Livia Simoka

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Livia Simoka (adventurer & filmmaker)

Filmmaker Livia Simoka created and presented Channel 4’s ‘Extreme Tribe: The Last Pygmies’. The series followed her journey as she spent 5 months living with a pygmy hunter-gatherer tribe in the rain forests of the Congo, where she immersed herself with a family and became part of their tight nit community.
On the Podcast, we talk about this incredible experience and the lessons she has learnt from living with this remote tribe.

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Transcript of our Conversation

Livia Simoka

[00:00:00] Hello, and welcome to the modern adventure podcast coming up. What is beautiful, you know, over there, beauty means filing your teeth and they would sort of ask us, well, what’s, you know, what’s beautiful in your country. What do you do? And, and we had got into a really interesting conversation where we explained well that some people actually make a cup underneath their boobs and they put things in there to make their boobs Baker, and they were just horrified.

They were absolutely horrified that we would do something like that or that there’s people that would inject things to make their lips bigger or light that we would pour hot wax on our bits or our intimate bits of hair and rip it out. I mean, they just. Couldn’t believe that they thought it was the most barbaric thing they’d ever heard.

[00:01:00] my next guest is Livia smoker. She is a TV presenter, and has an incredible story to tell. Produced and presented the channel Ford’s extreme tribe. She spent five months living with the Ben jelly tribe out in the Congo where she immersed herself with a family and became part of the tight knit community there on today’s podcast.

We talk about some of the differences in coaches, along with her experience of five months, living with them. It’s a fascinating insight into the culture there. And I am delighted to introduce Livia smoker to the show. Hello. Thank you for having me. No worries. Well, I had to say I was absolutely fascinated with the story about the Ben jelly tribe out in the Congo.

And I really wanted to get you on to sort of talk more about that because for people listening, you. You spent five [00:02:00] months with this sort of remote tribe, which is cut off from Congo society or the Republic of Congo. Um, but before we start before we sort of jump into that, let’s start with you and how you sort of got into this sort of line of work and these sort of adventures.

Hmm. So I’ve, um, you know, I’ve never sort of set out to be a TV presenter, and that’s not the sort of background that I’ve come from. So I first and foremost have always been a filmmaker specializing in sort of adventure and anthropology, documentaries. And, um, I was. Couple of years ago, a few be about three years ago.

Now I was out in Siberia, working on a project about a wooly mammoths and the ice age and was out there with a bunch of tusks contest, trying to find these incredible Willie rhino and woolly mammoth remains. And as part of it, it was a big Reckie trip part to do a bit of filming and, um, to sort of, you know, [00:03:00] explain to.

The broadcaster and the powers that be what we were looking at. And, um, the woman at the time, he was the controller of channel for women called Jay hunt, saw it and said, Oh, Livia is like really good on camera. Should we ask if she’s interested in presenting something? And isn’t really anything that I’d ever thought about.

But the thing that I have been passionate about for years, and now I’ve spent many years making are sort of anthropology programs. And, um, and the first thing that sprung to mind was that I’ve always wants to go and live with a tribe and one tribe in particular that I’d sort of had on my radar for about five years where the Ben jelly.

And I’d found out about them through an anthropologist at UCL that I’ve been speaking to for years about various different tribes and indigenous cultures. And I was just really, really fascinated [00:04:00] with their way of life. And I’d sort of spent probably about five years. Pitching them to various commissioning editors, um, in various disguises trying to get a project off the ground, um, that could allow me to go and spend time with them.

And, um, and also what another thing was, you know, all the projects that I make, I start from the very early development stage. So I always think of them. Get those sort of money from a broadcast to make them then go and visit them on the ground, work out what, who the people are that we’re going to film with and then tell the stories.

And as part of that, I’ve been trying to find a sort of female. Bruce Perry or adventurer for years, but as you well know that that whole genre is, is quite male white middle-class ex-army and, uh, under, so yeah, I mean, the first thing that I thought of was that. I want to go [00:05:00] and live with the tribe. I want to go and spend time with Ben jelly and thankfully, um, you know, the channel agreed.

And after the various hoops that you jumped through, I set off and yeah. Go out there. Good. And so how did it sort of, how did they sort of take to it because you were there for five months filming and I suppose, Oh, sorry. I suppose. Um, it was very much. You know, they were going to be filmed. Their lives were going to be opened up to the world.

How did they sort of take to that? So I, um, it was, it was five months. Well, it was actually six months, but we broke it down into three chunks. Uh, in order to come back and change crew and have various medical checks done. So I went out there for the very, very first time to, um, go and meet with the tribe and to basically ask for their permission to go and live.

There. That’s something that, where we filmed a bit of it, but it never made it as part of the [00:06:00] program, but it was really to go and introduce myself and say, look, this is me. This is what I would love to do. And we really seek that permission and also find the family that I was going to go and live with, which was a Kaia and mama.

And, you know, the people that you see in the documentary, uh, and then went back out there and did it. It was actually six months that was sort of time on the ground, but broke it up into three, two month chunks. Um, and they were, I mean, they were absolutely incredible at the way. They just opened up and allowed us to capture their lives.

And I think a lot of that was also, you know, it took a, it wasn’t overnight, it took a little bit of time as it always does when you’re filming with anybody to gain their trust and to really become part of the family and part of the greater community. But they were incredibly open. We, and just, you [00:07:00] know, there was no sort of, um, sort of putting on an act or anything like that.

Yeah, because I suppose that was probably one of the questions I was quite intrigued to find out was because suddenly they had. Camera cream. Cause I imagine it was you and what two or three others or one of them, there was a little group of us. So there was, you know, four translators because everything had to be translated through to languages.

Um, so there was, you know, from English to Lingala, which is the Congolese national language and then into Bengali, which is the tribal language. So it had to go through two ways. And then a director who was also camera man, and then a producer who was working with the translators. Um, and then we also had a, uh, sort of remote location, trauma medic, because we were a good sort of two, three days away from the nearest.

Medical facility and the nearest road [00:08:00] access. So, you know, in case there was an emergency, we needed somebody that could administer sort of remote trauma, uh, sort of assistance. Um, but they, yeah, because they hadn’t really seen cameras before. A lot of the time at the beginning was we actually would give them the camera so that they could film each other and then play bits back to them.

Cause they were just so fascinated with these big. Devices that we were carrying around and you know, what the heck we were doing. So actually it was quite fun for them to just have a look at, uh, sort of them filming each other. Yeah. And I said, I suppose with that, it was, how do you feel that it was sort of authentic because in terms of having that big camera crew following you and following them, did they ever play up to it or was it very much?

They just almost. There was a wall between that, where they just didn’t even think about the cameras. It was just all very [00:09:00] real. Yeah. It was really real. And because I think a lot of the time, you know, if, if you think about how long. We were there and compared to the three 46 minute programs that you see on TV, there were many days where we would just sit around and not film, and we’d always have a camera nearby, but I’d say the majority of the time we were there and we weren’t really filming or we’d go out into the forest, you know, Gathering food or sitting around chatting or preparing food or going around the village, chatting to people and bonding with people, um, and just really becoming part of the community so that when things then did happen, it was really natural to just pick up a camera and film.

And we weren’t as sort of odd ones out observing a situation because we was, we was such a big part of that community. How, um, in a sort of community that, which [00:10:00] is cut off from the world and Western world, how are the sort of individual roles of women and men within a sort of that community? What were the sort of differences between, let’s say the Western world and the Ben Ben jelly tribe in terms of the roles that each man and women play.

Yeah. Yeah. Well, the Ben jelly are known as one of the most egalitarian societies in the world. Um, so men and women are men, women, children of all ages have a real equal standing, which means, but that, but then. Roles are still divided. So men were very much in charge of hunting. Women would take charge of the gathering and more of the food preparation, but then both men and women, depending on when, where, and when they were around would raise the children and, you know, sort of play with them and, and, [00:11:00] and actually.

Even in arguments that would sometimes, as you see in the program, get very physical. There was no sort of like distinction between your man or your a woman, which is quite incredible to see really and kids that if they weren’t happy or they’d had an argument with somebody in the family, they would just go and sleep somewhere else in the village.

They would just move out of the home for a bit. And there was an argument between neighbors that got nasty. One family might just decide, I’m going to take off and I’m going to go into the forest for a while. And when I come back, everything’s sort of passed. Yeah. Because I watched it and I suppose it was very nice to boys that they’d have these full blown arguments and then.

A moment later, they were all friends. Again, there, they are like the Ben jellies are absolute masters at living in the moment. They really [00:12:00] like, they’re the epitome of living in the moment. Cause also they don’t, um, you know, they don’t measure distance or duration or time they don’t that most of them can’t count above three.

And so. They is. So when you ask them, you know, how far away is something we’d go somewhere. They’d be like, it’s not very far away. And then three, four hours later, you’re still walking through the rain forest. You’re like, you know, we nearly there. Yeah. We’re, we’re nearly there. Another two hours later, you’re still walking is they don’t measure anything.

It’s because to them, like I’m going off on one now, but eventually you’d work out. Not very far away as you can get there. And back in a day, fairly far away is it’s an overnight and quite far away means you’re gone for multiple days. Um, but they’re really, um, you know, they really live in the moment so that when you’re having around with them, Somebody the row is happening, the her, and then, and then when the row ends, it’s sort of forgotten [00:13:00] about.

And the same if they’re having a great time and a great night or a party, and they don’t want it to end, there’s never ever a case of like, Ooh, well, I dunno, it’s two o’clock in the morning now. And you’ve got to get up for work or you’ve got to go and, uh, you know, a monkey, it’s more like we’re having a great time.

We don’t want it to end until somebody is knackered and they’re going to fall asleep there. And that, you know, like they, they really live in the moment with their emotion, which actually took me quite a lot. And what is the sort of day to day life of, of the people there? Because if there’s no time, I suppose they wake up at sunrise and go to bed at sunset.

Yeah. I mean, a definitely don’t always go to bed at sunset because they do like a good knees up, but, um, life always does begin in the morning at sunrise and, um, you know,

That life is centered [00:14:00] around food. And putting, you know, food on the plate for everyone within the family, but that means that kids have to go and pull their weights or get dragged along to go and, you know, forage for whatever might be in season or, you know, help the women go fishing. Or if the men wants to go out hunting.

Uh, but it is a sort of case of sitting around and in the morning around the fire and working out who is going to do what, but that is what life would center around. And actually in terms of. Number out number of hours that they work is actually not very much because they would go out into the forest and be back again within, you know, two, three hours because they are expert Hunter gatherers.

Um, and then be back preparing food, gossiping, and chatting, uh, having a row with the neighbors or whatever it might be. Um, so in terms of their working hours, they’re so much shorter than. Then the hours [00:15:00] that we do here, obviously a much more physically demanding, but, um, but yeah, you find that a lot of sort of similarities between the tribes and the sort of Western culture of gossiping.

And cause there was one, there was one clip, which I saw, well, the one that sort of I took was the idea of women in the tribe. I think it’s really attractive to file their teeth down to just a, a point. Whereas, you know, in Western society that’s not really done. And then probably what they thought was what you would think is normal in Western society was very much frowned upon in their society.

Course. Yeah. And, but, you know, like what is beauty, you know, over there, beauty means filing your teeth and they would sort of ask us, well, what’s, you know, what’s beautiful in your country. What do you do? [00:16:00] And, and we had gotten to a really interesting conversation where we explained well that some people actually make a cup underneath their boobs and they put things in there to make their boobs Baker and they were just horrified.

They were absolutely horrified that we would do something like that or that there’s people that would inject things to make their lips bigger or like that we would pour hot wax on our bits or intimate bits of hair and rip it out. I mean, they just. Couldn’t believe that they thought was the most barbaric thing they’d ever heard.

And yet to us, the idea of obviously filing teeth, isn’t exactly attractive, you know? Well, I have to say when I was watching, I was sort of there with my mouth hand over my mouth, just being like, Oh, I can’t even see it it’s that they saw. Cause we showed them your app. For some reason, somebody had some pictures on their phone, you know, showed them pictures of somebody having a nose job done.

Oh, I mean, [00:17:00] when you really think about it, do you have a video, someone having a nice job on their phone? It’s a long story, but, uh, but also like, you know, pictures of fake boobs and things like that, that when you actually tell an outsider that that’s what is deemed beautiful in certain cultures, they thought it was complete madness.

Yeah. I’m sure. Yeah. Good. And what was the sort of moments where she will sort of take away from that sort of five months there? Um, I think the, sort of the biggest thing hands down is this living in the present moment a lot more and not obsessing. About where you are in life or trying to measure that against what, what you should have achieved or that like, Oh God, you know, late thirties should be married.

You should, kids should have won a BAFTA by now or whatever it might [00:18:00] be. Is that like, what does it really matter? Why, why measure yourself against what other people are doing? Uh, and just really embrace the moment a lot more. I think that was like one of the biggest takeouts for me. Yeah. I think everyone can be very, it can be very easy to look at other people and think that they’ve got, you know, life figured out.

But what you really find is that everyone’s in the same boat thinking, what, what are they doing? And that sort of endless thing of trying to what’s the word. You have this sort of idea that you’re way, way behind of where you should be. And actually, actually you’re, you know, you’re doing just fine. And some people, you know, they hit it when they’re 30, they hit it when they’re 40 and some people, you know, rise up when they’re 20 and full away when they’re 30, it doesn’t really matter.

Cause [00:19:00] they don’t know like, you know, age or time. So nobody puts any measure on, Oh, well you must achieve this. Or I must have the biggest monkey that I’ve ever hunted within the next week. You know? I don’t think like that at all. Um, which, yeah, which I really like. And also another thing that I really love about our way of life is that they, they only ever take what they need.

You know, they let their life is very minimalistic in terms of their possessions. And they don’t put a lot of, I mean, they do one full things, but then their life is very minimal. You know, so there isn’t this constant desire to sort of have more an order more, or have too many supplies. They only ever really take from the forest exactly what they need.

And, um, and that’s like another thing that I guess I’ve walked away from of going, I’m really happy in my life and I don’t need to go and [00:20:00] buy. Two three pairs of these jeans or that dress, or I don’t need to have a fridge that’s really fully stocked, but only really ever having what I need right now, if that makes sense.

Yeah. Yeah. No, of course I completely agree. It’s this idea of, well, you know, in the Western world, it’s very much consumer driven and say you, I think a lot of people have this sort of keeping up with the Joneses mentality. Yeah, I hate it. Like, that’s such a big thing of just like, just be really content with actually making your life a lot more simple and stripping it right back and going.

I’m going to use something until. It’s completely broken and I can’t use it anymore. And then, you know, yeah. I mean, I was, I, I was wearing my fleece, which I had in 2007 from university, [00:21:00] and it’s still got like the Edinburgh logo and everything. I was like, ah, it still does me. Brilliantly that may need to change it.

I love that. I mean, that’s like, yeah, I think a lot of people can learn something from that way of life of just don’t need to have all these things. And so with the documentary that came out on channel four, how was it sort of viewed or taken by the public? Yeah, it was really, it was actually really well received.

I was obviously at the time, do you know what it was not long after, you know, Stacey Dooley had a bit of an incident with the. Picture of that, that whole white savior thing that got banded about a bit. I was, you know, I did obviously have concerns when it went out, thinking, God shit, what’s it going to look like a very white woman going to live with an African tribe.

Um, but actually I didn’t. You know, didn’t have any [00:22:00] criticisms in that regard at all. Um, and I think, yeah, it was really overall, really, really positive feedback from it. I think what I, what I loved about it was you were just there to learn. We had Benedict Alanon a few episodes back. And he very much deals with this sort of immersive documentary style where you just, you’re not there to say, Oh, you should be done.

Should be doing that. Sorry, not there to preach. Yeah, exactly. You’re just there to observe and you’re, you’re just a fly on the wall, observing, learning, and understanding. And I think that’s, I, I think that’s probably why it was so well received was you were very much. Okay. Embracing it not, not trying to influence if you know what I mean.

[00:23:00] No, definitely. And I think, but do you know what? That was tough as well because, um, I was there for such a long time and they, and became part of the family and part of the community and they were, you know, They became my friends, the people that I was living, you know, I was, I mean, for God’s sake, I turned up and asked somebody, can I come and sleep on the floor of your bedroom for the next five months?

And they welcomed me with open arms. I mean, I’m not sure I’d react that, that if some random person just rocked up at my house and asked to do that, um, but they welcomed me with open arms. And so obviously I became friends with all the people in the village and which as a. Documentary maker, you are there to observe it, but of course, after such a long time and forming personal relationships, you do get sort of drawn into arguments and you form opinions and when behavior is right or wrong.

And so, you know, in episode two, I think there was the big [00:24:00] fight. That was sort of ended up breaking up a little bit, because I was worried about that when that went out, thinking God, I’m just people going to think that I went there and started interfering in people’s lives. But actually it was just a gut reaction that when one of your friends is.

In a fight you want to help out, you know, but fortunately that was sort of, you know, wasn’t taken out of context. So yeah, that’s always the trouble nowadays. And I mean, did you have, um, what’s the word. In terms of the editing process. Did you have any say on it? Well, because I was, cause it was edited in stages because there were three different directors because trying to get one director to come and do the whole stint would have been impossible.

So, um, whenever the FA you know, whenever they came back home, they started editing it already. By which point I was, cause I’d only come [00:25:00] back for like a week or whatever, and I’d be back out on location. And, um, so I didn’t actually see the pro I wasn’t actually editorially involved in deciding what would be in the program and what.

What, what should and what shouldn’t be in the program, which ordinarily I would do. Um, and so by the time I saw the programs, they were right near the end. And, uh, but actually it, you know, there was, we filmed so much and there were so many stories that just never made it into the program that because I’m so close to, it would have been really, really hard to make that decision.

I do sort of keep in touch or do you, are you heading back out there again? No. I mean, I’d love to go out. Um, but they are, it’s impossible to keep in touch with them because a lot of like, you know, a lot of other tribes now have mobile phones and got even I worked, I spent a lot of time with the hammer tribe in [00:26:00] Ethiopia and a load of them have got mobile.

They’re all on Facebook. Um, but the Ben jelly. So cutoff that they, there’s not a single person that had mobile phone or they don’t have an address as such. And they’re still semi-nomadic. So trying to even write a letter to them, not that they can read, but is sort of impossible. So the only way to really try and, uh, you know, get in touch with them will be to go and visit and is to turn up.

Um, sadly the last year as it has not really been possible. And is the plan to do another style documentary like this? Uh, I don’t know. Um, again with, you know, COVID in the last year sort of things got turned on their head a little bit. Um, so I don’t know. I’ll wait and see what happens in terms of sort of preparing for that sort of.

Um, five months then, did you learn the language or did you read [00:27:00] up quite a lot about the tribe beforehand? Yeah, so, um, our, the language is really, really difficult to learn. Um, and, but I did speak to a couple of anthropologists. I’d done their thesis with the band jelly, which is how I found out about them through the professor at UCL and, um, sort of, you know, would get.

Basic bits of language from them to just be able to say hello and how are you? Or good morning and good evening. Because obviously when you’re living with somebody and sleeping on the floor of their heart, you quite like to be able to say, good morning when you wake up. Um, and then with time I picked up bits of the language, but I was by no means fluid ’cause yeah.

I, I had a thought, um, with that, especially learning a sort of. Tribal language after five months, because you’ve probably got a English speaking camera crew. It must’ve been quite [00:28:00] sort of difficult, but in terms of immersing yourself, you’ve probably picked up quite a lot by the end of your five months then.

Yeah, exactly. And also because, you know, the crew were in a sort of separate crew area and I was with the family. And so there were. Days and hours that I was just on my own with them. So I’d say like, probably about less than 50% of the time, but I’ve spent huge chunks of time, just on my own with various people in the village and members of my family, which then.

So it pushed me to learn the language a bit more, just so that I could communicate on a very basic level. I suppose. What’s the one thing that you probably, would you say the one thing that you’ve taken from it is living in the moment or was there something else which you’ve sort of taken back with you to try and embrace on a sort of day to day?

Yeah, I think that, and the sort of trying to be a bit more simple with life and, [00:29:00] you know, using things until they’re on their last legs and just trying not to be such a rape. Big consumer. And in terms of your other projects, you’ve done because you’ve done the wooly mammoth. Uh, you’ve done polar bear, hired a bass.

Yeah. All over the world, doing these sort of expeditions and your focus is very much on, well, actually, when I say that you will, those two, uh, um, animals, but it’s more on the sort of indigenous tribes and indigenous communities around the world. That’s right. Yeah. Yeah. I’ve done stuff with various indigenous communities in Alaska and, um, Hamar tribe in Ethiopia did a big project with, um, and uh, created, uh, corporate about seven, eight years ago, series that.

Um, we deal with Ben Vogel called new lives in the wild, which is about, uh, which on channel five, which is about people who’ve sort of quit the right race, moved to [00:30:00] the back of beyond and tend to live a quite subsistence, you know, life off the land. Um, and that’s sort of taken, taken, taken us all over the world.

So yeah, it’s various things like that and did a series following the great migration through the Serengeti and the Maasai Mara, um, and that involved. It’s something with a headset tribe. So, yeah. What in terms of the migration of what the world? Yeah, that was the Willdabeast. And then, so we followed them for a year, uh, but we collared a, it was about eight or not eight or nine Willdabeast and followed them through the whole course of the migration through the Serengeti and the mass Omara over the course of the year.

And checking in with them at different points, um, on the route and then looking at how humans sort of, you know, interact and how their lives, um, sort of intermingle what, in [00:31:00] terms of the crossover between expansive population. Yeah. And it’s, you know, whether the conservation project or, uh, with the Maasai and their whole lion hunting and how that sort of the false circle of life ties in together, but told through the eyes of the Willdabeast on the migration.

Wow. Yeah. It’s, it’s an amazing part of the world out there. Yeah, love it. Absolutely. And yeah, you’ve just been out here in Kenya. I saw. Yeah. I was just out in Kenya for a couple of months, and that was working on a few development projects, which, uh, you know, let’s see what happens, but yeah. Yeah, there’s a great Hemingway quote, actually that says is it?

I never knew of a morning in Africa where I woke up and I wasn’t happy. And I think that’s so true. What was one of these countries like, you know, continents where you [00:32:00] wake up and I don’t know what it is, whether it’s the smell or the sights and the sounds, and you just always like wake up with a bit of a smile on your face.

I think it’s the Kuwait on my, one of my YouTube videos. It’s just like, I envy the man who hasn’t been to Africa to Africa, because he has so much to look forward to. Exactly. Yeah. I love that. It’s so true. It’s um, it’s such an amazing place. I w I had to say I had a year where I was like in and out of Africa the whole year on different projects, by the end of our God, you know what, I’m going to have a break from Africa for a while.

I need a break. Cause you know, there’s, there’s like Africa time and you know what it’s like, there’s just, it’s also a total nightmare to try and work in. And, uh, but yet lo and behold, after a good six to eight months, I was like, Itching to get back there. Yeah. It’s such a beautiful part of the world [00:33:00] and yeah.

As soon as I have the opportunity to go back, I most certainly will. Well, I have to say this, the story of you and the, uh, with the tribe has just been absolutely incredible. And, um, so, so fascinating because it’s very different and yeah, not many people really get the opportunity to do something like that.

Yeah, and I was so lucky and it’s one of those things that if I got the chance to do it again and, you know, sort of relive it all over again, I absolutely would. And that’s one of those things in hindsight, it’s like, Oh, did I appreciate it enough at the time? And like, you want to just soak up every moment.

Uh, well, Livia, 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. What’s the one gadget that you always [00:34:00] take with you. So I really dislike gadgets. I, um, Like technologically, an absolute source of moron. I, I barely, I barely know how to work my mobile phone.

I sometimes need help turning the TV on. I’m like, I’m really, really bad with gadgets and technology of any sort. Uh, so I I’m quite anti gadget. I’m afraid. Uh, Does a toothbrush count? I can’t go to sleep till I can’t go to sleep to my teeth. So I’d say like, my gadget has to be my toothbrush. That’s a thing works every time.

That’s a must definitely must on every adventure, which I’m sure people always might forget to take. Yeah, there’s diet, but any sort of other gadgets and Garmins or sat phones, I’m like, Oh [00:35:00] no, I’d rather just cut off from it all and work it out. As long as I can brush my teeth. I’m happy. Yeah. We were discussing, I think a few episodes back and saying.

I, I, I didn’t like people knowing what I’m doing at the time I miss, you know what I mean? It’s, you know, these people who have like a tracker, so you can see exactly where they are at every, at any given point. I’m just like, yeah, terrifies me. I’d rather just sort of get out and sort of immerse yourself into whatever of a or experience you’re doing and just completely shut off because you know, as soon as you get back into.

Normal and then a life then you’re almost, you’re plugged back in and to sort of switch off for a few days a week or so is just so. Blissful. Definitely. And I think that I don’t know about you, but for me, that’s the great point about going off on an adventure is the sorts of just turn it all off [00:36:00] and, you know, go and explore or go on the journey or wherever that you are going on and switch off from the world.

And that’s what, when I’m on a production, that’s the things that I, and I’m, you know, In a sort of directing whatever and have to keep in touch with the office. That’s probably like my keeping everyone updated as to what you’re doing. Cause I’m like, Oh, I love the bubble that we’re in, where no one knows what we are or where we are or what we’re doing.

And then you’ve got a gay with Patricia, from HR and talk about some health things.

Yeah. Like that. Um, what about your favorite adventure or travel book? My favorite adventure or travel, or do you know what I do love a good, uh, a good and like there’s the, what’s it called? The mammals of [00:37:00] Southern Africa book. I love that book. Any sort of encyclopedia or dictionary that tells me what a little biog of the creature.

Um, yeah, I love that. Probably that’s. That would be my go-to book that I take everywhere. Something that I can do a bit of learning on the way. Yeah. But like mammals, creatures. Um, why are adventures important to you? Why are dentists important to me? Uh, do you know what I. I am one of these people. I get very itchy feet quite very quickly when I haven’t escaped.

And, uh, I think it’s for my mental health is to go somewhere and experience a new place, explore a new [00:38:00] area and meet new people and cultures. And. Find out what makes them tick and how life works for them. And, uh, you know, just yeah, different smells and sights and sounds, and just getting out of the, the world that, you know, yeah.

That’s a slight sort of what, what makes life for me? Very nice. Um, what, what what’s that? Why is it important for you? Oh, good. Uh, the only time I ever repeated the question to me, I mean, I’m going on an adventure. What, in two days time and. I don’t think anything gets me quite as excited as planning it, getting all the sort of gear laid out.

I mean, I, then I see on my bed, I’ve got everything sort of laid out behind me, [00:39:00] um, in the next door room, all the kits sort of ready to go. And I didn’t know that it’s just such a buzz about it. It gets me so fired up. And then as, as we were saying earlier, it’s it’s that idea of disconnecting. Yeah. You know, connecting L L connecting nature or where you are and disconnecting from all the bullshit out here.

And for me, it’s, I didn’t need, I’m getting paddle boarding down the river seven and the excitement of just standing on a board, sitting on a board and just drifting down the river seven, which will probably be freezing cold, but. I didn’t know, there’s just something so exciting. So refreshing about the whole experience and it just make whether it’s difficult, whether it’s hard and the harder, the better, because I sort of feel with more challenge and more adversity, you [00:40:00] only grow as a person.

And by putting yourself into those different cooked spots and challenging yourself, you will only grow as a person. Whereas if you just stay in your comfort sane, eventually you’ll. I don’t. I get very, very bored and become very, very miserable in your ways. Yeah. I really like, and I think this all the time before I go off on like a big expedition or just like you, do you know what?

Even like a random weekend away somewhere doesn’t it can be the smallest of expeditions for a day out to, uh, climbing up a mountain or something or a month long. You know, adventure somewhere is I always have it on the way there I’m like, stuff’s going to happen. I don’t know what it is, but I know right now that come the end of this expedition, I’m going to be a slightly different person.

And I don’t know why, like, I don’t know yet what’s going to [00:41:00] happen, who I’m going to meet or how it’s going to fall change the core of me, but it will in some way. And I love that. The unknown. What, uh, what about your favorite quote, favorite quote? This is really hard because I love a quote. Um, but I, um, uh, I will have success with echo Tali.

I love him the power of now everyone needs to read it. It’s like, it’s my Bible. It’s such a brilliant book. And it was actually post, um, Congo that I’ve got really, really into him when I started getting more into light, you know, living. In the sort of present moment more and being more mindful and all of that.

And, uh, and he mean, he’s got so many incredible quotes, but one of my favorites is, uh, say yes to the present moment and surrender to what is. And I love that. And it’s just about being [00:42:00] sort of like, you know, the present moment is all that you’ve got and even when things are going, Oh, and there’s another quote that he says that I love, which is what is the problem now?

So it’s like, even when shit is going wrong, it’s like, okay, but what actually is the problem right now? And, and even when it’s all going wrong, it’s learning to live in acceptance of it and sort of like. Accepting it as if you’ve chosen the situation and then either doing something about it or accepting it.

And, uh, yeah, I really liked that. No, I think that goes back to why adventures are important because you become very, more adaptable to things going wrong. Hmm, definitely. And sometimes I quite embrace things when they don’t go, when it’s not plain sailing, you’re a bit makes you think on your feet, there’s nothing more boring than a story that goes, we went and did this and it will work fine.

And [00:43:00] then we came back. Yeah. I mean, it’s so much, it’s such a rewarding story. When something goes a bit tits up, you know, I remember like one of the Congo trips we’ve got out there and it’s a nightmare, you know, getting to the village and we got there and it was. Tasting it down with rain. And we were trying to allies, helping the crew try and put tents up and keep everything dry.

And then everyone, pretty much, they all ended up sleeping in one tent for the first night because they couldn’t get anything else up and stuff was getting washed away. And, uh, like in hindsight it was very much a, you know, type two fun. Um, and in hindsight it makes such a better story. Yeah. Yeah. Like one, two and type three fun.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. A better story. That was her type two fun makes for a better story. So type one fun is in the moment when you’re having a great [00:44:00] time and this is the best time ever. And in hindsight, it’ll still be the best time ever type two fun is when you’re doing something on it. Goes a bit wrong and you’re not having a great time, but actually in hindsight it was amazing and it makes for a brilliant story and type three fun is when it’s really shit at the time.

And in hindsight it’s still shit, but that’s quite rare. I mean, yeah, I definitely say type two is the best. Um, because as you say, that’s all the best stories come from type twos. Definitely. Um, so people listening are always keen to go on these sort of adventures and travel. What would you recommend for people wanting to get started?

Um, just do it, stop overthinking it and, you know, get on with it. Stop talking about it. Stop like [00:45:00] boring everyone with what you’re going to do and just. Book a flight. Get on a train, jump in the car, set off on your two feet and just do it. Like drives me mad sometimes when people are like, Oh, I’m going to do this and I’m, I want to do this and this and that.

And sometimes obviously you understand that it might be for, you know, reasons, finances that they can’t do it right now. But I do think that if you’re somebody that enjoys an adventure and an expedition, there are things also that you can do that don’t cost very much. And I think it’s just get out there and do it and don’t overthink it.

And, and if you are scared of it, then that’s good. Embrace the fear, you know, laugh into the face of the fair and just crack on with it. I think that was quite that said if it’s, if it’s exciting, if you are, we aren’t going to butcher this. Um, it said if, um, if it scares you and excites you at the same time, you should [00:46:00] probably do it.

Absolutely. Yeah. And there’s like, Oh, it’s in that, uh, basil alum and song. Is it, or do something every day that scares you is that I might have just got what’s the song. You know, there’s always wear sunscreen. You’re going to have to sing it. I’m not sure I’m a really bad singer. You’re going to have to listen to it.

I’ll send it to you on Spotify. But, um, but yeah. Do something every day that scares you. If you’re a bit scared of it or you’re dreading it, then even more so reason to do it. Yeah. My advice would be is just to just do it, get on with it, stop talking about it and just do it. And then actually there’s so many small or even bigger yeah.

Ventures to be had in the UK or wherever you are local. I mean, I’m going on one in a few days, which, um, which is, uh, you know, a week long. And then there’s Nick butter, who was on the [00:47:00] podcast, who at the moment is trying to come the quickest person to run around the UK. Wow. That’s cool. Uh, which. Again, I think it’s going to take about six or eight weeks.

Um, so, uh, but I mean, they, you know, what he’s doing is on quite a sort of grand level and to do, but double marathons every day for a hundred days is quite something that’s that’s going to hurt. Yeah. So, I mean, for people listening that probably wouldn’t recommend that as a start, but. Maybe just go for a run into your next door town or one 20 miles away or something even just like, you know, if you like walking, it’s just like go.

And I don’t know, even if it takes three, four hours to get there, just set off and do it. Yeah. It’s very true. Um, finally, what are you doing now? And how can [00:48:00] people follow you in the future? Um, I I’m currently working on a bunch of development projects, um, for various different documentaries, uh, both in front of and behind camera.

And, uh, yeah, let’s see what happens. Hopefully sort of, you know, the world is slowly starting to open up a bit, which, and, you know, foreign travel and foreign filming is sort of on the horizon. So yeah, let’s see. Well, I. Can’t really talk about anything sort of in particular that I’m doing, but, um, yeah, let’s see what happens in the next six months.

Yeah. It’s just like nothing’s, you know, signed off and in various, uh, chapter at the minute. Amazing. Well, Olivia, thank you so much for coming on today. Thank you very much for having me. It’s been an absolute pleasure listening to your stories. Thank you very much and good luck on your, uh, [00:49:00] Mission. Well, I look, I look forward to following your documentaries in the future.

Thank you. Thank you very much. And seeing what this development documentaries have to offer. Great. Thank you. 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 video.

Oli Broadhead

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Oli Broadhead (EXPLORER)

In today’s episode, we have Oli Broadhead a British Explorer and Adventure Photographer His previous expeditions include an attempted first ascent of a remote Sumatran mountain, a biodiversity survey of an un-researched tropical forest, and two months spent walking coast-to-coast across South India – sleeping in fields frequented by tigers and facing the monsoon with no tent. In today’s podcast, we are talking about his adventures and his purpose to why he explores.

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Transcript of our Conversation

Oli Broadhead

[00:00:00] Oli Broadhead: Hello, and welcome to the modern adventurer podcast. Coming up as a Verna Hertzog, the Austrian filmmaker. There’s a quote by him. I quite like, which is tourism is said traveling on foot to his virtue and what he sort of means by that, or what I’ve taken to me by that is can be like voyeuristic. And what I mean is you could, you are not actually engaged.

You’re just looking at it’s like you go to a zoo. There’s no vulnerability on your part. You’re not actually immersed in that situation. Whereas if you do some of that cycle of walk through a landscape anyone can stop. You ask what you’re doing, ask where you’re going have a conversation with you.

It’s not like you’re, you know, you’re not in any way separate and the most extreme form of that is obviously walking. So I was really interested in, in walking because at a walking pace, you will have to engage with people

[00:01:00] on today’s show. We have Ali Broadhead and Explorer with an absolutely incredible story to tell from cycling up Norway to the Arctic circle, walking across India is covered a wide range of activities missions. And on today’s podcast, we are talking about some of those we’re getting into detail about his fascinating trip in Sumatra and some of the amazing wildlife he discovered out there.

