they can’t continue. So he said, five days, I’ll say you survived. That you’ll be fine the whole way. [00:11:00] And we got through it, but there was a lot that happened in those first five days, amazingly.

He was totally right. Well, so what can go wrong in those sort of five days? Heaps. So, yeah, like I said, your kit is all new and kind of, you know, you’ve probably massively over-packed I really learn very quickly. You’ve got to get rid of basically everything. You don’t want, anything you want your bare essentials, you know, with like a very, very light sleeping bag, very, very light tent water for yourself.

You’ve got to find water along the way for your horses. Basic medical kit you know, charger for your phone, which has your navigation. And I learned it’s everything, which is so sad. I wish, you know, I wish it wasn’t everything, but I think in this country, when you’ve got a lot of complex navigation to do to.

Really bad road crossings and stuff is the only way now. Unless you do [00:12:00] paper maps, but I figured out that you’ve got to have 42 paper maps to get down so that wasn’t gonna work. Yeah. So first five days getting rid of loads of kit was a big thing, checking meticulously that you’re not getting rubs.

Cause if anything starts to rub underneath your saddle, you’re scuppered, you know, that’s maybe cause it can go septic and then you, you’ve got a really big issue on your hands. So meticulously checking almost every mile, taking everything off, checking, checking, checking and so kit and then learning how to ride on the road was a huge thing because I mean, people just don’t know how to drive around horses.

Number one, number two, people don’t know how to ride on the. And be safe, you know, and when you’ve got two horses, you’re the width of a car. So it’s not like you’re just on one and you’re quite narrow and people can get round. But when you’ve got to, you know, it’s a, it’s a whole different ball game. So [00:13:00] learning how to be quite dominant and to read the road and to you, you develop all sorts of tactics to keep everyone safe.

And it’s really exhausting all of that because you’re trying to navigate and get that right. Cause you can’t backtrack cause that’s gonna cost you like your, all your energy. And I mean the whole, the whole thing with this, the whole thing with horseback, adventure and long riding is, and the thing that distinguishes it from, you know, like, like things that we do as humans that are challenging is that you’re not thinking about yourself.

And you’re not, you know, you’re your own aches and pains and your own tiredness and your own hydration and where you’re going to sleep and what you’re going to eat. That’s so secondary, you know, you’re all about these animals that you’re traveling with and are they hydrated? Are their feet. Okay. Is the equipment, okay?

How tired are they? You know, other salt levels. All right. [00:14:00] Because they can’t talk, they can’t say, oh, I haven’t eaten in four hours. I need to, you know, so your whole mindset, the whole way is constantly going, okay, where are they at in this journey? Not where am I at? That’s like, so you spend the whole time, probably quite uncomfortable, probably in quite a lot of pain, but that doesn’t matter because it’s all about them.

And so really quickly you kind of figure out that that’s what needs to be your priority. So that happened, God, what else? In the first five days? Traffic bogs. Oh my God. We had the most horrific. It was the hardest, the hardest thing that happened the whole way, the whole journey was in the first five days.

We were crossing this, it was a 30 mile day, so it was a huge. Cause when you’re moving, we’re only walking, so it’s two or three miles an hour. It averages out with like needing the horses to [00:15:00] graze and find water and, and breaking off. And you’re walking slowly. You’re not really marching because it’s not sustainable.

Especially on concrete because it just wears their legs out. So yeah, there was this day when we’re crossing from the golf volt hotel, which is may numb, Britain’s most remote hotel which we’d had a really weird wild night there because all that I’d had to contain the horses was this washing line.

And they had like four kinds of washing line posts. And so had to wrap some rope around them. And that was it. So the horses were in there and they could so easily have just gone underneath it and got. Into the most remote part of the whole of Britain. And so all night I was so stressed that I was going to wake up and my horses are going to be gone.

I woke up that morning, super early and there, they were just, you know, waiting for me going what’s going on. Cause it was so Mitchie [00:16:00] as well. The images were horrific up there. So they were really irritated by that all night. And I thought, God, they’re going to just get so irritated that they’re just going to break down the fence and go.

So yeah, we woke up that morning and set off and this all did. I know that this was going to be the hardest day. Of of my whole life, not just of this trip by far of my whole life I’d spoken to, there was basically those two route options. That was one way of getting to the KRAS, which was my destination, which is a main number is most remote in.

And yeah, probably a lot of adventurey people know about the crash, cause everyone’s cycling up from London and it goes through, it goes past it. And so, so yeah, we’re aiming for the crash from the gaveled and basically there’s two options. So you can either go over this old Drover’s route that no one really knows about is just on this old map that I found and I thought, oh, that’s going to be [00:17:00] really beautiful.

You know, that’s super remote, super like no one knows about it. That looks gorgeous. And I was sick of the road even after three days, I was so bored of the road. And so I thought, oh, I could go that way or I go round and it’s more. But safe and on this quite quiet road. And so I spoke to this gamekeeper up there who said, oh yeah, I think that you should be fine.

It’s been pretty dry this year. So you’ll be all right. And I thought, God, he doesn’t really know about horses and horses and bogs and that kind of thing. And so I said to him, do you know anyone who’s ever taken horses over there? And he said to me, yeah, there’s a, there’s a lady who runs a horse tracking business over that route when she goes coast to coast in Scotland.

And yeah, so I called this lady and, and I said, look, I’m on my own with two horses. What do you think? Is it going to be all right, going over this route? And she said, yeah, you’ll have a [00:18:00] beautiful time. It’s going to be gorgeous. You know, you’ll love it. And I said, what’s the ground? Like, you know, is it super boggy?

And she said, well, there’s a couple of bits of bulk, but you’ll be okay. And, and then, and I said, is there anything else that I need to worry about? And she goes, no, no, you should be, you should be absolutely fine. Have a beautiful ride. So there I was merrily sort of setting off, up this beautiful route that I thought was going to be amazing.

And about 10 miles in, it starts to get really hectic. The past just completely deteriorates. There’s been no signal for the whole day previous to this. No way of contacting anyone or looking at any kind of at that point, I hadn’t even figured out to use OSPF maps app. I was still on Google maps. I mean, I was such a rookie at this point.

And so there, I am trying to figure out my way over this [00:19:00] Drover’s route. And and the ground starts just falling away underneath us. It’s peat, bog. So it can be two double Decker buses deep and a horse can weigh up to a ton. So me walk and I walked the whole way that 30 mile day, cause I’m walking ahead of them checking the ground to see if it’s okay or not trying to follow this little path, but it’s all well and good me jumping up and down on it, but it’s totally different ball game to a horse.

And so, yeah, and so it quickly started to get really, really bad and the horses are just sinks, sinking every step that they’re taking. And, you know, it w it was okay. Ish. There were patches that were, as it was all right. And then, and then we came across these bridges where they’re crossing these like ravines that are coming down off the mountain, running into this law.

And and around those, those bridges are totally rotten. So you’re [00:20:00] trying to take two horses and yourself across these bridges that look kind of fine, but then the second you’ve got two horses on top of it. It just starts falling away underneath you. And you’ve got sometimes a really, really steep drop underneath, and you’ve got these massive animals are there.

So we did have a couple of bridges that literally broke underneath us. And we had to like slap the horse on the housing crack on over it, you know? And yeah, so that was pretty sketchy. And then it got really, really bad, really bad to the point where we hadn’t had, so we hadn’t hadn’t had signal. No one knew I was.

And you’re looking at your horse, you turn around and you’re looking at your horse sinking in a bog, and they can like horses in bowls can drown very, very easily and break their legs. And that’s like, what happens? And so when you’re up there and it’s that remote, [00:21:00] and you’re looking at your horse going this, and it’s hurling itself trying to get through this bog with all your kit flapping about and you’re alone.

And there’s no way that anyone’s going to find you because no one uses that path. So you’re not going to be found for days. And like, my whole mind is just going. If, if my horse breaks his leg up here, one of them breaks his leg or if it starts drowning and gets completely stuck, what do I do? Do I have to put my own horse down here, myself?

And so that’s, what’s going on in your head when you’re up there and your horses are looking at you, like you bought me, they’re trusting you with every step and they learn to follow exactly where you put your feet. They’re sniffing the ground, checking if it’s gonna fall away underneath them. And so your [00:22:00] head’s just in this horrible state of do I turn back, but if I go back, I know those bridges are broken and I know that how horrific it’s been to even get here.

And so you’ve got miles and miles of that back, or you’ve got miles of the unknown ahead of you and say, okay, well, I’ve just got to keep going. I’ve just got to keep going. And then it’s getting dark and you’re still up there. And then it just, I mean, it just went on and on and on. And I remember coming all the way up over this mountain and I’m thinking I’m going to see the crosswalk at, around the corner.

When we got up to this month has gotta be there. We definitely don’t. The emails is we’d been on the road for like 12 hours that day nonstop moving. We got all the way up to the top of this mountain and look down into the distance and way in the distance, like miles away. It was a little white dot and in between me and that little white dot was just [00:23:00] like this sea of peat, bog.

And I just thought we are already done. We’ve already done 12 hours of this. How are we going to how? Cause the hoses are shaking. They’re so tired and I’m crying and it’s all just a mess. And yeah, we somehow, somehow got through it totally unscathed. And I just, I don’t know how that happened, but it meant that.

Everything from then on felt so much easier, so much easier in comparison. And I said, I’m never going to complain about Tom. I cover again, cause it’s the hair underneath you. And then we got the craft and it was totally getting dark, like really, really dark. And at that point in the year, it was getting dark at like 11 o’clock at night in Scotland.

And the Bishop of Scotland was there in the crass waiting for me with a pint. It’s just so bizarre. I was just so shaken up. And, and then there was this warm fire and people in a [00:24:00] bed and a pint in a field for the horses. And, and that I had no words to describe what we just been through because it’s so hard to describe something that I don’t think anyone who hasn’t been alone with two animals in that kind of remote place, knowing that you might have to kill one of your below.

Animals. It’s such a hard feeling to describe, and it makes you go, what am I doing? Like, I really, what am I doing? This is serious, serious stuff. And yeah, it made me really deeply question whether I should continue. Cause I thought, you know, I could, we really could die doing this stuff and am I prepared to do that?

Well, and that was any day five. That was literally I think day [00:25:00] four day five. Yeah. Yeah. Well with heavy stuff knowing that you had another two months of this. Yeah, yeah. But that, at that point in the journey, I think it still hadn’t hit me. The concept that we were going to do this day after day after day after day after day.

Four months. I think you just, at that point, you just literally, every step one step at a time, you know, you can’t start to, I’ve learned also in the first week, don’t zoom out on the map. Like don’t zoom out because it’s terrifying. You just got to stay in it one day at a time, you know, just plan your route for the next day.

Really just focus on that. Because if you zoom out is terrifying and unless you’ve got to call them all and then you can zoom out and you go, yeah, this is amazing. Oh, my word, I’ve only covered an intro. Like, I mean, this is the thing. Cause like cycling or even like, I don’t [00:26:00] know, even running, I guess you, you actually kind of gained quite a lot of ground.

Like we were moving it to. Like 500 meters or an hour max that day, you know, where one step, sometimes one step is a huge experience when you’re trying to navigate a bridge, that’s just collapsed. I mean, the hallway down that was, that was these issues where you, cause you’re trying to avoid the roads the whole way.

And so it often spits you out on these brighter ways that just haven’t been used because no one tends to use them anymore. That just haven’t been used. And so they’re totally ruined and wrecked and you would just come across rotten bridges or things that are way too narrow. You can never get horse through and river crossings and just, I mean, yeah.

So your little dot sometimes you’d do a whole day of grafting, 14 hours of moving, but your little.is only moved that much. [00:27:00] Oh my God. And that just brings up this whole thing of. You know, people are following this journey and do they really have any idea that I had? I didn’t, I really struggled to find the words to, to communicate how hard this is, because I think my tendency definitely with these things is to try and sugarcoat it and to try and make it seem like, oh, I’m really positive.

And you know, everything’s fine. And it’s going great when it’s really hard really. But one of, one of the things that I thought was very interesting was this idea of pasting and reality of what you were experienced him. Because I know from experience that it’s very difficult to convey what emotions you’re going through.

And a lot of people, when they see, let’s see on Instagram, a beautiful sunset or you ride in into the distance or whatnot, they look at [00:28:00] it through that picture. And although you might write down the sort of feelings the picture says so much, and how did you find the sort of balancing act between the reality of what you’re experiencing and what you are posting on social media?

Yeah, it’s a really tough one because I think there was a point in the journey where I got really, really upset about specifically this, because I think I’d spent a long time trying to be really, really positive and to try and communicate the good bits and the, I, I’m not very good at describing things that are tough because I think you, you still feel very grateful for what you’re able to do and, and how privileged you are to be in this position to be traveling and journeying like this.

And so, you know, and all the, all the feedback that you get from everyone is always very positive and everyone’s going, you’re doing amazing and all of this, [00:29:00] and it’s all very success oriented when actually like some things you do mess up and you make mistakes and things go wrong. And it’s hard to hard to find the words, to communicate those things.

And so this all kind of was there and bubbling away in me. And then it did get to a point. I think I made it all the way to Stroud gone quite a long way. And then I kind of did have this moment where I’m like, God, I do actually need to tell everyone that this is, this is really hard. And I found it was actually easier to communicate stuff by taking a video rather than showing people, photos.

Cause all the photos that you take, even if they’re a bad, you know, like really, really in the rain and things have broken and you know, it’s all a bit of a mess. I think people interpret that as. Oh, that’s part of the adventure, which it totally is. You know, it’s an amazing part of the adventure, but I think it’s still seen in this kind of glorified way.

So I found that actually just [00:30:00] telling everyone with my voice and my face, there’s really hard, you know, and explaining it more. And I think that I’m the amount of support and people actually going, oh my God, I actually get it now. You know? So that, that was kind of my tactic for that. And it, it did feel better after that, but I mean, the tough thing for me was like every day I’d have people asking me, you need to update everyone.

Why are you not posting more? You know, you should be more on social media and all this stuff, and I’m going, look, I’ve got my hands literally full of animals and I’m trying to keep us all safe on the road and. And organize where we’re trying to stay for the night and all of this stuff. And then to do that and to do all of the social media and communication stuff, it’s a lot, you know, I could spend half a day trying to put to words, everything that’s happened.

[00:31:00] And so I used to get really frustrated by people badgering me for more information. Cause it’s like, is it, you know, who, who, what what’s this all for in the end? You know, I’m trying to, absolutely this is all about fundraising and trying to raise awareness for environmental education. But also I really, I can’t be on my phone right now because there’s a car coming past and you know, I, all I can do is my best.

And, and you’ve got miles to do, and this is the cover and you’re busy. You’re really, really busy, but people don’t seem to think. You know, Y yeah, I, I agree. It’s, but I suppose people, you know, who are following sort of look at it, they don’t see the tough bits that you’re going through. They don’t see you waving down a car to slow down because your horse gets frightened or something like that.

They only see that one picture per day, let’s say, or every other day. And so in their mind, they’re always sort of intrigued. They didn’t really get the idea. And I suppose [00:32:00] the sort of pressure of posting for these adventures or these travels is very much on the part of, you know, how you sort of feel about it.

You know, some people can go on, but you know, social media is an incredible platform to find people similar interests, similar. And to tell your story. And I suppose that was the main thing. It’s about how you tell your story. Yeah. Yeah. Completely. I mean, it’s all storytelling really isn’t it. But it’s like, yeah, the difference between what’s actually going on and, and what people are seeing, you know, like it just really builds up, you know, cause every single car that goes past as a whole, you know, you’re checking, you’re, you’re watching it or it’s not just, you totally cannot switch off with this stuff.

And it’s, it’s so exhausting, you know, you get to the end of the day. And I actually developed some tactics cause you know, you’re staying with strangers every night. [00:33:00] And I mean, I was so lucky with that. Like the, the amount of kindness from strangers and people hearing about what I was doing and, and reaching out and saying, come and stay, please come and stay.

And it was so amazing because he’d arrive somewhere and you know, they were so excited about it and they see it as an excuse for a party. So that was. I mean now I’ve got friends at like 20 mile intervals down the whole UK, which is just so lovely. And they’re all such kind outgoing, generous open-hearted people.

But yeah, I mean, you got to the end of the day and you’re so naked, so you get quite good at like making it clear really what, what you need. And so for me that was, if, if there was a bath around, I was like, this is what I need, because you know, if you say I need a shower, then people go, ah, yeah, you’re only going to be like five minutes, but if you say I really need a bath, then you’re definitely offered her for about an hour.

[00:34:00] You can kind of go and, you know, chill out and just like, I just needed time to not be focusing on the road and. All of that stuff. And then also to be being hosted and to, you know, be really engaging and, and talking to people. Cause a lot of the conversations that you’re having, you do get asked a lot of the same questions when you come from, you know, are you really on your own?

And, and it’s lovely. But yeah, having that time was really nice. So you get your little tactics of, you know, how to find even a little bit of time, even one hour where you’re just alone. Yeah. I, I doing these, doing these sort of trips. It’s very easy to sort of go abroad and say, you know how amazing the people, I didn’t know.

India, Pakistan, wherever it may be. But actually when you do a trip in the UK, you do actually see that sort of this, the kindness of strangers is completely universal and it sort of just makes you, [00:35:00] I don’t know, like when I did a short trip, I mean, it was only a week wasn’t two months like you, but you do do see some of the most incredible hospitality and kindness from people all up and down the United Kingdom.

And it just sort of make these sort of trips just so worthwhile in a sense. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, from that people that you’re staying with to just people that you meet along the way, I mean, the amount of people who sort of see me traveling along and they, you know, they go, you look like you’re on a long journey.

Like it was probably done. They covered it. Saddleback’s and stuff. And then you go negative. There could be a wave. You come from top of Scotland and they’re like, wait, what? And then five and you keep riding and then five minutes later, there’s a car that’s caught you up. And they’ve got carrots for the horses and they’ve got like a sandwich for you and hot chocolate and, you know, they totally go out of their way.

And it just, [00:36:00] yeah, it really, really made me realize that it’s about putting yourself out there into the universe and just trusting that, you know, it’s going to be all right. This humans are really, really kind beings. We’ve just lost awareness of that. But deep down, everyone really wants to help. And so, yeah, I think, I suppose what I did also think about is that it’s probably a lot easier for me being like a young woman.

I think that was one of the things that it is easier to be in this circumstance. Is a young woman because people don’t find you scary or threatening, but I th I think he will say with that, it’s going on your own. I think when you’re on your own, doing these people see a sort of sense of vulnerability.

Probably take pithy on oneself. They, 73rd when I did it but then they, I think that when you’re with someone else, they sort of look at you and be like, oh, well, they’ve got each other. So they’re [00:37:00] probably all right, whereas on your own, it’s just you and them. So it’s much easier for them, I think, to engage.

Yeah. No, I think that’s really, really true. And that kind of goes back to the whole question of why I took on this challenge, you know, because I think it, if I really asked myself that question deeply, I think it’s a lot to do with wanting to find something that I really found hard and that. Would really be a challenge because I think I’ve spent, I’ve done a lot of, a lot of weird things and a lot of hard things, but I don’t feel like I never felt like I’d done something that really, really challenged me to the point where that I didn’t know if I could do it or not.

And so I think I, yeah, that was a big factor in doing this trip was, you know, people going, this is not possible when you can’t do that. You know, I got in touch with the long writer’s Guild. They’ve, you know, [00:38:00] Have facilitated and helps with people riding huge distances around the world for hundreds of years.

And they said to me, you, you must not do this with two, especially with two horses, you must not do this. Your chances of survival is very slim. And so that made me everyone I’m going to do it there. And yeah. So I think it was a lot about challenging myself and, and people then said to me, why don’t you just do it with someone, take a frame with you?

And I thought, well, I could do that. You know, and a few people, you know, kind of came into my head and thought, oh, that’d be really fun, but there’s something about being on your own with. The horses that enables you to do so much work on yourself and like it’s a whole, I mean, the whole journey was some kind of meditation process because the whole time you’re, so in your zone, in your rhythm, you’re tapped in through the horses, [00:39:00] especially, you know, traveling with horses.

That’s the biggest thing about it is when you’re with animals, they give you access to what’s going on in that, in the natural world, because they’re so tuned in, you know, they hit everything and they see everything way, way further before way before a human would see it. So, you know, you’re completely zoned into what’s going on around you and, and yeah, that’s just a really.

Lovely lovely spiritual experience. And I ne and I craved that, you know, every morning, if I’d had a slow morning and hadn’t got away early, I feel myself going, God, I really just need to be back in our zone with no one else doing this. And I needed that for a really long time. And it was only after maybe 800 miles or something that I felt like I was getting, we were getting our rhythm, you know, so even early on I thought, oh, I could just ride from, you know, the length of Scotland or something.

And that seemed like a huge journey. But by the bottom of [00:40:00] Scotland, I was only just getting our groove on, you know, we’re only just getting the, getting the hang of it. And, and once you kind of get into your rhythm, that’s when you really can start to enjoy it and see the amazing things that this journey is giving you.

So I think that’s why it’s so important to do long, long journeys because. It takes a long time to settle into it and to kind of get things sorted and to get your head in the right space and to be able to go, oh, I’m actually here now. And I’m actually going to enjoy this rather than constantly being up here and thinking, well, what am I doing?

Where am I going? You know, because you’ve got to get out of that for a bit and kind of into absorbing what you’re actually doing. So I mean, you’ve done the sort of 800 miles. You did probably another 200 to get that’s the finish line. It was 12, it was nearly 1200 in total. So it was 1200 1,150 miles, I think in total.

So two thirds of the journey to get into your stride. It took a long time. I mean like, yeah, [00:41:00] Scotland was just, people drive really fast in Scotland. My God, it was beautiful. I mean, it was some of the most remote, beautiful mountains and loss and just amazing, but I was still, I think the whole way down Scotland.

I mean the midges and the flies. And we had a heatwave as well when we woke up when we were coming around Glasgow. So that was really tough because you’re trying to get the miles done, but then you’ve also got 38 degree heat. So, you know, I had a real scare with one of my horses, the old one, Rosie. She, we did one day.

I think we did, like, I don’t know, it wasn’t long, like an 18 mile day. And it got pretty hot towards the end of it. And I’d needed to get through the city and to get to where we were staying. So I couldn’t stop in the middle of the city. There was no way I was going to find somewhere to park the horses up for, for the night and stop.

So I knit, but I knew I really should. I it’s really [00:42:00] hot. Now we need to stop. Which city was this? I think this is north of Glasgow, like combin old region, maybe something like that. Yeah. Strange part of the journey and. And so, yeah, it was super, super hot. It was crazy hot and it was midlife middle of the afternoon.

I knew I should’ve stopped, but really, really couldn’t. So I was walking and knowing that they needed a drink. And I, I knew that night, that was the one night where I was like, I’ve pushed, I’ve pushed them a bit hard today. And I paid for it because the next day was it was going to be a rest day anyway.

Cause it was just so hot. It was think it was nearly 40 degrees. Glasgow was like the hottest zone in the whole of that heat wave. And we were right there in the middle of it and yeah, and I, I went to go and check the horses and she seemed all right. And then I went again and she was lying down a lot that day, just really sleeping, lying down and, and everyone around me, it was just like, oh, she’s fine.

You know, I was, I was at staying at a [00:43:00] writing center where there’s loads of horsey people and they were like, oh, she’s fine. She’s just lying down. But I was like, I know this sources not. Because you get so in tune with your animals and, and she really, really wasn’t right that day. I think she just got really dehydrated.

Even though, I mean, they’d had so much water to drink, but the amount that a horse needs to drink to replace everything that they’re losing and the, the amount of salt that they need. So I’m having to really load up their salt and find food that I can put salt into so that they can eat it. Yeah, so I’d, I’d screwed up and I paid for it cause I was so stressed.

I called my vet that day and was like, I don’t know what I’ve done. I really need you to call me. And we were FaceTiming. He was going, yeah. If, if she’s not right tomorrow, then get physically out there and, and come and check her. And sure enough, you know, after I put the phone down to my lovely vet down here [00:44:00] The sun had gone down and she, and she was kind of up and about and find again, but it it’s horrible.

Cause you know, if, if they break a leg or if something bad happens, but you can see what’s happened. That’s one thing. Cause you can actually know what’s going on. But when it’s something that could be anything it’s internally, you know, you think, okay, maybe it’s just dehydration, but heat stroke can cause all sorts of crazy issues and horses can die and you can see that they’re not right, but you don’t know what’s going on inside.

That’s way more scary. Cause you can’t see it. Yeah, so I pay the price without heatwave. And so towards the end, getting into the sort of finishing line who was there to meet you at the end at land’s end. Oh, we had a lovely time. We had. Summers previous owner was there, which was really nice and everyone was crying and loads of children were there and like loads of kind of local people that I [00:45:00] just had just heard about it.

And, you know, my family were all there and some friends and I was lovely. It was a really, really lovely time. And it was so surreal though, you know, like coming down the track and seeing the sea and seeing all of these people and kind of, and the horses were really confused. We were all really confused.

Cause we were like the land’s just run out. Like we’re. So in this motion of, of just we move, you know, that’s what we do, we move and then we couldn’t, and that was the end. And so you can see, and I know the footage, the horses are going, what what’s going on? Like, why are we not keeping going Yeah, it was a really surreal experience and it’s still surreal now.

It feels very weird to be not moving. Now. I find myself wanting to keep walking. And yeah, it’s, it’s hard because you go from being so tapped into that and where you, where every day, you’ve just got the [00:46:00] purpose of you just gotta keep going. You just gotta move from here to here. That’s your days buffers.

And when you achieve that, you’re like, yep, that’s my job. I’ve done it. You know? Fantastic. And now life’s just real. Life is so much more complex than that. You’ve got so much to think about and so much to kind of keep, keep walking out every day and, and they crave that simplicity a lot. That’s probably a lot of people on the podcast sort of here.

It is, as you say, your day-to-day is. Doing going from a to B. And it is a very sort of simplistic way of looking at it, but that’s the reality. It’s literally you get up, you either run cycle sale, whatever, ride a horse, whatever it may be. That’s your day to day on these sort of adventures. And that sort of simplicity is, I don’t know, quite, quite nice in a sense.

It’s good for you. I think it’s what humans are actually [00:47:00] designed for. It’s much more natural way of humans existing. Isn’t it? And you could see that with the horses as well. They just looked amazing. They were so shiny and muscly and Pappy, and I’d love to say the same about myself, shiny, muscly and happy.

I was definitely happy. And yeah, I think life just becomes very simple and you’ve got your purpose and yeah. And how long did that take you? 64 days, four days, 64. Very, very lovely days that were very different. Every single one of them. Did you feel could have made it go longer? Do you sort of wish that you had taken your time a bit more?

Yeah, we were fast. We were definitely fast. I kind of, there’s part of me that wishes that you know, we’d really relax into it and just been able to just go, oh, you know, we’ve done five miles and this is really lovely. Let’s just stay here and enjoy this place for a [00:48:00] few days. I didn’t afford myself that luxury cause I had to get back for this master’s degree.

But there’s also something that I think if you, if you know, you’ve got to do roughly 20 miles a day, which is tough when you’re moving slowly, it’s a lot. I’m walking a lot of it cause I walked back a third of it, I think so or more so I think what that gives you when you’ve got, when you know, you’ve got a long day ahead of you, is it challenges you, I guess, way more way more than just feeling like you can just stay for a week even, and fix all your kit and sort yourself out.

So it definitely is more of a challenge, but yeah, I don’t know yet to know. Yeah. It’s I mean, it just sounds like the most incredible sort of adventure and you’ve got some incredible stories from it. Yeah. And what’s the sort of [00:49:00] reaction being over the last couple of months, as in, from other people.

Yeah, God, I think people are a bit weirded out. I even got told by someone that he totally didn’t believe me. I’ve done this thing. Which is interesting. No people tend to just, I think be quite confused. I mean, a really funny example of this is my dad came out to meet me when I was riding for. We rode from boss to Glastonbury on one of the days.

And and he came out to walk the last, I think, three miles with us. And and everyone we walk past dad would be like, she’s written from Barth to Glastonbury, to Glastonbury, and everyone would be like, whoa, you kidding me, bought the glass and read that so far. And I look at that and I’m like, dad, we’ve written from John O’Groats to Glastonbury, what are you on about?

And he said to me, Elyssa, people don’t understand that you just have to talk in that language. [00:50:00] And I was really frustrated by that at the time. Cause I was like, you’re not, you’re not telling the whole story, but I kind of get it now. Like if someone said to me, I’ve just walked here from the top of Scotland.

You don’t mind. I think I probably do, but like maybe if someone, I don’t know, maybe if you’re in South Africa and says, someone says, I’ve just walked here from. He probably just be like, whoa, that, I mean, that’s huge, but you wouldn’t have any kind of perspective on how huge that is. Whereas if it’s all quite local and you know, and you know that route, then I think people understand, oh yeah, that’s, that’s a long way.

Yeah. I sort of agree with that. And what was the, because you were sort of going through quite, you know, these first five days were pretty tough for you. What was the sort of, why in the back of your head sort of driving you forward? Because as you say most people quit after five days, as you said, the sort of 90% quit.

What was the reasons to sort of go [00:51:00] on? Well, I mean, I think with this whole trip, there was a multitude of reasons for me. I mean the whole thing, the whole thing really boiled down to I’ve become really, really passionate about environmental education. I feel very, very strongly that this is what we need to be looking at if we want a regenerative future for our species.

And, and it’s the solution that I’ve seen. And so at that point in time, that felt like the best offering that I could give to that mission. And it was all very clear in my mind. I knew exactly where every pound of this money has been going and exactly what impact that’s going to have. And I fully fully believe that those projects could really, really help us to exist on this planet, you know?

And so, you know, there’s that whole thing going on in your head which [00:52:00] is maybe really, I don’t know, way to kind of a bigger concept, but there is that in the back of your mind that you’re like you’re doing this for a really, really big reason, you know, and this is, and I suppose it’s just about giving.

Giving your best offering to something that you believe in. So that was one big reason that kept me going. And then there’s definitely a thing of, no, you haven’t really challenged yourself that yeah, I know. I could keep going. You know, I know I could, and I know the horses could, I, I never pushed that.

Like if they needed to rest, they rested. Yeah. Why go hold? Yeah, I think it is to do with doing something you’d really deeply believe is going to make a big, a good difference. And then doing something that challenges you and, and also about finishing something, you know, you, you want to, if you’re going to start something and commit time [00:53:00] and energy to it, it’s such an extent that I think you owe it to yourself to see it through.

Yeah. And so. Yeah, I think, I think it’s a lot to do with that really. I don’t know. I guess that’s yeah, I guess that was the extent of it. I think it’s, I mean, it really, really, really was about environmental education. And still is, you know, that’s, it’s continuing, even now the work towards that project the fundraising, the next mission is all singing from the same hymn sheet.

So yeah, that’s what I believe in. And I suppose we’ve copped 26 going on at the moment was the one thing coming out of it that you would like to see? Well, I think for me, I mean, it’s a hugely, hugely complex issue that we’ve got here. And [00:54:00] all of this stuff stemmed from me studying the education system and realizing that it is the system that we have to influence the human species.

You know, every country has some form of education, whether it’s a cultural ritual or a formal education system like we have here. And so that is the tool that we have to create humans that don’t destroy the planet. So if we get that system right, we don’t have it right at the moment, but if we work on it and get it right, you know, we are really, really doing something that is sustainable.

But if we’re just trying to kind of be more, we’re basically need to be more preventative rather than cure orientated. So at the moment, there’s a lot of, kind of, that’s just kind of a saw out the results and issues of this problem, but actually we need to look at the root of this issue. And it’s the fact that we’re producing people that are so in themselves, you know, we’re producing humans that are [00:55:00] educated to believe that the important thing in life is only what benefits them and not what benefits.

Everyone around them, the environment, their communities, and those factors. And you can’t blame the people. It’s totally not their fault. It’s not the fault of the people who’ve designed the system, even because they’ve been through that same system. It’s about recognizing that there’s flexibility in that system.

It’s not doing anyone, any favors. It’s really damaging people’s wellbeing and mental health. And it’s really, really damaging the earth because if you have that mind, if humans have that mindset, then that’s when they start making really wonky consumer decisions. And when politicians start making bad decisions too, cause they just don’t seem to see the connection.

I think between the way we’ve been educated, the way we’ve been shaped as human beings and then the way we’re subsequently shaping the world around us. So it’s about seeing how we have, [00:56:00] we have the capacity to really shift that within ourselves and within the system. And I think if we can. Create a system that actually looks at us in a more holistic way and looks at the environment that we’re living in the finite planet that we’re living on and shapes our human species to be in relationship with that more.

Maybe there’s some hope somewhere, one hopes. So yes, there’s a part of the show where we ask the same five questions to each guest each week with the first being on these trips or expeditions that you do. What’s the one gadget that you always take with you. Oh God. Gadget, does it have to be a gadget?

Well, of some sort. Yeah. I mean, it can be like a knife. If, well, I did take, I took a Gerber, not a Leatherman, a Gerber that as actually, it’s not with me now, but I really learned that that was a [00:57:00] totally essential piece of kit, whether it’s to. You know, get a gate off its hinges by bending a nail because you’re stuck in a field which happened a few times.

Or I don’t know, cutting something that’s wrapped around something lag and you’ve got to sort it out quickly. Or even eating rice with a knife. Yeah, my Gerber. That’s always a challenge. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, there’s no space for you to have that. I’m all about travel lights. So worms, your sport called spoon.

Nope. None of that. I didn’t take, I threw out my Tanja. I said my, yeah, I traveled. I would literally, like, I think it’s less than less than eight kilos of kit. Nothing including all clothes or like camping equipment. Well, all the safety stuff that is not a lot of weight. Yeah. It was. Nuts. I even, I even at one point got rid of my tent [00:58:00] and swapped it for a plastic bag, like a human size plastic bag.

Cause it’s just you just, if you, if you’re not, I mean, people would offer me places to stay a lot of the time. But if you’re not using something all the time, then you just present the kit that you’re carrying, you just look at it and go, I’ve carried you for days. And I haven’t even used you. Like, why are you here?

You know? So. Travel light. And nice. What about your favorite adventure or travel book? Ooh I’m currently reading Africa, Overland that God, I should know who it’s written by. It’s this really beautiful old book of how to drive a vehicle across Africa which may or may not be happening next. And and so, yeah, and it’s got all these like old charts of drove for 20 minutes, moved this distance and got from here to here.

And it’s just, it’s [00:59:00] beautiful that all the old, really, really old photos and, yeah, it’s amazing. Lovely. And what about your favorite? Oh, why? Sorry, why are adventures important to you? I think for me, it’s about rekindling. That sense of wonder about the earth and. Going back to childhood as well. I’m really fascinated by reconnecting people with that childlike selves and having a really kind of playful time.

I think there’s a lot about playfulness and not having the answers. I think something that I’ve become really. Yeah. I think it’s about the big thing I would say with this, why adventures is putting yourself in a position while you don’t know all the answers and having to be cool with that? That is so important.

Cause we like human life doesn’t have all the answers. And so we have to be able to just know that [01:00:00] we’re going to just trust yourself to deal with it, you know? Yeah. You got to, you’re going to go through life, not knowing quite a lot. Exactly. Whether you like it or not. And I actually really liked the way you just sort of put that.

Thank you. Yeah. What about your favorite quote or motivational quotes? Oh, my God. I didn’t know about that. One. Motivational quotes Dory finding Nemo. Just keep swimming. It does. I mean, I know it’s probably really cheesy, but like it, it came up a lot in my head when the shit hits the fan, just keep swimming.

That’s a good one. Thanks. And finally, what’s the last one. Finally people listening are always keen to travel and go on these sort of big adventures. What’s the one thing you would recommend for them to get started? God, [01:01:00] I think taking the first steps, the hardest thing, isn’t it. So I think it’s a lot about not feeling like you need validation from other people for your idea. I give this something you really want to do. Chances are everyone around you is going to tell you that it’s not possible for some reason. And you know, there’s always, there’s always a reason not to do something that’s, what’s really been in my head recently is every time something comes up, whether it’s simply do I, should I go outside and go and get a loaf of bread or, you know, go that far?

Like there’s always a reason not to do something. And you’ve just got to find the right reasons to do it because life’s too short to not say, no, it’s so short and it can come at you when you least expect it. And suddenly things change. You know, I think we’ve become all. We’ve become really [01:02:00] disconnected from our own mortality and yeah, we’re all, we’re all finite and we don’t know how long we’ve got.

So we’ve got to crack on make the most of it. And if you can do that for. Reason that helps something then that’s that’s nice. Take, take the trip or take the holiday. Cause, well, what’s the one it always says, cause you won’t remember mowing the lawn perfectly straight, but you will remember that amazing trip that you took.

Absolutely. We’ve got to get out. I mean, this world is just, so the problem is, is flying. You know, we’ve got to cut the flying, so yeah, if you can find a horse, then, then go for that a bit longer. It takes a while. I mean, my biggest message with the climate ride is slowing down, right? So we moved so slowly, two miles an hour, three miles an hour for months, months, and never been happier.

So slowing down is fine. You know, [01:03:00] sometimes one miles is a whole journey. So you did sort of just briefly brush upon it, but what is next. Well now I’ve just started my masters in ecological design thinking. So I need to get that underway before the next trip have, I’ve just done a shorter trip, a hundred mile trip on horseback with a friend who Johnny goes to London to.

So that just happened, which was a bit weird, cause it was very soon and it was with loads of people. So that was bizarre. Yeah, but next there’s something very, very exciting and very big lined up and I’m quite intimidated by it at the moment. But. It’s going to happen. I’m not gonna say anymore. Yeah.

Yeah. I always remember. You sort of want to keep it quiet until it’s like [01:04:00] official and then you’re like, okay, it’s happening? Okay, great. Now I can say it. You don’t really want to know. Well, exactly. Cause you also don’t know. You don’t want to kind of fix yourself to a sudden plan. Like, especially in this phase, things always changing a bit.

This, this, this thing is much more planned than my last adventure and yeah, it’s much more, I guess when you’re doing things with other people, you kind of got to discuss how you actually going to do it. You can’t just go, oh no, I’ll just sort myself out. So yeah, it’s a different kettle of fish.

I’m very excited. And finally Elsa, how can people find you and follow this big adventure when it does happen? Ah, that’s a good question. So you got to some, I was in a gig last night and someone was promoting their social media and they said the phrase, you got to pick your poison Facebook, Instagram, whatever it is.

And I quite like that. So pick your poison. I’m on Instagram as [01:05:00] Elsa Kent, and I’m on Facebook as the climate ride which is where I’m probably most active. Yeah, amazing. Well, I’ll say it’s been an absolute pleasure listening to your stories and I cannot thank you enough for coming all the way to west London, to F to film this, to record this it’s first time in a year.

We’ve actually, well, I’ve managed to record in person, which certainly has made it a lot more fun and interest. For sure. Now it’s been really cool to be here and it’s great. Isn’t it being in person. Wow. Yeah, exactly. Cool. So thank you. Thank you so much. Well, that is it for today. Thank you so much for watching and I hope you got something out of it.

If you did hit the like button and subscribe, if you haven’t already, and I will see you in the next video. [01:06:00]

Elise Wortley

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Elise Wortley (Adventurer)

Elise Wortley is a female adventurer bringing to life the incredibly lost history of female adventurers by literally walking in their footsteps, using what was available to them at the time. The expedition highlighted these groundbreaking women’s stories and achievements with the hope to inspire women and girls today.

After returning from this life-changing first expedition, she realised that the stories and achievements of female explorers like Alexandra should be celebrated and never forgotten and made it her mission to bring these stories back to life, inspire this generation and the next the same way they have inspired her. In July 2019, she set off on my second adventure to the Cairngorm Mountains in Scotland to follow Nan Shepherd’s footsteps, one of the UK’s best-known nature writers and mountain wanderers.

We talk about her incredible journey across India and towards Tibet on the podcast, how she coped in sub-zero temperatures, and how this trip changed her life.

Elise’s Website

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Transcript of our Conversation

Elise Wortley

[00:00:00] Elise Wortley: My next guest is an adventurer who is on a mission to inspire women into adventure, being inspired by so many female adventurers. She reads the books with these incredible FEMA adventures back in the day, and then recreates their stories right from scratch. What she does is incredible. And I was so happy to have her on the podcast to talk about these incredible trips from India to Scotland.

She recreates these stories. In such an amazing way. So I’m delighted to introduce Elise, welcome to the show. Thanks very much for having me well, it’s an absolute pleasure and what I absolutely love your about your story is the extremes you go to, to sort of look back in history and then recreate these incredible adventure.

Through these books that you’ve read before we sort of jump into that probably the best place to start is at the beginning. And how did this all sort of come about? [00:01:00] Reading these books and getting into these adventures. So I don’t really remember how I stumbled across the first book. So it was by Alexandra David, Neil, who actually, most people I speak to date, really know who she is.

And I came across her book when I was about 16 and I read it and I just thought, wow, this is. Amazing that this woman’s done this. So she was quite famous for a 14 year journey through Asia and where she left European about 1912 and traveled all through Asia just to get into Tibet where she could learn more.

But isn’t because obviously back then, you know, there wasn’t the internet there wasn’t, you didn’t have a face. So you actually had to go and, you know, find these things out for yourself. And I was just so amazed reading that book, you know, it’s actually just the last six months of this 14 year journey, but she touches on, you know, how grueling that trip was, how ill she got, how long it was.

She had to do things like sleep and [00:02:00] cold mountain passes with just her coat. And I just read it and I was like, I just don’t know. How she did this and also like, why don’t I know about this woman already? Like, why wasn’t I taught about her at school because she’s so inspiring. And then yeah, I read that book and I just, after that, I just always had it in my mind that I wanted to recreate her journey in some way, then I didn’t think, oh, I’ll do it without modern equipment, but yeah, I always wanted to do it.

And then about. Yeah, 12 years later, I decided it was kind of time to do it. I kind of went back to the book and re-read her story and thought, you know, I think people need to know about this woman and I really need to highlight, especially in a bit of a man’s world, like how epic her journey was and what she actually managed to achieve.

’cause a lot of people when they sort of recreate these stories as I was saying before, they sort of say, oh, well, I’ve got the socks from 1912, but underneath I have the north face jacket. You go for the real extremes [00:03:00] right down to everything, the small hot water bottles, the alpaca coats. So for people listening, why don’t you tell it how the sort of planning of these, this adventure sort of came about?