So I am delighted to introduce Molly Broadhead to the show, to some believable, some of the trips you’ve done. And I was really fascinated to sort of get down to sort of details about how you sort of started and some of your trips, especially in India. We had Iris who, you know, very well on quite a few weeks back, and she was talking about the story of Sumatra, which I’m [00:02:00] sure you have other stories as well to tell, but before we jump into that let’s find out a bit more about you and how you got into all these sort of events.

I grew up in rural Como. So. It’s always been, you know, nature on my doorstep. I’ve been extremely lucky with that and the sea as well, actually. So I’ve always really, as far back as I can remember, I’ve been certainly free diving and sea kayaking. And then other things like, you know, climbing or that came later.

And I think, you know, initially, like I think a huge number of people in the UK, I wanted to be David Attenborough when I was about, you know, sex. So I was always off foraging for bugs foraging for frogs, all that sort of stuff. But I think one of the, are the things that definitely, I would say that age you could possibly already noticed.

I was really [00:03:00] obsessed with, with sort of the, the longer the long, the longer adventure, the more immersive sort of thing. So, you know what I mean by that is I would much rather. Rough I’d much rather stay out overnight. Even when I was that old. I remember when I was like eight years old for my, I think it was my eighth birthday actually.

And like my birthday wish was that I could go camping by myself because, because I read somewhere that like the legal age of being able to camp alone was like 14. I remember my dad just being like, you know, well, go on there, you like that night out and the word, and I think it’s been the same way that with almost everything with, I haven’t been content to you know, to do a sport, like to go kayaking or to go you know, even, even to like go and free dive with seals or something, I would so much rather spend a day on an Island or camp overnight or, you know, stay out longer.

And that was something I [00:04:00] was always doing. I was always trying to do like multi-day little tracks down streams, even when I was about 11 or 12, I think that’s been really consistent. And then I think we all want to data. It’s sad. I’m just realizing it’s a bit unrealistic, but you will start aiming high don’t you?

And then I, you know, and then that just sort of evolved. I think the first thing I did was when I was, well, I mean, I traveled quite a bit. I I’d always traveled. Luckily again, my, my parents worked abroad and we traveled a bit with that. I’ve traveled quite a lot with them actually growing up. So it was never like that being an issue, it was, but as a first year university was not my first proper adventure, I guess.

Which was, I, I basically have no money as first year student you don’t. And I was just trying to think of something I could do for a factory, no [00:05:00] money and with no planning. Cause I was sort of coming up with this idea whilst my exams were coming up and I decided to I had a mate in Norway mate. He lived in Oslo.

He said, he’d lend me a bike. I decided to cycle to the Arctic circle because you just have to wait North, it’s very simple navigation. You take a compass, you don’t need a map. And, and that was about it in the evening. Yeah. I mean, as, as bad as it is for the environment. I do think about that a lot more that, you know, you can, you could get a flight to Oslo for, I don’t know, like 20 quid or something.

So even in, even in Norway and then, yeah, obviously Norway is a very expensive country. So I had this slightly bonkers diet. Cause I think I budgeted about five pounds a day for a month cycling. And what I could get for that, Norway was two bananas, half a loaf of bread and half a bar of chocolate a day.

So I lost about 10 or 12 kilograms over that, that month long period. And as many muscles as I could find, luckily I was, I [00:06:00] stopped at the coast. There’s this gorgeous coast road that goes all the way up from Bergen in the South, which is older. Fjords and mountains are, and then it goes all out the uptick and you can sort of follow it follow it along through all these sort of coastal pine forests.

And it says it’s a small road. It says nice, nice that like single single lane road. And so yeah, as much as many shellfish as I could forage, and I had like this one tube of tomato paste I’d got from LeDuc before I left. So I was sort of squirting that on to, you know, very sparingly. I think I made it last about three weeks.

And yeah, I mean, I managed it, so that was a, it was a huge confidence boost. Not without, not without some wobbles along the way, because it, it w it was June. I think I actually cycled through the summer solstice. But being Norway, it rained all but two days. And I mean, freezing rain and, you know, minus five degrees at night, so it was properly grim.

And I had a few in, what was, it was certainly the longest it’d been, there’s the thing you don’t think about? Obviously I was so low for that and I sort of suddenly realized I’ve like a [00:07:00] week of sort of basically not speaking to anyone. That this was definitely by far the longest I’d ever gone without sort of communicating with a human, you know, cause I was, I was, you know, occasionally past it’s quite rural.

So you maybe passing lots of people live in cities, in Norway. So actually when you get to the countryside, there’s sort of people, summer houses, potentially, you know, little fishing lodges and stuff, but they’re quite often deserted. So I did start to go a bit mad. I remember at one point sort of really quite seriously believing I was being chased by trolls sort of like I could sort of feel shadows moving outside of my tent.

And I was being really quite panicky when I was, when I was having my back to anything like collecting water when you’ve got to late to do that proper, I guess it’s proper animal instinct. Isn’t it. As you know, you’re, you’re, head’s bent, you’re looking at the stream. It’s the perfect time when something gets you from behind if you’re at, at all, because they’ll or something.

So yeah, I mean I had had a few little well, it was, but I mean, I made it and it was actually amazing. [00:08:00] It was possibly the. Possibly still one of the best days of my life was for all the right reasons. It was arriving in the Arctic because we had like absolute howling, wind and rain and naughtiness coming on shore right on the coast.

I think co the road was three meters from the sea. So you have waves splashing up, absolutely drenched freezing. And then as soon as I got actually the optic about 10, that evening sky just opened completely clear, beautiful sunset. And obviously the midnight sun and I had the midnight sun and the Arctic flight, the three days I was there kind of a few mountains.

It was absolutely. And I was camped just on the edge of the Fjord that just dropped completely crystal clear water. So going down like. 15 or so meters, you can see straight down and then this ledge, and then this drop into the absolute abyss. And you have these Cod fish coming up, coming up from the depths and sort of going on this ledge and this ledger, which just [00:09:00] littered with starfish and sea urchins, but huge.

They’ve got staffers, the size of car tires. There is amazing colors like purple and orange and sort of plunging into that and then getting out and seriously regretting it. So. Bloody cold, but it was, no, that was a, it was definitely a, this that sort of enforced. It was probably the right decision and I did huge enjoy it which is obviously sort of why I started paying more ambitious things after that.

But that was definitely the thing that got me started. Well, you much of a cyclist before you did that. Oh, goodness. Yeah. I, you have said I should have led with that. So I pretty much, I mean, I live in Haley Laney, Cornwall and cycling is a bit sketchy around here at the best of times we’ve got the head is outside.

My house are about this high of the double-decker bus. So it’s very much a blind prayer if you’re, if you’re taking a corner on a bike. So I pretty much never cycled. You know, all my mates can attest to that, that I’m actually a laughingstock on a bike and yeah, [00:10:00] and I have no real fitness for cycling the cycling, certainly when I, when I set off.

So I don’t, I just sort of made it work the first day. I was like, okay, I’ll get a hundred K done. On a day to day of 110 K and then the next day I couldn’t walk pretty much. I was just hobbling along and the doctor did about 10 K. It was, it was really not. I just remember thinking you know, bloody hell if I was going to get a loan to cycle across the country, I should have, I should have chosen the Netherlands.

You know, I should’ve chosen a black country first few weeks of just mountains anyway. Yeah. I mean, I survived it, so obviously learnt a bit, forgot it all immediately after Silicon Valley, I think it was day three, where, when I was doing across America and day three was the killer and you just sort of walk into supermarkets and your legs would feel like jelly.

Like you are about to keel over, even though you like, your mind was very normal and your body was your legs were just like, would just give away. And then it, it sort of took about what a week or [00:11:00] two before it sort of caught up with it because you’re doing it every day. I imagine. Yeah. Yeah, no, I think, yeah, a couple of weeks we’ll get you into anything.

I think it’s amazing. It’s amazing what your body can adapt to fairly quickly, as long as you don’t get too injured. Yeah, no, I finished fairly injury for free. I mean, I’m intrigued to imagine what these trolls that were chasing you alive. No, I don’t mind quite they’re like bears covered in Moss. I think.

Definitely. I mean, there was, there was seriously, it was at one point where I was setting up my tent and a tree. Collapsed behind me or a big branch came off a tree and I pretty much jumped out of my skin. I was so certain it was this, I don’t know if you’ve seen the film troll Hunter, but it’s a brilliant, brilliant Norwegian film.

And I think I’d, I’d watched that a bit too recently, but it is it’s the whole theme is that trolls are real and the Norwegian government’s been covering them up and they occasionally come out and eat [00:12:00] people.

Blair witch project style is very funny. Very funny. Like watching hostel before you go backpacking. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. There’s certain things you just shouldn’t do. Yeah. Yeah. Why mess with your mind? Why mess with it? Yeah. Makes for a more exciting trip. So after that you are absolutely hooked and I suppose you went back to uni and you were pretty much planning the next one.

Yes, I was. I, I was, I think the, what I found was. I mean, I, that sounds great. I really, really like people are more interested in PR their sun city, like more interested in people than nature, but there’s, there’s that crossover you know, like Norway, you are staring at a mountain in the distance for a whole day and it’s the same mountain.

It’s a big one. I mean, is it’s a big landscape. It’s big, wide opens being a big knot on a human scale at all. And you’re [00:13:00] obviously spending a lot of time just thinking on a bike, 14 kilometers uphill. There’s a lot of type of thing. And so I was really interested to go somewhere where there are more people and I was really interested.

I really I, as a Verna Hertz or the Austrian filmmaker, it was a quote by him. I quite like, which is tourism is and traveling on foot is virtue. And what he sort of means by that. Or what I’ve taken to me by that is quite often, tourism can be like voyeuristic. And what I mean is you can, you are not actually engaged.

You’re just looking at it’s like you go to a zoo there’s no vulnerability on your part. You’re not actually immersed in that situation. Whereas if you do something that cycle of walk through a landscape anyone can stop. You ask what you’re doing, ask where you’re going, have a conversation with you.

It’s not like you’re, you know, you’re not in any way separate. And the most extreme form of that is obviously walking. So I was really interested in, in walking [00:14:00] because at a walking pace, you will have to engage with people and you are forced to slow down. You, you won’t miss stuff in the same way. It’s, you know, if you.

You know, you could go out and look at a head DRO and you could cycle down that lane and see nothing. Or you could walk and be observant and see a thousand things. So I was really interested to do a long walk and India was a country I’ve been to with my parents before, and I know I absolutely loved it.

It was absolute madness. It’s a bonkers and quite wonderful country. And so I was looking for something that I could do and I had the time constraint All my time constraints at the time were, what could I do in the summer holiday from uni? So three months. So how far could I walk in three months?

And I thought I could probably walk the length of the co-vary and the Kaveri is one of the seven Holy rivers in India. It’s the Southern most of the great sacred rivers of India. And what’s cool about it is it cuts basically the [00:15:00] whole it’s a bit weird. It cuts the whole way across the country. It starts on the, on the West coast, about 20 kilometers, very close to the West coast, maybe 40.

And instead of just logically flowing to the West coast, it goes, Oh no, I’m going the other way. And it goes all the way, hundreds and hundreds kilometers all the way across the East coast. So if you start on the East coast, you can follow all the open source and you basically do the whole country following a river.

And I think you can see a theme here, which is, I really don’t like navigating or at the time. I certainly didn’t. So it was very simple. Again, take a compass start and go, go West, and then look, you’ll get where you need to go eventually. So it was, yeah, it was the same sort of thing in terms of the simple navigation and the, and the time has just worked.

So that was, that was, became my next project. And I assume what was it? So you sort of planning that project. What was the route from India? Okay. So in terms of the States, so it’s the most Southern States, so you’ve got on the East coast, you’re going to try [00:16:00] and get this right. In the East case, you’ve got Tamilnadu middle, you’ve got Kinetica and in Carola the slightly bonkers thing is about.

Indian States, you know, you can’t think UK County is think much more American States. I mean, I think Tamilnadu alone has a population higher than the whole of the UK is like 75 million people. So they’re fast and they have, they have their own languages as well. So each of those Tom loudly, they speak Tamar can ask how they speak Canada I’m going to be ready down and I’ve completely forgotten what they’re speaking keratosis.

You’re, you’re going through three, almost like three countries in terms of, in terms of the language, but also in terms of the culture that has history historically, they would have been independent. So it’s, it’s an amazing journey in terms of the diversity of it. And also in terms of the geography. So Tamil Nadu, when we were, there was at the end of a horrendous drought or four year drought.

And, and actually that drought ended just after we finished, but not in a good way to have some of like the worst flooding in a hundred years. And it was bonkers actually, were [00:17:00] we stayed with some students after we had finished this walk. And that whole like house was flooded out rats and snakes and the kitchen, all this kind of stuff really bad just after we left.

But when we started, it was boiling hot. I mean, like over 40 degrees in the day, everything was about beer desert, you know, walking through crop fields that were just dust, proper grim dust bowl for weeks, weeks and weeks not a single cloud in the sky. And I got, I got actually, that was very stupid.

I mean, things to be aware of when you go to a country that you just never think of in the UK, Oh, heat stroke. And I got sick once and then heat stroke, proper heat stroke, where I was really. Bad. I probably, so I was actually, I was with a guy and there’s a, there’s an interesting story that shows how I, well, not interesting story, but there’s a story of how I ended up going with someone.

I was going to do it so low. And then about a [00:18:00] month before I was going to actually set off, I freaked out and I thought, you know, this is a bloody long way to go. So though this isn’t quite Norway maybe I should go with someone and I sort of advertised on Facebook seems then I want to go walk across India.

It’ll cost about this much. Again, it was insanely cheap. I think the whole thing costs under 700 quid or something. And we, and I got a lot, I got loads of responses, but it was mainly from people way older and more experienced than myself. And at the time I didn’t really want to hand over, you know, who’s in charge.

Cause it was my, it was my thing that I wanted to do. And I didn’t want to go with someone. Who’d be saying we’re going here and going there. And there was a guy in the year below at uni I’d never met also studying biology. He said, yeah. Okay. And we met once, I think before we actually met at the airport.

So it was a bit bonkers and he was putting a lot more trust in me than I was bringing him because I’d been to India before and he’d never left. Then you might not have left the UK and he’d certainly never traveled alone. And at this point I had, even [00:19:00] aside from the fact I’d only done one sort of expedition thing before I, I traveled quite a lot within Europe, by myself and, and actually kind of all over the world a little bit.

So I w I was much more experienced in that sense than him. So very brave on his part, sort of throw his lot in a bit bonkers. Anyway, he ended up pretty much saving my life and week two or three, cause we ran out of water. In the middle of the day, I basically fainted and was waking up being sick completely.

But actually feeling very drunk, you know, completely had lost the ability to help myself as I was at that sort of stage of heat sickness and he walked several kilometers on, got to the next village and then managed to get water, come back to me, basically pour a load of water on me. And it dragged me into the shade, keep that going until it got dark.

And then we walked together to the next village. And I basically was just gone for like two days completely collapsed. So that was, that was lucky. I had, luckily I had some [00:20:00] with me and I have, I have learned and it’s it’s it’s something I always tell people when they, when they’re going to, if people are asking for advice about, about.

Anything that’s in a hot country. It’s just so easy to happen. It sneaks up on you. It really does. The same with hypothermia. It’s those things that you’d do in a temporary environment like the UK, you’re just not prepared for other things. You don’t even think about those. You know, there’s the really dangerous things is you’re factoring all, you know, they’ll just going to be snake bites or something potentially.

So we’ll take backs or what happens. In fact, we’ll take a radio, but what happens if it’s the stuff you don’t think about that you that’s really dangerous? And that was something I’ve never considered even an issue before I set out, which is very stupid of me anyway. Yeah. Not rambling on that. No, that’s quite, that’s quite the sort of story.

I, I think when you pick a partner, we had him Finch on last week and he was saying. That you’ve got to have the right goals. When you go on a sort of expedition like that, you both have to [00:21:00] have goals either whether it’s, and you’ve got to know what each other wants to achieve out of it, otherwise you could be staring down very different paths.

Would you agree with that? Yeah, I would. I would. Absolutely. And I think it works. I can’t remember I was reading this, but, but the, if you, if you absolutely nail your roles and then you’ve got to, I also think be very careful of not stepping across that boundary. There’s almost like an artificial politeness that comes into play on expeditions more so than in real life wherein, wherein you know, if someone’s the photographer and someone’s ex the writer perhaps.

And the right says, Oh, there’s a cool thing over there. I’ll, I’ll take, you know, I’ll just grab his camera. He’s not using Alto. And this is not something that’s ever happened to me, but it’s something you start to notice the edges of. And when you start stepping into other people’s prescribed areas, it just creates [00:22:00] stress.

So you’ve got to be really careful there. Not only do you have. This is what you do. This is what I do, you know, you navigate and I don’t question your navigation because I’m not the navigator. Or, you know, and if there’s a mistake it’s on you. So there’s a flip side to that, you know? And of course, same with any, with any role.

But you do really have to lay down responsibility because that’s what that’s, one of the really interesting is about, it’s just the do teach responsibility, you know, especially so that, especially everything is on you, but you’ve got to maintain those responsibilities, that level of responsibility into other institutions.

You don’t, you don’t give someone like a, a role for the sake of giving them a role that you’re not really going to trust them with. You’ve got to say, no, this is what you’re doing. If you’re the team leader or you’re dividing up before, because you don’t necessarily need to have a team leader, but you’re really stretched on this is your role.

This is my role. If they ask, if they say, Oh, I’m busy photographing this quickly. Take a video of that. That’s fine. But it’s when it’s don’t you gotta be really careful and proportioning that I don’t know if I quite [00:23:00] raise that. Right. But stuff that’s worked really well is, is my partner ERs, you know, she’s, she’s a much more serious scientist than I am.

And so she would always be, you know, absolutely science lead and I would always be photography and pretty much everything else. So, you know, in terms of camping, all that kind of set up food, that sort of stuff, the logistical, and that say also the, probably the media side, writing and photography. So of course I’m very happy for her to help on any of that.

And she’s very happy to help, but like, you’ve got those very clear delineations and it makes it much easier. But I think the other thing is it has a picking because I’ve been asked before, like, do I prefer like solo versus team stuff? I said, the problem with solo is. You can really push yourself at home or in familiar terrain.

Let’s say, if you’re experienced, not near, you can really push yourself, cider or experience talk or whatever. But when you’re in a new [00:24:00] environment, it doesn’t matter how good you are. You know, stuff goes wrong. If you don’t know the terrain. And so it’s, you know, the biggest safety. Aspect you can have as a partner, you know, way better than radio or tracking beacon or the best med kit in the world is having a partner.

So allows you to push yourself. So I’m really in favor of at least having one other person, preferably to, you know, on a team I’m I’m much, but teams. And I always think if you find the right person. You get someone who pushes you into the areas you’re uncomfortable, but they’re comfortable and you push them in the same way.

So perhaps, you know, okay. The most silly version of that would be, someone’s a bit scared of Heights and someone’s a bit scared of the dark, you know, so someone’s saying, okay, we’re going to walk through the night and someone saying, Oh, I’m going to go, you know, we’re going to climb this bell or whatever.

And that was it. You know, that’s completely flipping made up example, but I think you get what I mean and that, you know, if someone say, no, we’re going to, you know, we’ve got to really push to get this, this particular biological objective, this particular absolutely making sure you nail the let’s say the data collection and someone is absolutely making sure you nail the [00:25:00] safety and the, you know, the logistical side of it.

And, you know, you’re both absolutely on it and pushing it further than it would have been gone. It would have gone if you had been individual. So it’s really, really important that sort of complimentary nurse, you don’t necessarily want to pick someone who’s exactly the same as you. Yeah, no, I, I agree.

I’ve, I’ve done a few trips with other people and as I said, we’ve sort of covered. It’s so important to have those roles and on the trips, luckily, you know, they’re amazing at logistics. Usually when I go on my own, I’m just free. Well, it’s just, you know, no map just cycle and see where it takes you or walk or run and, you know, just look on Google and go okay.

Down there. But when it’s, you know, when ambles visas and logistical and how with this, you know, that’s them and they were pro and it sort of seemed to work really, really well. And of course you have that sometimes you have those little frictions here and there, but because you have your [00:26:00] certain roles, as you said it, you can sort of manage it.

So do you think when you did your trip in Sumatra with eras. So you sort of talking about sort of logistical nightmares, you had quite a tricky time in Sumatra, is that right? Yeah. Sumatra is so much as interesting and it’s got by the way, heads up, you know, Indonesia, as of 2019 has made it a hell of a lot harder to do anything that they bought in very strict rules around visas.

And if you breach them, you know, if they think your nudging across from being a, let’s say a tourist to being a journalist, then you can end up with genuinely as in president and then not messing around with it. Like the Indonesian government’s pretty hardcore. It’s getting well, it’s so much regressing now, but hardcore is a bit of an understatement and they.

Yeah, you can really follow the Taliban and BBC journalists and [00:27:00] Matt geo people that have fallen. You know, you don’t have the pay for this specific area you’re going to present. I think there are, there are still BBC linked to journalists in prison and in Indonesia. So it’s, it’s really something to be careful of and it’s become a lot more potentially dangerous since we were there.

When we were there, it wasn’t even a particularly danger, but yeah, so we, we were looking at trying to we’ll do a biodiversity survey and smart show, and we’ve gotten in contact, your friend of a friend of a friend, someone who’d done, someone had gotten that geo grants go and cover. Some of the restoration work off 2004 tsunami.

So they knew a lot of people at the university out in , which is effectively think about in terms of both independence, past history or that how sort of the Scotland of Sumatra and SmartShip on the Indonesian islands. And actually just for a bit of quick context, Sumatra and all of the Indonesian islands are, were not historically United.

They the [00:28:00] Dutch owned them. When the Dutch left in the sixties, I think it was maybe 1960, actually Java effectively seized control. And that doesn’t sit well with a lot of the outlying islands, particularly the ones like Sumatra, which were historically very rich independent and you know, potentially different religions and all this kind of stuff.

So it it’s almost, almost can be seen as a, an empire. I to buy Java up to up to a point. And it’s that’s a bit, a bit of a wrong statement. It depends kind of which Island you’re on, but Sumatra has got a bit of a independent streak. And RJ in particular had been fighting a sort of ongoing civil war about 30 years, which had ended basically with, and because of the tsunami the thousand percent army hit closest point of land was RJ.

And it absolutely devastated the coaster. And so hundreds hubs, I think a hundred thousand people almost died in RJ [00:29:00] alone. So they had to accept really factors, which meant they had to affect down the civil war. So good thing or bad thing, depending on who you ask. So it was, it was interesting time to go.

That sort of terrorism had been fairly ongoing up until sort of late 2010 sort of time. So we were going 2016, so sort of been quiet for about five or six years. But so we eventually found someone we’ve got good contacts. We’ve got contacts with university professors out in RJ. And there was some fascinating stuff.

So amazing rainforest. And it’s also some of the fastest deforested in the world. You can look at a map of smarter. So for the last 20 years, I literally made from 2000 to 2020 and it’s like, someone’s gotten a razor and just rubbed out the rainforest, gave out the country a country, the size of the UK, you know, just go from 90% forest, about 10% forest.

So it’s really quite upsetting, especially as they have some of the most amazing megafauna. It’s one of the only country. I think it is the only country in the world where you’ve got, you’ve got a great day. You’ve got the Wrangler time. You’ve got [00:30:00] elephants, you’ve got rhinoceroses. You’ve got tigers, you know, they’ve got Gibbons as well.

So you’ve got all these amazing species living in the same ecosystem. And so we eventually got a hold of the, this guy and he was suggesting we go to this, this Valley, the 40 kilometers long in the middle of very inaccessible forest cordoned off on each side by like, I think 4,000 meter mountains.

So 3000 meter mountain, so very inaccessible to get in. And then the sporty comes along Valley. And I was actually saying earlier that we were w. That we were very naive initially and the timing of how long this would take. Cause I was, you know, last thing I’d done was walking into when you could quite easily do 40 kilometers in a day.

So I was thinking, you know, what’s this two days walk and so, Oh, you need more like a month and actually turned out that when we did go to actually a separate place at Peyton Marsha, our record was basically walking Dawn until well into the night. So I dunno what 14, 15 hours on our feet and covering up 2.5 kilometers as the Crow flies because you know, it’s mountain [00:31:00] forests.

So it’s like, it’s like this steep, but, but you’re practically climbing. You’re climbing through something that’s. Pretty, you know, let’s say Bramble hedge is probably the closest thing you get in the UK. It’s a stuff called rattan is what you make or that sort of quite furniture out of, but in the wild it’s covered in spikes about this long, it just weaves through itself and it loves mud.

So if there’s rat on rattan thicket, that tends to be a lot of, a lot of mud as well. So, and spikes and steep slopes a good fun. And anyway, so we, we were like, okay, well, we’ll try and do this. And we tried to get permits. We emailed absolutely everyone, you know, every forest department and wildlife, you know, station that was to, to, to try and get into this place.

And eventually we had to fly out without permits and we ended up we were in contact with a few people. So we were sort of, we were going to meet people weren’t going in completely blind and. After about five, six days we met the, we met when we landed, we met [00:32:00] a couple of guys got in touch with who are very cool.

They’re a couple of smarter mountaineers called sight and Roy, and to get there trying to make a hundred first sentence mantra, which I think gives you an idea of the number of first descents there has to be made in smarter and that serious mountains, the 3000 plus meter mountains. And I think they’re made over at 14 or 15 first ascents between them and already, and they were really keen to help us.

And so we, and they were Indonesian. They were actually news actually. And they were really helpful in trying to get the permits and we, you know, going to the police and all this kind of stuff. And eventually we just got completely shut down. It was just red tape after red tape, you know, we’d been told you had to take police officer with you and you had to take X number of government officials with you and all this.

And it was, you know, with all of the weather in the world, you don’t want to take people who don’t want to be there. And don’t like you into a dangerous environment on a potentially dangerous expedition. So we ended up saying absolutely not. And we sort of found out later that potentially that forest had been logs that Bobby had been logged, [00:33:00] which is a shame because the reason we were really interested in going there, when I say a shame, I mean, a tragedy because the reason we’ve been in certain going there, the business guy had suggested he was an Orangutang expert.

And in 2017, the same professor was actually international in finding, identifying a new popular species of rank tanks. So Smartsheet previously was thought to be home to the Smartsheet Orangutang, which critically endangered species. And it turned out with a population of about a hundred of those once Motrin, orangutans, and tall, they were a different species.

They’ve been isolated. I think after the last ice age were, were complete different species and they were the newest, they are the newest eight species and also the most endangered species today. Great, great tape. And they were potentially in that Valley and their bodies potentially have been.

Completely logged. So we had to fairly quickly, you know, within days come up with a new objective. And luckily, because we linked up with these two mountaineers, Roy and Sayeed, they had an objective in mind, which was this unclimbed mountain Mark, correct, 3050 meters up [00:34:00] in the middle of Akshay. But what’s so interesting about that is it’s actually in the middle of some vast area of intact forest, you know, unimaginable when you grow up in the UK hundreds of square kilometers and.

That’s completely intact and it’s intact because it’s in mountains. So the forest starts at about 1,600 meters, but if are proper, proper and type forest is about 2000 meters plus, but luckily it’s sort of not a plateau, but it’s mountain from 2000 meters to 3000 meters. So just undulating cross, but covenant coming for us.

And it’s the reason it’s being protected. It’s just impossible to get logging machinery, and it would be useless to growing Palm oil, all that sort of stuff. So it’s hard to get that with, with the aim that we couldn’t find any research in this area previously. And that’s another amazing thing about Sinatra.

It’s very underfunded for conservation. So there are large and it’s biased. So you’ve got vast, you got not much money, vast areas, and that the funding that will tends to go to to small points, you know, to pockets known, to be [00:35:00] Barnabas, to, to let’s say to reserves that already exist. So there’s a lot of area that.

It’s almost certainly bursting with life, but that’s just not the money spent to go and conduct research in those places. So we were very lucky to be the first people going to collect by the best survey of any sort within this forest. And, you know, Mount Kurt being inclined also meant that it was not researched either.

And that was that. And we eventually got permits to go there and it was much easier to get permits though, because it’s not protected, which at the same point was quite worrying. They’re really unsure what we’re going to find. And actually on the first day hiking out with first people, we met were hunters.

Who’d been, who’d been shooting in the forest and of course, some beautiful birds who I’m not criticizing at all, because I think that’s very important to draw lines between people who were hunters and people who are poachers. And they were definitely hunters, you know, just coming from the village, just, you know, a relationship with the forest rather than extractive or destruction forest.

And and like I said, that was brutal hiking just to get to Mount Kirk was like two weeks of some of the worst. [00:36:00] Well, not the worst, the most brutal hiking you’ve ever done. And I think the. The thing you don’t think about when you think of a beautiful forest is you don’t see the forest, you see the trees, you see, you see several meters in front of you of Moss and rotting, tree, trunk, and all this kind of stuff that you don’t do.

You don’t quite picture it. And it was pretty much after, you know, after the first week, I think we got into a Ridge where we could see across the forest. I took some photos there, which I suppose is always use for any speech, but you’ve got rolling forest going into the distance, but it wasn’t like that at all.

I mean, most of the time he’s almost crawling on hands and knees. And then of course, when we got to Kirk and tried to climb correctly, had I hadn’t had some beautiful views as well. But the maps, we have awful like properly, you know, they were taken from a plane mapping so completely wrong the scale for walking on foot.

And we got to the base of curric about 2,500 meters expecting original line that would be followed bubble. And actually what we had is a series of plaques about 19 [00:37:00] music clefts. Another ledge cliff. And when I say cliff, I mean like Charles and Moss and roots coming out, you know, pulling off your hands, no way you could attempt it without some fairly serious planning and serious cat.

And there’s no, not like there’s any rescue option there. So it was something backed off with, but we actually climbed a mountain Lamu, which is in the same Massif. It’s just next door. Almost same height. And we were the S well, the second team up, we, we, when we got to the top, we were, we found this little concrete pillar about this big, you know, one bag of concrete.

And a Dutch team had been there in 19 off the top of my head. I might be wrong, 1936. It was 1930s. And they’d all written the names under there and smashed a beer bottle. And you just, you know, completely bonkers. Cause we didn’t even know that this is up there and how these guys had done it. They, they, we think they must have been part of some sort of survey survey team.

You know, [00:38:00] The last people standing on that, man, it was always more interesting than I think actually it was more interesting than being on non climb on, I’m not a big unclimbed mountain guy, so to suddenly go up there and just think, you know, the last people standing here, it was almost a hundred years ago and they were in an era completely, you know in colonial Indonesia, Dutch forced, you know, I don’t think they particularly enjoyed hiking all the way out here.

The Dutch invasion was, was fought back against Bruce. Usually, you know, the action needs gay pretty good. I think that the famous story is the first day the the I think the commander of the entire invasion force was shot by an attorney sniper. So it was not you know, it was a proper war zone.

It was not just a walk-in and stick a flag kind of image of climbers. And because the, the, the, the actual needs of being backed by the British. So it’d be, they had guns. And so, yeah, I mean, it was a proper, you know, free fall back in time, moment. It’s amazing. And when you looked out, we could see, you know, to the horizon unbroken [00:39:00] forest, which I hope is something I will see again, it’s the only time in my life I’ve ever seen it.

Yeah, just like looking at a sea, a forest and as human givens, about a thousand meters below calling up up the side of this forested mountain, it was like, yeah, absolutely. Or inspiring. And from there we walked to the coast and, and the whole way we were doing a biodiversity survey, which actually was.

Got some amazing results. It was incredibly bio-diverse area. We found critically endangered smarter, and orangutan is a very dangerous species of Gibbon called a CMA. It’s one. That is the biggest Gibbon. It’s a huge black, beautiful animal. And as well as some small cat species as well, and a load of birds about 80 something, birds species.

And for context, we were actually in that area focused surveyor for about three days. So, you know, 80, 80 plus bird species in three days, isn’t bad going. So absolutely absolutely mind blowing. Well, wouldn’t absolutely adventure really just had everything, everything to it. [00:40:00] Yeah, I think that’s, that’s the thing I’ve been, always trying to do and still trying to do, which is, you know, you gain experience slowly.

I couldn’t have jumped in with that. So it was, you know, each, each expedition leads to the next one and the skills come across. You can’t say from day one, I’m going to do an ex, an ambitious physical expedition. With a scientific objective because the scientific objective adds so much to the, you know, stopping every hour, taking off your pack, conducting a survey.

I know it sounds good to take a few pack, but to take back, get everything out, not rest, suddenly engage the mind suddenly be like, okay, we’ve got to be not making any mistakes now, who that write it all down, check. It’s all waterproof, packed away, properly, repack the bag, put the bag, you know, those interruptions, you can’t just get into a plot.

You can’t just get into the zone and outpace because you’ve got to be in and the whole way, you know, you’re anything opportunity. It’s not just the surveys you’re taking your fixed intervals. You’re also. Of course, keeping your eye open for anything, you know, that that [00:41:00] could feed into your biodiversity data.

So you’ve got to be on it the whole time and it completely massive to you. And even someone like like , who’s now, you know, done some very, very serious scientific objective exhibitions and really quite impressive field work. She started by cycling across Olivia and that had no science to it at all, but it definitely, you know, you can see that progress that you’ve got to know.

You can handle the physical side of it, the sleep deprivation side of it, the food and logistical side of it. Before you then add in something more complicated on top of it, like a scientific or a journalistic potentially potentially, or, or you dial back on the physical side of it and reading up on things.

But it’s, they all, they all tie in really nicely. I don’t think there’s, I don’t even object to to pure adventure because it does absolutely teach you a huge amount. Yeah, I agree. I think probably like every podcast we have on it’s always about [00:42:00] growth facing adversity, and I think it always helps in day-to-day life in a sense through tragedy or whatever experiences you have by doing these adventures, putting yourself through hardship, I think any makes you stronger in the long term.

Yeah. I mean, I think for me and yeah, I think, I think one of the things from that is it’s not just, I think people have this David, as you’re going to go ramble off on a slight tangent because I occasionally get approached by companies to sort of like promote the CA I tend not to, I, I don’t see like it.

And so I’ve used that stuff and you tend to get a thing where you know, can you look quite serious in this shot sort of thing. You know, they want you to sort of. Look out into the distance looking sort of frowning. And I think a company that gets it right, something like Patagonia, where everyone’s always got a massive grin on their faces because people who do adventure and expeditions tend not to take themselves too seriously and tend [00:43:00] to be know, it’s a very, it’s a very sort of stereotype from, I dunno, James Bond films that you’ve always got to be sort of frowning looking very serious.

But what I was going to say was, before I jumped off on that slightly weird tangent was that it’s not just dealing with stuff with a frown on your face. You’ve got to be being positive. If you’re in a team, you can’t be, this is rough. And I’m going to sit suddenly in a corner. You’ve got to be, especially for the team leader.

You know, you’ve got to be getting everyone else happy, motivated, but you’ve got to be very emotive. You got to be, keep it. You’ve got to be known, you know, are they being quiet because they’re just humming a song in their head or are they being quiet because something’s going wrong with their foot? Is that, is that, do we need to be doing some sort of early.

Yeah, quit treatment on that. Are they developing a blister? Are they in pain? Are they feeling sick? Are they angry? Do they think we’ve made a mistake? You know, you’ve got to be in touch with that and able to communicate that and able to handle that and also able to give people space. So you’ve got to be really on it, that’s it.

But particularly in terms [00:44:00] of the people you’re meeting, because you are going into a country, it’s not your country. You’re potentially having some very strange encounters where you’re basically just walking into someone’s village in the middle of nowhere, you know, imagine I know what the equivalent would be, but you know, suddenly a massive, you know, I’m six foot, four white guy walking into a walking into a.

Bandage of some, you know, smarter and people who happened to be about five foot forward, just minding their own business and the party field. It’s a bit bonkers and you’ve got to be, they’re not, you know, you might be feeding shit. I might’ve been walking all day and all night and be very hungry and ready be in a horrible mood, but you’ve just effectively invaded.

Someone’s God. You’ve got to be absolutely prepared to have a massive smile on your face and shake everyone’s hand and be really, really friendly and hugely grateful for any help they give you and not carrot or what if they don’t give you any help because it’s completely their right. Not to. And And your for caveat Sumatra was by far the friendliest country I’ve ever been to every single night that we were once we left the forest and we’re walking through rural areas.

Cause we were also compare it with doing [00:45:00] comparative survey of different landscape types, all the way to sort of monoculture with this pristine rainforest. It was one of the sort of things we’re doing. We, every single night we were invited, but so, you know, sometimes it was awkward because you’re right about three or four people’s homes and you had to sort of make a choice.

So I’m really sorry, but he asked first and so it was a bit bonkers, but they’re so absolutely incredibly friendly. And but you know, in India, you know, which is obviously a very populous country, we were meeting, you know, tens of thousands of people sometimes about hundreds of people a day. You know, that you would actually talk to hundreds of people a day and it can be exhausting because everyone’s asking the same question, you know, where are you from?

Where’d you come from? What are you doing? You know, why are you doing that? And for you, it’s the thousand times you’ve been asked that. For them. It’s the first time they’ve met someone. It might be the first time, you know, for the kids. It will probably be in the rural areas of India. It’s gonna be the first time they met someone who looks like you.

And you’ve got to remember that at every single and you know, every [00:46:00] single attraction you’ve got town, you’ve got, gotta be polite. You’ve got to be smiling. You’ve got to be positive. So it’s, it’s, it’s not just dealing with adversity. It’s dealing with adversity whilst maintaining empathy and being outwardly at least very positive.

Even if you, even if you’re gone inside, you know, so I think it is, it’s a proper lesson and that there’s a proper lesson in that. Yeah. I agree. Sort of negativity on an expedition, especially if you’re going with someone and they’re complaining and negative, it brings the whole trip down. And so if, if one can just avoid that and have a big smile, I think it’s quite funny how you were saying with clothing brands to sort of look serious, look left, look serious, look right?

Yes. Yeah. But yeah, I think it’s really important to always have a smile. And as you say, it’s the first time you’re meeting them. And so [00:47:00] it’s good to give a good impression. Well, Oliva is a part of the show where we ask the five same questions to each guest each week we weave with the first being on your expeditions.

What’s the one catch it or that you always take with you. I, yeah, I, I assume I’d probably give a backyard cause gadget. I mean, God, it’s boring. Does it always have cameras? I mean, I’m I work occasionally semi-professionally at least as a photographer, so I’ve got to have a camera on me. I’ll take a camera over a phone.

Obviously always take both. The thing that’s been slightly, I guess, slightly unexpected that has ended up on every single one of my expeditions is at some point I went into TK Maxx and got absolutely amazing deal on like a Merino wool, long asleep base layer. Of course, that thing. And it’s now so scruffy and I used it initially for running and it’s ended up because if you go to a hot country, it’s your warmer [00:48:00] packs up like this.

So you weren’t, you know, you’re wearing a light t-shirt and you put that on in the evenings and that’s you done? So India is smarter, was my wallet. And if you had a cold country, if you know, I spoke to coffee in Iceland Last lost last December gone, you know, pre COVID I’ve completely lost track of when it was you know, it’s you basically, so it’s ended up on everything cold or hot or in between it’s ended up coming.

So as things like that, I really like I really like to try and be nonspecific, think about what I can use for many different things. So I don’t like to buy a piece of cat that’s exclusive to a particular, you know, if you can buy something that you can also use under your dry suit kayaking, you can wear after a surf and you can wear as you be in a jacket climbing, and also a super useful for an expedition because you’ve thought ahead and thought, okay, for expedition is going to take a lot of abuse.

So probably, you know, I’ll go for the slightly more durable one or I’ll go for the one that drives a bit quicker or an exact, just always trying to think through. Maximal range of [00:49:00] users. I think, you know, people can get so tied down to what’s the, what’s the light I’m obsessed with. Y in terms of, you know, what’s the latest kit, minimal cap I can take, but I’m not necessarily obsessed on the, on the individual thing being the best.

So it’s, I, I much prefer something that, that does a bit of everything that applies to a lot of different stuff. And I know I’ll be able to use to let absolutely is gone. Yeah. What about your favorite adventure or travel book? I think anything, I don’t know if you’ve heard the author Norman Lewis, so Norman Lewis he died in 2003 or something.

It was late nineties and he was a wealth writer who, I guess he was born probably in the twenties. He, what it was in the second world war with everyone was, and he. Was with the Americans and it’s Lee, and then he was all over the world, you know Vietnam war by which, I mean the French war in Vietnam pre the American war and then the American war in Vietnam and yeah.

[00:50:00] And yeah, everywhere around the world, India, all these bases had. And he was a really bloody, awful time in history. I think, you know, we think, Oh God, you know, now’s bad. Now’s bad for a lot of reasons. Of course. But you know, this is the end of colonialism, a lot of brutal Wars, you know, cold Wars picking up on the horizon.

You know, that, that period of history, when he was very active was properly awful for a lot of people. And he was an incredibly human writer. He absolutely didn’t take sides. Absolutely told her how he is. He’s very good, but not one of the, not someone who goes, and this was bad. And I thought about it this way and it made me feel this just writes what happens, you know?

So. Very good way of building trust. I think it’s very good journalistic style that he just you, you absolutely see him as a witness who just tells it like it is and doesn’t interpret it. [00:51:00] And you know, it doesn’t matter that he’s with the British, he will absolutely crystallize the British or the Americans or, you know, et cetera.

I mean, there’s some really harrowing stuff in that. And he wrote a lot of books, some of useful, some are deeply potentially dark. But there’s a whole range. And I think one, you know, the first book I read was by him, was in Smartsheet. I read and part of the East, which has him in his eighties, late eighties.

He traveled around Indonesia during the apnea civil war. I just, you know, transformed the way you see the culture. I think it’s really important to read up on the history and the culture and the context of a country you go to. You know, so, you know, I, I was in Ethiopia a couple of years ago and knew almost nothing about the, any of the complex that had been going on over that over the last decades until just four out here somewhere.

Oh, bloody hell, all this makes sense. The sort of stuff that you guys come to [00:52:00] us about. And actually there is a very real and relevant meaning to it. And there’s all this stuff and it’s very important not to be completely naive to that. Are they, if you can help it, obviously, sometimes you can’t help it.

So yeah, anything, anything by Norman Lewis is brilliant. It was the conclusion to that rant. Why are adventures important to you? Yeah, I guess so right now, because.

Because they are ways of doing things by which, I mean, there is a difference for me between my early stuff, which was like adventure for the sake of adventure. And now I’m always looking for is, you know, I, my, my day job is, is about writing about ecological environmental issues. And so I, it’s always sort of, you know, can you use night vision to highlight something?

And I think you can incredibly effectively and [00:53:00] can, you can use it to investigate something. Can you, you know, can you, even if you’re not a scientist or you’re not an archeologist or you’re not ax can you draw attention to an issue or can you find, you know, if you’re a team leader, if you’re someone who can handle all the logistical and physical side of it, Can you find a archeologist or an anthropologist or a buyers all local, you know, especially local, especially in country who wants to come along and otherwise wouldn’t have had that opportunity, especially if someone’s in country.

That’s the really interesting thing, because then especially if you can get the budgets, right, you can basically bring someone along for no extra cost. If their flights aren’t an issue. You know, if that, if they’re actually Snapchat, you know, you say, what do you want to tag along? Do you want to, you know, do you want to do some biodiversity field work?

Have you got a project in mind? Can we talk to someone who would have a project in mind? And it’s really easy to facilitate that. So facilitation or a key objective. So for me is kind of objective based is what I’m saying. But then on the other hand, for me, it is also just. Fun. And it’s something it’s just a bug, isn’t it like for, for [00:54:00] anything, even if I do in the UK, if you’re going to see cocky, I’d much rather kind of down the case for a week and cut down the coast for four hours.

And I guess that does count as an adventure. So and that’s just about getting out of the day-to-day routine and getting a bit, you know, it takes awhile. I think it takes about three days for your, for me, it’s always my, what feels like my vision to really lock in and your Headspace to clear like it, it takes days not hours, I think, to really feel like you’re, you’re out you’re outdoors.

So I think that’s why it’s important to do this sort of longer term. Very nice. What about your favorite Quate Oh, give me a second. I didn’t time on these Chaucer. What did chores to say? Chelsea said, ah, I’ve got one for you. Yeah. Life is short. Life is short. So obviously the just overused and obvious quote ever.

And it’s [00:55:00] actually, it is actually not as you would imagine, something that popped up in the nineties on crappy t-shirts and Facebook, it was actually by Chaucer and it was written about seven, 800 years ago. What 12th century, 13th century. And the full quote is actually quite a bit longer. It is. If I can remember off the top of my head life is short.

Opportunity is fleeting. Judgment is difficult. I think, I think that’s the full thing. And one, I just love that, but it’s that old and it’s maintained and it’s just still applicable. And I think. The whole quote is so much more interesting. Life is short opportunity fleeting. That’s it. Life is short. Art is long.

Opportunity is fleeting and judgment is difficult. And it’s very true. Very nice. When you said cliche, I was like, he’s going to come with, it’s not the destination. It’s the journey. I was like, he’s going to build that one up. Isn’t he?

[00:56:00] Yeah. People listening, always keen to travel and go on these sort of granted ventures. What’s the one thing you would recommend for people wanting to get started? Yeah, something that I always need to remind myself of. So, especially, I mean, I could show you an Excel spreadsheet, which has got every single grant I’ve applied to this year.

And obviously it’s been a very rough year for applying to funding and even actually. Mostly partners, a PhD, you know, with a lot of experience as well. And we both take a lot of walls on funding and all this kind of stuff. And these Addie sort of travel restrictions of shut a lot of stuff down. So don’t, even if you’re going to go big and ambitious, have a backup plan, which is minimal, you can do yourself and you can fund yourself.

And by fund yourself, I mean, you can do stuff very cheaply. Norway was like I said, about 400 and I think any of us under a few hundred and a few. Yeah. There’s lots of more things that you, there’s amazing stuff you could do in Europe, especially in a place that Romania and [00:57:00] Bulgaria, you know, incredibly wild places and absolutely amazing.

Even Poland, you know, get up and down, no money. It’s very cheap to be there. And yeah. So how have a backup plan. Or have your primary plan be something that you don’t need permission to do? You don’t need a lot of you don’t need to wait through red tape. You don’t need to Wade through grant applications too.

And if you want to do all of that and really go big, fine, but be prepared that if you fail, you’re not going to have completely failed because you’ve got plan B and plan B or plan C maybe is the one that you can actually just do. You could walk out the door today and do it. So if you want to do a big bonkers cycle or a scientific objective, or you know, anything or a journalistic project, whatever it might be, have, have a project that you can do yourself.

Amazing. Finally, what are you doing now? And how can people follow your adventures in the future? COVID I was planning to be last [00:58:00] year, actually to kayaked from Mid Alaska down, Alaska, down the West coast of Alaska, and then down Canada, sea kayaking just take about four months. And I was, I was going to do that with my dad.

Cause he’s just retired. He’d retired, but just, just before COVID. So that was sort of our plan always seek out groups up, you cocky and obviously that was gone, but we’ve rescheduled that and hopefully that’ll happen in 2020, 20, 22. Cause you got to do it in the summer. So there’s no chance you can do that in the winter.

Alaska is a chilly place and I was also, I’m also, I’ve been putting a lot of effort into trying to get funding for a return to smarter. So the area I was in, in Smartsheet is now sadly in the sort of four years since I was there is now the largest remaining area of intact forest, outside of a reserve in Smartsheet.

And it still hasn’t had a proper intensive survey. Like I said, we were up to the only [00:59:00] the current Missy for like three days. And I want to go back and do a. A proper intensive by which the survey by which, I mean, you know, camera traps in the field for best part of the year, really? Because that’s how you find very recipe, species.

That’s how you find, you know, the, the stuff that’s very elusive will avoid people, you know, things like tigers which possibly, you know, they’re in that eco region. So that’s, that’s sort of my big ambition right now and it would be bonkers. They would require repeat expeditions then I overheard about you, so it’s a bit bonkers, but ambitious, really interesting.

We’ve got an awesome option team apart from myself. And then there is as a, as a advisor, but not, not in the build team. So it’d be really, really cool as Marshall students as well. So absolutely fantastic. And I’d be really keen to get that working and then sort of, you know, in terms of stuff I can do and I can find I’ve got a project actually, he was saying, and just [01:00:00] about Greece and it’s going through this and it’s I read a, that I’m really interested in go to I’ve I’m I’ve I grew up fridge I’m diving and I’ve always sort of wanted to go.

I, I freed up quite a lot in rivers as well as in in the sea, but obviously was quite narrow everyday get very long, beautiful rivers and we certainly don’t get, you know That was so bad in the UK with like pollutants and stuff like that now and our water. And there’s a lot of very bad visibility, usually in rivers.

So to go somewhere with a pristine undammed river intact reverie system and tax Delta system, and just drift down effectively with a, with a camera and over a couple of weeks and a little duffle bag with all my baby. And I’ve really instituted. There’s a couple of rivers I’ve got on my Island because they’ve there’s a few, there’s quite a lot of, you know, controversy around some damning projects and a few other projects going on.

So there’s, there’s a little bit of a journalistic angle on that, but, you [01:01:00] know, selfishly, it’s obviously something I would absolutely love to do from a experiential point of view. So you have to go out to go into a freed up down a river. But yeah, so to follow me, I mean, I’m on Instagram our ally Ali Broadhead and yeah, my website is probably probably the best place.

I’ve been being a bit laxed. I think many of us have taken a bit of a step back from social media, I think over know, I certainly have, I’ve been one of the people who sort of like deleting it intermittently then occasionally logging back on which I think has been, probably worth doing so. Yeah.

As things progress. Oh, and, and hopefully. Trying to keep it very low, ambitious. Hopefully going out to current around the other sky fairly soon, once things open up and everything becomes safe to do self supported, obviously. So not, not poking, not putting anyone else at risk. But you know, as, as locked down permits and no timeframe on that, but sort of as soon as possible because I’m getting sort of itchy feet to, [01:02:00] to get out.

I’m sure we all know here we all are. Yeah. I think, I think we all are. And yeah, with the Instagram, you always need a quick digital detox here and get out into nature. Bali. Thank you so much for coming on today. It’s been absolutely fascinating hearing your stories of which you have way more than I was ever expecting.

And yeah, I do go check out his website. You you’re a very, very talented photographer, take some beautiful pictures and I’ll be following you a little sea kayak in sky when everything opens. Yeah. All right. Brilliant. All right, Janice. 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.

Ian Finch

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Ian Finch (EXPLORER)

Former Royal Marine Commando Ian Finch is an adventure and outdoor brand photographer & expedition guide whose been travelling to remote environments for over 10 years. Ian’s desire to record, capture or lead expeditions in unfamiliar corners of the globe is driven by a passion to learn about heritage and traditions from the native cultures that call it home.

On today’s podcast, we are talking about his 1,300-mile journey to retrace the footsteps of the Cherokee people called the “Trail of Tears”

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Transcript of our Conversation

Ian Finch

[00:00:00] Ian Finch: Hello, and welcome to the modern adventurer podcast. If you haven’t already subscribed to the show and hit the like button, because we have some incredible stories to tell on this channel coming up, the, the journey that they took was it, they were forced to take this journey because of the Western expansion across America.

And they were forced to relocate from their homes in the great smoky mountains, which is where the Cherokee were traditionally based. And they were forced to walk. I think it was 1,301, 1,200 miles into Oklahoma, which was classed as Indian territory at that point. Now it’s modern day, Oklahoma, so they were forced with other four other tribes.

That would w were on the Eastern side of the U S they’re all forced at that point to walk all that distance in mid-winter. And to end up in Oklahoma and this, this story because of the, the tragedy of the story for the Cherokee people, because so many of them died on this route was called Dan called [00:01:00] the trail of tears.

On today’s show we have in Finch and adventure, photographer and Explorer, who has covered a wide range of expeditions over the years from canoeing RPA in the wilderness of Scotland to following the trails of the Cherokee people. He has some incredible story to tell. And on today’s podcast, we are going into detail about one or two of these stories.

So I am delighted to introduce in Finch to the show. Hey, how are you doing very well? Well, for people listening in, I had the pleasure of meeting about three weeks ago for a photo shoot with Musto and Ian has some pretty incredible adventure stories to tell. And I was [00:02:00] delighted to get him on, but before we sort of jumped into it, Ian, I suppose probably the best place to start is with you and about yourself.

Yeah. So first and foremost, I’m a photographer, so adventure photographer and I worked with outdoor brands to help them sort of like create a lot, really strong visual narratives for upcoming shoots. And also, I, I I’m an expedition leader, so I’ve, I’ve. Conducted sort of some pretty, sort of big meaningful expeditions in, in some wild places, all over the, all over the globe.

And then I come back and I’m really passionate about telling those stories and help inspire people to sort of find their own adventure and, and undertake their own big, big journeys. So how did, what do you think caused you to go into this sort of fear? Because I know you were. Former Royal Marines.

Do you think that training and that background sort of set you on [00:03:00] this path? I think the military, every aspect of my life, you know, looking back on it, the things that I took from that now are more the mindset principles of, of that you need and utilize when you’re on expeditions about like dealing with cold weather routines like positive habits dealing with challenge and setbacks and failure, or having to, you know, push forward physically in sort of arduous, arduous times.

Those are the things I look back and think that’s what I took from, from my career in the Marines or the practical stuff. Yeah. You do take certain aspects of that and bring that forward. But those real practical skills fade the mental ones and the, and the sort of the ones that you really absorb into your character, the ones that you you take forward without a doubt.

How long were you in the Royal Marines for. So it was close to about five years in the end. So I left in 2008, which is quite a long time ago now. And so you’ve [00:04:00] been on a sort of quest for big, big grand adventures ever since. Yeah. Yeah, it was when I left the call and even before that, I was always wild campaign going to Scotland and Wales Lake district and wild camping all over the place with friends and that kind of stuff.

But when it, when I came out of the Marines That continued because I’ve always had this deep love of nature and wildness and wildlife and all of those kinds of things. So it didn’t the expedition stuff didn’t really take hold. Until I did sort of mounting leader training and then I was doing sort of slightly longer journeys.

And then I would go to the Hebrides and I, I walked the length of the outer Hebrides, which was my first long distance kind of walk. As such. And then I found, I really wanted when the photography and that really became a big part of my life. I started to really think about narrative and the journeys I was taking on.

I wanted them to be bigger and longer and have a [00:05:00] much stronger narrative where I could really immerse myself in a story or a story and a group of people or a landscape or an environmental story. And as I really sort of cultivated the desire to photograph and writes about the journeys that I was on, I was then looking for bigger, more stronger stories, which then led to the bigger journeys.

So yeah, it was, it was quite an organic process to lead into the route, the real big expeditions that It’s now I couldn’t, I couldn’t imagine my life without them to be honest. Well, let’s jump into them. Say your, one of your journeys was in the Yukon. The sheriff, sorry, the Sharroky trail. What was that about?

What was the sort of aims of that trip? It was actually the idea of my expedition partner, Jamie bonds, and. Previous previously to that a few years before that I had descended the Yukon river by canoe where the narrative of that story was to meet. And [00:06:00] some of the, the many native groups that lived along that river.

So my, a lot of my expeditions revolve around. Learning meeting native groups in a certain region that Marine and then learning about traditions and heritage and stuff like that. And environmental aspects of, of their life, their modern life. So the Cherokee journey was based around a route that the Cherokee people were forced to take in 1838.

And. They that the, the sort of the in, in sort of embrace the, the journey that they took was it, they were forced to take this journey because of the Western expansion across America. And they were forced to relocate from their homes in the great smoky mountains, which is where the Cherokee were traditionally based.

And they were forced to walk. I think it was 1,301, 1,200 miles into Oklahoma, which was classed as Indian territory at that point. And now it’s modern day, Oklahoma. So they were forced with other four other [00:07:00] tribes. That would w were on the Eastern side of the U S they’re all forced at that point to walk all that distance in mid-winter.

And to end up in Oklahoma and this, this story because of the, the tragedy of the story for the Cherokee people, because so many of them died on this route was called then called the trail of tears, or as it was the Cherokee called it, the trail where they cried. And this is because yeah, lots of people died on that trail.

It’s a very sacred trail to the Cherokee even to this day. And we thought it would be very interesting to. ReWalk this trail and follow cause there was many aspects to this trail. So some Cherokee was split up into many detachments. So the army, the American army at this point split up and, and moved.

So in aspects of the Cherokee by river, by land and all this kind of thing. So we incorporated many different aspects of many different routes of the same trail of tears. [00:08:00] So that took us about to us about three months where we, we crossed the mountain range. We paddled cause so we canoed. 900 miles.

And then we walked another 400 miles the end of the trip. And we ended up in Oklahoma at the Cherokee heritage center, which is where all Cherokee artifacts, cats, or the, the Cherokee baskets. Lots of beautiful Cherokee tradition is kept in this museum. So we actually finished the trail. I’m actually finished.

The trial walking with Cherokee people. So this was all pre-organized and we made first make connections with the Cherokee. By the Cherokee nation, which is the kind of government body for the Cherokee nation itself. And we asked permission to do the trail cause obviously a very sacred trail. And there’s obviously some sensitivity towards two white guys from Europe during the trail.

So we asked permission and then we were granted that and. It was [00:09:00] our sort of aim to tell a really authentic representation of the trail as we went. So it was actually quite difficult to do that because there was massive periods where we, we weren’t we were, we’re going from one section to another, to another.

So what we decided to do was complete the whole journey and then spend a week with the Cherokee or a number of Cherokee people and live and live with them. In, in Oklahoma. And then really loud about the story, visit some historical sites look at all manner of Cherokee culture more than sort of traditional and yeah, and that, that featured when we, when we wrote that photograph, that that featured in the sidetrack magazine is one of their biggest stories, a 20 page story.

Wow. How did the sh Sharrocky people sort of take to this story? A lot of the, when we arrived into Oklahoma [00:10:00] and we were, we were telling people that we were doing this because a lot of the time we weren’t saying anything per se. So we, we would, if we were, we were stopping off along the way and speaking to random people or staying with random people, we would tell them this story and why we’re doing it, but we kind of kept it quite simple.

So once we got into Oklahoma, a lot, the questions. That came up for why, why are two white guys doing this? And understandably, that question was quite important for us to ask. So we, we both very much interested in native American tradition and heritage and, and I’ve come from a background where my dad was very much interested in that and still is interested in that.

So I’ve kind of absorbed that from him. So we just told them that we felt it’s a story that people in the UK haven’t heard. It’s a story that still needs to be heard. And we felt it’s just really important that stories like this are remembered and continue to be [00:11:00] remembered. So it went down with the Cherokee people, it went down well.

And a lot of the time people say thank you as well for making their story visible in different cultures. Amazing. And was it all plain sailing because you’re doing this in the sort of. Mid Midwinter, you said? No. So the, the original trail was in mid-winter. So when, when the Cherokee, you were forced to walk a walk them through it, it was in 1838, the winter of that year.

We did it in summer. Well, not in summer, but we started in the great smoky mountains in March. And that was, you know, that was going down to minus six minus eight in the mountains for that first week. So that was, that was. Pretty cold, but then it went from eight point to my but we also paddled, we the sec, the 900 miles of Canadian, which was on the Tennessee river, they are high on the Mississippi.

It was actually through kind of tornado season. So [00:12:00] it was pretty treacherous. To be canoeing. And also prior to that period on the water, they had had the worst weather in 20 years in terms of rainfall in not only in the regions where the main part of the river was, but at the source as well. So all of the rivers were flooded.

And all of the rivers had reached into the forests that were on the banks. So a lot of the time we were actually paddling through forests. We’re paddling through, well, Paul’s. All sorts of crazy stuff because the hydrology of the river had changed because it was pushed into the forests and everything like that.

And the water was going through submerged trunks, even submerged buildings at that point. And also it’s on a couple of the sections. We because of the really extreme weather and the flooding of the rivers, we were parting past trees that were upside down in a sari houses that were upside down in trees and all of that kind of stuff, which was [00:13:00] just incredible.

Really. So it was, it. The conditions per se, weren’t too bad, but the actual in terms of like the climate conditions, but the actual on the ground, the conditions were, and on the rivers, they were, they were quite treacherous and incredibly dangerous. And there was one, one time that we actually nearly died actually probably two occasions that we nearly died on the river.

What happened? So we had, we had paddled the whole of the Tennessee river, which was a couple of hundred miles, maybe five, 600 miles. Then we, the Tennessee goats up to the Ohio and then the high Ohio meets the Mississippi. So the Mississippi. It’s still used as a super highway. So the Mississippi is apparently it’s cheaper to still move cargo and goods up the Mississippi, like the old days on these huge barges.

Now these barges are these higher powered kind of [00:14:00] steamer boats that then push these huge metal containers, which are a hundred feet long, 200 feet long, but one of these boats can push upwards of 24 containers. So all stacked in a line in front of each other. So when we got onto the Mississippi we, then I, not only did we have the added danger of the river being flooded, et cetera, et cetera.

We also had the added danger of these huge boats coming up the river and kicking off these huge wakes, which were sometimes six, eight feet high, the wakes that were on the river. So whenever we saw them we had to go pull into one of the forests, which was still flooded and tie the boat up, wait for the bar to go past, take on the swell, holding onto the trees and stuff like that.

And then paddle back out, paddle down river. And if he saw another one, it’d be exactly the same story. And this could happen 10, 20 times a day sometimes. So. When, when the bodies aren’t pushing these metal containers, the [00:15:00] containers are cats on the sides of the river. So maybe sometimes two, two abreast, and then lined up down the event and tied by these metal chains, maybe 10 feet from the shore.

And then when the barges meet them, they go to this, they go to these containers, pick them up and then move them on and fill them with grain and coal and cement, et cetera. So we found that it was actually slightly more safer. So instead of paddling out in the river where the barges were, was actually to paddle down between the containers.

So you had the, the, the, the bank on one side, and then there was a 10 foot gap. And then one of these metal containers. So we would paddle down the side of these containers and these narrow channels, then every 15 to 20 feet or every a hundred feet, maybe there would be a hundred meter gap between sets of containers.

And then there’ll be another three or four containers. And then another a hundred meter gap. And in quite a few of these. Yeah, between the containers, [00:16:00] there was an Eddie and Eddie just for people to know is a an area of water. That’s almost coming back on itself. So the water reverses because of where it’s situated on the river and the flow and et cetera, et cetera.

So we would stop in these eddies between the containers and actually have arrest. So one of these times, one of these days, the weather was really bad. So we had. Maybe like 20 mile an hour winds on the boat, on the river, which is quite bad, kicking up a massive swell. And we had about three miles to go to get to this town where we knew we had pizza, coffee shelter.

We w we were, we had the canoe on the sides of the river, and we made a decision to take on the river. With the current, which was at seven, seven knots, which is pretty fast for a river with, with wind, with a very bad storm that was coming in just to get to this town. So these are the kinds of decisions that you make, which sometimes [00:17:00] you don’t realize at the time can be actually life and death.

And you take them because, you know, you think you want. Shallots are pizza, warm bed. When really, maybe we should have stayed in a tent on the side of that kind of muddy, horrible river for, for safety. But anyway, we decided to go for it. And we were nipping down between the sides of these containers.

And there was a huge storm that was coming in to our, to our side there. And this there’s pictures of pictures of this on my Instagram, which is almost, it’s almost like a form in tornado. And we, we knew we had to get to this tone for safety and it was raining. It was too seriously torrential rain. And we poured into one of these, what we thought was an Eddy between these two massive containers.

And we were reaching down into the canoe to get the cameras out, to take a picture of this storm. And then as I looked up, I realized that we were still in the in the flow of the river. Now at this point, the Mississippi. Was meeting. It was a convergence point of th th the [00:18:00] Mississippi on the Ohio and it was on the band.

So for those that know about water and rivers and canoeing or whatever, it’s, the bend is the part fastest part of the river because the water is pushed into the band and then pushed out the band. And there was just a kind of a convergence of. All manner of problems at that point. So you had the flow, the storm, the narrow distance between the two containers.

So as I looked up, the canoe was moving side forward, sorry, nose in to one of these containers. Now these containers have their front to like that. So the water was going down and underneath these containers at a rapid speed. So I just screamed to Jamie to start paddling. And as he started coddling, I kind of turned the canoe sideways.

So we were side on the container and then we were paddling hard. So as we were paddling, we would go forwards and sideways with the flow and we just missed the front of this container was [00:19:00] having this water suck underneath it. But then as we came around the side of this container, there was a barge coming straight for us.

And at this point it was, I can only remember. The feeling of, it was like a hose pipe. And when you squeezed the hose pipe and the water being shot out at the front of a hose pipe so fast, when you squeeze it like a garden hose pipe, and we just shot between the barge and the container, like a bullet.

Cause the water was so fast and we’re getting channeled past it. And Then the swell of the barge hit us, but we, I turned the canoe into the swell and then we went over the swell and then 10 minutes later, we paddled into this tiny, tiny coastal not even coastal. It was a tiny town called Witcliff in Kentucky.

And it was, the rain was so heavy and we would just sit in there and the canoe was filling up with water and we would just [00:20:00] shake him. Because of what actually happened. So we managed to just pull ourselves together. We went into this place and said, look, we need somewhere to just chill for the night and stuff like that.

But when we got into this tiny port, which it was, which was a barge port, so barges were coming in and out there all the time. Currently all the barge people, all the people with the bards captains have been on radio saying daddy’s crazy guys in a canoe now in the storm, out on the river and to watch out for them because people have been killed that this area before.

Cause of, cause of all of the convergence of factors. And then a boat captain came in and he said, you guys are suicidal. Firstly, being on the river when it’s flooded like this, secondly. Paddling down by these containers and paddling out on the river at this point. And they, they were saying that they had seen big boats get sucked under the front of these containers and get basically crushed like a Coke can in a Coke machine.

You know, [00:21:00] those, you get those machines where they crushed Coke cans. They had seen big boats being pulled in under these and being crushed like that. So we were no doubt. We were. Probably three feet away from drown in it at any one point. And then strangely enough, something not as not similar, but something moderately similar happened the following day where we were caught out again, even though we were taken, taken care.

So looking back on that situation, it was just a, you know, you learn a lot of lessons from, from days like that to, to trust her instinct, to sometimes try not to be too brave when the weather and the conditions aren’t suitable. And also yeah, just sometimes it’s better to sit, sit and wait out rather than go, go for the warm bed.

That’s basically it say tempting. Yeah. Say tempting after a few days while [00:22:00] camping, but yeah, I mean, I was, and you went even after the captain sort of said, you guys are suicide or you went the next day. Yeah. So the following morning, the weather was beautiful. And the, the conditions, the weather was clear.

There was no wind on the river. And we sat up for hours and we were like, how the hell are we going to get out of this port? Because there was shipping ships moving in and out of it, containers moving in and out of it. And. We just decided to make a run for it when we saw a gap after that, but that then that day was then our biggest canoe day and our distance day, we can at 55 miles that day, I think 53.

So yeah, it’s you like the rough with the smooth and I think it’s all about, especially when you’re on the river. It’s what about mitigating risk? And, and, and, and looking back on it, it’s just all about safety. You know, your life is the most important thing in the world [00:23:00] and coming unsafely as most important thing in the world.

Good. And so, I suppose, even after they sort of Tory times, what sort of motivated you to sort of keep going? Was it the story to be able to tell, to tell this story, not the story of us. You know, in that situation. But what we always had to remember is in times of hardship on that river, and when we were walking and crossing the mountains in cold weather was the, the, the story of the Cherokee was, was the driving force for that whole journey.

And the people. During that time lost their homes, lost their livelihoods. They were driven from their, their, their spiritual and traditional homes. They were forced into reservations and lands that they’d never been to with at times only the belongings that they had on them. So literally only the clothing that they had on them.

So any, whenever, every times got hard, we would think back to that and think, you know, we’re here to tell a [00:24:00] story and yes, we’ve been for a couple of challenging situations, but it’s nothing compared to what they went through and still go through from a. You know, a spiritual perspective and, and cultural perspective.

So that was always in the back of our minds. And when things got bad. Yes. We had to check in and be like, okay, we need to look after ourselves on, see here and make the right decisions. But we would think back to what those people enjoyed and still enjoy. And that was our driving force to keep going.

It is quite the story. Yeah. Yeah. One of many with the canoeing, you sort of specialize quite a lot in your canoeing expeditions, you also had quite a memorable one in the Yukon. What was the sort of inspiration behind that trip? So that trip was again to learn. Me talk with the people [00:25:00] of the river. And that was kind of my initial sort of ethos I wanted.

I wanted a three month expedition. I wanted a canoe expedition. I want it to be able to photograph film, learn, discuss, sit with native people of that region, to learn about where their culture stands today. That there, whether they’re still a connection to the landscape and the wildlife, importantly, their connection to the river and how, whether they may sustain livelihoods and foods from the river.

Obviously the adventure the three month expedition of being, you know, crossing completely from one side to another of Alaska, pretty much. So it was, it was very much geared around meeting the people and learning about who, the, who the people were, their traditions and their connection to the river.

Amazing. And so was that [00:26:00] with the same crew as your Cherokee trail? No. So with, on the Cherokee journey, that was with one person that was with a guy called Jamie Barnes and not the fellow sort of photographer and adventurer. The other one that they Yukon dissent was with a team of three people.

So there’s four of us in total and we had two people from Montreal and one from Brooklyn. So we had a lady called Caroline Coty. Who’s. An unbelievable athlete and adventure and filmmaker equally incredible. Canoeist called Martin Trahan who had crossed Canada by canoe. And then a photographer called Jay Kolsch, who is an incredible photographer from Brooklyn.