Oh, see, it’s not, I can just Google this stuff because back then, so women like Aleksandra, they were already fighting to be taken seriously. So in their writing, they would never. You know, if they felt vulnerable or weak or what they were wearing under that, they only just say undergarments and then whatever their coat is because they want to be taken seriously.

So they’re not going to talk about things like that. So I ended up doing so much research into what they actually had in 1912, and it’s quite surprising, like what they actually did have back then. But yeah. Going down to the same night bra and pants, she would have had say like rocket bras and yeah.

Like cotton undergarments and things like that. [00:04:00] So, yeah. I decided that I think to do her journey justice and to kind of show how difficult it was, it would never have been the same. If I was in, you know, like a north face jacket, I would have never. What she felt, and I would never be able to highlight, you know, the amazing journey that she did.

So yeah. I ended up researching reading all her books, actually going back to, you know, olden days when there was no internet and yeah, just reading through and I picked out everything that she mentioned. So she had your hot water bottles, like wooden ball, kettle matches all these little things. How yak coat.

So I ended up just picking all those out and yeah. Going, going with that, what was the sort of kick for this journey? What sort of kicked you into action 12 years later to really pursue it? So I’d actually, I I’ve always very open about this, but I actually had really bad panic attacks, like all through my twenties to the point where.

It still actually does really affect my life now, [00:05:00] but they would be so bad. I couldn’t go to work and I had to get loads of therapy and go medication and stuff. And actually, while I was going through. I re-read this book, because to me it was so brave. I really struggled with doing things like even getting a bus for me, which sounds crazy to someone who’s never had anything like this, but the amount of physical symptoms that brings up.

So like your legs would shake, I’d be totally dizzy. I wouldn’t be able to see properly. And for me reading this book, you know, she must’ve been so brave back then just to kind of leave everything behind. So, you know what I don’t want to. Traditional, I don’t want to have a traditional women’s life I’m going to, going to go off.

And the amount of people that, you know, must have fought back and thought she was crazy. And I think actually reading that and thinking, oh, you know what, if she can do that back then when she would have gone, she wouldn’t have even known where she was going. You know, she wouldn’t have had, she maybe would have seen a photo from India.

Like that was all she would have seen. So actually really helped me. And then after the. [00:06:00] Yeah. I just thought when I started to feel a bit bad, I thought now’s the time. So I sort of started putting the feelers out, seeing if I could plan a route and get a bit of sponsorship and then kind of before I knew it, I was, I was going, I was off.

And so how, how did it feel arriving in India? Was it, yeah. Arriving in India heading up into the mountains first day. What was the sort of feeling like? The thing I was most worried about was the wearing the old clothes. Cause I’m quite Obviously, cause I was quite a quite nervous person. Anyway. I thought everyone’s going to be looking at me.

They’re going to wonder. Oh, so I built actually built the old backpack I had out of an old chair because I kind of run out of my money. By the point I went to buy like a 1912 backpack and they’re really expensive. They’re like 500 to 800 quid. So I ended up doing laser research. Like what does a backpack actually look like?

And I built my own. How about this [00:07:00] chair on my back with a basket, all these old clothes. And I was just really, self-conscious more than anything, but you know what, it’s fine now. And even blinked in Ireland. So it was kind of that. And I just, the whole thing, you know, organizing a trip like this. It’s actually, I think harder than actually doing the trip.

So I had, cause we went to second, which is a really small little bit of India at the top and it’s really sensitive area because it’s so small and we had to get like five different permits. We weren’t allowed satellite phones or drones or anything like that. So organizing, it was a bit of a nightmare. So actually when I was there, it was quite a relief that it actually made it.

But yeah, it was probably. I think a bit overwhelmed, to be honest when I got there. And so how was the sort of experience of, because I then when I try on stuff from 1912 or 1920, which is very rare, I have to say. Yes. That’s [00:08:00] basically what I was trying to get at. Isn’t it really? Yeah. And I’ve actually got a picture of my, by the end of, so it’s there for a month in these old clothes and I just had a rash all over my body because.

The weather was, it was freezing, but in the morning it was actually really sunny every morning. So from about 7:00 AM to 12, it was really sunny. So I’d be walking and I’d be getting really hot. And then after 12, the clouds would come in and it’d be freezing. So I think my skin was just going through. So many different temperatures and, you know, sweating, they’re not suppressing.

And then yeah. Well, and it, yeah, it wasn’t pretty I actually had to put my arms in the code, like glacier rivers, quite a lot. And that really helped cause it put the itching down, but just shows, I guess like what they, you know, what people back in the day went through and they did these things. I mean, India and mountains towards sort of Tibet is some of the most beautiful scenery and theme imagery you must have [00:09:00] seen on a day to day.

Although it chain and freezing cold at times was probably was probably absolutely breathtaking. And I still learned to appreciate it. Surfacely the first two weeks I was just completely out of it, you know, like trying to deal with everything that was going on. And then, because it didn’t have any modern.

I would go, you know, there’d be a beautiful mountain or the sun would be setting or something amazing. And to begin with, I’d go for my phone and to be like, oh, I’ll take a picture. But then I realized I didn’t have it. So actually I really, really, I think appreciated it a lot more because I just had. My eyes and my mind to look at, to look at everything.

And I remember that trip so vividly. I mean, obviously I was doing something a bit crazy, but also I remember it more than anything else, any holiday I’ve ever been on, anything like that. And I actually put that down to. Not having anything modern to distract me. And to just really, I dunno, engaging with my [00:10:00] surroundings and really feeling it as well.

I think that’s what the clothes did. I really felt that weather and I would like be freezing cold at night, just waiting for the morning, just sitting up with my hot water bottle, waiting for the sun. So obviously then. You know, start loving the sun and yeah, it was really interesting actually doing it that way and how it changes your relationship with what’s around you.

And I suppose who’ll say sort of being in the moment gave you that time to reflect and take it off. Yeah. Yeah, definitely. And we did a lot, so we were all day long. We were kind of walking and walking in which again gives you, you know, a lot of time to kind of think and look around. And once I’d got everything on, it was a bit of a pack cost on his side, everything that she would have had on me.

But once I was going in, it was just all that time to kind of yeah. Reflect and take in. And obviously I had her book with me, so I was reading what she would have written when she was there. And yeah, it [00:11:00] was amazing. It was me. And food. Is that quite difficult or was it very much sort of buying local feed?

From the, well, from the locals? Of course. But it was, it, was it sort of difficult to get, get hold of. No, not really. So I did what she did and she would just go into people’s houses along the way and give them a bit of money and they cook her food. So we took quite a lot of food with us. So I tried to keep the team, I think, because this whole project for me is kind of about inspiring women and showing what these amazing women are the past it, I try to keep the whole team female.

So I had a female mountain guide and I had Emily who came along in the film. But female porters, aren’t a thing in India. They are in Nepal, I think now. But we were joined by five, like amazing guys from latching, which is this really amazing town, like nestled deep in the Himalayas most beautiful place.

So they came with us and they carried sort [00:12:00] of emergency equipment, cameras, staff bits of food, but we shared all out between us. And yeah, we just cooked as we went and we also stayed in. As we pass people’s houses, we just ate amazing. But potato Curry basically, which they were all cooking, which was incredible and get to meet people, a lot of Tibetan refugees in the area as well.

So they will have amazing kind of stories and lovely, like gentle, beautiful people. So yeah, that’s kind of what we did for food, which was amazing. Cause that’s what she would have exactly what she did as well. So, and also, I suppose, when you are up in the mountain, Not much probably has changed in those hundred years.

Yeah, exactly. And I see when we got to her cave, this is where it really hit me. So. Her cave was really important part of her story because she, she was actually the first Western woman to meet the Dalai Lama. And he told her she needed to learn to better learn and practice more Buddhism. So she [00:13:00] basically got herself, a teacher who was a really high Buddhist in latching and they went.

She lived in one cave for two years and he lived in the other and she basically meditated there learn her to my breathing, which kept her warm, which is only how she kept warm I’ve discovered because I couldn’t do that. And yeah, and so when I was in her cave, looking out, I was actually thinking, you know, this landscape, it won’t have changed in a hundred years and India, the country and our surrounding.

Everything, you know, culturally it’s changed loads. So second was its own country until 1975. So when she was there, it was completely different. But yeah, looking at the mountains, I was like, this is amazing because this is exactly. What she would have been looking at. And what’s the sort of moment that you look back on that trip, where was the sort of, one of the amazing moments that really stuck out for you?

I think so the whole point of doing that bit of the trip. So I did the. A bit of [00:14:00] her 14 year journey. And this was where she got the first views of Tibet and it kind of triggered her the rest of the 14 years, you know, going, I need to get into this country because Tibet, it was very closed off as it is now.

You can’t just, you couldn’t travel around freely. So she went up this path to look over and to try and find a way in. So that’s why I wanted to do this, but, and actually the main point where you can look over. And see into Tibet is near Mount Kanchenjunga, which is the third highest peak in the world, which I didn’t even know was there, like it’s up there with Everest in these, in this.

Second wreck. It’s crazy. So that was the bit where we were trying to aim to get to, and it was kind of the last bit of the trip. And so much had happened before we got there, but we managed to kind of climb up the side of this. It’s called the zooming glacier. So it comes all the way down from out contingent.

Like absolutely amazing. So we climbed all the way up there and the end and got the same [00:15:00] views that she would have had all those years ago across into Nepal and Tibet. So that was definitely the highlight. And also because we thought had quite a lot of points, we weren’t going to make it. So just being there with a pretty, pretty great.

And so she took 12 years to do this. Yeah, not that bit of the, the journey. So she was, yeah, the entire trip. Yeah. She took 14 years basically. Cause she just kept, she went through China, she went all different ways. Just trying to get into Tibet. And every time she got to a border, they would turn her away or she’d be like, So one would tell on the British and they’d come and get her and bring her out.

So yeah, she just, and that’s another thing, just persistence, 14 years of trying. And eventually she managed to get in and she described herself as that sorts of pilgrims that go into laws. But his program. So she kind of dressed as a man and covered her face and certain, obviously she could speak the language at the time.

So she [00:16:00] managed to disguise herself and get in and. Read these ancient Buddhist doctrines, which we’ve received, no one else had ever seen before. So yeah. Wow. God. And I suppose what was the sort of moments we should look back on or say. Did you have any sort of scary times? Yeah, I think mainly it was the code.

Cause obviously I was in an old canvas 10. I had, my yak will co and then I was just sleeping in blankets, which is all I could find that she had. But luckily she had the two hoard bottles and pretty much all night. Refill them and sleep with them by the, I didn’t even sleep in the tent. I just called up by the fire.

So you can imagine kind of what state I was in by the end of a month. But yeah, I, it just got so cold at times. It was scary, like really, really cold. I mean, it would go. Minus 10 minus 15. It was really bad. And then and I, I liked the warm, [00:17:00] I like being on a beach. So for me it was a real shock because I’d never actually been to mountains like that before.

And the hot water bottles saved me. I mean, I didn’t sleep much because I was just by the fire all night, making sure it didn’t go out. And then also when you get above a certain altitude that the trees were going. So that was, I was walking around kind of collecting sticks, manically, just thinking, God, if we get any higher, I’m not gonna be able to have a fire.

So I think it was the cold. Yeah, there were times where it was so cold. Yeah, it was, it was scary because up there, what sort of altitude are you at? We went up to 5,100, I think. Which obviously if you kind of do it slowly, it’s fine. But we did feel basically all the different permits and second, they all got a bit mixed up.

So we have. A different bit of the trip. First, we ended up going really high quite quickly, which I know absolutely you should do, but we didn’t really have a choice. [00:18:00] So yeah, the first week was we were all quite sick to be honest. But yeah, I mean, yeah, about 5,000, which is high and it means you just, I mean, I was going slow anyway, walking, but yeah, it was slow, slow going.

And you were there for how long? A month. Oh, God. Wow. And, and I suppose, sort of coming back, did, do you feel because as you said, you suffered with anxiety, did that sort of help not cure it, but alleviate it and you know what? I really thought it was. Thought, oh, I’ve done this amazing thing now, you know, I can do anything.

And then I actually got back and I just, you know, it was almost worse than ever. It was, it was crazy. But I think it was just such a big change, you know, and actually over, you know, over the next few months, it definitely helped. But initially getting back, I mean, you might know if you’ve been on sort [00:19:00] of long trips, it’s a big assault on the sense, especially if you’ve been in the mountains with.

No equipment and no one talking to you is quite overwhelming. Yeah. I, I always find when you sort of been out in the countryside and then you come back to a city it’s incredibly overwhelming, probably for people listening. In a sense lockdown. You were three months not being able to see anyone talk to anyone, then suddenly be chucked into a birthday party.

Oh, my worth. So yeah, it was a bit of a shortcoming back, but I think in the long term then, yeah, it’s definitely obviously helped. But yeah, I always say speed. We know you don’t need to, don’t need to go and walk through the Himalayas with a chair on your back to kind of get through your anxiety and help, you know, even if you just have a walk in the park, like anything like that is good.

Yeah, you don’t need to see why I did, although it sounds like the most [00:20:00] incredible event. Yeah, it was, it was amazing life changing, I’d say. Yeah, and yeah, and just the people I met and Django who was my fit, the guide that I found, she was absolutely amazing and actually was told by so many people you’ll never find a female mountain guide in India.

It’s not something that women they’re doing. And I looked for months and months, and then actually a friend of a friend of friend knew someone who might know someone. And yeah, I ended up being put in touch with her and she was incredible, you know? Blazing the way for women. And she’s now open to homestay that has kind of a training school for girls who want to be mountain guides.

She’s really like blazing the trails for women out there. So yeah, she’s yeah, a friend for life. So, yeah. Also really inspiring so many ways, I suppose that was your first sort of big trip in a sense, or really not about [00:21:00] past. And spirit inspirational female adventurers from the path, let’s say.

And then you went into nine shepherd, the living mountain. Yeah. So I wanted to do someone closer to home and I’d always known of this birth. And my mum gave me a copy. She was like, you have to read this. It’s amazing. And I read it and I thought, oh, I need to do that. I need to go and find these places and try and understand this book on a deeper level of what Nan would do.

Kind of experience while she was writing it. And then the more I looked into it, the more amazing her story was, you know, she’d put that book in a drawer for 70 years or something because no one would publish it at the time because it was an unusual format. It was, she wasn’t taken that seriously. And yeah, eventually it got published.

This sort of masterpiece and really, really sort of celebrated book now. So yeah, so I wanted to do something close also again, cause a lot of people I know hadn’t really heard of [00:22:00] Nan shepherd. Even though she’s on the she’s on the new Scottish five pound note now even when I was there and I said, oh, people are, do you know who this woman is?

No one really knew. But yeah, she’s amazing has an amazing story. And I’d also never been to Scotland. Could you believe it? So I just really wanted to go. Yeah. I only discovered her actually on this podcast because we had Jenny tough on an episode three and it was her favorite book and I’d never sort of heard about it.

And then your story as well, trying to recreate Nan Shepherd’s experience in. And Scotland was just incredible. Yeah. And I think, I just, cause that trip was more, I didn’t have a plan route cause she just writes about different locks and different places. And so I just went round with the book. It had all my stuff on my back and I just went around and found all the places that she talks about in the book.

And it was [00:23:00] really amazing to kind of be there and again with the old clothes. So. She wrote that at the end of the second world war. And it was actually going into the mountains, was her kind of escape from all the horrors that were going on. And I think that’s why that book is so strong and powerful because all that was going on around her.

But I ended up. Searching like what she would have had to eat. And then obviously it was the war, so everything was rationed. But again, I was really surprised. So there was mass bars, they were around things like this. They had, they have tampons that, oh, there’s lip balm. So I was like, great. I can take all this stuff with me.

So yeah, and then I just kind of wandered around in this old Tweed coat again, very itchy and this old sort of army 10 and found all the places that she writes about. And again, in the old clothes, it was amazing. It was just sideways raining when I first got there. And I just was like, this is miserable.

This is horrible. But [00:24:00] actually after a few days, I really kind of learned after reading the book, she kind of talks about the ecosystem and how everything has its place. And in the end, I kind of thought actually, yeah, like the rain is here because it’s doing something. So I shouldn’t hate the rain and things like that.

And all this stuff, you know, it became a bit of a. It’s like a mindfulness journey. Wow. And say for people listening, you know, going back to sort of 1940, what what sort of food were you eating when you were up there? Apart from deep fried Mars bars? Oh, they weren’t that you fried, unfortunately. And also I think.

A few too many miles, but it’s because they were rationed. Right. You’ve got the tiniest bit. I had a hole there. Maybe I cheated a little bit. But now it’s like potatoes jam eggs. Oh, start of, I just made stews like Kara. Things like that. And actually that was the best bit of the day, get [00:25:00] my little army stave out and I’m kicking up my carrots and having a wash in the, in the river and the logs.

But yeah, it was after the initial week of the torrential rain and sideways wind. Yeah, it actually, the sun came out and it was the most incredible experience. It was incredible that that whole landscape in the catacombs there’s amazing. Yeah, I went swimming the locks and did everything that she does an amazing passage in the living mountain where she goes naked into one of the locks.

So I did that as well, just on my own, like in the middle of nowhere CA it was really incredible. Wow. God. Yeah, it’s got Scotland has a habit of throwing up some extreme weathers from time to time. I thought it’d be warmer in June. That’s why I chased Jean. Was that the sort of, same as Nan shepherd.

Well, she, she actually lived there. So that was the little differences that [00:26:00] she, she had a house there, but she’d wonder across, you know, the whole Kango plateau for days, but she did it over a lifetime. So yeah, so I just went for three weeks, I think it was in the end. So yeah, so she would have kind of kept going back all the time, but.

Yeah. I just immersed myself in the three weeks I had. What was the sort of feelings like between Scotland and India in terms of recreating these two store? The themes. Did you say the feeling? Oh, the feelings. Yeah. They were really different actually. I think India, because it was the first while it was really overwhelming.

And I think the whole time I was just kind of overwhelmed and I’d never been to that kind of scenery. I’ve never really seen anything like that. So the whole thing was just. Not overwhelming in a bad way. Just everything was, I was just fascinating and I don’t really know how to explain it. Just overwhelming, [00:27:00] just the word.

But with the Scotland one, I was a bit more confident in myself and I kind of knew a bit more about what I was doing. So I think I had a bit more time to appreciate it. And also India, it was manic. We had a lot of ground to cover. So we were walking for eight or nine hours a day constantly. So by the time we kind of set up camp and I made my fire, I’d just pass out on the floor.

So I didn’t have that much time, I guess, for reflection or to write my journal. Whereas in Scotland, I had all the time in the world. So I was just wondering around and my own pace. And that was the hardest thing at first was actually. Just learning to be still. And I’d be sitting there with no modern stuff thinking, oh, what do I do now?

Set up camp. Like, what do I do? And by the end, I just learned to just sit there, literally just sit and look around. And I’ve definitely taken that from that trip. You know, how often do you just sit on your sofa and just do nothing? And I’ve tried to kind of bring that into my life now where you don’t have to be.

Doing [00:28:00] something all the time. It’s fine to just set. Yeah. And appreciate things I suppose. And I did a lot more writing on, on that trip because I had the time we kind of went to bed when the sun did and got up when the sun rose. So yeah, it was, there were really different, really different trips, I suppose.

It’s sort of like a form of meditation. Just being there with your thoughts and breathing without the sort of stimulation of. In a modern calms of your Fein TV computer. Yeah, absolutely. And also I find walking is quite meditative as well. So the whole thing, yeah, it was just like one, maybe it was my pilgrimage tense.

I don’t know if I came back actually feeling very Zen. I have to say. Yeah, I’m very clear headed. And how did that sort of, that sort of trip sort of adapt you into going back into London again? Yeah, again, I [00:29:00] think it’s, it was really hard. And also I got the train overnight train. So you literally get in at 7:00 AM.

When all the commuters are going to work and it was just, and I didn’t have any other stuff apart from what I’d been wearing, because I didn’t have room for anything else. So I was just walking through Euston station at 7:00 AM, literally just. Yeah, I think coming back is always hard, always hard.

Especially if you’ve been that detached from modern life, like, I didn’t even really know what was going on in the news apart from a few people I met on the way and I’d ask them, oh, what’s going on in the world? Yeah, it takes a bit of time to settle back in.

When I got back from one of my runs and Friday, I finished then on Monday, I was back into work, taking the tube ATM rush hour, and suddenly I was just like, it really does come over. You. I don’t know how to explain it. You just get this kind of overwhelming [00:30:00] feeling. Isn’t it. It’s, it’s really strange. It takes, it takes a while to sort of adjust back.

I always find, yeah, definitely. Yeah. Kind of get back in the routine. Yeah. And is there a sort of plan for the next. Yeah, definitely. I’ve got lots of, I actually had another one planned in Ireland, which was all funded for, and then obviously COVID happened. So that one is following in the footsteps of an old Irish pirate queen.

Who’s really, really epic. She’s called grace. So Molly and she was from like the 15 hundreds. So I would just love to get into that history and see what they actually had back then. I don’t even know what they had, but because she, yeah, she was. She traded a lot overseas, so she actually had a lot of stuff from Africa.