And I put that team together without meeting any of them. And we met on the trip. So we’d had Skype calls, et cetera, et cetera. And we’d all talked about our kind of vision for the journey and the dream, but each person kind [00:27:00] of had that designated role. And yeah, so we filmed that trip, which is now a documentary on Amazon.

And Martin was really the, the logistics guy of understanding how we would get it out, that amount of food for three months. The logistics of canoes, the logistics of sending food on sending barrels on, et cetera, et cetera, the really sort of. Day-to-day mechanics of the journey. And then Jay was there to just capture that whole experience.

So we, obviously, none of us got paid for that trip. We, it featured a sidetrack magazine of that year, but where we got a little bit of money for writing the story in Jacobs and money for the pictures. But other than that, it was completely self-funded. Yeah. So it was a, it was a pretty international team from Canada, us UK, and it worked wonderfully.

I mean, you have [00:28:00] those, those challenges of human relationships, which you have on any trip, people that you haven’t met and you haven’t sought, or the bonded. Yeah. Over the years of friendship and relationships and understanding characteristics and drives and everything. But yeah, it was, it, it became an Epic journey that kick-started everything.

Amazing. And do you, what do you think? Because as I say, when you haven’t met them and when you sort of are literally turning up probably to meet them for the first time and on these trips, you go through quite a few hardships and struggles, which really put push people to the test. What do you think sort of makes a successful expedite?

I think that what makes us successful expedition is. Personal narrative, like the, the why is everything? So my, my narrative was to go and meet the people and paddle through some of the wildest [00:29:00] sort of terrain in sort of, you know, North America. Caroline’s was to film, you know, to film it. She had an interest in native cultures as well.

Martin was purely a canoeist. So, and Jay was the photographer and Jay wanted to really capture that. So it was all, I think the, when we go on journeys or we choose journeys, the why is a massive important. That’s part of the important part of that, because when times get tough, you get tired, you get hungry.

Like I had on the river, that the story we just discussed, you know, it’s that the why is what keeps you moving forward? Yeah. You got to check in and be like, okay, this needs to change. Or we need to adapt this, et cetera, et cetera. But the why is everything. And once you have a strong, why you will go beyond.

What needs to be done to sort of achieve, achieve that generally? Yeah. We had Georgia, Georgia on last week and he was saying that he writes down all his goals and his wife about [00:30:00] why he’s doing the trip. I mean, I always have it in my head, but by writing it down every time he always said, It comes to hardship.

He’ll look at his why and be like, this is why I want to be here. This is why I’m going through all these struggles, which I thought was a really great way of, you know, keeping, keeping a focus on the success of the expedition. Absolutely. And I think as well, it’s, you know, having accountability, having people there that are on that journey as well, that can lift you up when times of struggle and then you do the same for them.

But I think, I think everybody has an idea. Personal connection to the journey is really, really, really important. And also everybody being clear about that, their motivations and their outcome for that journey. So what do people want to get out of it? No. Do you want a, B, C, D, or E? Or do you want all of the above, you know, it’s, it’s important that you clarify those kinds of things.

If you [00:31:00] go on a journey with people that you don’t know, because sometimes wise can get crossed and people think. Something, that’s not going to be sort of coming to fruition on some of these expeditions. I always find sometimes when you go with someone and you have different goals, were there any sort of clashes of goals where they sort of what’s the word conflicted in what one wanted to achieve and what the other one wanted and they both couldn’t work together.

Yeah, I think, I think they can always. Things can always work. If you communicate that trip, the year contract in particular was my, my dream trip. My first big, big, ever three months though. And I kind of treated it like that. So it was like, Oh, we can bring a filmmaker. Fabulous. I’d love you to just catch an objective view of this trip photographer.

I’d love you to catch an objective view of the strip Martin. You can come along and help with. There was the thing is [00:32:00] I never set any really true boundaries. So it was like, yeah, we’re going on this trip and we’re doing this. We kind of know what we need to do. This is how we’re going to do it. This is where the food is going to be picking it up, you know, flying into here and flying out there.

Yeah, but I never set any boundaries with regards to decision-making or safety and these kinds of things. So in, especially on the Yukon I was not the most. The least inexperienced, but I was one of the least and experience. So Martin was the most experienced person on that trip in terms of canoeing and long distance or expedition commitment.

So I looked up to him a lot and I, I trusted him and we, we looked to him for logistical sort of knowledge and how to get things done. And he was incredible at that, but we did clash because there was certain points. Within the trip where he decisions were being made [00:33:00] based on the skillset and the ability of him and the other canoeist whereas myself and Caroline who were in a canoe.

Our sort of collective skillset wasn’t as strong. So I am a great believer in, you know, you always work to the level of the weakest person or that those with the least, you know, skill set, you know, you’re there for that person. And you help them through that situation. If you’re more, if you’ve got better skills and decisions will be made and type risks were being taken based on the stronger skillset.

And when we had conversations about that I then had to get to a point where I had to set boundaries and say, right, this is I’m going to make the decisions here. Can we communicate before any decisions are made in the future, and this is why we making those decisions. So and that caused a little bit of friction because you’ve got on the one hand, you’ve got someone who’s experienced and making decisions based on their experience.

And then you’ve got me who’s. Who’s putting the trip together and is thinking [00:34:00] erring on the outside of safety. So there’s, you’ve got to find that, that, that sort of flux point of where you’re working together and then there’s a movement within that. And that did cause some friction. But all you got to do is just communicate and be open and be honest and say, and explain why you you’re, you’re coming to this decision and why you’re making this decision.

And then things tend to work. Okay. But yeah, I’ve always said on expeditions. The the, the distance or the tiredness or the practical stuff is never the hardest. It’s the human relationships, which are the hardest and getting on with people when times are bad, cold, wet, hungry, you know? Yes. When you find out what people are really made of and how people respond to adversity.

That’s when you find what people are rarely made of. So yeah, that, that, that was the hardest part. The expedition for me was, was the human relationships. [00:35:00] I think, I think they all are. I think when you go on these trips, the human interactions and what people want are always the toughest. And if you can get that right, it usually makes for such a successful expedition.

Yeah, totally agree. And that’s that, that starts before you leave. Yeah. The people that you’re with, you know talking to them, maybe even going out on an ex, a mini expedition with them, you know, COVID permitting or whatever beforehand is, is, is really important and spending a few days with that person.

So, you know, if you’re like you’re doing At some point you were doing a paddle, you know, I’d imagine that you want to go and meet that person and paddle with them for a few days or go hiking. And while camping with that person or spending some time in nature with that person. So you can get to know them a little bit.

So then when you go, you drop straight into that journey, you know, you’ve got that foundation of understand a little bit about each other rather than doing what I did, which was just going straight off [00:36:00] the deep end and making it work. But it’s not, you know, I learned something on that trip. I learned some of that.

The best leadership skills I’ve ever learned, probably even more than the Marines by being in that, on that journey and learning how to communicate with people in terms of their value systems and stuff like that. And learning learning how to communicate in terms of putting a team together to get the job done and finish and that kind of stuff.

And with everybody in a safe, a safe way. So, yeah, I might only be advice on that would be, get to know the person a little bit before you spend a lot of time with them. Yeah, I though, as I say, your photography and film that you’ve done on some of these trips and those ones in particular are absolutely breathtaking.

Your photography. Well, as I know, from being with you and also from your Instagram and website is stunning. And for anyone who’s interested in these stories, his website in [00:37:00] finch.com tells the whole story through. Words through images through film. So you can go and check, check it out, say, and 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 one item or gadget that you always bring on your expeditions. Other than a camera, which is like an extension of my body and my soul One gadget.

No, it’s the camera camera. What’s the camera without that, you know, like yeah, it’s, it’s, it’s an extension of my body and it’s something that I take everywhere with me and I’m learning to use now a little bit more not respectfully, but what’s the word? Intermittently [00:38:00] I’m learning to now when I do expeditions and I take photos, I’m learning to look more rather than take photos more, you know, there’s a time to take photos of time to not take photos. So that’s I can’t go anywhere without my camera. I agree. I think one thing I learned from one of my expeditions was especially going through all the all the images and all the photos and videos from it is actually.

Having an idea of what you want to shoot before you shoot. Otherwise you’re just shooting for the sake of shooting and being like, Oh, that looks nice. Click. That looks nice, click. And then you get back and you realize that they’re okay, but they’re not great. And actually, if you say, this is what I want to shoot, take the time, shoot it, then put the camera away and then just immerse yourself into that experience.

I think that it helps massively. Yeah, I totally agree. And I think, and I’ve spoken about this before, where [00:39:00] sometimes the camera can become a middleman, like a plane of glass between you and the experience and the desire when, when you, when you like photography, as much as I do in visual storytelling your first instinct is to take a photo.

Rather than look with your eyes and absorb that memory, et cetera. So I’ve had to learn to put the camera down or to think about Stuart. Like you’ve just pretty much where you just said that to think about story and like, does it, is this picture relevant to the story? Yeah, it could be. And then if not you just, the camera doesn’t need to be there.

It doesn’t need to be out and, and, and. Taking you away from that moment? Yeah, I think that’s, I mean, what’s it, I think it was when the poop first came to power. There’s a sort of picture of everyone holding up their iPads and you just watching the screen of what’s actually happening. Whereas if you take it away and actually just take a moment to, for where you are.

I think that memory holds a [00:40:00] bit, otherwise you’re just basically watching a TV. You might as well be at home. Yeah. And I think a good, a good practice for that is a few years ago, I did a project where I walked across the Lake district and I only had a throwaway camera as my camera. So I left my DSLR at home.

And I only had the 27 images on an old Kodak throwaway camera that you can buy like seven quid from Amazon. And that was to force me into a position where I only had 27 images to create the story for that, that, that trip. And also I had a very rudimentary camera that had no focus. I had to measure the distance that it was in focus on like the kind of focal length, et cetera.

So. Well, that taught, taught me was okay. If I come to a scene or anything, does this picture need to be taken? If it doesn’t, the camera can go away. If it does then it’s, you know, it’s a really important, beautiful picture. Cause the light’s right. And the context is [00:41:00] right. I would take the picture. So yeah, that was a nice example, you know, that kind of nice way of doing things because they’ll see I-phones and DSLRs, you’ve got unlimited imagery storage on those cards.

So. It’s nice to do that every now and again, you know? Yeah. Yeah. Very true. What camera do you have for people listening? I have a Nick on Zed seven. So I stay with, I work with Nick on which in today’s world, you know, they’re not. The best cameras out there. You’ve now got the cannon R five or the Sony, a seminar fours.

And that kind of, which are technically better cameras, but I just love the color profiles that come out of their cons. Yeah, they, yeah, I might change one day, but for the moment, yeah. What is your favorite adventure or travel book? So [00:42:00] I probably would have asked her when you say it was this one. The, the quote, because I know one of the questions you asked him about from the quote, but it’s one, it’s this one here called the North American Indian, and it’s a book by a photographer called Edward Curtis.

Curtis was a guy that spent 20 or 30 years in the early 19 hundreds using a plate camera. So like on an old tripod with plate glass, kind of exposure. And he traveled around to every tribe in North America and recorded them. In that state, in that point. So with the, I think we’re talking early 19 hundreds and it took him 30 years to do it.

And over this time he has taken the most unbelievable port traits. Step your port traits of these native Americans with their regalia on the book. It was just inspired me in so many ways because of the incredible native American portraits. It’s a book [00:43:00] my dad gave to me as well, which gives it sort of equal, you know, more important than anything.

But it’s just that the guys technical photography and how good he was at taking these photos with the equipment that you had at that moment in history. And the time that it took him to, to, you know, the breadth of his work over 20 or 30 years. Yeah. I have to check that one out. Why are adventures important to you?

The venture is important because. I think immersing ourself in nature, as much as we can is important. I think it’s something that we are losing contact with. Our connection to the outdoors, our spiritual connection, our physical connections to outdoors. It’s something that I believe that we are slightly losing a little bit losing touch off.

Also adventure is so important because. You’re in some way or another, [00:44:00] you’re pushing a boundary or pushing a comfort zone. And that to me is how we grow as people. And, and, and not forget forgetting that adventure is very relative. So you could be a mom with two children and put a tent in the garden as that could be adventure for you.

Or you could be like menu where we travel to wild places for something. A little bit more extreme or longer or whatever, something like that. So remembering adventure is still relative and adventure is in our DNA. Exploration is in our DNA as people, as human beings to explore, to go to different terrains, different environments.

And I think we need to, we need to nurture that and feed that as much as we can. And I think. Being in nature, spending time in nature, I just pushing ourselves is, is, is just good for the soul. Is food for the soul. Yeah, no, I, I agree. As you were basically saying, I think Quate is [00:45:00] comfort and grief cannot coexist.

Yeah, that’s it. And one of mine is without challenge. There is no growth. So that’s why on those adventures, you know, you’re not talking when you go on adventure, it doesn’t have to be a physical challenge. It could be a mental challenge, cultural challenge, like challenge, ideas, challenge, your perspectives challenge what you think is acceptable, not acceptable and also challenge yourself in terms of what you can achieve, what you can enjoy.

Yeah. And I say, I think adventure is important for everybody on every level. Yeah. I agree. What is your favorite quote? Sorry. My favorite quote is from that book of Edward Curtis and the quote is to accomplish it. Curtis has exchanged ease, comfort home life for the hardest kind of work frequent and long continued separation from his family.

The wearing Toyota travel through different regions, and [00:46:00] finally the heartbreaking struggle of winning over to his purpose. Primitive men to human, ambitious time and money mean nothing, but to who, but to her dream or a cloud in the sky or a bird flying across the trial from the wrong direction means much.

And that to me says that, you know, that. Th th the simple things on expeditions on adventure are the most important things. And you enjoy all of, all of those struggles of being separated from your family, the money that it might cost, the sacrifices that you might make to, to go in search of a more simpler life.

And when you’re on expeditions, I truly believe that it’s the SIM. When you, when you break it down into those really simple processes and acts of taking the less amount of equipment and, and and simplifying your life to a certain degree, that’s where the true [00:47:00] beauty of expeditions is is, is to live more, simply an exist more simply.

Very nice people. Listening are always keen to travel and go on these big grand adventures. What’s the one thing you would recommend to people wanting to get started? I would something that we’ve had to do because of COVID is to start local. And enjoy your local environment and explore, explore what’s around you.

I would say if people starting out is to, yeah. Just start local, find a beautiful Woodland, find a trail for a beautiful Woodland. Keep your phone in your pocket. Don’t bring your phone out and just listen, have, have a mindful 20 minutes while you’re not talking and listen to how much more that you can hear the birds, the animals, the wind or, you know, engage all of the sentences.

And if you’re looking for something a little bit more challenging and longer distance or something. That’s going to push you in different [00:48:00] ways. Again, start with your, why, what, what environment would I love this adventure to be in? Would it be Woodlands? Would it be mountains? Would it be on a river?

Would it be on water? And write down every component of that adventure? How long would it be for? Would I be with other people? What would be the goal of the journey? How long would it be for right. All of those things down in like a mini mind map and then think, okay, so what what places can I go that are mountainous?

What river could I go to? That’s here or there? What I need to travel that I really break down a back engineer, the components of that adventure and just really free think, write down anything and don’t let any restrictions be the travel restrictions, physical restrictions. Whether you feel that you can do it or can’t do it mentally, you know, free thing.

Just, just write down exactly that dream adventure, that dream trip. [00:49:00] And if it’s something that you kind of do this year, do it next year. Find something that feeds into some of those points somewhere here in the UK. So you could go to Wales, Scotland Lake district, there’s rivers, there’s mountains, there’s Woodlands there’s long distance, small distance trails.

There’s no excuse. Yeah. The skews and the barriers are the ones that we put up ourselves. So just design your dream adventure and then find a way to make that happen. And if you can’t. Contact me I’ll help you make it happen. Well, there you go. No, I think it’s very true. I think, you know, for this summer, especially as we were discussing before the podcast started our intent, well, my intention and probably yours is to keep it local, to keep it UK based.

And I thought, I think, well, not that we have any choice anyway, but I think it’s also nice to explore your own. Place you’re at your own home. I remember in 2017 cycling up to Edinburgh and I was just [00:50:00] like blown away by the peat district and the Lake district, especially, and I had never really had any desire to go up there, but other than maybe from with Nelson, but other than that, I was, yeah, I had no intention, but it was, you know, more breathtaking then nearly.

99% of the places that I’ve been around the world and it’s right on your doorstep or right on my doorstep. So yeah, it’s definitely one to do think local. Yeah. That’s it. And I think a lot of the time we, we, we assume adventure is far away into another country. Another continent. Or go into a desert mountain range or whatever, but again, go back to that.

Adventure is a mindset and what it means to you and what it means to me is probably similar but slightly different. And what it means to a mama to children is very different. So yeah, [00:51:00] explore local and find out kind of what adventure really means means to you. Cause you can, you can go and sleep a baby bag in a beautiful pine Woodland somewhere.

I’ll take a little stove and make a cup of tea in the morning and that kind of thing, even, you know, the boundaries of things been legal and non-legal, but you could do that. And that’s, that’s an incredible adventure, or it being in this country, you could go to a body, you could set up a body adventure and go and stay in bodies.

Now bodies are what, make a hike into a very cool adventure. So there’s this, if you get creative and you know, you find ways to do things, you can have an adventure in this country, a really good adventure. Yeah. Finally, what are you doing now? And how can people follow your trips in the future? So what I’m doing now is.

Planning for the year ahead, which is probably going to be UK or local Europe based. [00:52:00] I’m thinking of potentially with a friend, if we can crossing Sweden by foot and then Norway by canoe. So Norway and Sweden are joined together. So we’re going to just literally go across the width of those two countries.

If we can’t do that more than likely it will be. Scotland or something along those lines, some big adventures canoe in some big locks may be something similar. It’s like that somebody sort of arduous quite challenging for a week or two. And you can find me on Instagram. So it’s at Ian, the letter E Finch and my website, which is www N E finch.com.

Amazing. Well, Ian, thank you so much for coming on the show today. You have some incredible stories to tell and I’m sure a few more that we haven’t had the chance to get through. Ample people listening as as I was saying on the podcast and photography is truly brilliant. So [00:53:00] do you check out his website and you can see and Instagram, and you can see all the amazing photography he’s done over the years.

Lovely. Thank you. 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 video.

George Kefford

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George Kefford (EXPLORER)

George Kefford is a young Anglo-Australian explorer and writer who specialises in human-powered journeys: often by foot; sometimes by kayak. At the age of 17, he walked the Holy Lands, alone, across Israel, Palestine, and Jordan. On the Podcast, we talk about this expedition and about how he has recently returned from Morocco where after studying Arabic in Rabat, he walked the 250km length of the Souss River from its source in the High Atlas Mountains to its mouth near Agadir.

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Transcript of our Conversation

George Kefford

[00:00:00] George Kefford: Hello and welcome to the modern adventurer cost. And they shouted, they shouted at me and in Arabic Yahudi and they, they sort of picks up a can of Pepsi and chucked it at my heads. I had no idea what was going on. I saw some flags around of groups that, that, you know, some would call terrorists.

Others would go for it and fighters, but I sort of knew there was a lot of tension in the place and this, this kind of Pepsi still hit me in their heads.

My next guest is an aspiring adventurer. He has done some remarkable expeditions from walking the Haley land and walking Malter along with a load of others. On today’s show, we talk about his trip across the Haley lands and some of the [00:01:00] amazing moments he had. I am delighted to introduce George Catholic to the show.

Thank you. Yeah. How are you? I’m very well, very well. Well, you’re a aspiring Explorer. Who’s probably done more trips than most of my audience and myself put together. And you’re only 19, which is truly incredible. And I mean, you’ve done stuff from walking the Hailey lands to source to sea or Brisbane, but I think we’ll probably get into that later on.

Yeah. Let’s start with you and how you got into all these adventures. Yeah. So I was born in, I was born in the UK and grew up in Germany and Australia. And from a very early age, my parents would take me up into the, the, so the local mountain near where we grew up and and yeah, ever since then, that was, that sort of gave birth to my, my love of it venture and I just, I kept wanting to build on the last trip build on the last trip.

And [00:02:00] so I started with some small expeditions in and around, broke her up in Australia. And then I did walking the Holy lens, which was 800 kilometers across Israel, Palestine to Jordan. And since then I’ve done a few trips in and around the middle East and Europe. And and yeah, that’s that’s my background’s in adventure.

Yeah. Well, and so do you feel that we’ve, you, you said you bought up in England, moved around from Germany to Australia. Do you think that sort of moving around is what sort of gave you this. Freedom to sort of want to explore. It was the fact that you didn’t see any boundaries to you going to these different countries because you were moving so freely from such a young age.

Yeah, I think, I think that’s a big race. And then when I’m on these, these trips and everything, I don’t, I don’t particularly get homesick because, you know, I grew up in three countries, so there’s, there’s not so much. [00:03:00] You know, I’ll miss my family. I miss my friends, but missing an actual country or, or, or the places or anything like that.

No, not so much. But it’s, it’s definitely, it definitely helps. I’m not sure if that’s the reason, but it definitely helps. So I mean, you you’ve done so many trips. Probably the best place to start is with your main one, which was the walking, the Holy lands. Why did you decide on this trip? Yeah, so I was in, I was in year 12 comics class in Australia and I was quite bored and I knew I wanted to do something quite big and go somewhere where people wouldn’t necessarily go and do something that people wouldn’t necessarily do after I graduated.

So I looked into a bunch of places and. I love the middle East. I studied a lot in in senior history and, and yeah, because of that, I chose Israel and Palestine and Jordan, and I thought, why not walk across it? So [00:04:00] that’s it. So what age? Where, where did you start on the trip? So I started in Tampa ACO in the in the North of the country.

And and from there’s three days across Northern Israel, then I entered the West bank in the West bank for about two weeks. And then after that yeah, through Jordan and three more weeks down to the the Gulf. Got it. And I mean, I suppose being a westerner. And hearing the sort of news about the West bank and everything.

Was there not a sort of fear at because you were, what 17 when you did this? Yes. I’m sure. Like, like myself, you see on the news about the West bank and Israel, it sort of seems to be this. Oh, sort of slightly war torn area. And there is one of political [00:05:00] controversy from time to time. So was there not a sort of fear going into it?

There was, yeah, I was, I was very scared. I think. My mom was probably more scared than me, but but you know, that, that sort of, I had no idea what the West bank was going to be. Like, all I knew about it was, was what I heard on the news. It turns out it wasn’t that way, but, but you know, that, especially the first day I went into the West bank, I was extremely scared.

I was, I was fearful for my life. Like these guys would, if they think I’m Israeli or, or what, if you know any other things. So, yeah, it was, it was quite scary at first, but. You get into it and you, you prove your pre your preconceptions wrong. And it all works out in the end. Yeah, I completely agree.

We, we had Nick butters on recently who. We were sort of talking about this as well. He was going, he was running in Syria and had all these sort of preconceptions of war torn areas. And the reality of going to these countries [00:06:00] is you see the locals, you meet the locals and you find that they are incredibly friendly.

How did the locals treat you? Incredibly. I always say that the hospitality I experienced on this trip was, was second to none. They treat guests sacredly when I was in Jordan, especially I would never basically never paid for accommodation when I was in, when I was in small villages and everything, because they would invite me into their houses and, and let me sleep there.

And it was, it was just incredible. It was, it was amazing. Wow. So you going from Northern Israel into the West bank and then further on. Yeah. So when I got midway down to the, to Jericho midway in the West bank, I across the border into Jordan and then, then from Jordan, I walked down to Aqaba in yeah, the Southern most tip of the country.

Yeah. And so what was the sort of feeling you had because you had the language barrier, I know that you are [00:07:00] studying Arabic at the moment. Was there an issue with the language barrier? Yeah. Yeah. At first, especially I learned all the basic Arabic greetings before, and I could read about half of the Arabic alphabet, which is, which is pretty useless if you don’t know the other half.

But but yeah, I mean, I can, I can say I’m walking from here to here. I knew the words. For water and foods and, and everything. So the very basics were fine, but but having, you know, deep conversations or anything like that, that was difficult. Yeah. The English over there is quite good. Especially in Palestine, it’s actually very, very good.

In Jordan, not so much, but in the cities where the tourists go, then the, now everyone will speak English, but I didn’t find it too difficult towards the end, especially to communicate. What were the sort of moments along the way which you look back on in sort of fond memory? Oh, I mean [00:08:00] getting into Jerusalem was, was really, really special.

And that was that’s one of the ones that, that sucks out there was also near Nablus in the West bank. There’s a there’s a, there’s an old Roman Fort and I was walking there and The, the local men from the Palestinian village, they were, they were sort of re rebuilding the castle to turn it into a tourist attraction.

And They, you know, the village leader, the elder was there and he spoke a bit of English, so it was coming to me and, and he was, he was just telling me about all the people that walked along the same routes I was walking on, you know, Muhammad Jesus, Moses, or not Moses Abraham all these, all these different profits from from, from the Bible, when, you know, Congress like Alexander, the great, and that was just that moment of realization.

If, you know how significant this route is, that’s another one. And, and getting into the desert, the desert’s fending off with a desert when [00:09:00] I was there. It’s so peaceful and you know, nothing’s happening around you and there’s some sort of, there’s an aroma of death, but there’s some sort of, this, there’s some sort of beauty in that death, which, which I quite like.

Yeah. Did you say what you are camping in the sort of desert. Yes. In a, in a desert, I had a few nights about camping. If there was like a Bedouin camp sites or, or a small guest house or something, I would say there, because, you know, I tend to get smelly quite quickly on these walks. So any shower is is welcome.

So, so if I can, I’ll, I’ll stay in a bed, but if not, then add my tens and and everything like that. Yeah. You said there something quite sort of peaceful about the sort of aroma of death. Yeah, it’s, it’s just the absolute silence that the athletes silence and, and, and life business, you just really feel completely alone.

And, you know, especially what you’re on, where you’ve got these, these massive sandstone [00:10:00] massive sandstone rocks everywhere, and really gives you a sense of perspective, you know, that your life does. It doesn’t really mean anything. It’s sort of ego death, I suppose. And Yeah, just, just absolute peace.

So much time to reflect about everything and, and it’s, it’s no other environment is a lot of the desert. It’s incredible. Yeah. I, I, I, there’s something to be said about just sort of going out into these wild places like the desert on your own and wild campaign, this sort of eerie silence, I think is really sort of what blissful is.

Probably the word I’m going for. Yeah, it’s something I don’t think people can sometimes understand the idea of going out alone in the middle of nowhere where there’s nothing. Yeah. Yeah, for sure. It’s, it’s, it’s incredible. It’s wanting to get back to the desert and it’s like, yeah. And you’re at the moment you’re stuck in [00:11:00] lockdown in.

Stuck in the Netherlands. Yeah. Yeah. So in the Hague is for our study. And yeah, it’s, it’s, it’s not a bad place to be. It’s not, not the best place to be, but you know, I’m happy that I’m safe. I can work still and, and it’s, it’s all good. Amazing. And what, what do you think it is about going alone?

Because you’ve done a lot of these walking trips. What is it about walking a lane, which you like. I think it’s, it’s the, the Headspace that, that I get, it’s the peacefulness and spinning up to think about anything for just hours and hours and hours. And, and then, so that’s sort of the mental aspect of it, but then when you are alone, you’re a lot more, you’re a lot more vulnerable.

And as a result of that, the people that you meet are a lot more accommodating to you. They don’t see it as a threat in any way or, or anything like that. So, yeah, it’s just. Multiple factors, but it’s just that, that head space [00:12:00] and the vulnerability, which, which I find incredible, or just try it. I find sometimes trying to convince people to come on these trips hard enough.

When you’re like, I’m going to walk for a month in the desert. It was like, yeah, no, no, for me, no, for me. Yeah. I struggle with that as well. But yeah, sometimes I really appreciate going a lane. We had Jamie Ramsey on episode five, I believe. And we were talking about how going alone, as you said, with the locals, you have that vulnerability.

And it just makes the experience special and unique to you. No one can really understand what it’s like other than yourself and trying to explain it can be tricky, but you have that. I don’t know what the word is. That sort of memory in your head, which you cherish. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. It’s the solid, I was there’s people that [00:13:00] ask me, do you get lonely?

And sometimes yes, but there’s. I like the solitude. I don’t look at it as loneliness. I call it solitude and it’s very peaceful and beautiful. Yeah. Yeah. I agree. And so how long did that. Expedition take that walk. So about one and a half months, I think I was walking for 38 days and then, you know, I’d have a rest week in Jerusalem and a few rest days here and there and everything, but was 38 days of walking.

And, and yeah, it was, it was, it was amazing. Yeah. I mean, as we said earlier, you’re sort of going into areas, which I imagine some of the audience might feel. Are very dangerous. Were there any sort of moments along the way, which you were fearful? Yeah, there were a few. I was in this this place in Palestine called Jason’s going to school.

It’s just [00:14:00] South of Annapolis. It’s it’s a, it’s a refugee camp. It’s called Ballato, but lotta and Basically the people who live there are exclusively Palestinian refugees who used to live in Tel Aviv. And we were kicked out after, after Israel became a state and, and it’s, I read an article when it said it was the most feeble freebro place in the inside Indian, the Palestinian Territories.

And I had, no, I had no idea about this. I was just following Google maps on my phone and it took me straight through there. And you know, I was walking through there and someone of go red hair and, and they, they shouted, they shouted at me and in, in Arabic Yahudi and they, they sort of picks up a kind of Pepsi and chucked it in my heads.

I had no idea what was going on. I saw some flags around of groups that, that, you know, some would call terrorists. Others would go for it and fighters. But I sorta knew there was a lot of tension in the place and this, this kind of Pepsi [00:15:00] still hit me in their heads, not realizing where I was. I decided to pick up the Pepsi can drink it.

Cause, cause I like Pepsi and and then sort of, yeah, stupidly sort of sarcastically sort of Turn the can upside down is the chakra and thank you in Arabic. And and that was from, in terms of people, people was, that was, that was the most scary thing on, on, on any of my trips. But you know, had I known that that was the area I was going through was, was, was that fever or I’ve had I known the stories about the people who lived there.

I wouldn’t have gone there and be able to have been so stupid and sarcastic when I send the the Betsy can upside down. When, when did you realize that it was an act of hostility towards you? Did you know, straight away or was it like, Oh, it’s you giving me this kind of Coke? Well, usually they was usually, they would give me drinks and all around the, all around the West bank.

But you know, I walked into this place and just, [00:16:00] there was something, there was something off about the atmosphere and yeah, this, this happened and I got out and you know, where the hell have I just been. Not to my phone, but also, ah, okay. Bad place. So that’s, that’s one, two myths out on the on the trip.

Yes. I mean, there are, there are some Westerners that go there. I think the UN have got some refugee camps or some sort of assistance programs there, but you know, if you go in uninvited it’s, it’s probably not the best idea. Got it. And so your six week or one and a half month trip took you all the way through after that, were you.

Was there a sort of feeding of, well, I just want to do another one was that you were sort of hooked. Yeah, exactly. I mean, it started earlier than that, that this sort of a hook is the first strip and it just keeps on going after that. But, but that, that one expedition [00:17:00] certainly sort of reinforced my love for the middle East and the Islamic worlds.

And and that’s where I’ll be focusing on in the future. Yeah. And so going through the Holy lands, it’s a sort of a very spiritual place. Was it a sort of pilgrimage for yourself or was it just an idea of learning about the different cultures? It was both. I am, I am religious and that was, that was big big aspects of my trip to, you know, walk through the places that all the profits have been and, and, and everything like that.

But That was, it was only of the trip. It was also to just experience a new place, a new culture and learn about a place that’s often people have misconceptions about. So, yeah, there’s a lot of different factors. And so walking, I mean, you, you almost specialize in walking, you’ve walked Molter, you’ve walked the [00:18:00] Netherlands, Israel, all sorts.

What is it about walking that you love so much? I think it’s just the, the pace of it, just because it is a slow, it just forces you to take everything in you. Can’t sort of skip through a village that you would be if you’re in car or whatever, but it’s just yeah, how slow it is. You you’re forced to see and take in everything.

You’re forced to go to every, every cafe that you come across in every village, because you want to have a break. You want to have a cup of tea or something like that. So you have to stop. You have to interact with everyone and, and it’s just, it’s the best way to. To hear the stories of the people. And that’s, that’s what I love about it.

Most. Did you get invited in for tea quite a lot then? Yeah. Yeah. I mean the first, the first day I was in Palestine, there’s about a, I think two or three kilometers section from the border with Israel to, to the first town Janine and I just walking on this road, I was, I was invited in fatigue or coffee at least 10 times, you know, I’ve rejected or rejected most of them because I had to go to [00:19:00] Janine.

But but yeah, everyone was just, yeah, come in and come in. And. All the same. Welcome. And yeah, it was amazing. Yeah. It’s, it’s an amazing experience for anyone. Listening is just people around the world are so hospitable and just you, if you just let them so I didn’t know where I’m going with that one, but.

This sort of, as I say, I try and sort of promote and encourage people to sort of step out of their comfort zone and to go on these sort of big grand adventures, because it opens up a whole new world. As you said, you know, us in the West, we see Palestine and Israel and we, we laid out at the time, just see a massive political debate and.

Trouble is probably the best word to describe it. But when you experience these countries by yourself yeah. You, you come across some of the most hospitable and [00:20:00] incredible people. Yeah. Yeah. It’s, it’s, it’s unmatched. I was in, I was in Morocco recently and, and, and there is, there is something, there is something across, across these Islamic coaches that have, that have experienced of just of just absolutely, you know, Theresa the guest is with the utmost respect and being as splittable as he can possibly be.

And it’s something we can learn from. And it’s yeah, it’s incredible. So after that trip, you, you were hooked and the idea was to do the sort of walk walked more basically. So Multa what was about motor that attracted you there? To be honest, what attracted me to Volta was a 10 year Ryanair ticket.

Was that, was, that was that was it really? I mean, it’s, it’s obviously part of the Mediterranean it’s got, it’s got a very rich history of, of multiple empires and religions you know, setting themselves up there. The multiuse [00:21:00] itself is, is, is basically it’s our elective Arabic. It’s the only Semitic language.

It’s, that’s an official language of the EDU and No going there was, was, was incredible. Romans you’re awesome. And so you’ve got the French, you’ve got the British and, and it was, it’s a small, it’s a small two. The two islands are quite smaller. So it gave me, you know, I had a week, I was just planning to walk a hundred miles is, you know, circles around the islands or across the islands, or, you know, I had how I had as much freedom as I could give myself.

And and yeah, it was just, it was a, the expedition that had the most. I didn’t plan this spawn per se. I didn’t have, I’ve got to be in this town and this town in this standby by this time or whatever. So yeah, it was, it was completely, completely, you know, liberating in a way. Yeah. So that’s how you plan your adventures.

You look for the cheapest rhino ticket. I’m a student, you know, I’ve got, yeah. Yeah, [00:22:00] good. That’s not a bad, not a bad way to do it. Really. Yeah. And so, but how do you prepare for the youth expeditions, these walking expeditions? Are there certain things that you always bring with you? Yeah, I mean, I always, I always bring some sort of survival case or whatever, just in case something goes wrong.

Never had to use it yet. Apart from that. I mean, it’s, it’s a book and a diary and a pen that’s that’s that’s really is my, my, my goal isn’t really to, to rough it out or to break any records or anything like that. It’s just to go there and record the stories that I see and hear rebels and try and bring them to the rest of the world.

And that’s, that’s, that’s my real passion. That’s what I am today. What’s the craziest story you’ve had on your travels? Yeah, I mean, there’s. At the time I almost died. Really? That’s, that’s probably the craziest one. So it was on the last day of walking to Holy lands and [00:23:00] I was supposed to be, had to cross three males and ranges to get to Aqaba.

And the, I was crossing the second mountain range and you have to follow these shepherds trails up and down. And I’ll also the Shepherd’s trail when I saw these riverbeds. And I was like, I can just follow that. Then there was a waterfall, which was dry. So it was just, it was just a cliff and I thought, okay, right.

I’ve got to turn back. I jumped down a smaller cliff to get to this part of the river bed. So it was essentially stuck and And that was discreet slope from this Riverbed to it sort of a more stable area where I could get down. And I thought, okay, that’s, that’s my only hope. So climbed up to this great slope and started trying to walk across it, trying to keep my center center of gravity quite low, obviously not low enough.

I slipped quite quickly. And you know, I was just sliding on my backside down this, this, this great slope rocks flying everywhere, hitting me in the, in the heads and, and You know, this, this is a [00:24:00] good sort of 20, 30 meter drop to the, to the bottom of this. So even if I survive the fall easily, a broken leg, and it’s at least 10 kilometers to cruel to the nearest town like this, it’s not going to be possible.

So there was sort of this one Boulder and just, you know, I prayed, you know, please be stable. So grabbed onto it with all the workloads and luckily it was, and And then sort of cruel to the other side of this, this, this great slope is slowly and steadily as Kurds and, and just sort of just broke down on the other side, went into shock and, and it was awful crazy in a bad way, but but certainly something to sort of look back on with a bit of humidity and everything.

It was, it was gone. It was gone inside. Yeah. It’s it’s those sort of moments will always live with you, but they’re, I always find, they always make you a little bit stronger for the next one. [00:25:00] Yeah. Yeah. Hopefully you were a little bit less stupid in this instance, maybe. Yeah. I was going to say that, but I, I thought it within a sound, so yeah, so poetic.

Yeah. Well, Jewish, there’s a part of the show where we ask the same five questions to each guest each week. Yes. With the first being on your trips, what’s the one gadget that you always bring with you on your trips. The one I’ve got the loam inReach, so sip assess like messenger and and that’s, that’s the best way that I can keep in contact with my parents.

You know, my mom always wants to know where I am every day and stuff, so she can check on safe is so love is weird. But but yeah, so that’s, that’s, that’s the one thing let’s say apart from that phone camera and a massive fan of the high tech side of things, but yeah. Yeah, my when I go on trips, my family [00:26:00] always want me to have a GPS so they can track every movement, but I find it really creepy and weird.

So I’m like airplane mode the whole way. Yeah. Favorite adventure or travel book. So this has changed quite recently. I used to, I used to love I still do Arabian sadness, mobile Dessinger. That was, that was my favorite. But I’ve, I’ve recently read a letter, some woods Arabia. And I just found that I found that brilliant, cause it was more, it’s more relevant to today’s world and there was into various countries all around the Arabian worlds and, and yeah, I found, I found that a brilliant book.

Amazing. I’ll have to check that one out. I’ve got a signed copy as well. I was quite happy with it. I check you out. Why are adventures important to you? I think, I think to me, it’s. [00:27:00] I think it’s more just, I’m going to a part of the world and really broadening your own horizons is as cliche as it sounds.

It’s, it’s experiencing a new part of the worlds. And when you do it in an, in a adventurous, an adventurous way, it’s a completely unique way. The locals are going to see you and treat you different to the average tourist. And, and yeah, for me, that those are the big, those are the big sort of pull factors.

There’s also obviously the, the physical and mental challenge that I like, but But yeah, it’s more the experience and yeah. Opening up. Yeah, I agree. What about your favorite quote? My favorite quotes is from one of my sort of childhood heroes, Richard Francis Burton. And he said that I’ve got it here of the Gladys moments in human life.

And me thinks it’s the departure upon a distant journey into unknown lands. Shaking off with one mighty effort, the fetters of habits, the LEDs and weight of [00:28:00] routine, the cloak of many cares and the slavery of civilization, man feels once more happy. So that’s, that’s a good almost poet. Almost like a poet.

Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Something very poetic about it. No, it’s a good one. I haven’t heard that one before. Yeah. I mean, Richard Francis person was, was absolute madman. Like he was a, he did a pilgrimage to Mecca. Even though he wasn’t a Muslim, he spoke 20 different languages or something like that. Officer in the British, the British East India company and, and yeah, he’s did everything.

Yeah. And is I value you model your cell phone for the future? I try. Yeah. I mean, he’s a bit too Victorian for me, per se, but VAs is definitely some sort of some sort of role model. Yeah. People listening are always keen to travel and go on these sort of grand adventures like yourself. What would you recommend [00:29:00] to people wanting to go on these adventures?

I’d say just, just back yourself, really? Like there’s nothing more, I mean, planning, planning is hard and you just planning so hard. Spin is when you take that first step of the journey, that’s, that’s when it becomes easier. And, and once you’re there, just, just believe in yourself, it’s going to get hard.

But but yeah, you just believe in yourself, you have make sure I was right down my motivation for doing any trips. So if I’m feeling for the feeling shit, one day, I’ll just open, open my diary and just read that to myself. So that that’s. That helps me, but yeah, just, just back yourself. Really.

That’s quite a good idea. Actually. I haven’t, I haven’t actually, Dave had done that before, right. Your motivations before the trip. Yeah. It’s it’s, it’s great. It’s just, yeah, every time, you know, I was, I was in Morocco recently and I was in a walk there and sprained my ankle two days before I finished the trip and, you know, just opened it up and thought, okay.

Right. Take some painkillers and just soldier on and sure enough, I got there in the end. [00:30:00] So. Yeah, I was, I was speaking on the podcast a few weeks back and saying, it is always the first step, which is the most terrifying. But as soon as you break that first step, you’re like, Oh, okay. This is just walking.

It’s like it’s yeah, it’s all in your head. It’s like, You just take each day as it comes, you know, whether it’s you walking from, let’s say one lane for the length of Britain, just think of your staff, just going, you’re just walking to the next door town first. Yeah. And then just carrying on and eventually you’ll be like, Oh, this is actually quite easy.

Yeah. It won’t become fun. It’s not fun when you walk. But but yeah, it’s, it’s not as hard as people think. I think it opens up more opportunities because you’re at sort of eye level with the locals. And so it encourages more interaction. Exactly. Yeah. Yeah. That’s obesity. George, what are you doing now?

And how can [00:31:00] people follow and find you. So at the moment I’m writing my book about my journey in Morocco. I walked the length of the Seuss river, which was 250 kilometers from source in the high airless mountains to the sea. That’s due to come out on the 1st of May. It will be out on, on Amazon.

Self-publish and After that I’m planning skirt to a Turkey in Iraq and I’ll do a walk there, but but yeah, you can follow everything I’ll do on, on on Instagram. You can find all the links to my books and, and to the YouTube video I posted recently. It’s, it’s not amazing. It’s just some pictures with some music, but but yeah, so it’s, it’ll all be there at George is my Instagram just my name, no spaces or dots or underscores or anything.

It’s all there. Oh, you kept that, that little trip choir. Okay. What was that? I thought that was the next question, but, okay. Yes. So the next question you [00:32:00] what’s next, but I didn’t know about the Morocco trip. Ah, yes. So yeah, that was recently did I went to Morocco over Christmas too. Spent four weeks there studying Arabic.

I felt a bit behind him. My university Arabic here. I don’t particularly like learning Arabic online, but so I went to Morocco and studied in a scope of four weeks. And after that decided to do a walk across a long one of the rivers and yeah, it was, it was peaceful. Then I could actually practice my, my language a bit more than what I had before.

And yeah, just the, the hospitality just repeated itself as it as it was in the in the middle East. So yeah. Incredible. Yeah. I suppose if you are speaking to Arabic to them, they’re probably a little bit surprised and they’re they almost like, Oh, well my Arabic speakers. Yeah. I mean, in fact, most of the, most of the journey was, was through a region where the people, their first language is is, is [00:33:00] called Tasha Heath, which is, which is quite different to quite different to Arabic.

But But, you know, they, they, they learn Arabic in school. They have to win because it’s, you know, religiously mandated to, to be able to read and understand the Koran in Morocco. So they will understand Arabic, Arabic well, but I didn’t, unfortunately I didn’t learn any of any of their languages, which is quite angry myself, if to be honest, because there’s a very, very unique and beautiful culture and yeah, next time.

Yeah, hopefully, always the next time. Yeah. Well, George, thank you so much for coming on the show today. Thank you. Yeah, I really enjoyed it. It’s been an absolute, yeah. Pleasure listening to your stories. And as I said, as I was saying, I look forward to following your adventures in the future, especially the next one in Iraq.

And kurgastan. Yes. Yeah. Looking forward to it. So yeah, the Curtis son walk would be 800 kilometers across from, from DIA [00:34:00] Barker to hallelujah in Iraq. So, you know, once again, through going through some somewhat politically unstable territory, but you know, my aim is to go there and find the good news stories and to show it, to shed a different lights on the part of the world.

So. Hopefully it’ll be good in shit a lot as, as there was. Yeah. Well, thank you so much for coming on today. And as I said, I think everyone listening, your stories have been really interesting and you know, we’ve had many people on, but don’t think too many I’ve covered this part of the world. So it’s always nice to get a fresh, I’m glad I could.

Thank you. Okay, well, that is it for today. Thank you so much for listening. And I hope you enjoyed the show. If you did hit that like button and subscribe, if you haven’t already, and I will see you in the next video.

Will Copestake

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Will Copestake (EXPLORER)

In today’s episode, we have Will Copestake a Kayaking Guide and Explorer. Will Copestake’s adventures have taken him across the Great Walks of New Zealand, A Crossing of Iceland and several expeditions to Kayak amongst the Patagonian fjords. Most notably, Will was named both Scottish and UK Adventurer of the year (2015) for his 364-day solo circumnavigation of Scotland by kayak and a continuous ascent of all 282 winter Munro mountains. Subsequently, this was followed by a winter round of the Corbett mountains in 2016.

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Transcript of our Conversation

Will Copestake

[00:00:00] Will Copestake: Hello, and welcome to the modern adventurer podcast coming up. One of the things we got out by about two kilometers, and it went from sort of 20 knots of winds to five 50 knots of wind, and very quickly that builds the sea up the sort of two meters it’s breaking. You’ve got Spindrift these little tornadoes coming past you.

I know that that felt it was pretty extreme when you’re in the boat.

On today’s show, we have an adventurer and kayak Xtrordinair will, has done some remarkable things. Over the years from kayaking around the fields of Patagonia to Norway, he has seen some spectacular things. And today on the podcast, we talk about some of those incredible events. I am [00:01:00] delighted to introduce Will Copestake to the show.

Thanks very much for having me, man. Good to be on. Well, absolutely pleasure. I’ve been really interested to sort of learn a bit more about your stories and adventures. I, I sort of came across you recently and I had to say your kayaking trips, the photography and film that you do is spectacular. And I absolutely, I’m really intrigued to sort of get into your stories about Patagonia and Norway and your story in Scotland as well.

But let’s start with how you got into this kayaking adventures. So, yeah, I’m really lucky actually. So I live in a small towns. Ullapool in the far Northwest of Scotland. The bottom of my garden was the seed growing up. And I, I want it clear. I, I grew up in dinghy sailing. My dad’s really into sailing and spent most of my time sailing things about the law.

[00:02:00] And I won’t make it become a really rubbish Cena, but on a side note of that, I ended up getting into paddling and really dive into that for these the lawn. So I suppose being up in Scotland, you were always grown up as a kid. You had the sort of outdoors to really express yourself. What was it about kayaking that you sort of took such a keen interest in.

So for me, it was, I’ve always loved playing in water. Initially for me, kayaking, I started as a whitewater paddler, more than a sea kayaker, which I tend to do more of nowadays. It was, it was simply because there was someone a little bit older than me school, who we all thought was quite cool.

And he was where he was willing to take me and my best mate out in, in riverboats and just shock us off stuff. Probably spent more time swimming than I did toddling and, and he would pick us up at the bottom and sort of way, like try at this time try not to do that this time or. That was good.

Try that. [00:03:00] And then see, cocking didn’t really come until later seriously after after university. And for me, I really love that ability in a C car to go very far, very remote, but pack relatively comfortable things. If you go for a week, you can pack nice food and you can pack compass. If you’re going more minimal, like you would hiking, you can, you can go for a month or more and get all that stuff in a boat.

And so your first, well as I said earlier, you know, you’ve done these incredible trips in sort of Patagonia and Norway with some of that, I suppose, being in a kayak, you also. You can go to these sort of remote beaches, which are so hard to sort of get to what was it about Patagonia, which sort of inspired you to do your kayaking trip?

There? That’s a Patagonia is the most amazing place. For me kind [00:04:00] of like a Scotland on steroids a little bit. It’s the mountains are a little bit bigger. The wilderness is just a little bit Wilder. The weather is fierce out there. It’s famously very windy. As a sea kayaker, that’s probably your worst enemy is wind.

And if you combine all those challenges, it makes a really a looming place to go and paddle. As an expedition, I actually went down there first as a guide and sort of cut my teeth in kite guiding for the first time in, in Patagonia. And it was two seasons there where you, as a guide, you’re basically going down the same river.

You didn’t see kayaks, but we were, we want to live a system and you would go round amount of, and always looking at the mountains that you knew behind thousands of miles of yours. That basically no one can get to, unless you’ve got a boat. And that it’s really alluring to go and sort of know what’s on the other side of those mountains.

And so the, the end of the second season, that was the kind of the kickoff point to [00:05:00] go and start doing these big expeditions out there was that kind of curiosity to see what may be on those and to go and explore it by doing that alone. No. So I have done a few trips alone in Patagonia. None more than three or four days.

The Navy there basically are the sort of the key holder to the fields and the sea and the rivers, unlike in the UK or in Europe, anything you do in Chile on the water needs, Naval permission. That’s largely because they, your free rescue service and it is incredibly difficult for them to best get you in a lot of these places.

And so it takes months of preparation to go through and get these permissions to go there. I’m one of those step ends is, is no solo trips. You do have to have a partner. So my best friend from the middle of Seamus, Nan comes down and he, [00:06:00] he normally flies down at the end of my season and joins me.

And we go off from NZ, these big, long trips together. How, how was it, what how did it sort of all start? Were you sort of weaving in and around this sort of fueled so Patagonia or was it very much a sort of. A root of which sort of a historic route that someone’s taken that you wanted to follow. So a little bit of both, actually the, the route itself, not any significance in a sort of the route we chose.

However, parts of that followed on with some of the, the original native tribes quarter shares and other tribes out there, the the the yardman. They, they were the people that Tierra Del Fuego got its name from the land of fire. It was their fires on the beaches that the early explorers saw and named it, the land of fire.

And these, these people were incredible. [00:07:00] They, they lived basically naked in the equivalent of a Scottish winter. So this, this sort of rain and wind and it’s sort of plus minus five degrees. And they survived by putting seal fat on themselves and lighting a fire in their canoes on a, on a bed of clay and navigating these fields.

And they, they would Portage between the, the sections where you could. And so I’ll, we included some of these add in and in terms of our actual route choice, it’s, it’s linear journey that we’ve been doing now over two expeditions. We’re going to hopefully finish it off with the third that we had to cancel last year.

That’s basically gone from the North to South through the fields. I’m not in the most linear way taking details here and there to go and see the, the, the big glasses tucks in the back of some of these fields which is what you really want to see is the glass CSL. So did you [00:08:00] did you dabble in seal fat?

Did you strip off and. Yeah, I could do the butter butter on there. Keeps it, keeps it nice and clean. No, I mean, we, we did, we did eat a lot of butter though. So every day you I’m eating half a keto butter and you and your meals, which is seen Yeah, no, definitely not. This, the seals, they have a big and scary and you don’t really want to go anywhere near them, but I can show you here as a comparison.

This is a Scottish CLT for those who can see on camera, I even won that game three. No, so that’s a Scottish one. That’s that’s the Magellanic first deal. There’s quite a significant belly meat and everything. How big our CEO’s are that they’re big old creatures. I mean, what is that? A couple of inch tooth.

Yeah, it must be what, two and a half, three inches thick enough. Good. And so, I mean, we had [00:09:00] Katie on episode 20 and she was talking about her trip and Patagonia. Which she sort of said, there’s such a famous sort of quaint and I are probably absolutely Bertram, but it was something like. The scenery is taken from heaven and the wind’s taken from hell or something along those lines.

I can’t remember exactly what it is. Well, if I’m having landscape from having carved from the winds of how I think if you see a lot of brochures, I mean, it’s true. I mean, it is hellish weather, but the landscape is heavenly. Yeah. No. I mean, some of your photography, cause you’re a very talented photographer and some of the shorts that you’ve got are absolutely incredible.

I mean, certainly makes me want to whip out the brochure and plan an expedition down there. Yeah. I mean, we’re really lucky to be able to get to these places and the, I mean, what you don’t see behind those amazing shots is the many, many days of not particularly amazing weather. [00:10:00] But Patagonia is one of these places.

You can basically point the camera anywhere. You’re going to get something pretty decent. It’s a, yeah, it’s a very photogenic place. Yeah. So how long was that expedition? So the, the first, the first of those expeditions through the fields was 33 days. We packed for 45. Because of that hellish, wind and weather, you don’t know if you’re going to get caught in one of these mega storms where you just cannot get out on the water safely.

And you’re talking kind of 50, 60 mile an hour winds plus on a fairly regular same PVC. You’re planning quite a bit of extra time. We got really lucky with the weather on our first one. So we shaved 10 days off, up on time. And on the second trip, we, again, we planned, I think for about three weeks and it took us 16 days in title.

It was again, a little bit on at the time, which is what you want. You don’t want to end up having a ration and things. I mean, the fact that you can just hold a camera anywhere and capture [00:11:00] these sort of spectacular moments. Were there any sort of moments along the way, which you can look back and think, wow, that taking a moment, it’s just something that you can sort of cherish for the rest of your life.

Yeah, for sure. I mean, there’s some of the days, particularly on the first trip we shamed Shamus, Nan, his, his last name, it we’ve called this list effect and then effect in the Seamus. It was his first Epic expedition. This first trip we did. And we had three kind of jewel in the crown point. So amazing glasses.

And every single time we had horrible weather between them. And when you arrived at these jewels in the crown, it’s suddenly the wind drop and the sun came out and it was just glorious on the middle field. Particularly we were as remote as you can get sort of over 350 400 K from the NamUs mode and just glassy is everywhere.

Perfect weather and just Louie as paddling and that [00:12:00] our memory and feeling of remoteness, I think will cherish for the rest of my life. Wow. I mean, being in lock down in the U K S and the one for the imagination,

and I suppose with the sort of terrible weather and sort of bury with the challenging weather conditions there, must’ve been some times where there are a few sort of hairy moments along the way where you were like, Cool. That’s, that’s definitely a few that caught us out a little bit. Again, with the wind in some of the key one there we, we only really got caught out once which was on a crossing.

There’s a few big open crossings that we had to commit to. And you take it really seriously. There’s no proper weather forecasting out there. So when you get to these crossings that are going to take you an hour to get over, you look at the clouds and the mountains all around you, and you sort of say, okay, what are they doing?

Does it look like the weather’s going to change? Do I feel [00:13:00] safe? Where am I going to blow? If things go well. And one of these, we got out by about two kilometers and it went from sort of 20 knots of winds to sort of sorts and five 50 knots of wind, and very quickly that builds to see up to sort of two meters.

It’s breaking, you’ve got Spindrift these little tornadoes coming past. And at that, that field feels pretty extreme when you’re in the boat. It’s interesting as well, cause there’s waves as a kayaker as a sort of inexperienced paddler, two meters is not big for a wave. It feels big but it’s very manageable.

But with those wins, what you end up with is a very steep two meters and it caps off of the top. And then from that capping off at the top, the wind is blowing you hellishly sideways. And so you’re, you’re more gracing and steaming and just trying to keep the boat on track. Thankfully, that wind was behind us, which was nice.

And it just non-city down into the fields. [00:14:00] And we basically got blown across this, this big open crossing and thankfully found shelter in the islands behind God. That must have been such a relief to sort of get into those shelters away from the sort of stool. Yeah, it gives, it gives your mind a lot of time to rest as much as the boat.

And it’s always funny because you could see the storm coming. As soon as it started to build that we got out and he suddenly saw this wall of wind coming and he thought Oh dear. And then suddenly, yeah, sort of going great. We’ve got to get to that point, which at this point with about 40 minutes paddle away at, as soon as you get in, there is a bit of a light, right.

Let’s stop and have a chocolate bar. That was, that’s a relief now, because I imagine you’re sort of, they’re weighing up your sort of like, is it going to move? Is it not? And then suddenly you’re like, right, let’s go for it. And because in sort of mountainous conditions, the weather can change so quickly.

Probably a as you say, after sort of 20, 30 minutes, you’re like. [00:15:00] Yeah. Okay. Yeah, actually Patagonia apart from being sort of high in mountain, that’s the only place I’ve ever seen weather change that quickly. I mean it can literally go from sunshine and no wind to snowing and sort of 2030 knots in, in less than a minute.

And it’s amazing how those sorts of funds suddenly go behind and they’re just on very digital and that can sort of go bang and stop as well. Hopeful. So your plan is to go back there. Yes. So let’s say we’ve done two trips so far linking sort of start to finish of each trip. So we were doing this very long linear journey and we could do it very quickly, but the idea is to sort of take your time and really see what’s out there.

And we have one planned we’re less than a week away from executing it. In fact, last March. Almost actually a smaller would be a year ago today. We, we [00:16:00] suddenly suddenly sort of said, ah, yeah, that’s not going to happen. And we’ve got to get home and isolate now. And, and I, I was in uni at that point and we were hoping to link up another 850 kilometers journey South through the state to Magellan into the beagle channel through one of these Westco corsages.

Yes. And then proceed down and around Cape horn come back and get which would have been a bit of a real fun adventure. One we still have to do as well. Yeah. When, when it all quiet in this down and a few, well, Hey, a few months nearly there we’re nearly there. Yeah. It seems, it seems that way over the hump.

And so I suppose people are probably listening, wondering, you know, would you, would you recommend this sort of trip? For the average person for a kayaker for an average paddler unless you’ve sort [00:17:00] of done a couple of other expeditions first or have someone in the group that’s experienced with dealing with those sort of conditions for an experienced paddler, I would absolutely recommend it.

It’s a, a sea club trip. But it’s definitely not one to kind of cut your teeth on as a first expedition, because it is a very, very remote place and, and quite demanding. But yeah, if you, if you’re feeling confident and experienced, it’s a, it’s an amazing part of the well worth the hassle to get enabled commissions.

It’s incredible. Yeah, it, it just does like one of the most breathtaking places in the world, but as you say, can be quite hospitable at times. Yeah. Yeah. And I, it does, it does claim people. There’s normally a few deaths a year.

And so from there you came back to Europe and you were sort of pursuing. Different sort of kayaking trips each [00:18:00] year from like Norway to Scotland because your Scotland trip sounds quite interesting. Can you sort of test for people listening? Yeah, probably Beth, you, you sort of describe what the sort of purpose of that Scotland trip was.

Yeah. So my, my Scotland trips pre precludes the Patagonia stuff. And that, that started when I, when I left the university, I’d done a couple of small on fitter expeditions overseas in Iceland, New Zealand and had always been asked about my home country and. How much can you really say about your home country?

It’s for me, I could talk fairly well about a small pocket in the North and very well around the kind of pocket, whereas it started university, but the rest of the country, I really had very little idea about. And so the idea was to try and circumnavigate the country by sea kayak, and then come North again through the [00:19:00] Monroe mountains, which are Tinder native peaks, over 3000 feet.

And the idea was that by coast and mountain and cycling between those as it went up, it would cover pretty much everything in Scotland. And I now realize that there’s an awful lot more to cover, but it gave a pretty good, good sort of taster. So yeah, we had Emily Scott on an episode nine and she, she ran and cycled this sort of 282 Madres.

She did it very, she did it very quickly. She did a really good job of that now. Sort of doing the same running up, cycling up. All around them. Yeah. Yeah. So when the car can kind of came first and all of that, I did 21 of them. And those as I passed on the kayak, cause they they’re the logical ones you access by the sea.

And then through, by the time I’d finished, that was [00:20:00] September. And so it was coming through them and lows mostly through the winter. As a result of that, you kind of cycle in with a byte base camp and then circuits of two to four days going through big rounds of them and come back to the bike and then cycling to the next sort of base camp and doing another big socket and then coming down because, because I was kind of siloed on my own most of the time that you had to make circuits, you couldn’t sort of do linear things and much, much like, I think Emily did.

She said that lots of circuits. Yeah. She, she said it was. I really, really amazing sort of experience because as you say, very rarely do you get to appreciate a lot of your own country in such different sort of pockets? Like every, every single place has their own sort of unique quality and with 208 cm res dotted around Scotland, you certainly got to experience quite a fair chunk of it.

Yeah, I think that there’s a certain magic [00:21:00] in doing a continual round of advice. You get to a summit and if you are lucky enough to have a nice view, you’re looking at, I’d probably the next 40, 50 mountains, you’ve got to climb and you’re looking back at 40 50 that you’ve just climbed and you aren’t actually traveling massive distances a lot of the time.

So you’re kind of doing. Feed mountains, Haven, and you may be going five miles and then you’re doing the next five mountains or so. So you get the same view from many different angles. Well, facing this kind of daunting view to the North going, Oh my goodness. As lows, and then the space satisfying view to the South thing.

Yeah. I’ve done those now. And it’s, it’s quite a unique feeling. Yeah. And so that Scottish trip that took all the good part of a year, wasn’t it? Yeah by complete and utter coincidence one day short of a year, which was not planned, it was supposed to take 10 months. The, the caulking was about the [00:22:00] right amount of time that I planned.

And then the mountains, it was one of the worst recorded winters on record. And that, that really slowed me down. I think we had sort of 12 major storm funds come through in the space of six months. Pretty pretty cool. Well, I’ll have to talk to Kenny. I don’t know what you’re complaining about. Yeah. I actually, Patagonia compares very well with it.

It’s a logical next step. Yeah. I, I have to say I lived up in Scotland for a bit and yeah, the weather can turn pretty, pretty, pretty bad, pretty quickly. Yeah, it really can be. God. And so, and then I suppose you’ve sort of been doing these sort of kayaking trips just every sort of year or so, going to a new place experiences.

I mean, as I was saying earlier, it’s such a amazing way to sort of explore the coast of a country. Yeah, it’s a really good way to get, I mean, certainly for example, in Scotland historically the coast or [00:23:00] the highway, a lot of coastal countries before, if you went by boat and you get an awful lot of religion culture it’s very interesting in Scotland, the further North you go, the more fringes out of gala and into hiking.

not that time. And is your sort of intentions just to keep sort of traveling every sort of. Part of the world with this, because it’s such as I was saying, it’s such an amazing way to explore and see, you could literally just pick a country on the coast and say, right, I’m just going, weaving up Norway or Sweden, or I can, I can spend the rest of my life kind of picking, picking random parts of the world.

There’s various ones I’d like to go to before local [00:24:00] planet. And it would be, it’d be nice to get as many as possible, but I think for me, it’s a balance as well. Cause cause I run a kayaking business. I’m I’m paddling most of the summer. And then it’s my escape. I want to leave to go paddling or cycling or like and so it’s, it’s kind of trying to go somewhere that’s a bit fresh and new and, and develops your own, your own ability and sort of a license.

And it’s a bit. What sort of tips do you have for people who are keen to kayak? What’s this one sort of like bit of advice you would give them? Main thing I would say is not to get too hung up on kit because cocking is one of those sports that you can buy and spend a lot of money on. And you can have fun in a really cheap boat.

You do need to get obviously the safety stuff. So kayak and points, the aid. Huddles if you’re going on your own spare paddles of pump and I would recommend the helmet as well. But you don’t have to buy [00:25:00] the sort of thousand pound ones. You can buy relatively cheap things. And as a beginner paddler, I always say, be practicing practice with an onshore wind somewhere.

That’s going to blow you into a safe ground and not onto sort of clips of what was there anything. And as long as you stay close and I don’t share wins, if you’re a decent swimmer and you’ve got a buoyancy, Aidan, you’ll probably get into shore. If you get into trouble better, if you can do something with a club or something like that, there’s a lot of local clubs who will teach you really well as well.

Or someone like that. We’ll set you out and teach you. It’s a shameless plug. What’s the company called. Kayak summer miles. And here we go. So I have a little confession because your trip in Norway, I a couple of years ago had planned to do this kayaking trip around Lofoten. And I was very, very envious of when I was doing my research for [00:26:00] this to sort of see this sort of beautiful landscapes, no way.

And the trip that you had up there. Very sort of briefly, I mean, how was it so I can sort of imagine it and pretend like I was no way it’s basically Northern Patagonia. It is amazing. The ambassador fields has got, I mean, similar sort of thing. You can point the camera anywhere and it beautiful anywhere you go.

It’s just wonderful. The culture is amazing. Seamus actually joined me on that trip as well. And. To give a kind of background to this. When, when we plans Norway, Seamus, and I plan Norway, we plan this in, in June June, July. That was our big trip was to drive his van up to Nordkapp kayaker circumnavigation of our Millard’s cap, and then go into the photon and just explore the photon with kayaks.

But for a few weeks [00:27:00] on a whim, I then phoned Shamus and said, I’m, I’m planning this big Patagonia to it as you want to come down. And he sort of said, all right. And so I’ll drop tools and that, that Patagonia trip became this big mega wild adventure. I know way, which we planned them sort of paid for then became all as kind of a post-trip debrief and a, and a bit of a relaxed.

And we were staying in a we’re sleeping out in the back of a bag. We went intense, it was pretty relaxed and know you’re not going out for months at a time and going out for sort of days at a time. And so the, the whole mood of that trip for us was very chilled out. And there’s nobody doing sort of interesting things in both.

It was, it was kind of very much on our terms. And we got fortunate with the weather too. It was, it was gorgeous. Yeah. We, I take it. You went in the summer. Yeah. So it was kind of June into July. So 24 hour sunlight, but Seamus [00:28:00] liked it so much when we got to Norco, he got the job and stayed there most of the summer.

Not really surprised. I mean, I’d say as I was sort of saying then for anyone listening, it is just one, it just looks like one of the most spectacular places. Yeah. I mean, pretty much anywhere in Scandinavia, it really is. Fantastic is just a lovely culture and the culture generally, it’s very outdoors. If those, your average person is very capable of equipments doing something outdoors that, and they love sharing that as well.

Yeah. Yeah. Big fan of Scandinavia. Well, we’ll, there’s a part of the show where we asked the same five questions to each guest each week. With the first being, well, I, I need to quickly now look it up because let’s just see on your trips, what’s the one item or gadget that you always bring with you?

[00:29:00] I’ll not include the kind of practical stuff like tents and sleeping bags and things because you need those and all the trips. The one thing that I carry with me that is completely and utterly useless, but very important sentimentally is a compass, which. Is completely ruined. Yeah. I was going to say listening it’s completely broken.

Yeah. It, it, it, it doesn’t point North. There’s a large hole in the screen that was actually from someone’s crampon. Which has a funny story. I lost it on a Hill and somebody found it and through the power of social media. Got it. Back to me. And he found that attached to the Butler’s crampon it’s from 1914, it was like great granddad’s compass.

Just kind of being on every adventure of being not amazing, but it’s heavy and completely useless, but quite good from the County about. Okay. What is your favorite adventure or travel book? Ava travel. But I will [00:30:00] start with the one that really got me inspired the DMO Scotland trip, which is blazing paddles on Wilson.

Subsequently followed him. That was his, his account of, of caulking. And Scotland’s thinking the eighties late eighties really one of the first people to ever do so, and long before dry bags and technology and things were really kind of, as they are now. And it’s just beautifully written, really kind of captured it.

I’d also probably say mood to future joy as well as to Humphreys, which was kind of one of the early trouble, but kind of gave me inspiration to go and think things out and down on the world. Yeah, he does come out with some pretty cool stuff now. And again. Yeah, and I it’s, it’s one of those books, it captures, well, the little bits of expedition, the kind of the stuff that’s not so interesting to focus on like routine and the kind of small subtleties of things that people comment on and things, things happen [00:31:00] to you.

Things as simple as getting up and making coffee when you’re in a tent and that sort of stuff is often overlooked, but it can be a big part of your day when you’re batching your VT. We went last, the last sort of big trip. I did. We always used to wake up, make a cup of tea. God, that sounds so British saying that essential, essential

starts starts today, right? Absolutely. Why are adventures important to you? Ventures important to me because I find they, they kind of ground you in your surroundings. I find going on a longer adventure allows you to really kind of immerse yourself in whatever discipline or place you’ve decided to be in.

And it allows your body to slowly adjust and react to that. I find if you go in on a short trip, you can see things [00:32:00] and you can push yourself to whatever limits you want, but you don’t have the time to develop the routine. And it embeds you into that venture. And that over time slightly changes you as a person.

And you basically will making any version of yourself in different surroundings slowly. Oh, that’s really nice. I haven’t really ever thought of it like that, but it’s, it’s very true. What is your favorite quote or motivational quote? So this, this one was, is from my dad and he tells me every time I’m having a hard time on an expedition which is it’s better to be Shackleton than Scott.

And basically no one would know where to call it. And so it’s, and that’s often a login into the head so that when you’re going through a difficult time to go, should I proceed or should I stop sit and think about this? Like it’s. It’s [00:33:00] quite often better to stop and think back to still would be to the admin person who was successful pretty much throughout his expeditions.

Shackleton’s still had some diabetics to be fair. Well, who was it? Shackleton? And he said it’s better to be a alive live donkey than a deadline. Yes. Yeah. It was something along those lines. I probably, I, again, I probably just butchered an absolutely not the classic quote, the modern version. It’s better to be a check-in than the car.

Yeah. Hey, that’s I always liked that one. People listen always keen to go on uni, sort of granted ventures around the world. What’s the one thing you would recommend for people wanting to go on big granted ventures? The one thing I recommend for people going big brands adventures is to leave it a little bit open to what you actually want to [00:34:00] achieve.

The best adventures I’ve ever, ever had, often the sort of side things that happened as a result of the initial plan. And so not, not to get target fixated. And I, and I want to go and do this mission if you will, if you’re kind of there to do one thing, you often forget about all the other things surrounding it, and you don’t have the time to enjoy that.