So her little bit of Ireland, you know, her castle apparently was full of spices and different animals, skins, and all this kind of thing that the rest of Ireland didn’t have. And yeah, she was quite famous because she [00:31:00] was the only female clan leader kind of in history. And I really want to recreate.

A journey. She did in a boat to Greenwich where she met with queen Elizabeth. So that’s definitely one I want to do. And also Freya stark in Iraq and Iran. So I’m working on that one at the moment. So hopefully that’ll be next year as well. And there might be another Scotland one next year, too.

So first up, what did she do in Iraq? So she raise a bit of an archeologist, so she actually. Went around looking for archeology, basically. But she did lots of other stuff as well, but she wrote a book called the valley of the assassins, which is quite famous. Actually. It’s one of the more famous female Explorer books.

Cause they’ve all got all these amazing books, but no one ever really bought them at the time. So yeah, so she went and did that when all through that, which is around, which is actually, it’s been quite hard for British [00:32:00] passport holders to get into recently, but I think it’s changed. This month, actually.

So hopefully we can do around. And then she also went to Kurdistan, which is the bit at the top of Iraq which has beautiful mountains and she just traveled around there. Yeah, looking for archeological sites basically. So I’d love to. Do that and following her footsteps as well. So yeah, there’s lots.

I mean, I’ve got a list now of about 50 women say sinless. Yeah. I suppose once you find one or two, certainly they will come. You suddenly find this amazing collection because over history you do hear these sort of stories about these incredible women doing amazing stuff from flying, driving. Doing these incredible hikes and all sorts, and they’re there to be discovered.

But as I say, the sort of publicity back in the day was a bit more difficult. Yeah. And [00:33:00] I think, yeah, it was very, obviously the guys, the men got all the glory, but I always say these women have it. And a lot of them disguise themselves as men as well. They would dress up one of them. Boat a sailing boat full of men for six months and pretended to be a man.

And I don’t know how that’s possible, but she did because otherwise they weren’t allowed to go a lot of the time. Which again is fascinating that they would do that just to kind of go on a trip somewhere. It’s yeah, it’s incredible. So yeah, there’s a lot of them. Yeah. Wow. God, what a, what an absolutely incredible story.

And it was one of the reasons when I sort of discovered what you did. I was just so keen to sort of hear the story about it because it’s such a cool way of recreating these adventures from the past. But you do take it to quite an extreme for last, the fun bit. Right. And that’s the thing, sorry. Yeah. The other piece, I think other [00:34:00] people have also, you know, followed in these women’s footsteps and kind of highlighted their journeys.

Again, I think it’s so important to do what they have because that’s just showing how hard it was. And I think we kind of forget that now because we’ve got all our amazing equipment. Don’t get me wrong. I love her. I love a north face jacket, but I appreciate that even more now. No, I know. Yeah. I’m sure.

Especially with the itchy Tweed or whatnot. Yeah, exactly. It’s been absolutely incredible sort of hearing these stories. There’s a part of the show where we ask the same five questions to each guest each week. And this is probably going to be a bit difficult, this first question, because it’s what gadget do you always take with you on

No idea how it’s not a gadget, but it’s a wooden. And I’m a tiny little mirror. That’s actually completely ruined now. And this mirror has been through a lot with me. It’s [00:35:00] been to festivals festival and I got it. Like my stocking, my dad put it in my stocking when I was really young and it’s completely ruined now, but I always have this tiny little mirror.

That’s actually only got half a mirror left in it. And my wouldn’t comb. So those two things. Yeah.

Yeah. When I, when I sort of bounce Rita, I was like, catch it. This is going to be difficult with yeah. You get some people talking about camera lenses, and exactly. What about your favorite adventure or travel book? I was, so now I have lots. But yeah, so overseas, my journey to laws. Alexandra David nil.

But I’ve actually been reading so many now. And I just read a modern one called the salt par by rhino in, and I think that might be my new favorite. It’s absolutely amazing. So obviously the old books, but [00:36:00] yeah, that’s probably my new favorite travel book and she walks around the Southwest Cove coast coast path of the UK.

And it’s just so, so beautifully written and it’s made me want to go and walk around there. Maybe I’ll do that in my spare time. Yeah. Around the sort of Jurassic coast area. Yeah. Y while these adventures important. Oh, I think, oh, they’re important because it’s kind of shining a light on these women that were kind of forgotten all those years ago.

And still now I think they’re becoming more forgotten. So for me, it’s just really about highlighting their story. And also, I guess, just trying to inspire people to go and do their own adventure. Like I said earlier, you know, you don’t have to. We’re a chair on your back, goes to them. He can do anything.

And I really believe now in, obviously it’s been proved that, you know, how nature can help your mental health. So even if it’s [00:37:00] just going to a park for a little bit of time, things like that, I just, yeah, I think that’s kind of just to show that as well. I think that’s so true. It’s the idea of adapting and getting outside because it’s so easy.

Nowadays sort of be insight, be on your phone and unfortunately sort of social media and all sorts are, they’re just such easy conveniences and it’s so easy to be on your fence suddenly for like 20 minutes, half an hour. Where did that just go? Absolutely. And I’m guilty of it too. Like I actually hate social media, but I do it because, but I end up scrolling and scrolling.

Okay. I have to be really strict myself, but it’s addictive and sometimes you just need to put it away and. Yeah, yeah. Outside, especially the last year. It’s been really tough. So yeah.

designed to be yeah. Yeah, definitely. That’s why you’re [00:38:00] sort of like, oh, that’s cool. That’s interesting. A little rabbit hole people you’re able to look out. God horrible. The joys. Yeah. I think it’s so important. This. Put it down, go outside, go for a run, go for a walk, whatever it may be. And just give yourself the opportunity to have that time and space to yourself.

Yeah, absolutely. It’s so important. Definitely. What about your favorite quote? Oh, well I know that one, I found to show what the will of a woman can do. Alexandra David deal with 1912.

Yeah, that’s probably my favorite. Great. I would say and finally people listening are always keen to go on these sort of adventures. What’s the one thing you would recommend for people wanting to get started by a map that has walking routes rather [00:39:00] than roads or. Okay. Well, I just, so when I first I’d never organized anything like this, I’ve never done something like this.

So ordered all these maps. Cause I was like, oh, I need to look at the route where I can walk, but they will just wrote, you know, you need to get specific, which I’m sure everyone already knows that, but that’s something I didn’t know. I didn’t really know anything about this kind of thing. So that was probably my first light bulb.

Yeah, I would say that. And also the, if you think something’s not possible I would say it probably is. So just keep, keep going. Cause especially in India where I wanted to go or the people I was trying to organize it with. Like, no people don’t go there. We don’t walk there. That’s not where tourists go, but I kind of made us go, you know, you just have to keep pushing and then you can eventually get to these places.

I think anything’s possible. Yeah. Keep pushing, keep trying perseverance. That’s the word I’m [00:40:00] looking for? Yeah. And finally, what are you doing now? And how can people follow your trips and adventures in the. Amazing. Yeah. So I mainly on Instagram actually, so that’s a good place to follow and I’ve got website as well, which is women with altitude.com and then the Instagram is women without to change.

And yeah, and then you can follow me trying to get funding for my next, my next trip. And I put everything on there, so yeah, you can chat to me on there and send me messages or whatever, if you’ve got any questions and I suppose, sort of funding. So we’re doing two things at the moment. I’m going out to channels at the moment to try and get like a series.

Funded, I suppose. So we can kind of highlight a load of these women, which is obviously really, really difficult. So in the meantime, I’m just going to companies. And so for instance, for the grace O’Malley trip in Ireland, I’ve been writing to Guinness [00:41:00] who are yet to reply. But just companies like that because I get a lot of press coverage from these trips.

So there’s a lot in it for them. So, yeah, so just trying to find companies that are willing to kind of sponsor me and help me out really. So yeah, that’s what, I’m what I’m doing at the moment. Yeah. Because you’ve been recently all over sort of BBC. Yeah. That was yeah, that was crazy actually.

Yeah. We just filmed a little piece for BBC London. Cause obviously I live in London. And then it kind of went a bit. And I ended up on BBC breakfast, which is so funny, but yeah. So it’s going really well at the moment. So yeah, now’s the time to kind of get on the funding and try and sort out the next trips.

Well, it has been such a pleasure listening to your stories. Thank you. I can’t thank you enough for coming on today. Thanks for having me. [00:42:00] Oh, well, I can’t wait to sort of follow your adventures in the future. And hopefully if this podcast can help towards funding and anyone out that would be amazing.

But yeah, it’s just been such a pleasure listening to it’s been a great chat, so thanks very much for asking me. Well, that is it for today. Thank you so much for listening and I hope you got something out of it. If you did hit that like button and subscribe, if you haven’t already, and I will see you in the next video.

Jasmine Harrison

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Jasmine Harrison (Adventurer)

Jasmine Harrison is an adventurer and swimming instructor. On December 12th 2020, Jasmine Harrison set off in the Talisker Whisky Atlantic Challenge. Seventy days later, she broke the world record and became the youngest ever solo female to row any ocean.

On the podcast today, we talk about her experience preparing for this challenge. How to get sponsorship for an expedition, and what training for rowing the Atlantic takes.

We talk about her near-death experience while out in the Atlantic and how she narrowly avoided being hit by a drilling ship.

Jasmine’s Website

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Transcript of our Conversation

Jasmine Harrison

[00:00:00] Jasmine Harrison: Hello, and welcome to the modern adventurer podcast coming up in between half and one and a half knots, depending on whether you’re on a wave and they were going at like 10 knots and they just comply and buy. And then you’ve got the wake afterwards as well. And I’m completely side-on and it’s pitch black and you kind of blinded by this thing.

And it’s like, wow. When you’re also like my heart’s beating so fast because I’m am I going to die? If you haven’t already, please feel free to subscribe to the shape because we have some incredible guests coming up week after week. My next guest is a true adventurer. She broke the record for becoming the youngest person to row solo across the Atlantic or what could have taken up to a hundred days.

But she finished in 70 days crossing the finishing line after encountering sleep deprivation, hallucinations, and coming head to head with a bait that almost took her out in the middle of the Atlantic. But through all that, she had some incredible experience. [00:01:00] And today on the podcast, we talk about some of them.

So I’m delighted to introduce Jasmine Harrison to the podcast. Thanks for having me on here. No worries. Well, absolutely great to have you on you last year, got back from completing this incredible trip rowing across the Atlantic, and you became the youngest solo female to DC. How did it all start? And it all started three years ago.

Three and a half years ago now when I decided to go to the Caribbean, because our never been really like, anywhere like that, I’d never seen a white Sandy beach and I thought let’s go to the one that everybody has on their postcards. So I went to the Caribbean got involved in doing some swimming teaching and an island called Grenada, and then basically managed to get on a boat due to the hurricanes hit.

This was in September, 2017 and sailed [00:02:00] throughout quite a few of the items, maybe 15 islands going all the way up north. And Tega was one of the stops on the way was then until you give a few weeks And saw there was all this commotion going on and somebody said, oh, do you want to hold a flag?

I wasn’t getting all the fluff or walk. Okay. Yeah. There’s these guys who just wrote across the Atlantic. And I was like, oh, amazing. And then I met lots of their friends and family of different teams whilst I was there. And I basically just got really inspired and thought, I want to do this. Like, I don’t know what it was, but it standing up on the for looking over going, I want to be that person on that tiny little boat.

Don’t know why I just did. I need it. I think I needed a bit of an escape, a bit of a change at that point. And that just seemed like a perfect escape. I mean, a situation with Blackbaud, but yeah, I was just taken by it completely. So then came back home because I’d run out of money cause it happens quite expensive, especially when [00:03:00] you’re on a boat.

Then worked pattern, traveling a little bit round like Eastern Europe and then thought I’m definitely going to winter. So I entered and then it was a year and a half preparation planning, getting sponsors, training, setting off. And then seven days later finished. We’re about five months later.

Now I’m here doing a podcast with you. Amazing. Well, I mean, because you’re not a row, your sort of backgrounds in swimming. So this was the first time you were going to ride. What’s in it is that right? And the idea was to do it safely. So how was that sort of taken in terms of the people, the decision for me to do it?

Well, I, I sort of imagined, cause I remember my, my first big trip. And when you let’s say haven’t [00:04:00] ever done anything that big to suddenly go from nothing to the biggest, which I think sometimes the best way I imagine there was quite a few naysayers around, but also I didn’t really make it like a big deal.

I was just sort of, I didn’t really tell anybody, first six months after entering the I’d actually sort of entered it. I told my friends, instead of I’m just going to do this Burlington thing. But also like, they’re just cool. You know, how, like every weekend I’m away doing another swimming event or another competition or something or to another country and then, oh, okay, cool.

And then it was only in the December. So I entered in like the major and it was only in the December that I went to the start line of the next, the last year’s race. I went on a boat, went book shopping, and all I did [00:05:00] was I took a photo, stood on a bow set it as my profile picture on Facebook and it’s fun and exactly ongoing to VRBO across the Atlantic.

And then everybody’s just button boom. And everybody was like, wow. Oh my gosh. And then suddenly my friend that knows this reporter, well, that person that works for the local newspaper and everybody just went absolutely crazy over it. Right. Okay. Well, I’m really glad I never sent this earlier because I couldn’t fast for the, or for the past six months, to be honest.

So that, yeah, that’s how it sort of came up. People weren’t that negative really? Because by the time I’d sort of told people you could tell was sort of had my head screwed on with it. And I could actually answer questions and say, look, that’s my boat. This is what’s happening. It’s happening right now.

Look, I can do it. And to prepare. Yeah, when it’s such a big event like that you’re so [00:06:00] focused on what you need to achieve rather than actually listening to the people. So the fact that I knew that nobody could help me with just their opinion. I needed to know a fact. I need to know. I needed to know what’d you move on with your robo?

You know what I mean? And then they’re like, unless you’ve heard an ocean, I’m not gonna listen to you. And so you don’t end up sort of having that much negativity. And it was, it was only when it came from a rower that I was like, oh, you think I’m not going to make it? Okay. Now that’s quite a big thing for me actually, for everybody else.

Oh, you don’t know what you’re all about. Don’t give me your opinion. So it was a bit different. I’m interested because as I say, it’s this incredible event for all people listening that happens every year, going from Canary islands to anti. Yeah, just next to tanneries. Yeah. And how do you go [00:07:00] shopping?

This is sort of, you go to the year, the previous years before and you buy it off the, like that you sort of go with all the start basic. I like that one. Can I buy that off you when you finish to be fair? I don’t really know. Most people do. I had never seen one, never been on one was just completely taken.

So I went along the dock and especially all the solos because the teams that are not the same level. And I went on the solos. I was just speaking to them saying, oh, hi, can I just look at your boat? Do you mind if I stand on it? Is it weird if I asked to be in your cabin is a little strange, but I just want to see what it’s like.

I just have no idea. And I just saw. Was more taken by the different designs than what people are doing. And it was actually just more sitting in what I’m feeling like, is this the right thing that I’ve [00:08:00] done? Could I sit in one of these cabin rooms for potentially like a hundred days? So that’s what I was doing.

And then I was going along the different boats. And then there was one though that I asked to sit on, literally just sit on their own possession and just go, could I sit here and eat, just took me dinner. Why? I just really liked that boat. There was something about it. And I sort of asked how much it was going to be.

Like what you do, how would you buy a boat? To be honest, he was really, really useless. Didn’t help me at all, but then I don’t blame him cause he was about to go to do a row, but also he was useless afterwards. And it was, I sort of needed time to decide and it was in the January that I won and somebody said to me, that’s about the one when your best actually put the deposit down on what you need to put the deposit down as well.

I’ve never bought anything like big in my life. I never bought [00:09:00] a car or doing anything like that. So. Deposit. And I was like, I need to get hold of this guy in the middle of the ocean or something like messaged just like Facebook page and the reply. And I will speak to him. I said, I need to give you a deposit.

How much deposit do you need? I don’t know whether I’ve got it, but I need to buy this boat like panicking this boat that I really, really wanted was going to be gone by somebody else. And that’s how I did it. I have no idea. I think a lot of other people actually get boots made for them. They get them done grand new, but I was not a single sponsor at that point.

I thought that because I loved this boat, everybody else would. And so I need to fight for my boat. I didn’t, nobody else wanted it, but it was a good boat. And actually I sell next week exactly a week today on Wednesday, whatever it is Argos. Gone. So [00:10:00] same way, same way that you bought it there.

So on message you in the middle of the ocean, not quite. So I’ve had a few people message me saying, oh, it was all grown for sale. Cause now it’s becoming a big, popular thing that a lot of people want to go do on this. To be honest, it’s not like many boats out there, not for how many people want to.

So I’ve seen this postpone on Facebook by this guy. And the only reason I noticed the post was because it was a picture of me, it taken like one, one of the ones that London campaigns, the race body had taken of me. And I’ll go out with sea and put it to this page saying, has anybody got a solo boat for sale?

And it was blue. Let’s meet how often that boat is for sale. Excuse me. Thank you. And so I just messaged him, said, hi, you know, that. Yeah, that goes for sale. If that was the photo that you picked out, why didn’t you do it? That one was for sale. And [00:11:00] so all it should just message. It was like, excuse me. And now it’s going to hit amazing passing the buck down or passing it down.

And S and so of course, with all these sort of events, sponsorships, the hard part. Yeah. How, how did that sort of come about? Because you got your deposit down for the bait, you had the page, but it will say, I think, unless you’ve got huge pockets, you need sponsors sort of go about and say, how did you go about it?

I’ve started actually trying to get sponsors the previous six months before we even the very start. I was sort of going on company websites, Googling about them a little bit and then just sort of messaging them, you know? So send an email. This is what I’m going to do. It’s completely naive. I know.

Oh, well, why wouldn’t Amazon’s Martin to send me money, you [00:12:00] know, still flat up you see the big sponsors on every sport event, I think, oh, this is going to be a big spot. They’ll sponsor me too. They’ve got the money. They don’t want it. They probably get requests all the time. They don’t care. And so I sort of changed dramatically or my approach of just.

Lying on the grass in the middle of summer, sending a random text verbose. And when he came to somebody and then I decided that I would stick local find cause where I lived, there’s a lot of big companies anyway. So our town, everybody knows everybody. So I thought, let me ask everybody that I know if they own a business suddenly got really tuned into every single person that came in to the pub.

I look at that workshop see what? Cause they always come for a pint after work and think, oh, who do you work for you? The owner. And it gave me ideas of businesses. And then you start speaking to somebody. I said, do you know a friend that owns a [00:13:00] business? Do you own a business? Collecting knowledge of people and then say, oh, look at the people to respond to me who sponsors a local things.

So I basically created a massive list of smaller sponsors that I would approach to then bigger ones, like on a huge industrial estates and multinational. So I basically sent a couple of messages and found out as much as I could. I figured, nah, we’re just going to walk right in there. Just walk straight in don’t even on them.

So the can’t even sort of prepare a speech, have to say no. And I go in and I said, hi, could I speak to so-and-so somebody that I found out through somebody? And then he say, your friend, whatever told me when they were very drunk, that you would expose me. So you’re going to have to and so did that, I just find on the name of somebody walk in.

So this is what I’m doing. We sponsor. And most of the time they then said, yes, [00:14:00] well, I’ll say most of the time it was probably know. Five occasions. I actually managed to do that. And especially when you’ve got one that is quite well respected, certainly going to get loads. And they sort of sailors that chain on from each other.

Cause everybody, everybody likes the sheep and the followups they sponsor do what well I’m going to have to that. They can’t get the foot in something that I’m not, you know, and it was quite funny that competitive sort of thing throughout what a local businessman. But then also COVID hit all these sponsors that had promised me that they would sponsor quite a lot then didn’t and it was quite difficult or they then didn’t until the October, the following October.

So now I spent all the time training Huffman to buy things, having to spend all this money that I didn’t have until sponsors, they gave me and I didn’t fully buy my book. [00:15:00] Until I think the day I started through, I think that’s when I did my final payment, I was sending him like payments as soon as I’d get a sponsor and then send off.

Just because I was like, please, please, can I do that? Because it was, I call it be you, but I put my deposit down. So it’s my boat. And then also the payment for the race entry fee and stuff, but it was difficult to find sponsors just COVID was the biggest pain ever as well. And it is, nobody wants to believe that this, at that point I was only 20, 20 year old girl is only ever really spawn and gone traveling.

Like most people. I was actually going to do something so big and cool. Some people are home straight on. I believe when other people that are, did you know that you were going to be the youngest solo female to do it? Yeah, I did because that’s a sort of good [00:16:00] USP for sponsors. And I imagine, and actually your approach of going local is by far and away for people listening who are going down this route is the best way to go is, you know, friends of friends and people in the local area.

I think it was bear Grylls who decided when he knew he was climbing Everest to rather than gauge the big ones, he went to his local window repair, which was called Everest or something and approached them. And they said yes, because it had Everest and it was bad, real. So he was like, yeah, I’m in. Yeah.

It was I think my USP was one that didn’t necessarily always work to my favor though. It can be the youngest girl that’s ever done it by yourself and people. I wonder why somebody is not that young, then I think that’s what kind of went through their heads. I thought it was [00:17:00] great. I’ve got your spec.

So I’m going to get a world record, but in their minds it was a bit more doubt. I was again, right. Okay. If I could have, if I had already done it by and I suddenly next year ago, I’m going to be the fastest, that’s a USP because I’ve got something to back me up and suddenly everybody is going to, or if I’d already climbed Everest and that I I’m going to be the youngest person that’s going to Rover this, then it’s like, wow.

Yes, we were all back in. You know, are you though, are you really? And I also, I didn’t want to over promise anything because I couldn’t say it’s definitely going to be on BBC news. I can’t, if I could have said I’m going to have. Well, like however many hours of live air time, all over national TV. Maybe that have said, oh yeah, we’ll give you money then.

Cause that was all OGO. But I couldn’t promise, well, I suppose that that’s the way it’s a difficult thing with [00:18:00] sponsorship. And so you were starting, what was the sort of date that you start 12th of? December 12th, December. You’ve got the bait and you’ve just paid your last payment. You’re getting ready to row out family all there to wave you off.

Nope, of course. What was the sort of feeding, like sort of setting off knowing that you’ve got another two, three months ahead of you by yourself? It was quite relieved. Actually I made it here. I’m okay. I’ve got to this point, but then there’s almost, it was incredibly scary. I was just more nervous of actually getting away from the side.

Like I was thinking you’ve never quite made it yet. Like, yes, you were at the start line, but I need to get out of the locked gates, not the long day. So that was a train [00:19:00] out of the Harbor wall. I need to not hit the ferry. I need to go in the channel to get out. I need to clear the island and then don’t have a way point that I need to pass.

And then I’ve got this. And so it was all very staged and I was thought of stopped worrying because it was always nervous about then the following sort of challenge. But also it didn’t help that I was like having a bit of a, I was tripping a little bit on like seasickness patches. And you know, you think you’re fine and you, because I never experienced anything doing such a big challenge that I would be so nervous.

I didn’t know how my body was going to react. And I thought, well, this must just be normal. Maybe this is just a side effect of I’m doing something so big and scary. And it wasn’t, it was because they had sea sickness patches, and I was an emotional, but also completely not, I was like sort of cold, but also like what’s going on.

Everything happened so quickly. It was [00:20:00] it’s a feeling that I want to go back to the start line this year. And I think that will clear up a lot of things for me seeing it from the outsider’s perspective again, and that I think will put me back in that place. So that was going to be a bit of a weird one, but yeah, it was, it was just indescribable.

I think having all of them five doesn’t mean. Yeah, I think I’m good. D do you usually get seasick? Nope. I had been told to take the patches anyway. Because then it’s precautionary never do that. Don’t do what people tell you to do, because stop messed up. Good and say, see, you’re sort of out in the ocean.

How does it sort of feel sort of, because you’re, you’re on your rain say you’ve got to sleep because I know in pairs or in fours, they sort of D two hours on two hours [00:21:00] off and that’s where they sort of sleep and they’re rowing the whole time. But being on your own, you have to sort of sort of stop gates sleep for a bit.

I mean, you must, how was the sort of routine of being in the boat? So the first few weeks was a bit of a different routine because, well, the first, the first couple of weeks I was doing a couple of hours on revolvers was off sort of like war is recommended. And then I got hit with some really bad weather.

I couldn’t stop rowing a heart to road to try and fight it quite a lot. Then I was on power anchor, which was just a big, it’s like a sea anchor that stops you or tries to stop you from moving when the wind is blowing in the wrong direction. I then ended up sort of being able to sleep for days because I couldn’t vote.

And then you try and pick it, then you try rubbing again. I’m going [00:22:00] for like 20 hours a day, she’ll straight. But then it flows more again to later on, I figured out that I was fast-growing at nighttime, so it’s sleep a little bit more during the day and go for longer at night. And then the weather, the ocean would change again, or I would change and it would be faster to do it the other way around.

So I’d end up sleeping at night, rowing a lot during the day. And it was I never really got into a proper routine, but I would, the majority of it I’d sleep between three eight, like am. Oh, well good. And I suppose being out in the ocean, you know, there is nothing it’s just, you’re surrounded by water.

You must have seen some incredible wildlife throughout. The wildlife is amazing. So I swung the dolphins. [00:23:00] Just to say that you’ve spoken with dolphins before is really cool to be able to say, but it’s not like you have to wear a life jacket and you were stood in a warm pool in Florida and you have a photo of it.

You know what I mean? That’s sort of resolve and is that sort of like standing up petting warm? I was in the middle of the say that all around you and you can hear them all. You’re under the water and you can hear them all squeaking and bubbling and diving around each other. I know it was something else was just completely next.

And credible beauty to be able to see something so clearly feel such clear water. And then we’re looking at you going, who are you? What are you? And I’ll go, what are you like? It’s just absolutely incredible. And I had lots of fish as well. So I spent, I think I wasted quite a long time of rowing watching wildlife.

I didn’t care. I dropped my Oles and just watch them. I was meant to be rowing and I spent [00:24:00] three hours filming some fish because they’re really pretty. And it was just, was really, really cool. Whales. I asked some little pilot fish on Stripe fish under the bottom of my boat. Like every single day they were there, Judah Vado.

I had a Marlin as well. I’d have extract mine and say, hi I flying fish, lots of flying fish, even at a squid London. I also had a crab, which is a really weird one, literally like 40 days in I had a tiny little, I’ll be an old crab that was just said, hi, pretty sure you shouldn’t be here.

And it really questioned my knowledge as well as again, crap, they should be at the seaside, they need rocks and some, they don’t need thousands of [00:25:00] what were you bad? Like this guy, he was clinging onto the bottom of the boat. Cause he was there when I was cleaning it got him. I took him off the bottom of my boat.

It wasn’t there before because I’ve cleaned the bottom of it. And it was already four days in, got hung there for 40 days when I’m already cleaned it. And I sort of brought them on deck and I was like, I don’t know what to do with you now because I’m thinking if I throw you overboard, you’re then going to take hours before you hit the bottom of this.

Like I do. What do I do? And so I did, I was like, well, I can’t leave you on a boat because you know, there’s nothing for you to eat where you’re just going to have to go back in the CME. Sorry. Well, I just don’t know. I wish I knew stuff and I should maybe Google it, but I also don’t want to find out I did the wrong thing.

Cool. So when you were swimming with dolphins, did you sort of just strap yourself on, because you can’t really not strap self onto these boats because within a second they could be a hundred meters away [00:26:00] from you and say, did you just sort of flight there and it’s just swim around while they sort of circled you or, yeah.

So I always, when you go in, you have to have a harness on and your waist anywhere was attached to the boat. And then when I spam, I just put myself on an extended lead of just a rope that a heart attached and jump in, go swim with them. Yeah. Sometimes there’s loads of different like pods that were sort of ones right below you.

One’s over there, one’s behind you, one’s in front of you. And it was really cool and you just sort of I’d swim towards them. So swim away from Argos from towards them. And I just was so mesmerized by it. I’d be there. I think where’s Aldo gone think, oh, I’m attached. Right. And I have no idea what my boats over to my left and the right photo behind me, not to clue because I’m so fixated [00:27:00] on these dolphins that I’m just sort of watching this from underneath me.

And there’s no, there was no tension on this rope. And I was just like, can you imagine if not immediate, I kept fine, but yeah, we definitely got to stay tight. So why, why are you with that? Because I knew that. What was really interesting about your trip was that you’re in this huge expanse of ocean and the chances are so slim of you being hit by something, but that’s what actually happened.

Almost happened to you. Yeah. You think you’ve got like vast ocean, you never even really going to see anything. And then in the middle of the night I had a big, like 800 foot shit was going on the exact same course as me right behind me. And then he took me out to familiar them and stay up the [00:28:00] way and row and yeah.

Try and avoid it, which he did just cause I managed to get them on the radio. But it was quite a close call. I don’t think any ruin boat has been that close to a boat in the middle of the sea. Yeah, because you are, how big is your beat in comparison? It must be. 10, 12 24. Yeah. 21 foot is my boat. I’m on the, this tanker.

Well, it was a, it was a drilling ship. It was 800 plus feet long, 130, I think compared to it literally absolutely tiny on the fact that this thing towers, like they own boat measurements that you see you it’s always like the Wix, the land. There’s never really how actually tall about is this boat honestly was so, so tall.

Right? It was towering over the top of me eat. I was so [00:29:00] close the effort toppled over. It would flatten me like it was really, really scary. It was just the light that it created. It was just, it owned the ocean. Like yeah, you feel so insignificant. How will you sort of alerted to it? So I have a system called AIS, which alert incoming ship is the easy way to say what it is.

And it says an alarm when there was a boat fairly close to you. Oh, this one didn’t alert me until it was like quite late on. It told me when we had like six minutes to impart or dust in the middle of the night. And this was a tool impact, not the, of a mile away. And they’re never going to hit you. Cause you know, it could be Malta masala eat.

It was fine. I kind of woke up thinking, oh, it’s [00:30:00] just another Walnut. It’s just way off is like four miles away. And it’s, and it’s going the opposite. I actually stuff like that. And I sort of, so tired turn off the alarm, wake up again. I, she was quite close to me. Right. Okay. Maybe we should do something about that.

What do I do? Radio? What’s the boot called? Should I do I, Dan, look outside and see this thing coming towards me. And it’s, I would have thought a lot clearer or a lot faster, but I was so tired. I’d just been asleep for like an hour or something to about four o’clock in the morning. How’s your sat up?

Y and also thinking you think, oh, sorry, they’ll be able to see me. They’ve got a system on board and it tells them I’ve got lights on low semen lights. Didn’t not happen at all. But I managed to get hold of them [00:31:00] on, they moved very last minute when we had not 0.2 miles till impact, which is literally a couple of hundred meters.

And they turned and missed me just so they turned north. So they turned to star board and I turned to Paul and headed south. And yeah, it was called closer. I mean, you’re probably getting at what 0.5 of a mile an hour or not. Yeah, pretty much. I was going between half and one and a half knots, depending on whether you’re on a wave.

And they were going at like 10 knots. And then just comply and buy. And then you’ve got the week afterwards as well, and I’m completely, side-on, it’s pitch black and you kind of blinded by this thing. And it’s like, wow. When you’re also like, my heart’s beating so fast because I’m, am I going to die?

Do you do a, do you sort of have that, [00:32:00] but when you don’t know whether something is going to happen or, you know, you don’t want to pretend like you are, what if I’m just being daft and, you know, it was just a bit of a weird one. I just don’t know how to take the situation. Cause also it’s quite prolonged.

Like there was time and so that I’ve got time to think, but I need to think correctly, this is really important. And it’s a bit of a strange one. Yeah. What would you say that was a biggest near miss? Because I remember listening to Ben Fogel and James crack nails, a little, little trip. It’s not really that little rowing across the Atlantic and you know, you capsize.

All sorts was, was that the worst or did you have other other moments? So I did have a cup size as well. I kind of had two, one was I was on deck and I just went for an accidental swim that didn’t really bother me a little bit. I was a little bit sort of like shaky. It was just a bit of an [00:33:00] adrenaline, but then the second one.

Yeah, by that point. You’re so in tune with the boat, you can feel what’s okay. What’s not okay. So this first light cup side of those that’s fine. But then the second one, when I was in my cabin and it was asleep again, it was like four o’clock in the morning. And I went the whole way around and it got bounced off the ceiling, bounced off the side and it really hurt.

Like, and that was the one that I thought we argue. Maybe it wouldn’t be okay. I thought, have I lost anything that was on deck of, I lost my life after philosopher calls. I really hurt my elbow. I’m pretty sure we like broke. Cause I walked it so hard on some safety glass, on a bunch of monitor screen, and then swelled up.

I couldn’t bend it to be able to row, but I was too, I was two days out, [00:34:00] so it wasn’t too bad. Well, it was, I think that would have been the worst if I was actually outwards in, I still had long time to go. But because I was so close to shore, I didn’t mind, well, obviously I did it really hurt and that was my poor boat.

We nearly made it. But yeah, that was sort of, I think if that had happened in the middle of the sea, that would have been a lot worse. I space on those last two days you were sort of running on adrenaline. You, you knew that you were close, so you sort of knew your time at sea was coming to an end. Then you just had two days to sort of push through the pain barrier and get to the.

Yeah, pretty much. And that’s what happened and to be fair, the reason I capsized because the smell was a big, the, I didn’t actually really need to row for the next two days. Anyway, I had to [00:35:00] be awake to make sure that I was staring in the right direction, but it was such bad weather. I only really needed to row for the last day to make sure that I could get him book a hard, like 24 hours recovery time after the cup size anyway.

So it was okay. And at that point I didn’t, I knew I was going to arrive it on Saturday. I didn’t care what time or anything like that, you know what, why don’t I make it I’ll make it. I just wanted to come in on a weekend and that’s, and I still was even if I didn’t row. So it was fine. I needed that last, that like day to sit there and take everything really in, you know, I don’t need to be rowing.

I can just, I’m a mom. I mean the ocean until he is just over there. Let me enjoy and savor on, watch this on. Is that properly? Let me not play any music and let me just absorb this world. Which yeah, whilst, obviously start by [00:36:00] going, oh my arm off. I forgot that that really hurt. It was sort of a magical about the last few days.

Yeah. You sort of had time to reflect. Yeah. Before I then go massively with media covers and people suddenly a lot of people. And after what? 70 days seeing no one, you suddenly surrounded by crowds and all sorts. Yeah. Well, what was, what was the feeding like when you came into the bay and you could see. I why she family probably want there because of COVID as well.

So because you can say I needed somebody. I was that with no money and no phone that was working either you know, clothes. So I needed to have somebody to be there basically. And it was elite athlete, so you could get away with having one person. [00:37:00] Okay. And so, yeah. What was the feeling like when you wrote in again, it was a little bit like the star.

It was the most amazing while sort of thing, but there was so much else to worry about. So I. Was I panic. And again, I’ve not seen alarmed in such a long time and suddenly you see land. And that’s the one thing that I’m really scared of on a boat, because I always feel that you’re so small. You’ve had the ocean suddenly this alumna and five meters away is way too close.

Actually, you’ve got to be five meters to be able to get in through the Harbor. And there was so many with the boats around so much noise and so many things. Telling me instructions, especially somebody that I didn’t know was that I don’t wanna listen to you. I’m listening to you, whereas [00:38:00] people I know and I trust and, and then it’s right.

Okay. W have I finished yet? I have a finished one. Person’s telling me that I finished. And then when I put that person said to me that I’ve not finished until the head they come and go off, and then it was, oh, well, don’t do as many have made it. I was that. Right. And it says, oh, do another two strokes, do another Trish ropes and then a male, what was going on?

I don’t know. And then I held the flares. I was like, yay. Celebrate the birth of harm. Really Bartley’s was in so much pain. And then I’m still, my biggest concern is go and I can see he’s drifting towards rocks. Again. I’ve got to get back on the doors of this is I can’t be, it, it felt like a hun until I was on land.

I hadn’t made it. Our goal wasn’t safe and you’re so reliant. You’d been relying on just yourself so wrong that as soon as there’s help there, I don’t know how to access. And it was just a bit of a strange one. And so the finish was [00:39:00] absolutely magical, but also the most stress stuff ever beaten because it’s quite an important thing.

And I remember I lit the flare. I don’t know, I’d never left LA ever, not like that in a way. And I pulled the flat top off and I just launched it because for some reason I thought that was going to be hot. It wasn’t. So I just took this top out to see anyone I was holding. I was raising money for a cleanup, the oceans charity I’ve just been witnessed.

And then this, then this flat burned 100 good. Feel it better. I thought I’ve got to throw it, throw it in a thought. You can’t be seen to throw the entire flame as well into the sea to get pulled on. Jasmine, just hold on. And literally melted my hand away. Like it was just stressful. It was really stressful.

I can’t say it was the most enjoyable thing, but also it was because you had made it, you know, so thirsty, you get to land and there are a [00:40:00] lot more belief. Like when you put a mask on your

food, please. Yeah, it was, it was, they depends on the day when I’ll look at it and think about it, whether it was the most wonderful thing ever or actually the worst thing ever. Because I think that was also the last day. I probably rode my boat and it was emotional and. Yeah, it’s just a weird one. I think it had every single feeling you could possibly have.

How in one, and what do you think the sort of lesson that you sort of took from these 70 days about yourself? Cause you, as you, as we said earlier, you mean you want a rower before you had this goal and you went out and achieved it and like unbelievable. But like probably before you probably learnt so much about yourself.

Yeah. [00:41:00] I think,

I don’t know. I spent a lot of the time clearing out my brain. So I had a much clearer vision of life I wanted. And that was sort of the biggest thing that I learned was actually, I needed to have no distractions. You need to have a focus. And so, yeah, I had to focus on the finish line, but I needed to focus every single day.

I needed to know that today I was gonna do this. Even if it’s the smallest thing, even if I was going to eat something, that’s a big thing. If I was going to clean the boat, if I, if the biggest achievement of the day was to sleep, I knew that to not feel like I wasn’t achieving anything, I needed to have the smallest little goal and take everything step by step.

And I think for me, that was like, sort of what I learned about myself is that as long as [00:42:00] you’re, you’ve got to do. Everyday. Like, I would really annoy me if I didn’t make miles. I was, I like, but it’s fine because you’re still achieving it. No, no, no. It doesn’t matter if you don’t move today, as long as you’re doing this.

And I find that in our everyday life now, as long as I’m doing something that is going to help towards the end goal of having a good life if you do nothing all day, right? I don’t feel accomplished. I need to do something. And I found that that’s better for my sort of mental state as well to know that, but not make excuses for yourself.

Don’t think, oh, I needed to do nothing today. Again, you know, it’s actually learning what your body needs is what I don’t, cause I’ve never been. So in tune with myself, I never paid any attention to sort of like when I needed to go to the loop, you know what I mean? And suddenly I paid attention to that.

I don’t, it just happened. [00:43:00] I ended up being, yeah, I know. I understand myself on my mentality quite a lot more. I think when you, as you say, when you’re doing these trips and you have so much time to think, because every day is very sort of simple when you break it down, it’s, you know, get up, eat row, sleep, eat row, repeat.

It’s almost like a t-shirt. And you have so much time to sort of think in that soil, it’s like almost like a sort of form of meditation, which you used can sort of do over 70 days. And I think you learn so much about yourself, your character, just how strong you are mentally. Whereas before. It’s quite difficult to sort of figure that out sometimes.

Yeah. It was strange that I needed such a big thing to make me understand myself. Like I [00:44:00] think other people are quite lucky that they sort of know, like they, they know why they think a certain way or why they do certain things or what they really want. Just in life. I’m quite a, whatever I don’t really care.

And then it sort of changed on the ocean. Become a lot more self-aware. Yeah, good. I mean, it’s an absolutely incredible story and just an incredible achievement as well. Any, anyone here raise across the Atlantic, it’s just especially doing it solo as well. It’s just a phenomenal achievement.

Yeah. I feel like, I feel like that maybe one day, how does it feel to you?

I don’t know. It just it’s what I wanted to do. And so I did it, you know, it’s [00:45:00] yeah, I feel like for me, it was just sort of, what does my achievement, that’s more I managed to do. And I knew that that’s what I wanted to, I knew I’d make it so same. Like. I think it’s quite a personal, like the word you just said phenomenal.

They can maybe not asked for me, but maybe somebody else, like you say any round, like let the Africa, Kenya, Kenya, same thing like that. That is phenomenal. That’s like amazing. And I’m like, I would probably be more proud of doing that then. Well, my own thing. Well then I’m sort of quite similar on yours. It was something I wanted to do.

And in my mind, I don’t see it probably because you’ve sort of done it as a big deal because it’s, as you say, you sort of, it’s something I wanted to do. It’s something that every day I got up and just ran and probably like [00:46:00] you every day you got up and row and at the end, it’s an, it’s a great sort of feeling of achievement, but it’s something you don’t think too much about.

Yeah, it’s a strange one. I’m just like, it’s just a story for me. I don’t necessarily see it as an achievement. I just see it as something to talk about the story, like something interesting. Well it’s a great story.

Good. Well, I mean, it’s been absolutely incredible listening to the story of yours and thank you so much for coming on and sharing it. There’s a part of the show where we ask the same five questions to each guest each week which is the first being. What’s the one gadget that you always take with you on your adventures.

[00:47:00] It would be a camera. I like to take a camera, but then again, off the time of the photo of cool things. Yeah, I don’t, I’m not really a budget person cause I travel quite lightly, but it would have to be a calmer phone. Probably it’d be somebody just take a picture there, there is something to be said, like when you have these incredible moments of just a being in the moment and sort of appreciating it, which is usually what happens, you sort of capture the sort of minor details, but then suddenly when something incredible comes before you, you sort of just stop and take it all in and don’t capture that incredible moment.

But it’s it’s with you all the time. Yeah. It’s that? I find that just having like a photo, it wouldn’t tell you anything really. Like somebody could look at it. Oh, well, that’s nice. But like, no, it’s so much more than that. It puts me [00:48:00] back in a moment to really have something. You know, it’s the, yeah, I don’t, I don’t think I even dependently eventually gadget, I would probably need, would be GPS.

Cause I kept lost quite a lot. That’s the most necessity one for me, but yeah, be a camera is the most desired desirable one. Your favorite adventure or travel book? Ventral travel book a month. I really

well, this is getting really like, I really liked four-stage Lee. So his first book art of resilience was quite. Well, not quite on the fact that it was swimming as well. Like I, to me, that just sort of screamed out like cool, but [00:49:00] I’m also, I don’t understand how we can do it. So it makes me think about how do you physically do even make everything sound so easy.