And, and whatever you do big or small, you want to take that that’s sort of take the blinkers off. And so. Remember that you’re in these amazing places or you’re doing something amazing and you should enjoy it for what it is. Even when you’re feeling pretty grim about it, if it’s, if it’s hard, it’s types of fun.

Yeah. I agree with that. I was sort of speaking about it the other day, the idea of going quite on an open-ended adventure, where you don’t know too much about what’s going to happen. You just sort of take it on a day to day, because sometimes if you’re so target focused, as you said, you do miss. [00:35:00] Those little moments, whether it’s someone saying, come in for a cup of tea or whether it’s come in for dinner or, you know, wanting to stop and chat, if you’re so driven and focused, usually you miss those interactions, which end up being the most unique and what makes those expeditions really memorable.

Yeah. And I have an example from some personal experiences from my Scotland trip being on my own, but at the end of the cocky, I got very. The last few months you get very target fixated when you start seeing a goal. And I, I got very good at kind of doing distance and just putting head down and then paddling, and of course enjoying your surroundings to degree, but you kind of also sort of making ground as priority.

I’m not held into the Patagonia trip where Seamus joins. And in the first couple of days, I kind of went into that and recessed back into that mindset of, okay, we’ve got eight to be today. That’s the way to be. And then Seamus pointed out that actually, no, let’s, let’s [00:36:00] go look in, in those bays and let’s see what’s around there and then sort of deviating and slowing down and sort of saying, Oh, I’ve never seen a penguin before.

Let’s go and have a look at that penguin. And stuff like that. And, and slowing down very purposefully. Yeah. Initially for me, I found that the first day or so, a little frustrating. And then afterwards being like, Oh no, he is completely right. Yes. That’s what you’re here for you. We might as well enjoy it.

It’s probably never going to be there. Yeah. I think we were at disco. That was, I think it was discussing with Julie Stewart and saying, no one really cares how quickly you go, unless you’re breaking the world record. For be in the fastest kayak to go round Scotland. No one cares that you’ve put in a hundred miles or 80 miles.

It’s really just about your own personal ambition. Yeah. It it’s, it’s kind of your memories and the memories that you can. Give to other people, if you’re, if you’re in a group that kind of what you want to produce a record at the end of the day is just [00:37:00] a bit of ego on the wall, hanging at home. Do you have one of the things?

I don’t officially know. I could probably claim some if I, if I hunted through that’s never really bothered me. Yeah, they did do it for do it for yourself for a coolest. So we’ll finally, you know, what are you doing now and how can people find you and follow your adventures in the future? So at the moment, I’m preparing as hard as I can to get my company back up and running offering kayaking trips in the Northwest of Scotland.

If you want to join us, you can find us at kayak, someone else.com or on Instagram contact or somewhere else. So my personal adventures, I’m kind of looking a little bit ahead now for 2023 to do that capable and trip. And you can follow me on will state media.com or at Wilco state. And yeah, and look forward to seeing some of the outlets come this way.

[00:38:00] Well, we’ll put a link to your Instagram and a website on, on my website. Say, people can follow you and find you. And well it’s been an absolute pleasure hearing your stories. And as I saying, feel me a little bit of envy. At the moment, like I say, I’m the same as everyone else. So you get home, I’m building a shed as my big adventure feel, feel a bit less obvious and do that stuff as well.

Well, very soon we will be out I’m sure in big adventures, but we’ll thank you so much for coming on today. Been a pleasure. Thank you for having me well 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 video.

Iris Berger

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Iris Berger (EXPLORER)

In today’s episode, we have Iris Berger. Iris is a 24-year-old conservation scientist and National Geographic Young Explorer, interested in interdisciplinary topics that contribute to reconciling nature conservation and human well-being. We talk about a crazy expedition out of university to cycle across Bolivia as well as talking about her research expedition to Sumatra. A great insight into the future of conservation and so much more with Iris

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Transcript of our Conversation

Iris Berger

[00:00:00] Iris Berger: on today’s show. We have an Explorer and conservation scientist. She’s travelled all over the world with her work and done some incredible expeditions from cycling across Bolivia to a five-week Trek in the Indonesian rainforest on today’s podcast. We talk about some of these expeditions and I am delighted to introduce Iris Berger to the show.

Hey, thank you, Iris. It’s great to have you on the show. You are a fellow member of the scientific exploration society, and I was really intrigued to find out more about your expeditions, but I suppose probably the best place to start is with you and how you got into all these adventures. [00:01:00] So I’m from Austria.

So I grew up, you know, but right by the mountains and they got to go skiing and hiking on the weekends. I think there was always quite strong connection connection with nature and adventures and the weekend, even quite small scale. But I think the first of B expedition I got to do after the first year of university.

So I decided to do do my undergrad and Scotland and Edinburgh in biology and ecology. So. You don’t know anymore more about the natural world. And I was quite keen to have sons of more dry than the cake, and I got to pick out what place places in the world and stuff, I guess, at that age, you know, being 18 or 19, I really want to sort of test myself and see what I’m actually capable of, because I think never really had the chance to do it before.

So I think yeah, diving in and seeing what’s possible. And I think once, you know, once you start off. [00:02:00] Really another world really aprons and think, you know, what he can do and actually wants you on the ground, you know? Yeah. You’re, I think you’re a lot more, you’re capable of a lot more than you think you are before you, okay, good to hear that you Edinburgh too.

When did you use it? What did you do? I, I did landscape architecture, but I suppose having that sort of weave Edinburgh, you have that sort of, sort of freedom to explore all around it. You’ve got the sea, you’ve got source B crags. You’ve got Steve. So I absolutely loved my time at Edinburgh, but But I suppose your first sort of big expedition out of uni, what was that?

That was so a combined two expeditions in a way. So after my first year off, off university, I did psych in presbyopia, but before that, I just did. Research assistants shipped and [00:03:00] internship with an NGO and the Peruvian Amazon’s of collecting baseline biodiversity data. So to get an insight and effect of climate change and of the this nature as and you know, flying basically across the world, I wanted to sort of use my time and add a bit more of an adventure component because I think.

It was an eight and an amazing experience. And so I learned a lot being in the Amazon and helping out there, but if there much stuff, it was all pre-organized nauseous, saturated I had to fill out. And that was it. So I didn’t have to push myself that much out of my comfort zone in that sentence. So I want that bit more of an adventure.

So, yeah, I think I decided to psych across Bolivia with a guy I met on the internet very last minute because a friend of mine dropped out. So but yeah, that was my sort of first dive into. Proper adventure. Do you put out an advert for someone to cycle across Bolivia [00:04:00] with you? Yeah. Yeah, so I think literally a month before I was out to go to South America and in the Amazon, I was, I didn’t have any internet signal, so I had to sort out everything before.

I I’m literally just posted on a variety of Facebook groups, if you know, sort of world cycle touring pages, if anyone would. Like to join me and think explorers connect as well. But eventually this guy from Bolivia actually Mario got in touch and said he will be quite keen and yeah. It didn’t quite know whether you would be able to, at that point, it was quite nerve wracking going out, flying out to South America, not knowing whether they actually have someone to cycle with.

But yeah, he did shine and he was, he was amazing. He was a really amazing expedition part is amazing. Actually having someone from the country with me as well. But he is from this Bolivia sort of divided. You’ve got, you know, half of there being the Andes and the other planet where we cycled and the other half is.

The low lands where you got [00:05:00] basically the younger son. So here are some of the low lands. So it’s actually quite changed for him too, is like, you know, at like minus 20 degrees and, you know, dry, dry and love wind. But yeah, it was, it was a fascinating experience and it turned out my parents weren’t so keen and I told them most details afterwards, but yeah, I thing.

So what, what was it about Bolivia that attracted you? It’s quite tricky to say. I mean, because I was going out to, Perri obviously wanting to go somewhere probably to another country. They were sort of nearby and I, you know, just doing a bit of research, just seemed to Bolivia was of. Less touristy. I think it has the highest percentage of indigenous people in South America.

And I think, yeah, just being less traveled to and cause I, I think that really appealed to me and having that sort of odd to plan and sort of quite a contrast as [00:06:00] off the Amazon where it was in before. I think just the openness and just. You know, we did come across villages, but every 33 days of say so it’s just, yeah, just seeing the landscape and the wilderness aspect of it, if you will.

And so with Olivia, I mean, how long did that take you to cycle across the country? Only three weeks? Actually pretty quick. Yeah. Well, the thing is like, once you, I mean, there was some up and downs, but actually as of yet, so I can continue as in the. Yeah. And the plateaus is there’s actually not that much, too much, you know, altitude to games.

So, and so what were the sort of moments along the way because by having what was his name again? Malia, Malia, by having him, I suppose you had a really good intro into the sort of people that believe here in terms of introducing you spoke that [00:07:00] language. And it probably opened up quite a lot of doors.

Is that, did you find that or? Yeah, definitely. It definitely did. I mean, I’d say because he’s not from the entrepreneur, I think that’s himself. I wouldn’t say tension, but there’s, you know, that I have a very different culture. The people, the indigenous people living on the interplant anniversaries of the European ancestry, you know, Spanish answers to people and living in the known lens.

So that there’s quite a big cultural divide I say within the country. And I think people were really quite surprised actually to, so, you know that, I mean, or I’ll say then there is a people cyclocross, Bolivia, or. You know, the art people are doing, yes, I can cross the whole South America so that occasionally do have people coming cause I can get a three and coming across them.

But I think that for a lot of people, I think it was the first person cyclists from Bolivia they encountered. So it was quite interesting to see and you know, how they interact as well. I’d say people from the arts kind of a bit. A bit more [00:08:00] reserved, a bit shy. I think that just comes with essentially the climate being so harsh, so windy so hard to grow anything you’re around.

But I think certainly like I could speak a bit of Spanish, but wouldn’t have gotten me very far. I think. And what were the sort of amazing moments along the way? Because these three weeks, I mean, you, were you a big cyclist before? No, I could not. I could not change a tire. I had to sort of get my friend from universities or teach me how to take off, apply and repair punch.

I mean, I cycled before a fair bet just for fun and off cycling to uni. But I w it wasn’t something I had done loose before. I hadn’t really cited much, you know, the overnight talk trips, any of that. So it was quite a sort of learn as you go thing, but surprisingly, we didn’t have a single puncture, so we’re quite lucky in that respect.

Yeah, I mean, there’s so many incredible moments. I think it would be quite hard to sort of pinpoint one, I think just sort of race season [00:09:00] we couldn’t years and just, I think really for me, the overall package is sort of. Traveling on countering country in a way you would never be able to do otherwise, because I mean, I always loved traveling and done it, you know, quite a lot growing up, but I think there was always some sort of barrier and you know, you not really get to know people or

So we were cycling in the other and they’re quite lots of Jeeps, a few salt lakes around and landscape. They’re really pretty, they’re coming normal, different colors, you know, green, bright green, red, and yellow, and really beautiful. So you have quite a few Jeeps coming around with the tourists. And I felt like you wouldn’t really be able to sort of appreciate the landscape in the same way as we did, you know, Yes, it’s nice being able to come, you know, sitting in your car and appreciating, not having to be out in the wind.

But I think you sort of put another sort of barrier between you and actually really sort of embracing the [00:10:00] landscape and the place you’re at, but it just sort of, you know, creating too much comfort for you. So even though it was sort of measurable and bets and we had to come down and minus 20 degrees and think got a bit frostbitten and things like that, I think actually is, have you noticed.

So a lot more ingrained than my memory. And I feel I actually have really experienced the place in a way. It wouldn’t have been able to do otherwise. Yeah. What is it about Edinburgh? I mean, it was exactly the same sort of situation with me. I, when I sort of decided off to Edinburgh to cycle across America, and again, barely cycled very much.

Didn’t know how to change a tire. After 10 days, I was like, ah, okay, this is amazing. Hopefully I never get a flat tire and then it happened. And then I spent an hour and a half sort of. Bagging away banging away at it, trying to sort of rip it off. Kind of got a clue. I don’t think a YouTube videos were on your phone just about then, but yeah, it’s it’s such an amazing way to sort of experience the country.

[00:11:00] And so from that, I mean, camping out at sort of minus 20 and being prosperous that must have certainly felt pretty No. Luckily I was quite sure that I think it was a few days before we finished. There was I imagine. Okay. We’re almost done sort of thing get there. But yeah, it was definitely, I think I had to wake up every 10 minutes or something like that in the sleeping bag yourself to sort of set ups and just sort of keep some warmth.

I mean, you probably would take if you were sensitive a lot more KET, but essentially because it was a first year student not having much money and. I would say, I think coming obviously from the youngest and there was so much limited having to pack for being in rainforest, as well as being at mines coming out of minus 20, it was just like a bit of a challenge.

So I think you could do more sensitive in terms of just, you know, taking better care essentially. But it wasn’t too bad. [00:12:00] It was quite a contrast afterwards going back to the rainforest areas. And so, yeah, the kinematic contrast, but. Yeah, yes. Rich has come from struggles. So I think it’s definitely, I definitely do it again.

Wow. And so we’ve that trip that’s, that was your first sort of big trip out of your comfort zone and sort of pushing yourself and that sort of spurred on quite a few adventures. After my second year in university, I did. Mega trends act across Sumatra. So it was actually me and my boyfriend and two smarter mountaineers who were absolutely incredible.

I mean, they take all the credits and I think that currently attempting to do a hundred first descents smarter mountains which is amazing. But what we did essentially, so we started off in the very Northern part of SmartTrack called and. [00:13:00] Not that many people go there. So we’re leaves of ons, travel warnings and stuff.

When you have terrorist attacks and things like that, but these were the loveliest people I’ve ever met and, and you’ve made solutions. They’re just so kind. I mean, we could, it was actually struggled to sort of move each day cause everyone would want to invite us, came and just feed us incredible amount of feed.

But we started off sort of having about 10 days, two weeks And so the Moss cloud rainforest and this Reese this area has completely unknown. It was completely unknown to researchers. So essentially we just did a very simple sort of bird surveys. You’re walking each day, but recording all the birds we’re seeing.

So I think that brought a lot of new challenge with that sort of having it was physically incredibly demanding. I mean, maybe hot and Bolivia. I’m not quite sure. It’s just, we managed to walk about sort of two. Two and a half kilometers that most, each day, because we had to, well, some Motrin team [00:14:00] members had as have used machetes to cut a wave through because there were no past or anything since insane dance staff, but at the same time, you have to be really aware of your surroundings.

Because you don’t want to miss the bird. Cause you know, you have a few seconds to see what species it could be in recorded. So I think that’s sort of having physically really demanding as well as mentally still having to be with it. I think that was quite a new challenge. But essentially, yeah, that was of two weeks covering a very small area of on, on research forest and.

Take the first records of the bird species you’ve got there, whereas the tempter, the first ascent, but we failed. Unfortunately one of our team members have he tried to push his machete down to the ground to rest, but his fingers slept cause there was a rock beneath. So essentially a sliced up his fingers down to the Bay.

And that was also the furthest [00:15:00] away we could have been from Manny’s off road. And I used to hear it was doing rubber dumps. He wasn’t eating or drinking. I have no idea how he did that. So, and only he used to stop, stop eating and drink completely. Cause he thought it was a punishment. But it was fine in the end we got back and his immensely tough guy.

Yeah. And then from then on was, it was just an abandon at that point. Just me and my boyfriend. We just walked from this part of down to the. Coast for another five or six weeks or so. Obviously far more degraded landscape began still recording the birds and it was at that point much more about the interactions we have with the villages and yeah, sort of more well, the cultural experience in a way.

Wow. And so with that, you were sort of looking at the beds. With the, sort of the forest station that sort of going on there because there’s [00:16:00] quite a big area for Palm oil. Were you looking at this sort of what do you call it where you’re sort of assessing how Palm out is having such a huge impact on deforestation there?

Well sort off not specifically Palm oil and it was more just seeing how, you know, landscape’s changing will impact of human impact. Might as well being grown how that’s obviously sort of degrading the bird community. But I have to say, I need, I was after my second year of university. So it was very much, the science was rather simple.

It was feeling hopeless to have a major impact in the sense that it was just an area that was unknown to scientists, sort of any sort of baseline by diversity data kind have. Yeah, hopefully a fairly big impact in terms of, you know, building the knowledge base and both so very simple, essentially sort of looking [00:17:00] what’s out there.

And I think then later on the Biltmore and sort of did more exertions that sort of more scientific, had a greater scientific focus, more scientifically, more robust in that sense. So your, your life as a sort of conservation scientist, you are now taking that to a sort of new level, studying your PhD. What is a conservation scientist?

Oh, God. It comes in all forms. I think it’s quite a broad term really. I mean, it’s just obviously the science around conservation, as of how acknowledging in a way that we’ve failed quite miserably, like in the past, I mean, Well, there are all sorts of measures to try and Hort extinction and wildlife declines, but we haven’t been that successful.

So that’s really how you’re building the evidence base. Like how do you conserve species now, don’t go with your gut feelings, go with the science essentially. And you know, where it’s, it’s a very broad fear comes to, you know, [00:18:00] where. It’s the most biodiversity, well, should we have protected areas, but I’m building from, what’s known now protected areas.

Aren’t, you know, going save our species and there’s a lot of ethical concerns around it. So you know, building more sustainable agriculture and, and our species to move between it comes, it’s quite buried from sort of behavioral observations to more sort of mathematical models. It’s quite a broad field and yeah.

Coming, very interdis interdisciplinary as well. You know, very much so natural sciences, which is more on the side, but ID to social scientists, trying to understand the impact, give them conservation measure, have on the local community or indigenous knowledge and things there that says it’s a very broad field.

Where do you sort of see the future of conservation going? Hm. Well find the balance between not being a pessimist, but Being realistic optimistic. I [00:19:00] think basically needs a revolution. I think a lot of people in the conservation field agreed. I mean, it’s changed over time and what the focus is.

And there’s a lot of disagreement within the conservation community where should go. I think everything’s clear that what we’ve done so far is not working. And I think while nature has to become. No, the center of decision making, or at least a key part of the session making use of mainstream economic and business ideas.

But at the same time, I think there needs to be sort of a change and revalue. Well, yeah, just rebound how we place nature in our license of Nanda accident and our interactions with nature and not sort of having a dualistic idea in humans, wildlife, you know, being a barrier and around it. And because I think that’s hat, the hat that was of the original.

A movement of conservation, you know, put things in national parks base of [00:20:00] fans around it’s about fortress conservation, sort of the idea of wilderness ignoring the fact that people were actually there. So with a lot of, you know, sort of colonial undertones to it. So when people agree, we definitely need to move past that.

And then there was sort of moving around how much, you know, she would put a value nature and economic terms. And now it’s sort of, well, who knows where it’s going? I think no one really knows, but I think what was clear that we do need to change what we do cause it’s not, not really working. And and I just changing our relationship with nature.

Yeah. I sort of agree. It’s, I’m sort of figuring out a way of nature and humans to co-exist in a way, which I suppose puts value on the sort of communities. Cause we had Lizzie daily on. In one episode 16, I believe. And, you know, we sort of speak in sort of detail about the sort of coexistence between humans [00:21:00] and at the time the wildlife, but it’s a really sort of interesting or pressing concern, which I think as you say, there’s a lot of, lot of stakeholders involved and therefore.

A lot of people who get annoyed and go to people no matter which way you go. No, definitely. I think there is because there is quite a big divide. You know, people arguing the conservation movement. I think I’ve seen a reason descriptor of you, you know, about, you know, they Russians have economic talk about assets and things like that.

And that has been outcry, but other conservation is we, we, we shouldn’t be using this terms for nature. You know, there’s an intrinsic value and know we shouldn’t go near these of trying to. Yeah, price nature as well. So I think sort of marry all of the difference of streams of conservation will be certainly tricky.

And the but I think whatever, and I think is agreeing on that. We just need a, quite a drastic change, not just minor adjustments to what we’ve been doing before, but really sort [00:22:00] of you know, on the massive scale and readdressing, I think the drivers of biodiversity loss, they really. Yeah, let’s get rid of cover to this and sort of thing and you know, change the economic system.

And I think food system transformation as well, because agriculture may understand the biggest driver by diversity does climate change will come up and in about a hundred years or so probably even take our culture. But I think it’s just coming to the root causes rather than just release of addressing your, what you see in the ground.

And now it comes down to sort of blaming or. The local communities for an, for bushmeat hunting and using the local forest, whereas really it’s of the massive, big corporation driven by demand in the West that sort of driving deforestation. So I think it’s just making sure it’s equitable as well.

So how, when you go on the sort of expeditions to Sumatra [00:23:00] doing your research, how do you prepare for them? I think they, I think it really depends. I think there’s no sort of generic answer. I mean, from the boring stuff, like sorting out logistics and flights obviously having a, sort of a mental component to it as well.

And depending what it is, whether there’s a physical component or whether do you need to do better, you know, training for that. But I tended to not. Be able to have that much as, or in a way that because of my expeditions tend to be sort of in the summer, you know, summer holidays and exams right before that.

So I always feel quite unprepared and actually gauge just because they, you so busy to revise. I think the lesson to learn is that it will be fine once in the field. I mean, there’s always something you will forget. Don’t forget the key bet. But, you know, you’re not going to always have everything ready.

And there are things depending on the country guarantee that you’ll be able to [00:24:00] get that. Well, there’s a part of the show where we ask the same five questions to each guest each week we have the first beam. On your trips. What’s the one item or gadget that you always take with you? It’s a bit tricky because I think my expeditions always vary quite a lot in terms of the objective, you know, is that an adventure based or very much a sort of science focused expedition I think in GPS was quite very quick, definitely quite useful.

But actually we’re always take us some sort of treat for myself. So I mean, chocolate unfortunately melts, so it would normally take chocolate. But I think just some sort of nice and as you both, and sort of, yeah, something to cheer you up when you, we had a rough day, some jelly babies or something.

What is your favorite adventure or travel book? It’s quite hard. I don’t think I’ve got one. I mean, I liked so [00:25:00] sort of George members of early books, environmental investigation, like on, I think specifically the Amazon watershed which is sort of about him being essentially investigating.

Deforestation in Brazil. And so being, especially in forefront and what’s happening in the Brazilian, Amazon on the ground. And you know, the, the, yeah, the injustice happening that I think the combination of having itself adrenaline cake and like nice descriptive writing with some sort of more, I think, inside about, you know, what’s politically historiography happening.

Yeah, I think that’s sort of that combination of, I mean, that’s quite specific as I’ve done research in Brazil as well. So I think just me always trying to read more around, well actually going and the history and things like that and engaging way. So then the other book would be Norman Lewis and [00:26:00] empire of the East, which is of his travels in Indonesia and of his encounters with his observation he takes and sort of the impact of the ruling Geminis and.

Yeah, how has impact is of local communities? And so I think that combination of sort of being able to get some factual knowledge and that being able to see the place where I’m going in a different way with sort of engaging good storytelling, isn’t it have to check them out. Why, why are adventures important to you?

I think it’s just probably because I was way too complex for any one self to be able to kompromat comprehend. I mean, Evolutionary, our brains are not wired for everything, our globalized super complex world with an overflow of information. And I think also that capitalism obviously makes us self believe where there’s an isolated, competitive, you know, ruthless [00:27:00] individuals and of the constant competition and nothing productive.

And. Yeah, I think just the Uber complexity and Uber estimators of like our world, where I just sort of striving for themselves simplicity in a way. And I think I find it quite hard to sort of switch off I’m it Amad Holmes. I think I have to really, to taken out of that environment. So fairly simple, you know tasks, you know, ever sort of cycling or each day, you know, just getting from a to B you’re getting certain amount of.

Milestone. And essentially I think, I mean, that’s really appealing to me. Yeah. I agree with that. I think it’s nice. Just take yourself away, leave your mobile home to sort of go out for whether, you know, it’s a weekend or a week. These sort of adventures that we do. So just completely takes you from one.

Lifestyle to another. And sometimes simplicity is just blessed. What is your favorite quote? [00:28:00] I was thinking about that because I don’t think do I really do quotes? I think it changed it all the time, but I think the right filler around Twitter the other day was by Kate Woolworth, the author of doughnut economics.

Don’t be an optimist if it makes you relax, don’t be in a pessimist. If it makes you give up, be an activist and get into action. And I think that’s just especially coming, obviously from the conservation background, as of in my mantel background. I think it’s, again talking about the conservation, even better as a movement to have more talk about, you know, optimism and optimism conservation and not going away from a sort of doom and gloom narrative, but at same time, you know, being realistic and the numbers aren’t lying and we need to do something about it.

So I think personally, if I had quite challenging to find the right balance of Yeah. Getting actually being able to, you know, do something about it and get into action rather than just sort of be dragged down by what’s all the news and things like that. So, yeah. Switch off [00:29:00] people. Listening are always keen to go up to travel and go on these sort of grand adventures.

What’s the one thing you would recommend to people wanting to get into adventure? Okay. I mean, it sounds, sounds silly, but I think. After having done one exhibition while that being cycling was Bolivia really easy in a way. I mean, even now, when I think about playing another, yeah. Expedition is always seems quite bit scary and unknown and you know, all the things that could go wrong, but I was really surprised how calm and confident you are once you’re actually there and really surprising yourself, how you handled the situations.

I think. Getting the first expedition to on is probably the most the hardest, but you can do that once you have done that. I think it’s shown seems very natural to you. Yeah, I think I was saying in the last episode it’s very much about The planning is exciting, but the start is always terrifying, but literally as soon as you take the first [00:30:00] step it’s Oh, okay.

All right. We’re rolling. I was really surprised. I was extremely calm once I was actually in Bolivia. I mean, a bit was because it was something I had initially planned the expedition. There was Maria who’s joining me. But it sounds weird that he was sort of relying, you know, I was doing the planning, the route planning and where we ended up the next day.

Well, we find them, we’ll be finding water and things like that. And I was nine, just turned 19 at the time. And he was, I think, 32 and an officer from the country. So it was a bit bizarre for me, but I think because having that sort of expectation on me, so I think it made me a lot more. Yeah, sure. I can do that.

I think he only found out about my age. Yeah. About two weeks then, but yeah, I think that, and I think Augusta is those about finding the robot. It’d been definitely pushing you out. They compensated a lot, but obviously still being somewhat feasible because I think before Bolivia, the year before I was kind of thinking, Oh, I should didn’t bet.

Anything else? I think I was thinking about [00:31:00] walking across Africa just having finished school. I think that was just a bit, yeah. A bit too ambitious, essentially. I think I think I obviously didn’t, I’m doing it as a think, you know, do something that’s actually pushing you, but not completely unrealistic.

What are you doing now? And how can people follow your adventures in West Africa in 2020? Obviously got postponed and I hope it be doing that this year as well, looking into wildlife corridors and West African lions. So. Hopefully we’ll get to do that this year. And I’ll be doing my feet work and expeditions from a PhD in India as well.

Amazing. Well, I can’t wait to follow along and see, see the adventures you get up to hopefully towards the end of the year. I think it’s starting to calm down, calm down a bit now. Just want to say thank you so much for coming on the show today and yeah. [00:32:00] Look forward to a following. No trips in the future.

Brilliant. Thank you so much for having me. 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 video.

Nick Butter

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Nick Butter (Runner)

Who is Nick Butter? Ultrarunner Nick Butter recently set a world record, becoming the first person in history to run a marathon in every single country globally – 196 marathons in all 196 nations. On Today’s podcast, we talk about this unbelievable achievement. This episode has it all, from running in Iran to being used as a drug mule getting into the Yemen.

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Transcript of our Conversation

Nick Butter

[00:00:00] Nick Butter: Hello, and welcome to another episode of the modern adventurer podcast coming up. You’ve been, I think, got a little bit hairy in sense. I got I was marked at knife point in a gunpoint in Lagos in Nigeria. I had some big cat incidents were very, very close to some big animals in the wild by accident.

I also was hit by a car. I was shocked. I was put in a cell. I had a minor heart attack. I was attacked by dogs. You name it basically. But we two, nearly two years around the world. That’s what you get. On today’s show. We have Nick busser, an ultra marathon runner. She ran a marathon in every country around the world. On today’s show. We talk [00:01:00] about his experience and the sort of logistical nightmare that goes in to an 18 month expedition like this, I’m doing this. We talk about some of the crazy trips from Turkmenistan to his insane story about being used.

It’s a drug meal getting through to the Yemen without knowing, but we have him. And I am delighted to introduce Nick butter to the show. Oh, thank you so much for having me looking forward to chatting things, all things, adventure and there. Yeah. Thank you. Well, you’ve had quite the adventure. I mean a marathon and all 196 countries over 18 months.

I mean, that just sounds. Unbelievable from probably Petraeus mountains to war zones. I mean, there’s, there’s quite a lot to cover, but I suppose probably the best place to start is with you and how you got into running and this sort of lust for adventure. Yeah, of course. So I guess, I guess running you, everybody does it by accident.

Sometimes whether you’re running for a bus [00:02:00] or running to the fridge or whatever it may be, but I guess you just take it that next step further. Everybody goes through the cycles of running for fitness and running for them, for enjoyment and then to compete. And then it goes a step further. And I obviously ran and make it made in my job, I suppose.

But running for me is. It’s about the endorphins, the peace, the calm, the serenity of moving through a country slowly at it, effectively walking pace just a little bit quicker. And so there’s a little bit more efficient and you get to see things, you know, I think it’s quite different from cycling or whether you’re going in a car because you do see stuff that otherwise you’d miss.

As you know, so running is very special. I guess I got into it properly. When I started to do normal races, just the new marathon here and there. And then I thought I’m not bad at this. Maybe do do a bit of a longer race. And so I did a big, it did an ultra and then I went and did, did pretty well, then won a few and won a few more and then race and race and race, and then kind of almost exhausted [00:03:00] racing to the point that at that point brands were saying to me, would you like to come and do this race or do this way?

So, and I had to actually turn lots down because I was working. I had a real job. I was in finance. And so. I had to give up my banking job to be a runner. And that’s not what a lot of people do. And so I understood though that on one hand I was filling the bank. And on the other hand, I was kind of degrading the, the soul, the soul bank, if you like.

So it was just a matter of balancing it and for running, it was, it was such an escape through the stresses of work. And I think everybody does that. Anybody that enjoys running, and I think you have to get to that stage where you enjoy running, then it’s complete escapism and you can want it. You can be listening to a fiction book about something you, you completely mystical and it can be off in your own head.

And then the other, you can be focused on your run and. It’s it’s absolutely brilliant. And then I gave up my job and started running and and eventually we came to this point where I wanted to run a marathon in every country in the world. [00:04:00] And amazingly we did it. The people close to a trip we’ll, we’ll say, and we’ll know quite how bad it was to get to the finish.

I was the only life traveled on my own, but most of the time but the people that were planning it, we honestly, for months we really didn’t think we were going to finish. So yeah, so I suppose that’s the, that’s the story of me. Runner, and then you just kind of keep on running. So what was the kick that sort of, because I can’t imagine, sort of comes to everyone to do this sort of trip.

What really propelled you to do this hundred and 96 marathons? Was there something that sort of triggered it? Cause I, I usually find. There is always a trigger that sort of says, I need to do this. I do. I think there is one trigger. I think this particular example was the, the last final trigger. You know, it was almost like a series of pushes towards the edge of the cliff.

And this one push [00:05:00] was the one that popped me over the edge. And that was meeting this guy called Kevin. I ran the marathon sub race out in the, in the Moroccans are a desert obviously grueling race tents of I think it was about how many times is a thousand people that take part tens of eight.

And and one of these guys was Kevin. Kevin was 49 at the time. Happy, generally normal looking bloke, quite tall, massive smile, just a jolly bloke. And we got chatting about running and stuff. And then he told me that he had terminal prostate cancer, and I said, I don’t know what you, and he said, yeah. Apparently, apparently only got two years to live and it was completely out of the blue.

And he was almost saying like, he was just going to buy a new car or something. And well, and, and then I realized over many hours of SIM speaking and then weeks afterwards of finishing that race and going back and kind of dwelling on what he was talking about. You know, during that conversation, he said, don’t wait for a diagnosis.

Don’t wait for something to happen for [00:06:00] you to completely follow your dreams. And he said, even then even there’s lots of people out there that believe they’re following their dreams or living their life to the full, when they’re actually making excuses of why they don’t do lots of stuff. And so he said just, you know, try and start again.

Like I have a nice blank canvas and write down what you want to do. And obviously wanted to raise some money for prostate cancer after meeting him. And then I thought, well, what better way than to listen to his advice? And I was already running, I already had a decent beginnings of a running career. But he kind of opened up the opportunity for me to combine all of my passions, photography, running meeting people, traveling the world, you know, and this was, this was all of a sudden, a way to incorporate raising some money for prostate cancer, prostate cancer, UK And so I dreamt the idea up after Googling.

It realized nobody had done it and thought, right, we have to do that. And at the time I didn’t even know how many countries there were. And it took a long time to get to the start line to two years. And then those two years there was [00:07:00] lots of, you know, finding the finances, understanding the logistical challenges.

Wasn’t an intentional two years. I thought it would maybe take a month. It just took lots of time to get right. And then eventually we’re ready to go on January the sixth, 2018 and 674 days after that. So 23 months after I started, we crossed the finish line eventually. Well, yeah, it sounds like a complete logistical nightmare with it.

You know, you’ve got to have 196 countries, so many visas to so many countries, which would probably, you know, reject your visa just because they want to, whether it’s a war zone or whether it’s political reasons. So to get 196, must’ve just been. Incredible. But at the same time, very stressful. How did you do it?

How do we do it? People, I think people are at the heart of everything that any, any [00:08:00] adventure or a traveler will tell you that, that it is all about the people. And I think, I believe that when people said, Oh, are you going to meet so many people, it will change your life. And I thought, yeah, yeah, yeah.

But now I realize I get it. Like the people of the world human beings. Are just fundamentally so special, like unbelievably unfathomably special. And I got to see that every every, every walk of life basically. And they propelled me around the world. So the answer is how we did it with a lot of help from my friends, I guess.

And. Talk about Visa’s particular company called universal visas, worked all of my visas for me. We thought we’d need about 220 flights. We ended up needing 455 flights. We thought we need about two or three passports. We ended up needing nine. And it was just this massive mess of, Oh yeah. I’ve climbed this well too.

I have done a really bad job at planning there. So this is hard now. [00:09:00] And we ran out of money after the first few months and I wrote it in a book, you know, the spiral of just the stresses of making sure we we’re being able to continue because, you know, once you start, you can’t just stop and start again because there’s a hell of a lot to do.

And we were running what, three marathons in three different countries every week for 96 weeks giving, you know, averagely And with that pace, you don’t have any time to anybody that has done some decent traveling. You’ll know, you rely on like airports as your, like your home. Basically airports feel the most familiar.

They have wifi, they have food and everything else in between. It’s just up to you to get by and make it, make sure it happened, happens. And so and even airports sometimes let you down. So yeah, it was, it was a struggle to get the planning done. But it was a, it was a great, a great combination of like blissfully blissfully, ignorant and completely innocently naive.

When we went into the planning and have that little bit in the case, [00:10:00] then I think it would have been the too afraid because it was just so complicated. But we, we eventually got there. So 196 countries, let’s start with number one. No, I’m joking. We’ll be here all night. But I say, when I read the book, I literally did that.

I was, I was going to go, I’m going to get a detailed account of everything. I’ll see how long it pays me to do. And the book that is now ours, 400 odd pages nearly 500, I think. But when over the original manuscript was three times bigger it was like 300 and something thousand words. And we ended up having to cover color a lot of my rubbish bits out and put all of the, the essential bits in, because there’s just so much that happened.

Every single country has a story. It’s it’s one of those things. Every country has their own unique sort of special specialty. And you know, where. Where you traveling or different. There’s just [00:11:00] so much that you appreciate about each one. And it’s just that little individuality. And the heart sort of distinct, they’re easy to distinguish, but you know, 196 sorta talk about, yeah, it’s feeling people actually say to me, well, how, how can you get to experience a country when you’re only there for a couple of days and you’re running a marathon?

My answer to that is. Yeah, I’m not experiencing the entire country, but I am very quickly arriving a stranger and then turning into somebody that knows how the customs and the culture operates. So whether that is about religion and whether that is about when prayer time happens. Or what the customs are like about covering up or what side of the road the traffic drives on, or if they have traffic lights or not, or if they are a country that beats their horn all the time, or if they’re a country, it could be neat and tidy and, and have no cars on the roads at all.

And there’s literally is, is sort of like a, an a writer’s dream because everything is so, so, so different and [00:12:00] comprehensively intricate. It’s, it’s magical. Well let’s I suppose a couple of years ago, I was out in central Asia and the middle East Turkmenistan, which was a slightly bizarre country.

I found what happened there because visas are, can be quite difficult to get into that country. And it’s the most bizarre place that I think I’ve ever been to. For all the weird reasons that no one could really comprehend. Well, the weird reasons I love Terminus Stan is, is crazy. And it’s got its downside as well.

Obviously the rich poor divide in Terminus, not as very, very obvious the Capitol is Ashgabat obviously where, where you experienced and the city it is imagined. A child has been given a Lego sets made of only white bricks and the bricks. You have to make towers of massive [00:13:00] structures. So basically 10 minutes, Don is a.

It’s a model village, but on a real scale made of marble, the entire city is made of marble and anybody that doesn’t know Turkmenistan’s laws and the, the leader of their country is frankly nuts. And they have renamed all of the days of the week. After the leaders, children, I believe correct me if I’m wrong.

And I think that was right. Yeah. I think it was the old leader, not the current leader. That’s very true. That’s very true. The old leader, the old leader, they’re still the names of the days of the week is still the same. Yeah. But the current dictators, like he was his old dentist. Yeah, that’s true. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

That’s right. He loves, he loves horses and there’s always, they would leader the statue has been everywhere, but. It’s an unbelievable place because it’s utterly clean and it’s also completely, completely empty. You have highways, [00:14:00] it’s like a city for the future, right? When the world is full, will spill over into this beautiful country that is ready to ready to live in.

You’ve got like a, it’s almost like a going back to the Lego analogy like this magical. Building maze of white marble. And then on the outskirts, you’ve got all of the bricks that were kind of discarded and, and that’s where the poor divide begins. And it’s quite shocking. And I run in both of those debts absolutely amazing place.

I don’t want to say it’s the weirdest place I’ve been along to one of the weirdest North Korea is obviously up there. But that Scott actually seems incredibly similar in the sense of cleanliness and scale and emptiness and the only you, I suppose, North Korea feels a little bit more.

Dark, I suppose as the answer, like kind of not dirty, but I guess it’s the, the, the preconceptions that you bring onto it, you make it, make it what that is, but [00:15:00] yeah, no, actually about so many Stan was an experience. I was very hot when I was running as well, actually, because over that hundred and 96 countries, you must to run a marathon, you know, sometimes where you sort of run along the roads where you on the beaches while you.

Cause each one must have been so different. I, I sort of heard you had quite a, sort of an experience in Syria and Damascus. Could you tell everyone about that? Yeah, Sarah. Yeah, you’re right. So I ran everything from beaches to like love of fields to tar, to grass, to sand lit everything or monsoon mud in Nepal actually.

But yeah, Syria was a great experience. I So the full story is this series. It was nearly the end. So I was about 190 countries in 200 and 196. And Syria was obviously has its own preconceptions and dangerous. [00:16:00] And I was going over Overland into Syria from the root, I believe. Am I getting that right?

Yes. From Beirut into Syria to Damascus spirits, Damascus And a few days before my, my dad called me and said that the organization that we had support that had supported us in order to get in, get this done, it was about 24 different people that managed to link up the safe access into Syria. It was so difficult because we were going over land and we needed to make sure it wasn’t going to be canceled.

And I got a call from my dad saying really sorry, but. Your driver who we’d organize months ago to take me into Syria from Beirut has been shot and killed on that same drive, literally the day before you were a two days before you arrive. And obviously that’s incredibly sad and shocking, but also we were then stuck in Beirut without our own we’re travel.

Cause we were obviously hopscotching from one to the next. And so we were. A [00:17:00] write up the spout. And I also had a bad feeling about it cause it was loads of protests in Beirut at the time it was the last 20, was it 2019, October, November. And and there was flaming roadblocks everywhere. It’s a very hostile experience.

And I really thought we were getting into something, you know, it was gonna go wrong. But anyway, long story short, we found another driver. We went into Syria, went into Damascus and I was expecting. To feel afraid because of everything. Yeah. You see in the news. And actually I had completely the opposite experience.

I was hosted by this brilliant chap who helped me find the hotel they stayed in, which was a beautiful hotel, absolutely stunning. In the middle of the old town, it wasn’t just out somewhere in a nice, neat compound. This was real. A hotel in the central Damascus and an amazingly late to that day, when I ran, I was, I ran with the under nineteens female national faculty who have just happened to be [00:18:00] training in the stadium where I was going to be starting my run.

And we ran around the stadium together. And then the other football team, the other, the, the boys’ national team came on a regional teams or he came on and we did a bit of running together and just talk about people and community and the amazing feeling. They made that so unbelievably special.

Cause they didn’t know I was this Nutter from England. There’s going to be running around the stadium and they’re SETI. And yet they open, welcomed me with open arms and I had the most amazing feeling of being such a small piece of such a brilliant world. And Is again, when it catches you. I tried to, as the trip went on, I tried to learn to not let my preconceptions kind of, yeah, give me the experiences.

And yeah, I went into Syria expecting to be afraid because of war. And I should have known, I should have known there’s something was going to happen because every country I went to that was the same thing all of my preconceptions wrong. But [00:19:00] now we have the most amazing time in Syria and I will never, I will never forget that day because.

It was, as you can imagine them going to every country, there’s a handful of countries that you would pull out of the air of that might be tough. And Syria was one of them and it turned out to be one of the most enjoyable. Yeah, I think a lot of what I love about travel is that it does break down preconceptions.

So of different countries, you, you see these countries portrayed so badly in Western media sometimes. And you know, I, when I did my trip where it was in Iran, but. You suddenly go there and you suddenly find that the locals are just so welcoming and hospitable and they could not be nicer. And what you see in the media and what you experienced are two very different things.

Yeah, that’s so true. And I’ve always like, I almost feel like I want to campaign for like a good news channel where there’s only the good stuff that goes on. Cause I’m amazed that there’s literally thousands of [00:20:00] news channels. And all they want to hear about is the bad stuff when my experience and most people that travel a lot.

Is the experiences there’s so much good in the world that goes on everywhere from every walk of life, every religion, every race, every

there is so much more good than bad. And what you see on the news is bad stuff. And I understand because that’s dumb and that’s what we, human beings, you know, expecting to see on the news. I just wish we could mix it up a bit. And I guess your, your, your platform like this job is one of those, honestly, and that’s why I love doing these kinds of things because it’s it’s the, it’s the only voice of good in the world.

Isn’t it? I sort of agree. I mean, Throughout that, I mean, you must have had so many countries where it was like that you went there with that sort of fear that something bad was going to happen. And then when you got there, it’s sort of. I know, it’s just like you get there and you’re just like, wow, [00:21:00] why was I even fearful?

Why did I even build this up in my head to be terrified when actually the reality is just so different from what I was thinking? Yeah. Yeah, you’re right. And there’s also the other side of the coin where I think preconceptions generally are a bad idea because you immediately put yourself in a, an expectation box of, of that.

And it’s then very difficult to come out of it even like, I don’t know The Bahamas or Cuba or those kind of places that don’t just me as somewhere that I might be fearful of you. I have preconceptions, let’s say The Bahamas lovely white beaches, Lucy. Bright blue sky and sun. And I was running in The Bahamas and it was torrential rain and floods in overcast and cloudy and windy and horrible.

And so once again, my preconceptions that I thought can’t win. I can’t be wrong this time. I was wrong again. And say, whether it’s the weather, whether it’s the culture, whether it’s the political volatility, whether it’s Wars, whether it’s a random protest in a place there’s so many things And [00:22:00] yeah, he’s just, it just shows you the wonders of the world, I guess.

And I quite like that, even though I desperately tried to not. Let my preconceptions determine what I was expecting. They did up until the final day where I still do now. So I don’t know whether I’m going to ever get out of that. Did what was the sort of, was there a particular moment on your 18 month expedition where you sort of look back and you’re, you can pinpoint one moment where you were like, wow, what an amazing moment?

Gosh, there’s so many like that. I had a, a couple of very moving when I was in a, so one was in El Salvador. When I ran with a thousand kids in San Salvador, in the city, I always kind of planning that, you know, maybe running on my own or maybe the embassy would come out and put few people out, but the embassy had a we’d contacted them.

They then organized with the ministry of support of sport and the elite athletes in schools, in the international schools. Loads of kids coming out, waving [00:23:00] union, Jack flags and sharing, they’re sharing their story and running with people. I just have those overwhelming feeling of just overslept inferior to the moment because it was so, so wonderful.

And then other moments where one was in I’m in Panama. When I went to see we didn’t, we visited loads of schools and organizations and running clubs and hospitals and children’s hospitals and orphanages. And basically tried to see as much of the real world as occurred. And one of these was in Panama.

And in Panama I went to CA cancer rehabilitation center in a rehab center, a a chemotherapy ward, sorry. In Panama. And there was these old leather chairs with people that were looking. Quite solid in their chairs when I walked in and it was an air conditioned room, obviously Panama’s very hot.

And I was sweating buckets and they will all in there. What wrapped in jackets with the drips in their arms and, and something most amazing thing where [00:24:00] when they finished the chemotherapy session, they go and ring the bell. And it’s like a sign of. I am still alive and kicking and we are going to beat this.

And obviously cancer is so universal. I was doing it for a cancer cause and sat down and had a few chats with these people. It was the most. Just special moment to experience. And there’s lots of tears when we went back, cause that was mid runs. We then had to carry on running and think about this and that was very special.

And then there’s plenty of other opportunities. One, one in which my last example, cause there’s lots of them is I was running in the Caribbean somewhere. And I was running, I ran out of money, run out of water and I really desperately needed some water. And I came across a lady who at a tiny little store with a few bottles of things like some fuel and fuels and some plastic, what was on some water.

And I said, Oh, can I can I, can I have a sip of water? Can I have a cup of water? I’ll bring you money back another time. I’ll [00:25:00] bring money back when I finished. And she just said the most simplest things you just gave me the bottle of water and said, water is life. And just looked at me as like, you need it.

And this is somebody that has absolutely nothing in comparison to material things that I would or jobs or opportunities or freedoms. And she’s just willingly going. Yeah, there you go. That was such a strong correlation wherever I went, the less people had, the more they wanted to give. And I’m sure you’ve experienced that too.

It’s the most weird paradox of travel and the world and I think those moments will sum up why I have so much admiration for the diversity of the planet. Well, there are any sort of hairy moments you’ve had because you’ve must, you’ve crossed quite a few borders. You’ve quite a few customs. You must have had quite a bit of difficulty here and there.

Lots of different groups. I’ve had quite a few moments where I’ve forgotten which country I’m flying in from and which country I’m in. [00:26:00] A number of times, I’d say at least four specific times where I’ve been questioned by immigration staff of wherever you come from and where are you staying? And I had no idea.

I don’t know. And I was just so tired. And I was really stumped, you know, when you’re in that moment where, you know, you have the answer, but you just think. I don’t know. I don’t know. So that was quite embarrassing, but now things got a little bit hairy in the sense I got I was marked at knife point and a gunpoint in Lagos in Nigeria.

I had some big cat incidents where were very, very close to some big animals in the wild by accident. I also was hit by a car. I was shocked. I was put in a cell. I had a minor heart attack. I was attacked by dogs. You name it basically. But it two, nearly two years around the world. That’s what you get.

Yeah. And they were moments, which I still look back with a fond memory. Cause you, as everybody knows the whole point of this kind of endurance and life, I [00:27:00] suppose, in general, as you overcome them and then you enjoy overcoming them as well. So no scary moments, but moments that I can look back with fond memories of, I think, yeah.

I th I think it all happens to us. You have to experience the bad to appreciate the good. Yeah, absolutely. It’s so it’s so easy as well to just assume that I w I know I have 22 different bouts of food poisoning in two, in 20 hours. And I come on that’s I thought I might get food poisoning once or twice, and it be horrible, but I got food poisoning a lot.

And that was just because I was so run down. My body was depleted. I was also hungry, so I was eating anything. And yeah, that, that made the the running a little bit more hard. Yeah. I’m running marathons zones. An empty stomach and food poisoning. It’s just brutal. It’s not a nice feeling. Running on empty, running on empty energy wise, let alone when you’re vomiting every mile or where I have kidney infections, I was pig blood a lot of the [00:28:00] time.

Like my body was just wrecked. And all it was, it was a case of just having that tiny little bit of rest between countries where I was on a plane, like my safe places. And if I was lucky, I’d be able to get to the airport and they’d have never air conditioning or they’d have somewhere I could sleep on the floor.

So yeah, the it’s amazing though. And like you say, you’ve got to have the rough of the smooth. The logistics of food I found it’s really difficult because you sort of plan it. And in these countries you might sort of see in on Google maps that this is a little town which you’ll run through or something.

Then when you get there, it’s absolutely nothing. And so you sort of plan to maybe have your snack or have your lunch there and suddenly. There’s nothing. And so you then running on empty for the rest of the day, did you sort of carry a massive backpack with stuff in it or were you just like hotel drop it off run, come back.

Yeah, [00:29:00] that’s right. Yeah. Most of my equipment was like camera gear and filming stuff. And obviously just a few items of clothing and like books and pens and things like that, but nothing major. So I run without anything and I got very good at just finding places and got quite good at learning that.

I need to turn around and run somewhere else. That’s just the benefit of not doing point to points of the benefit of dress running the distance in the country is means. I know if I’m, you know, if I run three miles in one direction and I don’t find anything. It’s probably safer to run this back three miles and drink and then go in a different direction.

Because yeah, I got out, I got into a few sticky. Everyone was a good example where I ran in Keisha Island and it was very hot, very early in the morning. And I only had about 12 hours in the country. And. The guy that was my driver, lovely chat, very friendly, but didn’t really understand what I was doing.

That’s another thing I learned is that the rest of the world doesn’t all know what running is [00:30:00] a sport or what marathons are as I’m sure you experienced. And so I, I said to him, no, I need, need to get water before we go. And he was going to follow me in the car. So this happened quite a few times in countries where I’d have people with water if it was unsafe there.

You’re all very hot, which was both in the East in this case. And he followed me and he said, I will get walked around the corner around the corner, so, okay. We’ve got round the corner. And there’s nothing I said. Is there a water soon? Cause I’m like, it’s an eight miles now. Like I need some water and then more and more miles went by in the same conversation.

I was getting quite grumpy with them cause I really need water now. And I did 24 miles without any water in like 30 or degrees. At like two o’clock in the morning having only just landed. It was horrendous. Unfortunately I managed to there was a little classic travel, I suppose it was a little was there a construction site near a petrol station in the middle of nowhere in cash.

And it had [00:31:00] nothing in it apart from a few cables and like some scaffolding and a water cooler. And it had water in it. And I was like, I don’t know how long this has been here, but I am having that water. And that was the only way I drank. Yeah. And that was, that was through the whole mountain. Good.

And with the sort of escorts, I mean, I find it slightly embarrassing when you have someone driving behind it sort of four miles an hour, creepy and behind you. I mean, it makes you run faster, but you just sort of, they’re running, being like, Oh God, the poor person in the back. Some people don’t know what they’re getting into either because I don’t think some people you, Oh, no, you just need to follow the for a few hours and he’s running a marathon.

Like if my team had organized it for me, they really realized that I’m running at running pace or slower and it’s very hot. Then I have air-con or it might be Ramadan that happened many times where they’re seeing me knacking water and eating on my runs and they can’t drink or eat. [00:32:00] And that’s, that’s brutal.

It’s also having cars. Cars driving behind you is really not very peaceful. So I got used to asking them to either drive ahead or, or wait or something, but it was incredibly, I absolutely needed them because there was many opportunities that I, you know, I could have been mugged or lost or all sorts of things.

Had they not been there now, mainly for water really, and will happen in the Yemen. Yeah, man. Huh? Yeah. But you haven’t was another Overland journey right near the end. Might think marathon number 191, maybe I’m right in that new. I remember the order, let’s say it was close to the end, running in Yemen. I was going over land from Amman.

And it was a few hours over the morning mountains, gorgeous mountains, dead of night. So kind of sunsetting as we got to the border. And the driver that I [00:33:00] has, well, just be very good English, but was very friendly. Picked me up. A little, you know, classic travel things, pick me up from the airport.

And then he said, Oh, I just have to go over to this garish. Cause I need to pick up a new windscreen. You know, it didn’t have a windscreen in his car. And so pick up a new windscreen, put that in and then he would take me. And so that was already a bit odd, but then We got to the border and it was one of the most, if not the most scary, I’m going to say the most scary moment of my life.

When I realized we were in this dead of night, lots of military or people with guns and officials with their uniforms and their dogs and stuff surrounding the car. And we’re in the middle of their money, does it on the, on the border. And if you look at it on the map, it’s just barren, absolutely barren.

And and then. We had dawned on me that the guy that was driving us, he was trying to smuggle in drugs and counterfeit goods into the country. And he was using me practically as an excuse, as a mule to get these into the [00:34:00] country. And I was there in the passenger seat and hearing these conversations in Arabic, which I couldn’t understand, but I got the gist that we were in trouble.

Unfortunately, fortunately he managed to give give everything that he had to these guards in order to let us go. But it, it took a long time and I really didn’t know if we were going to get in or if we were ever going to see anybody ever again, they could’ve just put me in a cell. As you know, there’s some countries that don’t let you, you know, the British government don’t have any responsibilities to come and save you because you’re a bit of an idiot to go there.

And so I, I went and I was genuinely fearful that I was never going to see my family or friends or loved ones again, because. They were angry and then everything passed and let it subsided. And he, the driver was annoyed, but we got into the country. And I realized, ah, I mean, Yemen now. And we don’t have anything to Bart with on the way out.

And it’s going to be the same chops. Like, are we actually going to leave? [00:35:00] Like, are they just, what, what are they trying to pull there? And unfortunately we didn’t have any trouble. Well, let’s say we just had to have a lot of patients. I’m sure you’ve had it. You just have to have. Like a bucket of patients.

And then you have to have a loan of like the thousands of buckets of patients in order to be able to get through these borders, because it’s just so slow and just, you feel like they’re just trying to put every blocker in your way, especially when you’re tired as well. So you just have to be patient and stand there very, very quietly.

And eventually they let you go. But it was that was scary. That was, that was scary. After using you as a drug meal, did you tip him? You kept him. If I could, if I could tip him, I would not have tipped him as it happened. They took all of our money. So there was no opportunity to tip. There was, you know, their, their story goes on because he there’s little, we’re supposed to be staying in a hotel before we go at, went over the border.

And I’m as dubious about where this hotel was going to be, as we were driving through the mountains, because there was [00:36:00] nothing. Like camels and mountains and road and a few cars, very few cars. And that’s it. No buildings, no nothing. And we drove past the only kind of building we could see, and it was effectively a concrete shell that looked like it has just been bombarded with bullets.

And that was where we were staying. It was literally nothing other than concrete. And a few broken down walls. And and he then proceeded to invite people that he knew in the area to come and have a party. And they played music in the next room at like crazy o’clock in the morning and I’m like, what’s going on?

And he was chewing the cuts. They’re the, the, the, the grass, you know, like these called cuts that they eat and chew the cat. Yeah. Cats. And they they, and he was kind of the little bit. Yeah, of course face a little bit. And I was like this, guy’s going to have to drive behind me in about five hours time in the morning.

I’ve rarely as it’s going to happen. [00:37:00] Unfortunately, it worked out okay. And we had a different driver but there was lots of military and big tanks and things that went past us. And I, at one point I said, I just need to do another mile or so up here before we can finish. And he said, no, you can’t do it there.

There’s already been people that have been driving past and looking at you as if to say like, we can, we can get him, we can mug him. And so when that happened, you just want to leave. You just want to go. So there was lots of lots of tensions in that one, but That was, I was already, you know, nearly two years into the, experiencing the world.

So I was ready for that stuff, but I’m not quite ready for Yemen. And so to finish off, where, where was your final marathon? Was it in the UK or was an, did Kevin, was Kevin still alive? Yeah. So amazingly Kevin was diagnosed and given two years to live, it took me two years to plan the trip. And so technically by science, they were saying that he probably [00:38:00] wouldn’t be alive by the time I started.

Not only was he alive when we started. But it was also alive when I finished and we crossed the finish line together, hand in hand with him running American with me in Athens, the famous marathon Terrapin is marathon, the marathon of marathons. And so that was our finish line. I’ve never lived 10 and amazingly Kevin is not only, still alive, but doing very, very well.

The sad reality though, with terminal prostate cancer is, is terminally will kill him. And he is still on a, on a clock cause they’re on his website. He has years since he was diagnosed. And I think he’s on six years now. And just phenomenal and that’s, that’s science that has done that. But it’s still very sad that one day we will know that those drugs will stop working and the next set of drugs will stop working.

And then that will be it, unfortunately. But having them there at the finish line in Athens, not just him, but loads of people that had run with me. I’ve got a great friend who used to work with good Andy who came out individually across those [00:39:00] two 23 months and did 19 marathons with me just whenever he could an odd weekend, he’d come out and run.

Which was amazing. He was there, those people to planned it. My parents, girlfriend loads of people from all over the world that had helped host me. And they came to Athens to see me, see me run and celebrate and It was probably one of the greatest days of my life for loads of different reasons.

And it was also quite weird to have the feeling of sadness to finish all that time. I’d wanted to finish because I wanted to get the mission done and achieve the goal. And then it’s done. And like, I’ve literally run out of countries. I can’t, I can’t go and run in another country cause there isn’t any more and yet then you also have the understanding that the world is so much bigger, more, so large, that you could never run everywhere.

Even if you had a thousand years, you know, it’s just so big. And so I’m now hence going after all of these other journeys and running across countries that I want to go and see more of yeah, the old cliche term. [00:40:00] It’s not the destination. It’s the journey. It’s so true though. It’s cliche, but it’s so true.

We even said that girlfriend and I, Nikki, we were saying that was, we were driving back from the Alps and we were talking about, you know, the first year we’ve had in the van and experiencing it. And we had an nightmare getting back over on the tunnel, by the way. And we got back and really, you know what, that was a great journey.

We will, we will always remember that journey. So that’s the same with running the world and everything else we’ve done. So 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 one that gadget on your trip that you always take with you.

That’s actually quite an easy one. It is an international extension lead with very boring, but incredibly practical. Anybody there stayed in dorms or hostels or basically rubbish hotels. You need an extension cable because you’ve got a lot to charge, especially for [00:41:00] running. You need your watch. You need just sacrificing, you need you your own phone.

You need everything to work. And so an extension cable, as sad as it is, what is your favorite adventure or travel book? Ooh, there’s a fantastic book called Jupiter travels. It is a chap who wrote around the world on his motorbike. This was in the sixties. And it’s, he wrote it as he went and he released it recently.

And I was recommended it through penguin who I published through and they said, just read this because this is a great book. And I, it’s just fantastic, incredibly raw and real experiences of traveling the world when we’re in a time when very few people did. Why are adventures important to you?

They teach you perspective, context, enhance your empathy. They make you value you and everything you have around you. And they [00:42:00] realize you realize how big and how small the world is all in one go. It’s, it’s amazing. How did you think this trip did change you? It gave me. Temper really gave me patience during the trip.

And then you can very quickly become inpatient. But it also, it also gave me the. A second wind of like the lust for life. If you like. I think, you know, in a Western civilization, we all get very, very bogged down with, Oh, I haven’t, I dunno my friend’s going on holiday there or not in a job. That’s earning this much money or haven’t got this car.

I haven’t got this TV. I can’t afford that phone or, Oh, she’s prettier than me or those are these things. And when you see the world just in its raw fantastic form. You go, you know what? I am so lucky, so, so lucky. So I think it’s just appreciating my own privilege. [00:43:00] What is your favorite quote or motivational quote?

I like don’t count the days, make the days count because it doesn’t really matter how long we live for it matters. We’ll be doing in that time. Oh, that’s very nice. People listening are always keen to travel and go on these sort of grand adventures. What’s the one thing that you would recommend them to get started?

Oh, Abel an op an object or an item or a method. Well w anything like yeah, yeah, yeah. I think to have true adventure you’ve got to kind of embody the misadventures. So try and plan something that you want to do. Let’s say you usually go on holiday to the South of France or Spain. Why don’t you pick a place that you’ve never heard of and go there?

I think it’s about going and getting out of your comfort zone in the travel. Cause a lot of people say to me, Oh yeah, I’ve traveled quite a lot. And they [00:44:00] mean they gone to the same four or five places a lot. But I have learned much more from anything in any part of my life, by going to the places that I’d never heard of.

You know, like the pistons of the Pacific islands or some of the central African countries, or literally anywhere, you know, Mongolia. Right. Yeah. People know of Mongolia, Mongolia, but the cultures and the way of life there is just, and the beauty of the country is phenomenal. So just go out and see as much as you can.

Yeah. What are you doing now and how can people follow you in your future ventures? Yeah. So what am I doing now? I am planning to, we literally, I’m not told many people this actually 12th of April, we are about to. Start running my next challenge which is to run Britain and the very essence of adventure.

I realize it’s rather foolish of me to have seen every country and I’ve not actually went around my own country. [00:45:00] And so in the celebration of kind of coming out of lockdown life we start on the 12th of April and we finished on the 24th of July. And. It is all about me pushing myself harder than I have.

We are raising money for the one nine six foundation, which is the foundation I set up from running the world. And that’s going to help people all over the world for, we asked for small donors, patients of one pound 96 per month from individuals everywhere. And that money goes into a pot and we’ve developed this process called the democratic donorship where people that vote, that, that donate to get to vote on who we help once a year.

And so that could be buying a wheelchair for a neighbor that needs it, or whether it be building a school in Uganda, for example. So there’s like the whole spectrum of, of courses that we support. So whatever we’re doing, Britain running Britain trying to break the world record the current people run around the country and about 300 days a walk or, or run it.

I’m trying to run around the country in a hundred days, which means [00:46:00] doing two marathons a day for a hundred days. So that’s going to be. Tough. But we will celebrate with everybody. We’re going to raise the money for the charity. And that’s, that’s coming soon. So that’s, what’s happening very soon.

I’ve got loads of plans. We’re doing Japan, New Zealand, Himalayas, Malawi, et cetera, et cetera, over, over the next couple of years. And then we’ve got a big thing in 2023 in terms of getting involved. I mean, I’ve got a, an increasing band of brilliant people that volunteer their time. We have a team of about 13 or 15 of us now which helped with all our nonprofit stuff.

We focus on three main causes within our. What kind of Nick butter clan, if you like, which is adventure community and environment. So if you’re interested in all that sort of stuff, combined, then get in touch. We have a free or footprint campaign, which is all about the environment. And so I’m learning more about that over the next few years and getting more people involved.

So getting in touch with me there’s this way is to go into the website. Nick butter.com, Nick [00:47:00] potter.com and just email me, which is Nick, Nick butter.co.uk. Or get me on WhatsApp, which is Nick butter run sorry, on, on Instagram, which is Nick butter run and on WhatsApp number is on there as well.

You can WhatsApp me come and run with me, get involved in the projects. If you need any coaching or training, we help with that as well. Basically anything that’s running and fun and doing some good then we’re trying to do it. Oh, absolutely amazing. So how much did you raise at the end of it then?

We raised, so we’re still raising. It’s kind of, it’s never, I’m purposely not closing it. Cause the more and more people hear about it, like shows through like yourself trying to raise more and more. We’ve got to just over 220,000 that we know is happened. So many of that actually is offline donations that haven’t gone through the just giving page and frustratingly, but we’ve had lots of people say, Oh yeah, we’ve given this money.

And it’s kind of all accumulated to about 220, which is great. But I think by the end of this year, we’ll probably be up at two 50 which was our [00:48:00] original target. I think we did pretty well considering that. Many of the countries I was going through, obviously nobody from those places can afford to donate.

And so therefore most of the donations came from people watching my journey from afar, which I’m very grateful for. And to show that that, that grass judo spoke for everybody’s name, that donated in the back of the book to say, thank you. So there’s some things about four or 5,000 names in there that people have people that donate and say, thank you to everybody that did it.

So. We managed to do it. We completed our mission. And now it’s time to get onto the next one. Well, your book is on, on the website. So you can buy it at my website if I’m for anyone who wants to read it and yeah. Go check them out on Instagram. Thank you so much, man. That’s I I’m really grateful for that.

And I think again, a lot of people may assume and take it for granted that you are. Enabling people or me to have a platform and a [00:49:00] voice to share what we’re doing. So, so thank you to you as well. No worries. Well, it’s been an absolute pleasure. I sort of feel like we haven’t even scratched the surface of your trip.

I think there’s a hundred more stories to get through. I mean, we didn’t even touch on Africa already or South America or America or anywhere. There’s a lot to it. thank you, mate. Absolute pleasure to chat. Please do get in touch with me yourself directly and we’ll get some running done another time or get you involved in some of the trips you’ve got coming up.

Yeah, well that sounds great. Well, Nick, thank you so much for everything and coming on the show. No, thank you. It’s been an absolute pleasure. 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 video.

EP.022: Mollie Hughes

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Mollie Hughes (EXPLORER)

In today’s episode, we have Mollie Hughes a British sports adventurer and explorer who in 2017 broke the world record for becoming the youngest woman to climb both sides of Mount Everest and in 2020 became the youngest woman to ski solo to the South Pole. In this podcast, we talk about those expeditions and the highs and lows of solo travel. We talk about what it takes to climb Mount Everest and the psychology of it.

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Transcript of our Conversation

Mollie Hughes

[00:00:00] Mollie Hughes: Hello, and welcome to another episode of the modern adventurer podcast coming up. The wind’s just raged. A couple of days it was like 45 knots going or 50 nights. Super strong winds. And every day I had to try and get out and try and ski in these conditions. Cause I had, you know, miles to make, or you had a certain amount of food and my sled behind me.

So the first year, nine days of this trip were absolute hell

On today’s show. We have Molly Hughes, a female Explorer who broke the record for becoming the youngest woman to summit both the North and South part of Mount Everest, as well as the youngest person to ski solo to the South pole. On today’s podcast. We talk about the highs and lows of [00:01:00] those expeditions and some of the amazing moments she’s had along the way.

I am delighted to introduce Molly Hughes to the show. Hey, thanks for having me. Well, you’ve been on quite a few adventures in recent years and. I mean, it’s truly incredible. You became the youngest person to summit both the North and South of Everest. And recently you’ve just got back from Antarctica after being the youngest person to solo ski to it.

But probably the best place to start is with you and how you got into these grant expeditions. Yeah, always good to start the beginning. So I grew up in Devin. I live up in Edinburgh now. But I grew up on the South coast of Devon little place called Torbay. Probably as far from any mountains as you can get in the UK.

So I didn’t climb any mountains until I was 17. And when I was 17, my school organized one of those [00:02:00] expeditions where you go off around the world. And we went to East Africa, we went to Kenya and did lots of charity work. And then at the end of the trip had the chance to climb Mount Kenya. And that was my first proper mountain climb to my first kind of taste of a bit of high altitude.

And I obviously loved it. And I think I did okay on it. I did pretty well. And like getting to the top of that mountain. I knew I was hurt. I knew that climbing mountains was something I was probably gonna do for the rest of my life. So then after that, I kind of kept going to school, went to uni and each kind of term, I would save up as much money as I could.

With random part-time jobs, I did everything from like selling ice cream on the beach in toll Bay to a lifeguard at the Lake was William pool. And I was say anything I could, and then in the summer girl from a different expedition with some friends around the world and climb as much as I could.

So yeah, I guess that’s, that’s kind of the beginning of it. So when you say you were sort of claiming we’re friends before the sort of big [00:03:00] ones, what, what were you sort of climbing? Was it mom belong or was it up in a sort of around sort of kurgastan or usually kind of big expeditions? And I think my first kind of.

The thing that drove me at the beginning was like a love for travel. And I love seeing the world and just kind of opening my eyes where I, where I came from a Devin is pretty small town. So that first trip to Kenya definitely opened my eyes. And then I wanted to see more and more. So the year after that, we went on that expedition to India, to the Himalayas there and did a bit of climbing and all sorts of other things.

The year after that, I think I was maybe. 19 the, after that, and we did a quick trip at the beginning of the summer to Morocco and climbed in the Atlas mountains. And then later on in the summer, we went off to the Andes in South America, Ecuador and decent climbing there. The year after that, I think we went back to East Africa, the Kilimanjaro but to the Alps, it’s in the pool quite a few times.

So yeah, just as much as I possibly could [00:04:00] to see the world, but also to incorporate a bit of climbing into those trips. Good. Wow. And so when, when did you have the idea? To climb Mount Everest. Yeah. So Everest came up when I was in my last year uni and it never been, yeah, my radar before. Like as I said, I wasn’t like seriously going after mountaineering or climbing.

I just did it as part of these trips. Cause I loved it and I loved it. Getting high on mountains is amazing. But Evers came up cause I was studying sports psychology at university, and I had to write my dissertation, which I’m sure, you know, it was a massive project, 10,000 words of writing. And there wasn’t particularly academic.

I was pretty disliked. I’m pretty dyslexic. So the idea of like sitting down and writing 10,000 words was terrifying. So I kind of like racking my brain of something really interesting. I could write about. To make sure I actually sat down and wrote this project. And I kinda thought what’s one of the biggest, like psychological challenges in mountaineering.

Cause I wanted to focus on [00:05:00] mountaineering cause I’ve been doing so much of it recently. And obviously Mount Everest brings to mind cause it’s the highest month in the world. It’s the most famous mountain in the world. And for this project I interviewed seven guys. Who do submitted? I can only find men at the time, unfortunately, but I found seven men around the UK and I went and met them all and interviewed them and asked them kind of about their motivations for doing it, their kind of ability to control, fear and anxiety on the mountain, the kind of psychological pressure that they all faced when they sat down at base camp, looking up at that huge mountain.