And it’s one that I think should have much more, like, turn that I put you. Can’t just say that you then just went into the gym and put on this much muscle in kilos. How can you, how can you do that? So I just find it fascinating, something that I can read over and over again. And it’s got everything in it.

It’s got science mentality adventure swimming, perfect combo. Why are adventures important to you? Because. It gives people life. Like it gives me life. And it’s it’s stories. I like to be able to talk to people and have something, the smallest thing that reminds you of a time or something funny that [00:50:00] happened.

Everything can, it makes things relatable. Like you have an adventure and suddenly you can be talking to anybody. And you find something that, you know, you can, you adventurous taught you about either listening to that conversation or being able to join into it. And it’s yeah, I think it’s really important.

Just to get outside, to build up confidence and it’s of food. I like having fun. I like things that cool. Like adventures are cool. You can’t Harbor when cool adventure. Yeah. NA very tree. What about your favorite quote or motivational quotes? So there was one that was from the first guy that rode Argo my boat.

This is his quote is be stronger than your excuse. Well, I sort of changed [00:51:00] that when I was running a little bit, be stronger than my excuse, but I don’t have an excuse. How can I be stronger than might have chiefs? Well, I don’t have one. It’s sort of, I remember thinking about it quite a lot thought, right?

Don’t give yourself an excuse and then if you happen to get one, be stronger than it, and it’s sort of broke it into two paths. And so I don’t really know whether that was a quote. Don’t give yourself an excuse and then if you do, because you know, we’ve all got a other form out and then be stronger than it.

You know, if you can’t be stronger, Oh, well, you have informed not quite loud, but yeah. Be stronger than your excuses, the official one. And you can adapt it to whatever you feel like. Oh, very nice. People listing. Oh, sorry. That was done by mark slops. Yeah. Yeah. You could slightly change it and have it by yourself almost.

Yeah. [00:52:00] Don’t give yourself the excuse Jasmine Harrison. But if you do become mark people listening are always keen to travel and go on these grand adventures. What’s the one thing you would have recommend for people wanting to get started? Going on, to be honest, I wouldn’t recommend. Anything because it, mate, you’ve got to make it yours.

It’s got to be your adventure. So for me, whenever I’ve done any traveling and all gone to like a random country being a park lightly I’ve just gone to the cheapest place. Like, and I’ve always been determined. The, I want to look for something cool. Like I don’t care as long as it’s cool, but that’s because that’s what I’m into.

Like your adventure is it’s very personal. I think that’s a really personal thing. And so it would actually be don’t listen to anybody and their advice, because the advice that I got given was to [00:53:00] wear seasickness patches, but I look what happened and it ended up making me blind and going in circles and I lost three days worth of Rowan.

So, oh yeah. Don’t forget hallucinating. I ended up seeing people that want the, so I think biggest advice is follow your path rather than listening to others, because all of them, something like that, maybe one other person wants to, but it’s not quite the same, you know, it’s never the same if you’re exactly trying to copy something.

I think people are always trying to go for us, you know, something unique and in the world of sort of exploration, it’s very difficult to find something that’s unique to you. And so by creating your own sort of adventure, whether it’s you rowing across the Atlantic. You know, you can create it and you have your own experience from it.

Your experience is completely unique to you. No one else is going to [00:54:00] have that experience. And so by doing it, you, I don’t know, is this making sense? I’m not sure you create your, your own sort of story to tell. Yeah, I think in on what you’ve just said is don’t force an adventure either. Like it should be for me anyway, I took me so long to decide to definitely do it.

I’ve got to, if it’s going to be a big thing, something that’s going to really mean a lot and make a big impact in your life. Don’t take it lightly. It’s going to be. Sort of, you got to know your mind, so don’t do it because somebody else told you to, or because somebody else did that, what do you read reborn?

And that’s what you’ve got to go for it, but also you can turn anything into an adventure. Like you just can’t. If you want to turn going to the shops into an adventure, do it, you know, [00:55:00] he come, how would you recommend doing that? How fun do you know my favorite? I’m not, I’m not aware to sit in other people’s trolleys

and see what they do, push you along and just go, you know, it was just fun and you meet people and and that ends up in an adventure and you don’t know what’s going to happen. Like they might be like, oh, nice to meet you. And you’ve got friend dress up. Like this was the one during like, lockdown with, to dress up really smart, to go to.

To gates late Tescos or whatnot, dress up in black tie. And just to go do your shopping, it’s your one, one day out for the week or something, but that’s an adventure you can, yeah, you can do what you want. Yeah. It’s so funny. So funny. So funny finally, what are you doing now? And how can people follow you in the future?

[00:56:00] So, At the moment. I I’m at the start of putting together a new adventure challenge thing for next year. It sort of in the very early stages of planning so much so that when I explained earlier about the, I never told anybody for the first six months, because otherwise it just went crazy. I’m not ready for that yet.

I can’t answer enough questions. So I’m planning on doing something next June over the whole of summer. And the best way to follow is social media. My name is Jasmine Al Harrison and it’s Durham. So literally mark at the moment on Twitter, on Facebook, but that was my team named for the rowing, but I think I need to change it.

So then I are me rather than my team name for row. So yeah, you’ll find me on Jasmine. Oh yeah. [00:57:00] So what is this big thing next? Top secret. There is something that’s swimming related, something swimming related, because I think if I can have never rode before then those 3000 miles and get a world record from suddenly being on call podcasts like this, then what, what could I do with something I actually don’t my entire life.

And I know that I’m fairly, you know, where could that take me? So that’s, that’s the plan or is Yes paperwork in, man. I’m not very good at it. I’ve not been, I’ve not been like a home to be able to actually like laptop repair. Right. That’s just more for a long time. You find yourself scouting, Google maps quite a lot.

Yeah. I love it. I’ve got a special notes folder, which is just full of places that I need to go and tick off the list and I get really sort of, you get a day and you think, Ooh, let’s go take off another [00:58:00] thing. No. Okay. You need to focus on, you need to think about your plans. What do you want to do now? But I’m always describing this.

Like people say, how would you close these places and all of that and all right. I’m like, I have like an internal, like human version of cookies that when you hear something, it just sticks in your head, in your pickup, everything that is something outdoorsy or like adventurous or an edgy sort of place to go.

I don’t know. It’s certainly a comment. And I don’t know. Can’t just go. I couldn’t tell you, like, if I tuned into something like, oh, let’s tune into running, you know, suddenly I’ll pick up all of these running groups into my head, but I don’t, it’s all do something different and it swarms me, you know, I’m just walking around all the, like, you know, your phone listens to you.

It’s like me listening to the things you pick up stuff. Everyone’s convinced the pain is listening. Oh, it is definitely it’s. You have a of chat about fishing with your [00:59:00] father or something. And then Sunday it’s like, Hey, do you want to go fly fishing next week? Well, nicely. So it’s daft to saying near the guy.

So my, my my friend’s dog had an accident is now on like he’s got stabilizes, but the bark. And when she said, oh, we’re going to have to find a new hydrotherapy place where, because it shortened down and genuinely the next day I had a hydrotherapy advert for a place to take your dogs to. And I was just that, like, that was, I’ve only seen that once.

And that was literally the next day and not seen it yet. And I’d never seen it before. Right? Well, that’s clearly been listening to us.

Well,

all right, Jasmine, I can’t thank you enough for coming on. It has been absolutely incredible listening to your story and can’t wait to see what this big adventure next year is with this. [01:00:00] Yeah, well, we’ll see. It should work. It should go out. It’ll be fine. Just need to get a little bit. But yeah, it’s just been an incredible story and thank you so much for coming on and sharing it.

No, if I gave thank you for inviting me, have a me and also chasing me up about it because being quite useless just even looking at my phone to post, well, that is it for today. Thank you so much for watching and I hope you got something out of it. If you did hit that like button and subscribe, if you haven’t already, and I will see you in the next. [01:01:00]

John Horsfall Podcast

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John Horsfall (Adventure Athlete)

Marking the 1 year anniversary of the Podcast, in this episode I talk about my trip running 27 marathons across Kenya in a month and the extraordinary time I had doing it. Running through Tsavo National Park, meeting Vice Presidents and having a gun put to my head. This story was an adventure like no other, showing the very best of what Kenya had to offer.

For people new to the Podcast, I’m John Horsfall Adventure Athlete and host of The Modern Adventurer Podcast. I have spoken to amazing people over the last year and I thought having heard so many wonderful stories, I would share one of mine.

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Transcript of our Conversation

John Horsfall 

[00:00:00] John Horsfall Podcast: This podcast is going to be a bit different. So today marks the one year anniversary of the podcast and it has come so fast from exactly a year ago. I was in this room talking to Charlie Walker about his incredible experience cycling for years around the world. And over the course of the year, I have spoken to so many incredible adventurers and explorers with amazing stories to tell, and I hope you have enjoyed it, but this episode is going to be a little bit different.

It’s me talking about one of my trips and this is just one of my stories from back a few years ago, when I decided. To run 27 marathons in a month across Kenya. It’s what one of my friends described as the stupidest idea he had ever heard of the idea was simple, though. It was [00:01:00] to run from Mt. Elgon on the Ugandan border to Khalifa on the Kenyan coast, a distance to say of running from here in London to Paris, and then turning around and coming back again.

Why did he think this was such a stupid idea? Well, partly because I really wasn’t much of a runner. In fact, I’d never run a marathon before in my life. And now I was proposing to run 27. In a month in the heat of Africa, solo and unsupported. It also didn’t help that I hadn’t given myself that much time to prepare.

They say to run one marathon, you need about six months to sort of prepare your body for it. I, on the other hand had given myself three months. To train for 27 marathons. And then there’s a fact that I just accepted a new job offer and I’d have to explain to them that one month after starting my [00:02:00] job, I was going to have to take two months off or seven weeks to go and run across Kenya.

So yeah, in hindsight, it probably. A pretty stupid idea, armed with very little knowledge and let’s say a backpack full of assumptions. I quickly learned on day one. What a quick Google search would have told me was that Kenya and the north is not very flat. I plan to start a Mt. Elgon on the Ugandan border, which at an altitude of 2,500 meters is.

Higher than any European ski resort. The scenery was beautiful. It had this sort of big rolling waves of Hills, beautiful green forest and farmland and these sort of dusty roads. However, it wasn’t exactly the easiest place to do your first marathon. Every step I took was either going steeply uphill or very steeply down.

It also, I remember at the time [00:03:00] it was actually quite a dodgy area. A friend of mine had given me like a report on the sort of safety of the area. And it was quite a dodgy area. I, it was some sort of tribal dispute between the tribes up there. And I, I can’t even tell you, so with this, I had to be escorted for the first 20 kilometers, but despite all this things started really well.

I had people waving to me. I had children running beside me. I even had some guys stop and sing to me.

to this day. I still have no idea what he was singing about. However, trying to complete your first marathon or ultra marathon on a mountain was hard. And it really was, the first day was really tough. And then the second day I had to get up and do another 60 kilometers [00:04:00] because I had talked about doing this.

To everyone, I suppose, the nations of slightly over promising and under-delivering set in. And I probably felt that I might have bitten off more than I could chew. Another big challenge at the start was the food sitting at home in England planning this trip, I would sort of look on Google maps and, you know, pinpoint different areas to look at and see that I could maybe stop it at village.

And this. To find lunch or things to eat. However, up in the north, in these towns, it’s not exactly overflowing with nice restaurants or supermarkets when I got up there and I was sort of running along when I got to these towns, which had earmarked, it’s like, okay, you stop here for lunch. They were nothing more than a wooden heart with avocados and bananas.

And so to run all [00:05:00] day on just an avocado or a banana was really challenging at the start at the spy tool that I soon got into some sort of rhythm getting up early each morning, running all day, staying in sort of hotels and lodges. It helped that there were such amazing things to look out while I was running people.

People think that sort of Africa. Really dry, dusty place, but a lot of it is beautifully green passing through the countryside on thirt. What’s an amazing experience, you know? If I was just in a car, you’d be going along it sort of 60 miles an hour, whizzing past all these little villages and towns. And they would just be a sort of blur in the background.

But on third you actually got to experience the sort of real Kenya in a sense, you got the smells, the sort of taste, the people he, you sort of met along the way. I remember on the seventh day when I just ran about 30 [00:06:00] kilometers in the morning. I was absolutely knackered. And so I lay under a tree to get some rest just around the sort of mid day sun.

And as I lay there, some kids started sort of crowd around me. There wasn’t very many, it was probably eight or 10, but they didn’t want doing anything. They would just stare at it. I didn’t really know how to sort of interact with them. And after a while I just got up and started walking and running on or jogging on and they began to follow.

And when I turned around that group of eight had suddenly become. 20. And they were laughing and giggling as they sort of ran behind me. I got chatting to them while I was running and they kept wanting to Blake pinch my, my arm and pull my hair. I wasn’t sure if they’d ever seen like a white person up in, up close before in person, they asked me to come and see the school.

And I was like, well, [00:07:00] Hey, you know, I’ve got no. 30 40 kilometers to cover today. Your school is up on that hill two kilometers on my way, but Hey, why not? This is, these are the sort of moments that. These sorts of trips. Incredible. And, and so I took the detour up to their school, but when I got there, there were hundreds of children there shouting , which is white person in Swahili.

And there they were. And now I had sort of a hundred kids wanting to sort of touch me and pinch my skin. Well, one of the teachers came to me and sort of asked if I wanted to be shown around the school. And I, of course accepted, I mean, I’d been running through these sort of villages with mud huts. And this school was really modern.

It was very glass. Like it look completely out of place in the middle of the sort of Kenyan countryside. You know, this, this [00:08:00] building wouldn’t have been. Anything different from something you might see in central London? After I had sort of spoken with the teachers and said my goodbyes to the kids I carried on a special day was the day I visited lay work children’s orphanage in the Eldoret district.

It was about the halfway point between Mt Elgon and Nairobi. One of the reasons I undertook this project was to raise money for the children’s orphanage there. And. Running through it made the whole experience really sort of special, you know, seeing where the kids lived and the amazing work that Phyllis K9 does up there for the children made the whole experience.

Really personal. I mean, there were a lot of times where things were really tough for me on this trip. And having that in the back of my mind really sort of inspired me to sort of carry on to the, gave me the strength to always keep going, no [00:09:00] matter how tough things got. So for the first week or so things went well, surprisingly, well, don’t get me wrong, like running every day.

Pounding against the hard Kenyan roads was really tough, but I, you know, I was sort of getting up and doing the distance and it seemed to, it seemed to work fine, but. Then on day eight, things started to go really badly for me. I had a sort of pain in my left calf. My right quad, I think had a dead leg.

And I remember turning in off the road onto a dirt track and then spraining my ankle. I rest it up for the night, but I didn’t really have much choice. I had to sort of just carry on, say strapped it up and. Kept doing the miles, the dead leg eventually went, but my left calf [00:10:00] just caused me agony for the rest of the trip.

And just when I was caping with my leg, I reached the town of lake element titer, which is this beautiful lake, which is between the Kourou and NAI Basha. And when I was there, I was staying with his family. He decided to take me to. What do you call it? And they are trauma, which was their favorite restaurant was like a barbecue shack in town where food so fresh.

They were like chickens running under your feet. And I remember as the food arrived in front of me, I think it was check-in and go out and maybe beef. And I can just hear my father’s words to me before I left with whatever you do, just do not eat the street food or the street meat, but, but doing marathon after marathon, you are like a sort of ravenous, Labrador.

You are so hungry. And so you just heard. [00:11:00] Anything that is put in front of you, which is exactly what I did. And just, just to prove my father, right. I got food poisoning really bad. I was throwing up all night. And I don’t think I need to go into too much detail about anything else. But then in the morning when I got up, I tried to hide the fact that I was ill.

And then as soon as I said, good morning, I was thrown up again. But any same person. Would have just decided to stay in bed, recover, try and get better. I had a target. I wanted to complete this trip in under a month and that’s basically what I needed to do. So I got up with no food and decided to run another marathon, but covering that distance that day was one of the toughest days I ever had.

So many times I would look over my shoulder and think, God. I should go back, but in my [00:12:00] mind it was just telling me, just keep doing another two kilometers. Just do another kilometer finally. I mean, when I got to know basher, I was actually surprisingly, okay. I think I was just completely high on adrenaline or something, but I still hadn’t eaten anything all day.

And someone had very kindly put me up for the night. And as I sort of came into that house, there was like draw off in with its head in the house and sort of, soon as it saw me, he got a complete fright and ran off, but seeing stuff like that certainly made me feel that was a reason to sort of go on.

However, the food poisoning stayed with me. And then the following day, I was meant to run 55 kilometers up the escarpment. But after nearly. Well, 24 hours, 36 hours of eating nothing. I, I had no energy to sort of even just about get [00:13:00] out of bed. So I spent the day recovering, not the best guest, but I spoke to a doctor who he told me that my legs were severe shin splints and his, his advice was really simple.

It was stopping. It’s only going to get worse. I obviously thanked him for his advice and completely ignored it. I’m not gonna sugar coat what the days were like getting to know Raby they were really dark one for me. And for quite a lot of time, I didn’t really see any light at the end of the tunnel with little or no food to sort of go on my sugar levels plummeted and.

I just fell into a completely, utterly depressed state, just questioning every single step, why I should go on, but reaching Nairobi gave me a real boost. It was the halfway point between the start and the finish. But as you [00:14:00] probably imagine, I was in really rough shape by then. And when I arrived in Arabia to be greeted by a friend and their flatmate who I had met two weeks ago.

Open the door and was just like, can I help you? But she didn’t even recognize me. I’d lost so much weight. And then running an authority was also really intimidating. You had gone through the last two weeks running in the countryside and suddenly you were contending with buses and mater cycles. And just so many people.

But it was a bit of an adrenaline rush. Another memorable experience came on my way out of Nairobi. When the former president of Kenya had got wind of my story and reach out and wanted to see if he could help. I wasn’t really sure what to expect. I, he said, you know, come over to my office and I was sort of expecting a handshake and a pat on the back and sort of well done [00:15:00] and bear in mind.

I, I have no clothes other than my running stuff. So I had to turn up in my running gear with all these suits. And when I got there, he shook my hand and then sort of told me about my experiences. And then Sunday, Well, let’s go meet the media. I was sort of expecting, you know, the local paper with sort of school, boy doing a little piece or something, but no, this was full Blaine conference with every single TV station, print media there, you know, and I’m sitting up right next to him and without hesitating, he just goes, John, why don’t you tell them what you do.

And I was like completely speechless and try to sort of what’s the word string, a few sentences together about what I was doing and why [00:16:00] I’m like, just couldn’t help, but maybe wish I. Sort of brushed up a bit on a speech or something. If I had known after Nairobi, things continued to be really tough. I was taking a lot of painkillers for my leg sort of questioning like how long I’d be able to go on for.

I was still, I was still doing sort of 40, 50, 60 kilometers every day approaching the. The it’s the scenery started to change it. The altitude dropped and it became a lot hotter and drier, not the sort of lush green that I’d had in the north. As I approached to Saba national park home of the man-eating lines of DeSalvo for anyone who knows the story, I thought I would inquire about what I needed to run through a park in a, if the.

Two weeks. It taught me anything. It’s maybe the lack of preparation had cost me a little bit. So I decided to cool. What, who I believe might be the [00:17:00] sort of head of the park and asked him if I needed like a knife or a gun to sort of run through the park. He sort of laughed at me basically implying that I’d be absolutely fine running through the park by myself.

So I was like, great. And though, so the next day I got up at 5:00 AM crossed into DeSalvo national park and started running and I’ve got 25 kilometers before suddenly this land driver pulls up next. Winds down his window and they just stare at me intently and then go, what are you doing? I I’ve had to explained to them like, oh, well, you know, I’m running cross country.

And I thought I would. You know, run anyway, they just say, they look at me like I’m a complete idiot and they’re just like, get in the band. You’re not allowed. So [00:18:00] they take me back to where I start and they say that I have to be escorted to go and run through the park. So for that day, I just inquiring about who I can get.

And luckily I managed to organize. Escort for the following day at sort of 10 o’clock the following day, I had a land Rover with four Rangers armed with AK 40 sevens going along beside me, as I ran through the park for 50 or 60 kilometers. Going at, I don’t know, five, 10 kilometers. And I mean, so slowly, I just felt so sorry for them.

Unfortunately, on my trip, I, as I ran through the park, I didn’t see any sort of majestic elephants roam past me or see us sort of line on the rocks, but. I think the only scale was like a sort of Babin. He would let me [00:19:00] pass. And so I had to sort of cross the road to get to the other side and a bit boring, but my, probably much to the relief of my escort that Nathan’s will fight on that day.

So throughout my trip, I have had like the most incredible experiences, real tough times, but. Another really interesting moment came on day 30. So we’re getting towards the end of the trip and it was lunchtime. And I sort of just, and I was sort of running down the road parallel between the train track and as it was being built and the road, and I sort of pulled over to the side and found myself under.

Completely by myself, just about to have my lunch. And as I’m having my lunch, I feel stained start to fall away from the railway. And suddenly out of nowhere, these two armed guards. To the [00:20:00] TIF run down the railway track, pointing their guns straight at me. I am just about to have my lunch. And suddenly I’m told to identify myself guns straight in my face after handing in my ID and sort of telling them what I was doing.

They sort of said that I was probably in the country illegally. And that I could be a terrorist, but then they made me strip my backpack and bear in mind, this is day thirsty and I only have one set of plates, maybe two or three boxes, couple of socks, that’s it. No much else. So they made me strip my bag and like take each piece out.

So one by one, I sort of take out a sock and the gum would sort of raise, take it out. And then they’d be like, what is that? And I’d be like, it’s, it’s a Salk. Put it on the dirt. Right. Then another one, these are my [00:21:00] pants dirty, disgusting. And then pull another thing out and he’d be like, It’s the other Salk.

I mean, I literally had nothing. It was only when all my stuff was on the floor, which they were happy that I wasn’t a threat and slightly lowered their God. And they, they then try to imply that I could have been a terrorist. And I try to explain to them if they’d ever seen a terrorist like me, you know, wearing light crush shorts, running top and a little small back.

They tried to claim that was, but I was a bit stunned by the events, but on day 32, the end was in sight. And the Indian ocean as Iran was there in the distance, like a sort of honeymoon postcard, it was beautiful white Sandy beaches. It was a boiling hot day [00:22:00] and in a blue turquoise water. And. By that point, I’d sort of done a month of pretty much nonstop running and I could hardly stand at that point, but after 1,250 kilometers in 32 days, I ran fully claved into the water.

I’d lost sort of six kilograms in weight. My legs were just getting worse and worse by the day. And I did look a bit of a mess, like some sort of crazy beard bearded. It was a great relief to know I had finished. In a strange way. It was also kind of sad because although this run had been incredibly challenging, it also been like a life changing experience, every little interaction along the way, whether good or bad with the truckers, the policeman just kept me going to sort of see what was around the corner.

[00:23:00] There wasn’t so much a fear of failure, but a fear of missing, like the next big thing along the way. And although this was a solo and supported journey, I never felt alone running across Kenya. The generosity of the Kenyan, people who didn’t have a lot to sort of give, would come, go out of their way to sort of show me what Kenya was all about.

You know, they would be running with me, give me food to eat, give me a place to stay. And they would just sort of go out of their way to sort of help and support me. But the biggest lesson I learned was probably about myself. Don’t get me wrong. Like waking up. I can’t tell you how torturous it is to wake up every morning, knowing that you’ve got another marathon ahead of you.

But I realized that endurance is more mental as it is physical sport. And I could always keep going, even as my body [00:24:00] was just slowly over the days, breaking down. As long as I had the willpower to keep going, I, I always Curt. So if there’s one thing maybe I want you to sort of take home from this tool is that there are no shortcuts to Alation.

Anything works, shearing. I mean, I think we’ve talked on this podcast before is gainer require you to suffer just a little bit because otherwise I don’t think it’s really worth doing when I was probably at my lowest, my lowest dab. And this was in between Natasha and Nairobi. I mean, I was in the middle of Kenya.

I was say depressed, but I got a message from one of my Instagram followers. You’ve given me sort of a message of support. I read a quote on our page that I suppose stayed with me throughout and sort of became, I didn’t know [00:25:00] the sort of feeling that I had throughout the trip is that. Success is not final failure is not fatal.

It is the courage to continue that counts.

And that’s sort of what this trip was all about. It wasn’t, I wasn’t getting any metal for, I never wanted it. It was the sort of experience and to sort of feel like I could just keep going. And there was a sort of feeling that as long as I could keep going and see. That was what I wanted. And as long as I had the courage to continue, then that was what made it.

So that’s my story from Kenya. It was an incredible. And just an experience that I will never forget for the rest of my life. And you know, some of the people I’ve met along the way, you know, I’m still [00:26:00] in contact with now and it’s, it opened up so many friendships and opportunities there. And I’ve just, absolutely.

I look back on that trip. Although my legs don’t look too kindly upon that trip as just such an amazing experience. So on the podcast, I always ask the same five questions to each guest. And I suppose I can’t be any different. What is the one gadget that I would always take with me would be like most is probably a camera.

I think I love photography. I love capturing moments that stay with you and they always joke your man. My favorite adventure book or travel book. I can’t remember the number of times, Lord of the rings has occurred on this podcast, but for me at the moment, it’s a difficult one. But at the moment, I’m reading heat by Serena fines, [00:27:00] which is great.

And after that, I think I’m going to try Megan. Hines is mind. Mind of a survivor, which I think is a fascinating, will be a fascinating read who we had on the podcast just a few weeks, just a few months ago. Next one is, why are adventures important here? I think adventures are important because you learn so much about yourself.

They put you in an uncomfortable situation at the best of times. And through that. You learn so much. And I think it’s a great schooling in terms of full future life. When you are in difficult situations in everyday life, knowing by putting yourself in there. Terrible situations makes you more adaptable to when things go wrong.

That’s probably the best way I can sort of say it. And they’re also great fun. I’d say [00:28:00] think Livia smoker said type two fun. When, when things go. That’s usually when the most exciting and the best stories come from the adventures. My favorite quotes, my favorite Quate is probably that Winston Churchill.

One that I just said success is not final. Failure is not fatal. It is always the courage to continue that counts. But I will say like a confident grave cannot co-exist don’t wait for the storm to past, learn to dance in the rain. I think it’s a great one, which I had quite a few years ago. That’s, that’s always stuck with me throughout.

And finally, what would I recommend for people wanting to get started? Well, it always be start local. There is so much opportunities where I am in the UK. There is an abundance of adventures and I’m sure wherever you’re listening in the world, just around the corner there. [00:29:00] Awesome stuff to be had, and might not get for you the recognition you want, but as a starting place, it is just phenomenal.

And here in the UK, you’ve got where I am in London in a, there are many, many adventures on the river out. See up in the Le in the district. National parks, wherever it is, there are all sorts of adventures to be had. And if you can’t think of anything, take out us the Humphreys walking around the M 25, which is a meter away in the UK, which for anyone listening, who knows the M 25 is just sounds hell on earth, but he managed to have quite the adventure around there.

So. Whatever you can think there’s always adventures to be had. And finally, what is next? What is next is at the [00:30:00] moment, hopefully I am working on a potential documentary. Next year across Europe, where I will be going to some of the most roommates spots. Off the beaten track in Europe to look at sustainable tourism.

And this will be a long documentary with seven other people involved, traveling all over Europe, seeing some of the most phenomenal places which are always off the tourist map. And we will be highlighting these incredible communities and showing a different side to tourism in. I I’ve absolutely loved doing this podcast.

It has been so much fun. And just speaking to some of the most incredible people, most incredible explorers and adventurers out there who are pushing their own [00:31:00] limits of endurance and breaking records along the way. So. I hate paper the next year to be speaking to a lot more people with more incredible stories to tell I’ll probably try.

And because in a, there are people like Nick butters and Lucy shepherd who are out at the moment who have just got back from doing incredible adventures who were on the podcast before, say probably look at doing sort of expedition specials, where they come on and. Just give the story of the expeditions that they’ve been doing.

And if you’ve got any recommendations about who you want to see on the podcast, then please let me know. Cause I. I’m always looking for inspiration. And I would love to hear who you want to hear on the podcast. So I hope you enjoyed this podcast. If you did, please subscribe and follow the [00:32:00] podcast for the future episodes.

You can watch. The podcast on YouTube has always, and it always goes out onto apple, Spotify, Google, whichever podcast platform you listen on, but I see you next week for another fascinating tale of adventure. This time with Jasmine Harrison, he became the youngest female to row solo across the Atlantic.

That will be next week’s episode, but until then have a great day. And happy adventures.

Brendon Prince

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Brendon Prince (Extreme Athlete)

On today’s Podcast, we have Brendon Prince, who became the first person to stand up paddleboard around mainland Britain. He began his circumnavigation in Torquay, Devon, on April 27 and arrived back on September 14. Over 141 days, he covered a staggering 4,203km on his SUP, and he hoped to complete it in 120 days. Unfortunately, winds plagued his journey from the start, and he lost a total of 22 days to the weather.

In completing the expedition, he broke three World Records

1. First person to SUP from Lands End to John O’Groats via the coast.

2. Circumnavigation of Mainland Britain.

3. Longest ever SUP journey approx 3800km.

One of the reasons Prince began the challenge was to raise awareness for water safety, which you can donate to below. We talk about the highs and lows of such a trip and one particular experience where Killer Whales hunted him. Let me know what you think and leave a review of the episode.

Donate here

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Transcript of our Conversation

Brendon Prince

[00:00:00] Brendon Prince: Hello and welcome to the modern adventurer podcast coming up and then paddling. Thinking nothing are there and it’s not no nice night. It’s it’s drizzly. It’s Dre. It’s perfect. Perfect predator condition. So he say, and I’m paddling. And basically an Orca came up behind me and I actually saw was a fishing boat that I just hadn’t heard come up behind me because, and I, I can’t describe just how big these things are in the water and just how tall that finished standing out of the water.

So. Yeah, it actually surprised me so much. I fell off the board and I’m in the water thinking, do I panic and get out or do I just lie there? Interesting. You know, I mean, it’s world. There’s nothing like if it wants me, there’s nothing I can do about it. My next guest is an Adventurer and Teacher and it’s fresh off the board after 141 days Paddle boarding round, great Britain embraced the British weather and had some of the most [00:01:00] incredible experiences on his trip.

Encountering up moments with orchids, where he was thrown off his board and felt like he was being hunted by the Orca whales in Scotland on the podcast today, we talk about some of its incredible experiences and the why and why he did this incredible. So I am delighted to introduce Brendan prince to the podcast.

John, you awesome to speak to you, buddy. I really looking forward to a chat, so yeah. Awesome day. It is amazing to have you on your fresh off the paddle board. Any what? A couple, couple of weeks ago you were round the UK paddleboarding. How does it feel to be off? It’s a funny feeling, isn’t it? Cause it’s something that you kind of.

You dream of ending because that’s part of it. But then when it happens, it’s, I mean, I still feel like I’m on cloud nine. I still feel, you know, being away for four and a half months, 141 days, you lose perspective of a lot of things and [00:02:00] gaining those things back gradually each day is just. Well, for people who don’t know where you are, probably the best place to start before we jump into this incredible expedition that you did.

Why don’t you tell the audience sort of about you and how you got into paddle boarding and this sort of massive adventure? How did it all start? Well, I suppose, I mean, I started teaching water sports when I was 16 and went on lots of different expeditions. Back then it was more about maintenance here in the water as expeditions.

But it’s always been in there. And then you have children and that sort of changes perspective. And I stopped climate and did more and more and more stuff on the water. And then I got my first, I was given a paddleboard in 2007 as a, as a thing to try and you know, lots of people pointed and laughed when they saw me, because he was like, what’s that guy doing?

[00:03:00] Standing on a board and there’s no waves. But. And I’ve been paddling ever since. And it’s always been something that I thought, you know what? I could use this as a tool to have awesome people like yourself, listen to why what my, why is for doing it. So I thought, well, you know what, it’s a guy called Jordan White.

He tried to do it last year. Top guy, good friends. And for lots of reasons, it didn’t achieve. And I thought, well, now we’ll never really let’s give it a go. It’s going to be a slug. It’s one of those endurance events where it’s not just about what I do, but it’s more about how, what I do in the weather.

It’s all about the weather doing something like this. And yeah, 141 days later set a load of world records and got it. Well, yeah, we had Jordan on a F a couple of months back here, as I say, so unlucky with his attempt. But as he said, he he said your [00:04:00] name and said that you were doing this incredible trip.

And you know, such as I say, from, from the beginning, starting in Tor ki, I mean, what was the sort of big reasoning behind. It’s funny, isn’t it? Because that’s the key question that people ask and I’ve got a very big reason for it and that, and I’ve delved into my own mind to say, well, actually, could I have done this where they at that reason?

And I don’t think I probably could have done. I think you have to have a very strong motivation to do this, you know, getting up at four in the morning when it’s freezing cold in Scotland. W I C you know, even in the center, I see stuff on there’s wet. You know, you gotta have a good motivation and to paddle for 16 hours.

So my motivation comes from all about. Prevention of drowning or water safety. We live on an island great Britain, fantastic island, huge coastline, huge amount of inland waterways, but we unfortunately don’t [00:05:00] have the knowledge to support our, our geography and deaths through draining and accidents through draining, rescues through draining are just off the scale and bigger things have got to be done to keep everything in line, to try and do something about this.

And Having taught water safety in schools and as an instructor as well for three decades I’ve, I’ve tried every avenue and it seems that the, the 21st century way of teaching children water safety is to create an app. It’s perfect sense. I mean, let’s get w when they’re on their phones playing a game, but within that game, it’s all about water.

So these things cost a lot of money. So I thought, well, what crazy thing can I do to sort of raise this money and raise awareness and come in and paddling boarding around Britain seemed the obvious choice seen as I was a pilot boarder, I’ve got the experience, I’ve got the knowledge of the water and to put it and like Jordan, you know, I mean hats off to Jordan Wiley because he’s not a [00:06:00] paddling.

And he doesn’t have, you know, he’s water, not a Waterman. And he took the challenge on, which is just incredible. And then I took the challenge on and I got the skills and it was still a massive challenge. So yeah, that was my motivation for those 8 million pedal strokes. Oh God. Wow. And I mean, it is incredible that as you were saying, the why it’s just so important in these events to do, as you say, to get up at four 40.

And put on an icy wetsuit in the middle of Scotland. I mean, we had Sean Conway on, he swam around great Britain and he used the same. He was just like, God, the motivation sometimes when you are just so cold and you put on this IC wetsuit, and it’s amazing that you had that huge, why sort of driving you throughout.

And so for, for an expedition like this. The sort of planning that goes into it, because you must have had quite a decent support team around you [00:07:00] helping you throughout. Yeah. I’m, I’m very proud of our planning. Very proud because we can sit back now and look at it and nothing went. Which I’m sure it was a little bit of luck and there been a lot to do with planning.

So my mission was to not do it with any support on the water. And the reason for that is to prove that with the right skills, the right equipment, the right knowledge, you can actually undertake this. Venture. But I needed obviously a crew or land so that when I came in and that, and that, you know, half that, the problem, half the difficulty of doing what I did was the fact that I was coming in every night.

So you’ve got to smash it through waves. You’ve got to come back in three waves every night to get in. And that they’re the gnarly aspects. So I needed a crew often to guide me, cause I’d be surfing into beaches with massive waves. On a beach I’ve never served in before. I don’t know if there’s there’s hidden rocks or dangerous, so they would [00:08:00] watch for those and died me and signal for those sorts of things.

So, and also prepare my food and a bed to sleep in, in a van, you know, so land crew. So I had Willard, Harry once Will’s a professional video photographer, so he was documentary documenting what we’re doing, and Harry’s just an all round, super legend can turn his hand to anything and, and, and be a problem solver.

So between the two of them, there was. Eyes on the land. And especially, you know, certain parts of England, certain parts of Wales and a lot of Scotland, there’s nothing else. So, you know, and, and this was super important. Some people kind of, and I’ve spoke to some adventures, unfortunately, sadly that have an opinion that if anything goes wrong while we’ve got the RLI or the coast guard to come and save us I don’t view it like that.

I think it’s ultimate failure if you’ve had to resort to that type of rescue, because if we’re the right plan and even the unexpected you can deal with, and I had lots of unexpected, [00:09:00] but through skill and knowledge, you just deal with it to still be safe. And that was when I was trying to prove within the activity.

So Yeah. I mean, it’s a team effort really as a team effort and we’ll Harriet and Zoe and Lucy back at base in torquey where we’re all part of that team. And of course, I’ve got to mention as part of that team, my wife and children who were a big part of that team. Yeah. Because, because you left your wife and kids behind to support you from Tokyo imagines, probably the reason why you started from there as properly.

From cookies, my home turkeys. I can actually see, I could see some of the window now. Exactly what I started and where I finished. Oh, wow. That must be so nice. Yeah, that was part of it really. And I, I mean, I love tool bay. Being at a time within toolbag, I wanted to, to, you know, advertise where I live and the beauty of what I, where I live and put that on it as well, to support the local [00:10:00] businesses, that water business related businesses in Torbay.

And indeed, as I traveled around, you know, having as much interaction with stand up paddle boards, schools, and, and, and water people was, was a massive part of. And so you set off from talkie. Oh, tool bay back in April. And the idea was 90 days, was it? S and I remember you saying that, that was like, if everything went perfect, like the wind, the waves, like the whole, the weather, everything, but it took a little longer.

So what happened. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, the plan was to leave Torbay turn right. And just keep turning right until I came back into tool bay, really simple concept. And my, my. Ideal of 90 days. It was based on the last five years, really of whether we haven’t had a [00:11:00] year’s weather, like, you know, like anything else for a long time.

I’ve got connections with different weather organizations, and they’ve said, you know, the recordings of wind on the, on our coast have just been ridiculous. But what the most important thing about that is when coming from the same direction for two weeks It’s almost unheard of, you know, without it changing.

And the issue is if you’ve got wind coming in your face for two weeks, it’s, you know, it’s ridiculous. It’s crazy. And that slows you up, you know, on a good day, I did 78 kilometers. When I was training back here, you know, I could do a hundred kilometers in a day with the right conditions. And yet I have.

20 days where I didn’t go on the water at all, because the weather was too bad. And I had another sort of 30 days where I did less than five K in a day because the weather was so bad. And, but I might’ve been paddling for 16 hours to do that. 5k, you know, it’s just so [00:12:00] demoralizing. So yeah. Had the weather massively against me in places.

Thankfully then as we got around. John and Dan, the east coast, it was more favorable to make a bit of ground up. But yeah, we completed an a hundred and forty, forty one days, so that’s a good chunk over, but Hey, that’s just the way it is. Sometimes you just got to go, go with it. Never against it. Yeah. I suppose for people listening and who don’t know much about paddleboarding, I mean, I did a.

Expedition in April and you CA you’re going at quite a slow pace. And when the wind’s in your face, it’s almost like a sale dragging you back. Yeah. That’s exactly it. You can show on a good day, I’d be doing eight kilometers an hour, so you can start to see, you know, if you’ve had them for 10 hours, how much, how much distance you can get.

Fantastic on a bad day, I’d be doing. Maybe one and a half kilometers an hour. [00:13:00] So in 10 hours of paddling, you’ve, you’ve, you’ve only gone as far as you can see, you know, it’s, it really is demoralizing and also brutal on the body because it takes 10 times amount of energy to go quarter the distance. Yeah.

And, and, and as you say, demoralizing in your mind, should, you know, Just absolutely nowhere. And you put in all their surfer. Yeah. I mean, there were some places around the coast where, you know, we’ve got big concrete sea defenses or promenades and because the wind was so strong, you trying to hug the coast because trying to get some shelter and often I’d be paddling.

And there was one particular time on the Northwest coast where I was paddling all day. All day. And basically the guy that walked past me cause he was fat much faster than me walking on the promenade in the morning with his dog, went walking again in the evening with his dog. And I was still in that stretch of water.

You know, it would have been so much easy to get out or walk the [00:14:00] beach and it was to paddle that, you know, that was part of the challenge. What makes it all fun. Good. And so I suppose what I suppose when you had the sort of westerly winds. Probably the start was the most brutal. Yeah. Well the Cornish coast corner will then Devin a bit like the Northwest coast of Scotland is different from the rest of our coastline because they always have Atlantic swell coming in.

So no matter what all the local national staff is doing, you know, if there’s a big, is a big storm or a winds and the Atlantic America is it comes this way then actually. So when we were in Devon and cool. You know, we had all the local wins and what that creates and the swell that correct. But then you’ve also got this five meter swell coming in from the Atlantic constantly.

And that fashion smashing the cliffs on top of all the other weather just means sometimes it’s just brutally [00:15:00] dangerous and you just can’t get. And yeah, that’s what we found. And so to start off, you know, in the first 30 days, half the time was sat watching rather than paddling because the weather was just too.

Wow, God. Well, just enormous waves when the hot, the whole nine yards. Yeah. All of that. And you know, there was a tire I’m going, I spent five days waiting, imbued, and the day actually paddled out was, is a 10 foot swell, 10 foot waves coming in there. So for most people, they were like, well, you’re not going out today.

And I said, well, actually once I’m back there, it’s not too bad. I just need to get out there and on a 14 foot ball, that’s never easy. So, you know, to get out there and I manage 10 K that day, but of course, if you got out there, you got to come back in and that can be the really sketchy part of serving massive waves on a 14 foot board trying to protect yourself.

But also the board is if I fold that board, if I damage that board, I’ve got to [00:16:00] still do it on that board. So, you know, you’ve got to be overly cautious to make sure I didn’t snap in half. All right. So you didn’t even have a spare one gain just in case because of part of the record attempt, you have to do it on one board.

So you know, it’s about fixing it. It’s about sorting if you smash it up, but that then means you’ve got a delay. So it was all about just looking after that board because it’s a priority. Absolutely. And so throughout that trip, what were some of the amazing moments from. Well, you got a seven, eight, you know, amazing motion for me personally.

So the days when you do get that 50 K in, in the morning you just fly in, you know, places like the men in straits, in Wales, where you’re doing 35 kilometers an hour places in Scotland where you’re doing, I mean, fastest. Speed was 39 miles and at 39 kilometers an hour, you know, you’re flying along. So [00:17:00] they’re, they’re exhilarating and amazing.

Some of the beaches surfing in, you know, fantastic, but really other than the amazing geography that we’ve got, it’s the, it’s the wildlife that create those magic moments. And there, I mean, I saw everything you know, hundreds of dolphins at one time, 10, 20,000 seals at one time, you know, in different places.

Whales, I saw pilot whales, Minky whales, and of course, killer whales. I saw porth Beadle shark. I saw massive stags, you know, on the beaches in Scotland, you know, watching sea otters play as you paddle past them in all these magic moments, create. Create a big smile on your face for the next 10 hours of pilot.

Cause you’re just thinking about, wow. I’ve just seen that, you know, as I come around a corner. So those moments really the magic ones come. And how close were you to the orcas or the killer whales? Yeah, so I this is just past Cape wrath and it was about seven o’clock at [00:18:00] night. So just started, I mean, there’s Scotland.

It doesn’t get light at that time. Midnight it doesn’t get dark until midnight but it goes that sort of desk issue at seven, eight o’clock and I’m paddling thinking nothing are there and it’s not no nice night. It’s it’s drizzly. It’s gray. It’s it was, it was perfect. Perfect predator conditions.

So we say, and I’m paddling and basically an Orca came up behind me. And I actually saw was a fishing boat that I just hadn’t heard come up behind me because. And I, I, you can’t describe just how big these things are in the water and just how Saul that finished stand out of the water. So proud. Yeah, and it, it, it actually surprised me so much.

I fell off the board and now I’m in the water thinking, do I panic and get out? Or do I just lie there? Interesting. You know, I mean, it’s world, there’s nothing. If it wants me, there’s nothing I can do about it. And I just let it cruise past the other side of my board. And it was like a submarine go by. It was that big.

And [00:19:00] then as I’m climbing back on my board, because I think I’m all good and safe and it’s cruised off another one just came up, brushed past my feet. And you know, that that moment of vulnerability can never be matched on anything I’ve ever done in any, you know, standing on top of a maintain or wherever it might be.

I’ve never felt that sort of. Minuscule that redundant that vulnerable ever. And then I had two more encounters with a back that evening where other mom and babies came to check me out. And then another encounter where they just felt like they were hunting me rather than. Just come in to have a look.

And at that point, I thought, you know what? It was about 10 o’clock at night. I’m getting off the water now because it’s just getting a bit too familiar. So yeah, that was my Orca experience. Amazing creatures. You know, they’ve never harmed anyone in the world, but it doesn’t help your mind from just going crazy.

Cause they’re so big. They’re so big. And if they, they got you mistaken as a seal and [00:20:00] chumped you up, no one would ever know because there’d be nothing left of you. Cause it would be one may fall for these guys. God, well, time to sounds absolutely incredible. Well, I speechless. It was, it was a crazy experience.

And one they’ll always have an, and then people say to me, oh, that’s amazing. Like I want to go up to Scotland and see orcas and, you know, best of luck to them. But I would quite happily never see one again on the water, because as I say, and the vulnerability of it, it’s just phenomenal to understand.

And I, and I encountered other way. When I was at there, the same feeling wasn’t there, you felt they were beautiful things and you were really watching them, whereas the killer whales, you know? Yeah. It’s that vulnerability that a killer whale offers when it’s, when it’s up close and personal. I mean, the adrenaline pumping through you at that time.

I mean, you can almost feel your hearts [00:21:00] through your chest. It is pumping. I mean I must have watched enough documentaries on watching them hunt seals and all sorts. So to actually feel like you were being hunted must have been quite the experience. Well, the last ones that I encountered, I actually saw a big male ahead of me.

Two, 300 meters. Cause you suddenly see the fin come and that in itself is just like takes your breath away and then it’s coming towards you and you think, yeah, it’s all good. He’s just coming to check me out. Just come to see. And it’s getting closer and closer and about 50 meters from me, I thought, well, I’m not going to keep heading at it.

I’m just going to turn off, you know, get bit, bit closer to land. And as I attempted to turn to came in from either side behind me, and you just think that is total predator. You know, if I was a seal, that would be the end of me. And it was at that point that I thought I just, I just, I’m not, I’m not comfortable anymore in this environment.

I need to jump off the water. So within about 20 [00:22:00] minutes, I found an exit pointing. Because in the wild, they sometimes with their prey, they just play with them in terms of like, they, they didn’t sometimes hunt just for the sake of killing. They like almost hunting and playing with them, teasing them to the point of like, I didn’t know, it’s like that.

I don’t know. I don’t know what it is, what they call it in the Y eh, this sort of technical term, but they. I think they sort of do it with great whites as well. They hunt them. They, and everyone’s just sort of, as you say, because probably see what they sort of feel the Mercy’s lovable creatures, but in the wild they are terrifying.

Absolutely. Yeah. I mean, I, up in Scotland, there’s lots of people and you know, all about coach watch seeing where they are and they tell you when they’re about and that sort of thing. And only be like a week earlier was watching some video footage of the seals, [00:23:00] Nia Gianna groups, sorry, the kiddo Wales near Gianna groups.

Close enough that the people could see it happening, but they were literally, as you say, brutally playing with seals and the throwing them around. And I had this blood in the water and you had this image. The only was about a hundred kilometers from where I was when I saw them. And you know, that’s their hunting ground.

They come, they sweep through there and. Nope. The seals, you see, you just think, crikey, you are taking your life in your hands, swimming around this. What do you need to head safe through? It’s safe. But yeah, it’s, it’s a wonderful thing to see in the wild. And so that always stayed with me, but something I don’t want to necessarily repeat well, what an experience and I suppose, well, that was one of your more exciting moments, but.

I mean 143 days, 141 days. Were there any sort of moments of trouble, like experiences where she’d look back [00:24:00] on and think, well, we’re supposed suppose we’ve just had one with the killer whales, but are there any other moments where you sort of look back and think God, that was quite testing? That was quite the day?

Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. And what I mean by that is cause, cause to, to be able to do what I did in. 41 days and 400 kilometers, you have to pretty much go Hedland to Hedland to cut that distance down and end up in Scotland. There are so many thinkers of, of land that you have to try and get. So I call them cross ends and crossings can, may anything from 30, 40 K.

And that can take all day. So your open water, I could be 30 kilometers off land, but you do a huge amount of planning to eradicate any dangerous. You know, you would only do that when you. You’ve got favorable conditions and all those aspects, the only [00:25:00] issue, and this is where knowledge and understanding and ability comes in up in Scotland.

And in other parts of the country, you’ve got things that can change and make weather within 15 minutes. And they are basically maintains and massive concrete you know, cities. So those things can create weather that no one’s planned for. And especially if it’s got and can change within 15 minutes.

And I had two occasions in Scotland where, you know, you read the weather and you can see the signs and it’s changed. And it was one particular time up in Scott. I actually. Saw it or change in his, started heading out further to see, because you’ve got a bit more understanding coverage in open water than being too close to the land.

And I mean, close to land within the first 10, 15 K can be brutally horrible. Because it’s right near it’s on the coast, whereas the weather system can be safer, [00:26:00] further. Right? So I plan, I, you know, I, I spent an hour going further out to sea and this weather system, this storm that had brewed, literally fell off the mountains in Scotland, hit me and I spent six hours basically paddling for your life.

Really. But I knew I had the ability to paddle for that sort of time. And the idea was that in those six hours, I just hold my position as best I can because within six hours I could have been another 50 to a hundred K off eight into the Atlantic, the north Atlantic as well. So not a place you’d want to be.

So for six hours, I just tried the best I can to help holding my position. And pretty much did that given. 10 or 15 K and then of course, once the storm passed and I could see, and I knew it would, those types of storms, you know, they roll through quickly. You just had to paddle in and it still had four hours to paddle after that to try and get into land.

And the beautiful thing about things like this is once I got [00:27:00] in that, that evening and I was destroyed, you know, I was, I was mentally and physically broken off that day. I spoke to my Latin crew and I said, guys, you know, It’s pretty close to dying that to this day, my Lanka are awesome because they just kind of carry on doing what they were doing and sort something out and they just looked up and well said, cool.

What time you in tomorrow now? You know, that’s what I needed. I didn’t need anyone to feel sorry for me, or I didn’t need anyone for for sympathy. I just needed to get on with it. And they were brilliant. They can show that happened. I remember having mark Baymont on and when he was talking about him, Around the world cycle.

He said, if you can just cut out unnecessary things that would sort of let you down. And he said, you know, no one needs to know how I fit. No one needs to ask me how I feel, because I’ll always feel crap, but just sort of be on the planning and say, okay, we need to do this. You don’t have to say, oh, how [00:28:00] do you feel.

You know, after site clean or paddle boarding like yourself for 16 hours, you’re not going to feel that great, but it, but as soon as someone asks you how you feel and you start telling them, then you start to bring yourself down. Whereas if you take that away from it and just focus on the job in hand, then that’s really what you need in that situation.

Because even in your mind, even in your mind, you want to sort of say, oh no, I should, I need to be feeling down and this, but if you have someone there, who’s just like, no, we’re not going down that route. You’re like, okay, great. I need to now focus on tomorrow. That’s exactly it. That’s exactly it. If I think if you articulate the troubles, they go to.

So you don’t and you know, from day one, I never moaned about anything and I always had a smile on my face and people would say, ah, you must be, you must be feeling so tired after that day. And I’d be like, no, no, because exactly that, as soon as you start saying, oh yes, it was really tough. And [00:29:00] you know, it starts to bring everybody down.

So smiley face it, you crack on with it. Otherwise don’t start it in the first place. Or it’s like, someone goes, you know, your knees must be killing and you haven’t even thought about your knees. Oh, yeah. Maybe they are feeling a bit weak at the moment. Yeah. That’s exactly the amount of times people say, oh, your shoulders must be.

You’re like, no, they’re all good. They’re all good. You know what? There’s only one person I mowed too. And he’s up there, you know, not, no one on planet earth would like mode. Exactly. Wow. And so coming into the finishing line, And a talkie and seeing all your family there and everyone that sort of greet you on the beach.

What was the feeling like? I mean, that is the million dollar question in that, you know, I said earlier how I started off by going right to them. They just kept turning. Right. And that last right hand turn into tour bay where suddenly the bay open. And I could see the people on the beach. [00:30:00] I mean, I was joined by a couple of hundred paddle boarders, so they were with me and that really helped to get the strength from them.

Cause I think I would have been on my knees, just you know, the, the emotion of it. But yeah, seeing the pupil on the beach here in the picture of people on the beach and then that last 500 meters paddling in beautiful conditions was something I’ll always remember, you know, always be with me Said, you know, I’ve, I’ve bottled it up and I’ve got bottles of it held that I can just open up in the years to come for sure.

Wow. And, and of course, I mean, this was any, a couple of weeks ago and it must have been quite a Welwyn sort of time for you the last couple of weeks, as you say, speaking to people like myself. And I mean, how is this sort of feeling being you’ve gone from a hundred. 41 days solidly getting up every day to go paddle boarding to subtly resting.

[00:31:00] Yeah. That’s. You have a uniform approach to life. When you’re paddling in that you get up, you eat, you paddle, you eat, you sleep, you get up, you eat you paddle and so on. And that’s incredibly uniform and you get used to that. After about six to 10 weeks, you kind of get used to that. It’s your system. All of a sudden it stops and it, and life is chaotic where there’s everyday totally different and there’s nothing uniform to it.

But I spent a lot of time preparing myself for it on the board. You know, you have 10, I have, I’m an average 10 hours, 15 minutes a day Padlet. So you got a lot of time to think about there. Put things in the boxes that need to be sought your life out mentally and the meditation, some people call it.

I mean, I just, I mean, I don’t know if it’s meditation, but I know that I had a lot of personal time to think about things and within the structure of the thought process because I put a [00:32:00] real structure in place is a lot of what happens next. So I had a lot of things to happen next to actually now I can do.

You know, when you’re paddling, you can’t, you can paddle and asset. There’s nothing else you can do. So it’s actually a really exciting time and I love it. And, and I also cool to just share stories with you and, and people as well, because I never got to share the stories whenever. You know, this, the, the Orca story, for example, I didn’t see any other humans other than whether the Harriet with, for another 10 days, because you just don’t see humans up in Scotland there like that.

So there’s no one to tell. So yeah. You know, to share the stories, relives it in your own mind, relives it in your own body, and that helps it. Yeah, it really does. And you’ve done a sort of documentary. So you did, you sort of keep a video diary of like day-to-day and you know, these sort of moments, because I always find, especially on a long trip like that, it’s very easy for it to slowly mold [00:33:00] into one.

Thing. And you forget those little moments along the way, whether it’s, you know, some old lady inviting you in for a cup of tea in the Hills of Scotland, or, you know, something like that, you wouldn’t be in anywhere near the Hills, but you know, it’s the, yeah. Did you keep it sort of video diary or journal or.

Yeah. So basically I kept a, a written journal just to remember those key points, you know, even simply of where we stayed, for example, that night, because after the next day you forgotten what happened the day before. So I kept that we’ll be in a professional videographer, photographer was cataloging.

Everything was meticulous with doing that. And it’s all those little moments. I mean, really. Issue. You’ve got it. I had, I found was capturing the absolute, most exciting moments on the board because I had a GoPro GoPro’s last an hour. [00:34:00] So you can’t have it on the whole time. So, you know, trust me when a, when an Orca comes up behind you, the last thing you think about doing is hang on a second there, just turn the camera on.

You know, it’s, it’s, it’s a really tricky and I’ve got some moments, magic moments, but Mississippi. That is just the way it is sometimes. But yeah, it’s important to have that. And I’m so excited about how we’ll and others will create the documentary and what, and how we produce what is paddling, but, you know, paddling the paddling sets a bit boring to watch after awhile.

It’s not really a spectator sport, is it? But paddling within. You know, the, the, the culture, the communities of this fantastic island is what it’s all about and the different conditions and the different coastlines and the different people. That’s what it’s all about. And that hopefully will depict that within and be able to see, I mean, in my mind, I see great Britain very differently.

I see Britain very difficult. I see this [00:35:00] whole island now in the way that if you visited a small island, you’ve just got the whole thing in your picture. And I’ve got that.

No very true. I think I think those sort of stories, as you say with paddleboarding, I imagine the story would be more about people and yourself and the sort of message, which is, as I say, a really interesting story to convey, and if Willow Harry who ever the videographer is can portray that. Yeah.

It’ll be a fascinating documentary to. Yeah, absolutely. And you know, it’s, it’s almost, you know, I’m, I’m probably belittling video photographers that little here. So I apologize if that comes across at that, but capturing the magic of a beautiful scene as in the cliffs and the albatrosses and all those sorts of things almost seem easy compared to catching that one moment, like you said, let, the little old lady invites you in for a cup of tea and what that [00:36:00] means or vitamin for a shower, you know?

Cause showers are like, Yeah, pinnacle. As, as, as a warm shower, you know, you go, you go months with a bucket, share the back of the van. So when someone says, do you want to come in for a shower? You’re like, yeah. You know, it will catch you in those moments. They’re there the kind of. I think that, and that we’ve seen that with our social media, people love those moments to see those moments and can get a little bit blahzay about, oh, here’s another beautiful cliff.

You know, it’s so yeah, you’ve hit the nail on the head. It’s capturing those moments and prep portray in the mid, within the documentary. It’s so fascinating when you do these trips, such little things that mean. As you say, like a warm, hot food or warm shower, which, you know, day-to-day now you’ll probably just take for granted, but in those moments, it’s just like absolute gold at absolute gold.

You’ve hit it there. Absolutely. I mean, they made two times that, cause I [00:37:00] expressed that I love coffee and I paddle in, you know, seven beaches I’d actually paddle into. To just take a moment, you know, 10 minutes walking around on the beach, just revitalizes you to paddle another six hours and some, they would come down on the beach and just sort of hand me a coffee, you know, to say, we thought you’d want this just ham and just like, oh yes.

You know, absolute moments. And you know, you said, as you say, it’s the little things and I even now to go and make a coffee where I can just flick a switch. Rather than spending 10 minutes setting up the cooker, put it in on the gas, the gas takes 15 minutes to warm the water, you know? Yeah. It’s the little things.

Well, well, Brendan, it has been absolutely incredible listening to your stories and just what an adventure. Thank you. Just as amazing to share it. And yeah, I said he has been a very special time in my life. Well, there’s a part of the show where we ask them. [00:38:00] The guests the same five questions each time with the first question being, what’s the one gadget that you always take with you on the paddle board?

Oh, well, it’s gotta be the safety equipment really. That’s a bit boring though. Isn’t it? You could go with two, if you like. Well, the safety equipment has to be there and I had lots of different safety equipment where I could just literally press a button and satellite signals would do all that. So yeah, that’s super important.

But other than that, I probably have to say my, my aftershock headphones just cause they keep you company, you can listen to your family. You can listen to friends. Yeah. Really important and waterproof. I hope and totally water and float as well, which has come in handy a couple of times. Hi, Ben. What about your favorite adventure book or travel book?

Ooh. I would have to go with books that massively helped my, [00:39:00] and that’s any of Ghoulies books on how to read water haters. The weather. I mean, the guy is a phenomenal ability to, to bring together all the experiences around planet earth into, into his books and that hate to read water and had to read the weather are essential books, and he puts that into the adventure format.

So, yeah. Any of Christian Goonies books. Okay. Why, why are adventures important to you? They released. They take the soul to a very different place. And if you can bring that back then and share it, I think that’s a very important thing to do, especially with my work in schools. Lots of children don’t understand that they can do these things because they can’t see them, you know, and by going in and speaking to them, you are labeled them.

What the body can do and the body, our human bodies are amazing things and can be put through such tests. [00:40:00] So if I can share, you know, the little bits that I’ve done hopefully these people in the future, these kids in the future will smash what I do and then better it and go on and create and be better from it.

Yeah. I always think that’s the one thing is that people underestimate what their body is capable of or even their mind when it’s sort of focused in. I mean, it’s just, as you say, probably with what you’ve done or, you know, stuff I’ve done, it’s, it’s sometimes shocks you what you are actually capable of doing.

Yeah. You just got to. Yeah. Once you, and then once you do these things, you trust your own ability and you trust actually what you can achieve. And then all of a sudden, you’re, you’re five rungs up the ladder further than you ever thought you could, you could give you, yeah, we, we had Jamie Ramsey on episode five and he sort of said it was like blowing up a balloon.

And then it sort of deflates, but it’s slightly bigger the next time. And it just slowly gets bigger and bigger and bigger as it just inflates more. [00:41:00] Yeah, that’s a good way of putting it. There’s good way of putting it. And and then also, you know, when it’s gonna pop in a way that no one else does. So I always say that whatever your, your wildest dreams are, you, you’ve got another 20% after that actually.

If you push yourself and that’s still a safe limit before the balloon pops. Yeah. What about your favorite quote by, well, I’m a man of faith, so there’s lots of Bible passages that keep you going. But a single quote. Well, that’s, that’s a hard one. Anything that, anything that adds. Depth to motivation, really anything that adds the ability to hope.

I love most things that center around hope. I think hope is a fantastic word and is something that can be used so well to create bigger and better things on the planet. Nice. And people listening are always keen to [00:42:00] travel and go on these sort of granted ventures. What’s the one thing you would recommend for people wanting to get started?

So local first go local first, you know, it’s amazing, actually, what’s just around the corner to prepare you for what’s further a field you know, within Britain, we’ve got some of the best, we’ve got some of the gnarliest, we’ve got some of the ugliest coastlines and experience those. And then when you go abroad, because when the different spoons being in a different country is you’re adding you add in elements, the unknown whenever you’re.

Whenever you’re on the edge, then the least amount of unknown that you can put in there, the better you are, the better that you can actually succeed, what you’re trying to do. And the more chips you do abroad, the less I know things are, but, you know, start, start local and, and build us experiences at first.

Don’t go, don’t go big too soon. Otherwise you will be coming home to SU very true. And finally, what are you doing now? And how can people follow your [00:43:00] adventures in the future? So the next six months, they’re a huge six months for creating as much funds to, to make this app happen. This gamified water safety app happens.

So please check me out on the long paddle.co.uk, the long paddle as well can be found on all social media support. And I often say. Do you know what to be able to share what we’ve doing, whether it be on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, or share our website with your database of human beings that you love and cherish on your social media is worth more than someone putting in a tenor.

And, and it only takes a few clicks to do that. So if you can share what we’re doing, you never know who that then reaches, and those people might be able to have help us in a way that we’ve never dreamt. So, yeah. Check us out on the long paddle.co.uk. Social media and just share the mission of what we’re trying to achieve, which is, you know, to reduce drowning in this country and then across the [00:44:00] world.

Cause you know what? 340,000 people drown every year on planet earth. It is off the scale. Wow. That’s a statistic. I did not know.

Well, Brandon, I cannot thank you enough for coming on the show. You’re very welcome. It’s fantastic to talk to you. I love talking to people who have a shared understanding and share a way of thinking on a venture in, so it’s been a pleasure. Yeah. I can’t wait for the documentary and hopefully the app to come out.

And as you say, you can [email protected] dot co.uk.co.uk and donate there. And. God, I can’t wait for the next big trip, wherever that might be. Yeah. There’s lots of things planned for next year. Just trying to work, work it through. Well, well, thank you so much. Absolute God bless. Thank you so much, John.

Really appreciate your time. If [00:45:00] you have you, haven’t already please feel free to subscribe to the shape because we have some incredible guests coming up week after week.

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