Just kind of talking to these guys and hearing their stories of walking through the Western Coombe or along the Northeast region, Mount Everest just totally inspired me. And I knew probably the first time I started writing about it. I didn’t want to just write about it. I want you to see these places with my own eyes.

And if I was lucky enough to get, get to the top. Gotcha. And so in terms of the psychology of climbing, Mount Everest [00:06:00] what do you think one of the biggest psychological barriers to climbing Mount Everest is good question. And th there’s tons like the guys that I interviewed all successfully submitted over a period of about 10 years.

But they all have really different psychological journeys on the mountains, different motivations for going there. And I think a strong motive for doing it is one of the most important things. There are two guys. I interviewed two, we’re doing it for a friend that they’d lost and it was always their friend’s ambition to summit Mount Everest.

But he unfortunately died. So they did it in his honor. And that seemed like such a strong motivator for them to keep putting one foot in front of the other. A couple of the other guys just did it as friends. They’re like a friendship group and it sounds like they had a super fun expedition just with people they knew really well.

And they just enjoyed the whole kind of journey on the North side. And that sounded like a really great way to do it as well, doing it with friends and just kind of enjoying it, not focusing too much on the summit. So [00:07:00] yeah, everyone had really different motives for being there. One of the challenges or one of the biggest challenges, I think it’s definitely the pressure that climate’s face on Everest.

And no matter what motive you’ve come from, the pressure is always there because you’ve either spent up to 50, 60,000 pounds to get there. Or you’ve raised the funding 50, 60,000 pounds, which I think is actually harder than spending your own money. So you spent all that money into it, you, but all that time and training into it.

You’ve probably been speaking about this for years, and then you’re sat down at base camp looking up at that huge mountain and you’re feeling rubbish. Like you’re a 5,000 years, you’ve got a headache. You’re pretty terrified. And as mountain, and you’re thinking, how enough am I going to get to get up there?

So really kind of work out how to balance us psychological pressure, I think is one of the only ways to kind of succeed on the mountain. And what was the psychology behind yours? Was it very much about, about the thrill to experience [00:08:00] it? Or was it more about something that had happened to you? Yeah, really good question.

And one, I don’t think I really. Analyzed or thought about it actually until quite recently. And when I was like a kid and when I was at school and even at uni, I was like pretty shy. I was always one of the shyest kid in the class. I would never put my hand up and say, you know, answer question. I remember just always going to bright red in class.

If, if a teacher asks me a question so never had that much like self-confidence, but I always kind of felt deep down inside of myself. I could do something and I could hopefully achieve something cool with my life. Even if I didn’t have that kind of. Confidence to shout about it. So I think in a way, when I started learning about Everest learning about the journeys that these guys went on, I thought, Hey, I could probably do that.

I might not have the confidence to start shouting about it just yet, but I think that might be something that I could do to prove to myself that I can actually achieve something with my life. Which is a bit weird in a way and a weird place to, to choose to do [00:09:00] that. But yeah, I think it was great. And I went in there and we had a great expedition and kind of the back of it.

I definitely gained so much more confidence. And just that kind of self-belief that I can do things and I can achieve things. So I think that was actually my motive for doing it at 21 to prove to myself that I could. Yeah. Nah, it’s a good, that’s a good one. And so you, the first one was when you were 21, the first summit was at Athene North or South face.

So that was on the South side. So the Nepalese side, Nepalese side. And how did the North and South really sort of compare because we’ve, we’ve had a few people on from Jordy Stewart to Lucy rivers, Buckley, and you know, they’re both, Stamets at different different sites. What what was, how did you find the sort of difference between them both?

Really different, really different. And I feel very lucky that [00:10:00] I’ve had a chance to do both the North and the South. The thing it’s hard to compare it too much because obviously I was very different when I went. And the first time when I was 21 on the South side, too, when I was. 26 on the North side, when I was 26, I was a much better Mountaineer, felt much older.

I’m much more sensible, much more experienced on the North side. And I think that’s probably why I love the North side way more than the South side. The South side, I was there in 2012 and it was a very busy season. It was the kind of the first year you saw all those cues on the Hillary step and people getting into trouble because of the overcrowding, many due to a small weather window.

But it just meant the mountain. The day I was up there was horrifically busy. And we had an amazing expedition on the South side is an incredible place like going through the country-wise fall. And the Western Coombe is gala. Lucy faces is absolutely amazing, but yeah, th the busy-ness of it. Was dangerous.

Absolutely. Whereas comparing [00:11:00] it could be the North side feel so much more reboot. It probably had about a third of the climbers on it. So when I submitted on the South side, I think about 150 to 200 submitted the same day when assumptions on the North side, we think there are probably around 25 to 30 people spread out over a whole day.

Which, which made such a huge difference. The nose had felt remote. It felt like proper mountaineering in a way, which I know is stupid to say on that Everest, but it felt, yeah, it was cool. They had a very small team on the North side and we just had a lot of fun. So yeah, I think fun and less busy was, was good.

And with the reason to go back again in summit, was that the motivation of the record or was that motivation? Just to try the North side. Yeah, I think it was a few reasons. Like I it’s been such a long time preparing to get to Everest the first time and interviewing all these guys and learning about it.

Half of them had done it from [00:12:00] the South side and half from the North side. So after I did the South side, I kind of always had this feeling that I only really seen half of the mountain and then experienced half of it. But I spent my life talking about it and I felt like I needed to go and see and experience the other side.

And that was, that was definitely one of the motivators. Also the North side is like steeped in history is where the first British teams were going in like the 1920s. And I wanted to see it, see Tibet and experience it. But then it also, I guess the South side, I did suffer a lot every day, every minute of every day, probably.

And the summit night was so tricky with. Or the people and just like my first time above 8,000 meters. So I suffered a lot and I got myself to the top button down just about. So I think I wanted to go back and really experience it as an older, slightly older person and more competent Mountaineer.

And just with that experience, I wanted to actually enjoy Everest and see if it [00:13:00] was everything I’d kind of built up in my head. And the North side definitely did that. We had an amazing couple of months on the North side. Yeah, it’s cool. It’s such a rich history behind it, then. I’m not surprised you wanted to go back.

And so that was 2017, and then you had the drive to go to Antarctica. Well, what was behind that motivation or was it simply by sort of pushing yourself a little bit further each time? So at Everest I got home and it always takes a good, like 12 months after big expedition to even start to think about what’s next because the suffering is still so fresh.

So after about 12 months, you kind of forget the pain a little bit. And just remember the good things. And I started to get a little bit obsessed with Antarctica, probably around that time. I used to live with a guy at a housemate who worked with a British Antarctic survey and he spent like a couple of field seasons down there [00:14:00] and he’d come back in the spring with amazing photos and stories and videos of Antarctica.

And that’s kind of when I, my eyes started opening up to this continent and I feel like once I get. A place or a mountain or something under my skin is all I can really think about. And I know that I want to go there and just experience it. It’s never really about these records or achieving anything.

It’s just about wanting to travel to these places and see them with you’re in eyes. Like you can read about them, you can hear about them, but it’s not until you’re actually bad that you can fully experience a particular environment. And Antarctica was so interesting. Like it’s this huge bust frozen continent.

It’s the world’s biggest desert? No like humans have ever permanently lived there. There’s hardly anything like in the center of Antarctica. There’s nothing there not even bacteria can grow because it’s so cold and so inhospitable. So yeah, obviously I wanted to go and see it, see it with my own eyes.

[00:15:00] But getting to Antarctica takes a lot. If you don’t work for something like the British Antarctic survey, if you’re not a scientist you can go as a tourist, but that costs crazy amounts of money. So I knew I had to go and do an expedition down there, an expedition that I could hopefully get funded by, by sponsors like I do with, with all of my trips.

So yeah, I found do some research and found the expedition that would go from Hokies and look, which is kind of where. The landmass meets the sea ice and the Tosca right on the kind of edge of the continent. And if I skied from there to the South pole like 700 miles and if I did it solo, then I would be the youngest woman to do it solo.

So we’d getting sponsorship and, and trying to fund these experts. You always had to find like a USP or a record or something that you can target. So yeah, I found that. That record, they will be the youngest at the age of 29. And so, okay. That’s what I got to do. And this is my, my target to try and raise the thousands and thousand pounds I need.

Good. And so in terms [00:16:00] of sponsorship, how, how long did it take you to raise that sort of money? Almost 12 months, I think for Antarctica is it always incredibly hard? And I kind of thought it would start to get a bit easier because I’ve started to get a track record of, you know, being successful on these trips, but it did it, it was unbelievably hard.

But yeah, in the end I managed to see a secure or by about six weeks before I was going to leave. Wow. God, which was good. Cause Everest, the first time was four weeks before, a little bit better. So six weeks before signed the dotted line, the contract and you’re like, Oh my God. Amazing. Right. Yeah. And so landing in going from.

Edinburgh or, or at the time to Antarctica, it’s quite a mission in terms of you have to fly to Chile or New Zealand and then fly from Chile to. So you [00:17:00] fly from Purina and Chile to a big camp could union glacier. Cause the majority of the kind of expedition on Tosca are run by an American company called Antarctic logistics and they have a big camp called union glacier on the kind of close to the kind of edge of, of Antarctica an amazing camp.

Like people go there who are going to do trips like I’m going to do. People go there. If they’re going to go and climb Mount Vincent, or if they’re going to go to visit like the penguin colonies on the coast. So it was like a hub of all sorts of random people from around the world. All there to do different trips and different expeditions.

So yeah, I really cool place to, to start a big expedition like that. Huh? Good. And so how did it, how was the feeling like when you sort of arrived and you were sort of prepping, you’d got your sledge and you knew that you were about to spend two months in complete isolation. Yeah. So arrive at union glacier had about three days there [00:18:00] to do well, the kind of last minute prep pack up my sled.

Do you mind kind of checks with the comms team? Cause there there’s a small comms team who every evening I would have to ring them up on my sat phone and give them my location, let them know I was okay. And so do all the checks for them. Meet the doctors that are, the camp goes through my first aid kit.

Get to know them. So if I’ve got any problems, I can ring them up and have a chat. So doing all that kind of last minute prep also getting used to the cold a little bit, getting used to the 24 hour daylight, which was really cool. And yeah, just in all the last minute checks over there three days, and then suddenly it was time to fly to hope isn’t it, which is just like a short half hour or so flight from union glacier.

And then getting dropped off, that was kind of the start of the trip. And I was, you know, finally alone in Antarctica. And so you’re sort of taking off, you had two months where there was this sort of amazing moments from that trip. [00:19:00] Many amazing moments. Should I, maybe I talk about the hardest moments first, because.

It started. Okay. You started really badly. Okay. Let’s let’s, let’s start with a terrible thing. Okay. The good stuff happened later. But I guess like the first two hours were quite good. I’ve began two, two hours out of two months. So I’ve forgotten the plane flew off. Leslie now. I began along the, kind of the CIS of Hokies and LA, which is flat, the sled that was pulling behind me with all my gear in it was moving really well.

Cause it’s flat really hard packed after about two hours, I kind of got to the edge of the inlet and started on the incline. And actually most people don’t really realize, but if you do a trip like this, To the South pole, you’re basically going uphill the whole way. Cause you start close to sea level.

And then the South pole is at like 2,800 and something meters above sea level. So it’s pretty much uphill the whole way. And as I hit that incline, that [00:20:00] first incline, the winds really picked up and they were kind of flowing downhill towards me. At that point I remember looking behind me and seeing these massive clouds coming over the horizon.

And I didn’t realize at the time, but. These clouds and this weather front that was coming in was going to stick to me for the next nine days or so. And I experienced the worst weather I’ve ever experienced in my life. The following morning, my first proper morning I woke up and my whole temp was shaking violently in the wind.

I looked out and it was a complete whiteout. So I don’t know if you’ve been in a whiteout before, but it’s basically when the cloud comes into your, basically less than a meter of visibility. And left looks the same as right. And not looks the same as down. And it’s so kind of disorientating and that white out just stuck on me for eight days straight.

I say eight days, it didn’t let up. The wind’s just raged. A couple of days it was like 45 knots going or 50 knots super strong winds. And everyday I had to try [00:21:00] and get out and try and ski in these conditions. Cause I had, you know, miles to make, or you had a certain amount of food and my sled behind me.

So the first year, nine days of this trip were absolute health. Yeah, it really kind of hit me straight away. Antarctica. Wasn’t like, let me add a tool. I’m just trying to get through this first nine days was the struggle. I was hardly making any progress I was aiming to do about 12 nautical miles a day.

And the first few days I did. Three and a half, four, five, if I was lucky, like hardly moving uphill, deep snow, it was, it was horrific. So yeah, not until day nine. Did the whiteout finding clear and when it did finally clear and I could finally see more than a meter in front of me. I just cried. I just cried so much, just like all of that emotion from nine days just, just came off and I, I cry is horrific, like hysterically to, to nobody in Antarctica.

We ha we had Jenny Wordsworth on the show in episode [00:22:00] 19, who I think was down there at a similar time. And she sort of said that she always made sure never to open the tent before she was dressed. Yeah, that’s a good, good technique. I’ll tell you. Did you, did you follow that? Did I find that? Yeah, I probably did.

But like the thing is you can, when it’s really windy and horrible, you can hear it, you know, you wake up in the night when it was like, yeah, exactly. But that is a good tip because if you were to look out, you maybe wouldn’t want to get out of your sleeping back in some of that weather. So once the sort of relief of that nine day storm had passed, you were probably opened up into this sort of.

Vast white expanse. Yeah, totally. It must been amazing. Yeah. I saw when I came out with the whiteout where these three mountains could the three sales mountains and luckily that was actually the point I was navigating towards for the last nine days or so. So it was good to know I was [00:23:00] in the right place.

But I think when it first started to kind of open up, I couldn’t tell what it was. I think maybe my vision had got a bit weird, cause I hadn’t seen anything like nine days, but it just looked like these three big gray things like, and it was hard to tell like the distance, how far away they were from me.

And at first I thought it was like a massive plane, just like hovering in the sky. I think I was probably getting a bit crazy at the time, but as the cloud cleared more and more, I realized it was these three beautiful mountains. And that was such a relief to see. And then kind of on from there, I guess I quite quickly realized that.

There’s not really much in Antarctica is basically just like white, as far as you can see in every direction. After those mountains, there were another small range around about my halfway point. Then after that, there’s just nothing. So there’s literally such a lack of like visual stimulation. So there’s nothing to see apart from white.

Sensory stimulation. There’s nothing too to smell or taste [00:24:00] or experience down there. So you’re so yeah, sensory deprived on an, on an expedition in Antarctica, especially if you’re doing it solo. There’s also no one to talk to you. I was about to say, and then another, along with all that, you’re allaying with your own thoughts.

I mean that it was quite something. Yeah, it’s a weird experience. And I think the beginning was such a struggle for me. It was unbelievably hard. And then when the sun finally came out I started making slightly better decisions and that was the point that I decided to get a resupply. So at the halfway point, according to get 10 more days of food drop that.

Because of my time, I was about seven days behind schedule and I kind of worked out that I would have to do like 16 nautical miles a day for the next 35 days to get to the South pole with the food that I had. And I realized that that wasn’t the kind of expedition I wanted to run down there. I didn’t want to be like, I didn’t go there to break any kind of speed or time [00:25:00] records.

I went in there because I wanted to see and experience Antarctica. And if I was rushing like that, just to get this kind of record of being unsupported, I knew that. That totally. Wasn’t what I was there for. I didn’t want to risk injury. I wanted to go and enjoy it. So after I caught in this resupply, I relaxed a lot more into the expedition.

I knew I’d have plenty of food, plenty of fuel to get me to the end. And I could just totally do it within my own time, under my own steam. And that’s when things totally starting to improve. And with that, I think I found some sort of Headspace. Because I would literally ski for like an hour and a half stop for a 10 minute break ski for an hour and a half.

And during that kind of hour and a half, my main aim would literally be to lose my head. And one of my head just to disappear away from this like white world into memories or into future. Plans, future ambitions. And it was amazing how much my, my head and my brain kind of opened up when there was [00:26:00] no other stimulation around me there was one day where for about an hour or so, I kind of relived this like school sports day from when I was like seven years old.

And it was all these memories that I didn’t even know where my head. But I kind of remembered it in every state, tiny minute detail from like the morning in the classroom to like the egg and spoon race at the end of the day. Like I remembered every tiny detail and it was amazing to find out that those kind of memories busted in my head, even though I didn’t know there were, so I think, yeah, that lack of sensory stimulation and in anything down there did do some amazing things to, to accessing different parts of my brain and my memory.

I think you’ve just given me flashbacks to my seven-year-old sports day as well. I can spin rates as well. Yeah. The sort of 17 meter dash in the field, little, little Oak tree in the corner. Yeah. Good thing to think about when you’re scan along in Antarctica, I think. Yeah, because I, [00:27:00] when you see the solo expeditions, it’s I find it’s a very sort of therapeutic and sort of like a form of meditation you are because your day-to-day life is you get up and you are walking, you know, And that’s all you do.

And so you have a lot of time to think, unless you have like a podcast or some music in your ears. But you have so much time with your thoughts. And so you get these sort of flashbacks all the time.

Unbelievable amount of head space down there. And I think you kind of appreciate stuff a little bit more as well. Cause I remember one day like Antarctica is a really windy place. Like. Almost every day I was horrifically windy and there’s always like a headwind as well, coming at you, but through a a couple of days where the wind just died off completely.

And when it does that in Antarctica and when you were alone the silences. [00:28:00] Incredible. I don’t think there’s silence like that anywhere else in the world, probably. And I remember one day because you don’t really hear it until you stop because as you’re skiing along, your skis are scraping your, your kit is rustling your sleds making noise.

But I remember one day I was probably about five days from the pole. And I remember just stopping and sitting on my sled for a break. And there was zero wind whatsoever. It was reasonably warm because the sun was shining down on me. And I just sat on my sled. And every other day I’ve been so regimented with my 10 minute breaks.

But when this day I just kind of. Melted away into the silence and the silence was so deafening and so kind of all encompassing. And I was probably Sam, I said for like half an hour before I realized I should definitely start skiing towards the pole. So yeah, there was kind of amazing parts of Antarctica I think will stay with me for a long time.

And how, how, what was the finish? Like how did you feel when you finally got to the little bull at the South pole? Amazing. Yeah, so I, I [00:29:00] stopped the night before, about five miles from the South pole. For a few reasons, I w I didn’t want to, cause if I’d kept going that night, I would have had like a 18 month day and I could have done it, but I really wanted to arrive at the South pole fresh.

And to remember it because I’ve read so many stories and accounts of people that push really hard for the last bit. And then they don’t really remember getting to the Poland sort of big rush, but I was like, no, this is what I’d been skiing towards for the last. 58 days, you know, I’m going to enjoy this.

So I stopped just five miles before, has a nice, slight final night by myself, which was kind of some kind of therapeutic thing I think, to ending the expedition. And then the next morning I woke at really early, because I was pretty excited to, to get into the pole and see other people. So I skied the last kind of five nautical miles to about three hours or so really pleasant, ski.

I came into camp. It was really early in the morning because. I left really early. So I was at eight in the morning and I skied into camp and unfortunately everyone was still in bed. [00:30:00] Her skied in, you know, expecting some like fireworks or something, everyone was just sleeping, but I managed to wake them up and yeah, there were a few people I knew there.

Jenny was there another female skier code Anya from Germany. Who’s who’s amazing. So she just arrived the day before me. And then Devin, the account manager who would help with all my prep phase petition. So it was great to see them get my first kind of hugs in a couple of months. And then from the camp, I ski down to the little ball, the, the actual South pole.

And yeah, it was quite emotional, you know, cause you’ve focused on that point for so long in the trip and then you’ve finally done it and you’re there because I guess on my Everest, by the time you get to the top, there’s never that. Sense of achievement or anything cause you still got to get down the mountain again.

But when I finally got to South port, I knew that was it. Like I could take off my skis and maybe never put them on again. And that was okay. Yeah, no, it was, it was a nice feeling. God, what a story? Well, [00:31:00] that’s amazing. I must say it just, must’ve been such a, an amazing moment as well to sort of finish it.

Yeah, I’ve, I’ve sort of always, I’ve always wanted to go to Antarctica, so yeah. Oh, you should. It’s it’s incredible place like yeah, you could, it’s hard to describe because it’s so vast and. And white. Well, that’s kind of, it actually is vast and white. Yeah. I, it’s funny. You sort of, when you describe it, I, well, it must everyone listening must be just like why?

I mean, if it’s just a vast desert of whiteness, what would it, how does that appeal to you? But I don’t know. There’s, there’s some draw to Antarctica. I always find, and it unfortunately is becoming harder and harder, but no, it’s. It just sounds like an amazing place to go. It’s different to anywhere else.

Really just the scale of it. It kind of almost feels like you’re on a, another planet and maybe it’s partly due to like the 24 hour light or they’re just not being anyone there, but knowing that there’s no one around [00:32:00] you for such a long way, and there’s just nothing and you’re so independent and yeah, it’s amazing, amazing that you can survive and, and.

And work in those conditions and make things, make things happen and get to the pole. Yeah. It’s a cool place. You should go. Well, one day are we need to get out of this pandemic first? Well, Molly, there’s a part of the show where we ask the same five questions to each guest with the first beam on your trips, what is the one gadget or item that you always bring with you?

Good question. And probably have to say something like an iPod. And not even just my phone cause in Antarctica on my phone, but Spotify stops working after like 30 days without the internet. So it took a really old school iPod and filled it with all seven Harry Potter books and loads of [00:33:00] like nineties classics.

Got me through Antarctica. That is exactly the same story of my run across Katie. I went, I went, I went with Spotify, Spotify stopped working in Kenya and then because they don’t have a deal with them at the time. And then I had to listen to Harry Potter for the. Entire month. Where do you see how to it’s an honor.

Like when I run, I like to run to music, but then suddenly running into Harry Potter and listening to Stephen Fry as you’re running, sort of it’s very slow. And so you end up almost going to a walking pace, listening to him because you can’t really constant. Yeah. I know what you mean. Maybe that’s why it took me so long to get to the South pole.

It took me quite a long time as well. We can blame Stephen Fry then. Yeah. Good idea. What is your favorite adventure or travel book? Key question. The first, one of the first books I read about Everest [00:34:00] was from Steven . It was called higher than the Eagle soars. I think and an amazing book about his expedition on Mount Everest and getting to the top without oxygen and how much, like dig a snow hole close to the summit and spend a night there.

It was amazing to read about that story and really inspired me, I think, to get into the big mountains a bit. Oh, nice. What, why are adventures important to you? Good question. These are tricky. I think they’re an amazing way to grow and become more resilient and become the people you think you are like, you challenge yourself in the outdoors and yeah.

That’s the only really place I’ve ever grown and achieve things. So yeah, I think they’re important for everyone just to, to push yourself and work out who you, who you actually. Yeah. Yeah. I would, I would agree with that. What about your favorite quote? [00:35:00] Good question. Here’s one from Junco Tobago.

I always. You used to put in my, my talks when I do some school talks and it’s all about like willpower being the most important thing and like technique and ability or just things that you can kind of learn. But willpower is the one thing that’s gonna make you achieve things in life. And I think that’s totally true.

Like when I started with my idea to climb Everest, I didn’t have any other techniques or ability, but I had that one and that will, so if you can harness that willpower, you can learn how to do anything and you can really achieve anything. Hmm. Yeah. It quite from, from junkie, it’s a nice one. People listening are always keen to travel and go on these sort of grand adventures.

What’s the one thing you would recommend for people wanting to go out on an adventure? Just to take this first steps. Like I could say all sorts of things about trading and, you know, researching it all and doing it properly. But I think the [00:36:00] one thing is just committing to yourself that you’re going to do it.

And once you take that first step, and for me, it’s usually telling somebody else. Well, my time is in my head. And then after I’ve told them I’ve got to do it. So take that first step and then just put everything you possibly can behind it because we’re not on this planet for very long. So you want to go out and you want to see it.

You don’t want to end your life with regret this that you could have gone somewhere. You could have seen something. Cool. So yeah, take that first step and then wholeheartedly go for it because there was an amazing place. I always think the start is the most terrifying and exciting part, like planning these trips, but.

I think, I don’t know about you, but always the first, when you are there about to start, you’ve have all this moment of dread, but as soon as you take that first step, it sort of just washes over you. But before you’re like, Oh my God, all this fear and everything, but you, then you get into it and it’s a bit.

So much nicer. Yeah, absolutely. And the ball starts rolling and you kind of move along with it. Cause you’ve put all the kind of prep into it. Molly, how [00:37:00] can people find you and follow your adventures in the future? So social media or my website is just Molly Hughes, Molly with an I E here’s the credit UK and there’s loads of blogs and videos and all sorts in there.

Or on social media, I’m there as Molly J Hughes. So yeah, come in at the moment, come and see me sitting in my flat in Edinburgh, but in the future, hopefully, hopefully we’ll get a venture. And what, what is your plans for the future? It’s a good question. And I’m not really sure, like big expedition wise, it’s quite hard to plan it.

I think at the moment I’m hoping to do a lot more stuff kind of based out of Scotland. Lucky enough to actually like just recently in December become the new president of scout Scotland. So working a lot with young people and, and pushing for them to get more into the outdoors, to help with physical, mental health and everything.

So hopefully a lot more work with young people. And then hopefully some more big trips, [00:38:00] but we’ll, we’ll see when this pandemic finally finishes. Molly. Thank you so much for coming on today and telling your stories really, really something credible moments you’ve had along in the last three years.

Yeah, no, absolutely. Yeah, I feel very lucky to have seen and done what I’ve done. And yeah. Thank you for having me on the show. Well, that is it for today. Thank you so much for watching and I hope you got something out of it. Hit that like button, if you did, and subscribe, if you haven’t already, and I will see you in the next video.

EP.021: Charlie Young

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Charlie Young (Marine Biologist)

In this week’s podcast, we have Charlie Young, forced to grow up in a wetsuit and spent every weekend at the beach with her family exploring rock pools and hidden coves. She has a lust for adventure and diving. Charlie has spent the last 3 years travelling the world conducting research on human impacts in our oceans. In 2018, Charlie joined scientists, Nat Geo photographers and filmmakers on the Elysium Expedition to the heart of The Coral Triangle. A fascinating episode about the dangers of diving and how quickly it can go wrong.

 

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Transcript of our Conversation

Charlie Young

[00:00:00] Hello and welcome to the modern adventurer podcast coming up current was so, so strong that my goggles are going and my rags go and, and I just. Stop. I’m starting to feel that fear, you know, the visibility’s really dropped and it’s just felt like I was being hit by like 70 mile an hour winds.

On today’s show. We have Charlie young, also Nina’s ocean magpie. She is a Marine biologist and has traveled all over the world with hard benches and seen some of the most spectacular things. On today’s podcast. We talk about her diet and some of the amazing work that she is doing in conservation. I [00:01:00] am delighted to introduce Charlie young to the show.

Hi, thank you so much for having me. No worries. Well, great to have you on. And I came across you recently and I was really intrigued to find out, you know, some of the adventures that you’ve been doing with your work as a Marine biologist, which has taken you all over the world. I suppose probably the best place to start is with you and how you got into it all.

Yeah, so, well, I mean, my obsession with nature started like, I guess, many people that have sort of moved into this the same career path with just, you know, watching documentaries as a child, becoming obsessed with David Attenborough and then made the decision to go to university study conservation biology.

And it was really through that degree that I, I guess I decided that I wanted to pursue, you know, Marine science. And so I’ve been lucky enough ever since I’ve graduated over the last five, six years to just travel the world. Like you say, to so [00:02:00] many different places, I’ve been lucky enough to live and work in the red sea in Indonesia, um, in Australia and.

All of my work is really focused on assessing human impacts generations. That’s what I’m most passionate about is understanding how humans are sort of, you know, impacting and threatening biodiversity in operations. And so, yeah, I, I specialized in Marine science during my master’s degree at Glasgow university.

Um, and then yeah, have just used it to take me all over the world and go on amazing adventures and tell impactful stories about wildlife. Amazing. And so w was this, um, at the young age, did you have access to the ocean and were able to explore last? I was practically made to grow up in a wet seat. So I’m from Pembroke show and, um, it’s a beautiful part of Wales.

I mean, you know, I lived right next to the sea, used to spend every given moment in it [00:03:00] and. My family has got a long history and a long connection with it, but yeah, my dad would have us in wet seats every weekend. We’d go camping in a beautiful place called St. David’s and go to a wonderful spot. That’s now become extremely popular called the blue lagoon and go jumping off of the cliffs there together.

So yeah, I was very much just thrown in the deep end as a child and made to fall in love with the Asian and. My dad was also a B’s Zack instructor. So I remember going to the pool as a child and, you know, seeing everyone in there, dive in KET and sort of swimming around them. So I was exposed to it from a very, very young age.

Amazing. And so your, your adventures over the past few years to taking you all over the world from Indonesia to Australia, um, what sort of, um, trips have you been doing with your studies? So my first big expedition was to Indonesia and that was back in gosh, 2017. Now I [00:04:00] can’t believe it. Time. Just absolutely flies.

And I was lead scientist on an expedition to the coral triangle, and I was there to assess plastic pollution in coral reef habitats. Mainly on the surface. So I traveled there with a group of videographers and photographers from around the world and we started our journey in the molecule islands. And so getting there was a logistical nightmare, given the amount of people that were going on this trip, we were going to be three boats.

I had all my science carrots. We had people with just. Six bags of, you know, camera kit. Um, and so the logistics of getting there was, was pretty crazy. Um, but then when we arrived, we all got on the boat and spent 16 days traveling from Maluku. She wrapped around pats, which is the, you know, the Marine biodiversity hotspot of the worlds, the coral triangle is just absolutely credible and say, that was an incredible, incredible journey.

I mean, I saw. Some things that I’ve never seen before. You know, [00:05:00] I got to see scalloped hammerhead sharks. I got to see mantas. Um, and I really can’t quite describe just how incredible the briefs are. There. They’re just like any, like nothing else in the world. You know, if you want to go and see reefs in all their majesty, that is where you go.

Amazing. And so with that sort of expedition, while you with that big group, I mean, you must have seen some incredible things. Um, and in terms of the sort of studies that you were doing with microplastics did, um, what did you sort of uncover. Essentially that this area, which is normally thought of an incredibly pristine place is impacted by plastic pollution.

You know, what we found is that closer to the sort of built up areas. So when we were in on bond, which is where we started our journey, there was, you know, lots of people living there. We found bigger bits of plastics. Bottles and plastic bags, [00:06:00] but generally yes, as we got further away from land, all of the plastic became a lot smaller, but it was still there.

And I think that’s the really important point. Um, although the important message that came from the trip is that even though, you know, the type of plastic might change, even when you’re so far from land there’s plastic. And, you know, as, as research is now showing that’s plastic on Everest, there’s plastic in the poles, you know, it’s just.

Ubiquitously spread. Um, and I also found a very, very poignant piece of plastic actually, which was a sticker that said made in the USA. And this just really supports the idea that plastic pollutions, this global problem. And just because some things entered the ocean in one place doesn’t mean that it stays there.

You know, our oceans are connected and plastic moves around. And so it’s a global issue and we all have that responsibility to sort of manage it, you know? In our countries to ensure that it isn’t going to go one to two impact areas, other places around the world. And so with that sort of trip, [00:07:00] you must have had some pretty, I mean, I’ve done, um, deep, deep sea Dutton or deep sea diving.

Um, yeah.

Um, and I mean, I, I absolutely love it and I, you know, I, I did mine in Columbia, which was just incredible. We were on this sort of Island. But there must’ve been some sort of hairy moments along the way, because you do this for a living. I mean, I get it on a sort of one-off. Yes. So, you know, the nature of diving anyway is it’s a dangerous sport.

Things can go wrong when conditions are completely perfect, but Indonesia is a notorious place for currents and Roger and pats. You know, people go there because of this, because of these currents, you have such a rich biodiversity on these reefs, but it’s. Can be extremely dangerous. And I had one, I I’d say it was, it felt very much like life and death situation.

One of those situations where, you know, if you did the wrong thing, you could quite [00:08:00] easily get yourself into, you know, die or get yourself into big trouble. So we were on a routine dive. We were going along a reef wall and. Every time before we got on the board. So there would always be somebody that would go and do a quick recky and make sure that you know, where they’d go in, assess the current.

And we’d been told that the current was mild. So all of our teams get in and people are going in to do the choral transects and the fish transects. And as I got in, I hadn’t moved that far along this refall and then the current just hit and it was as if I had just been placed on an elevator and just being whisked away.

And all I could see is. My dive leader, sort of just disappearing. And fortunately, I guess three of us were close enough that we got kind of got swept away together. But at this point we were still quite deep and we had had to make a decision about what we do, you know, naturally in this situation, you kind of want to try and let somebody know at the [00:09:00] surface where you are because you’re, you’re being moved away from where you’re supposed to be at quite a drastic rate, which can be extremely dangerous in this situation.

She can get lost at sea. And unfortunately, we didn’t actually have, um, a long enough line for our DSMB, which is delayed surface marker boys. So we call them safety sausages, essentially this big sausage that you, you fill with air, it floats to the surface. And it’s basically this beacon to anybody on the surface saying, this is where I am divers are here, but we only had five meters and we were at 15 meters and we’re being swept.

And so. In, just, you know, in that moment we were like, right, we have to grab onto the reef. Neither of us, none of us had any reef hooks. So we’re just grabbed on said the nearest coral that we could find. I would never, ever, ever tell anyone to touch coral in any other situation, never touch it, but we just grabbed on and the current was so, so strong that my goggles are going

[00:10:00] Stop them starting to feel that fear, you know, the visibility’s really dropped and it’s just felt like I was being hit by like 70 mile an hour winds. And it felt like the longest 10 minutes of my life waiting, we were like waiting hopefully to, to re reconnect with our dive leader. And my air’s is going down.

And then I’ve got to about 50 bars and that’s the point at which you should be on the surface? You know, you shouldn’t really be surfacing with any lesser than that. And then just as I thought we were, we were going to have to just let go of the reef and be swept away and tried to get up to five meters and put up our surface market boy there, my dive leader repaired and, um, he thankfully had a, uh, long enough.

Um, Strang. And so he grabbed us, we all huddled together, let go of the reef and he sausage went flying up and in an instant, the reef was gone and that was, yeah, absolutely terrifying. And, um, we did actually lose temporarily two people for an hour and they got swept a kilometer [00:11:00] down the reef, and that’s just how crazy things can change in a split second when you’re diving.

Um, and you, you have to meet really. Quick and kind of like logical decisions. Cause it can, it can be really a dangerous situation. Good. And so, uh, probably before we, uh, put everyone off diving, um,

let’s talk about some of the amazing moments because you’re in one of the most diverse reefs on the planet. What, what did you see. So, I mean, one of, probably the most breathtaking moments was seeing my first scallop head, how much, uh, hammerhead sharks, just absolutely incredible, you know, not just one 18 of them were going along, you know, looking around at the reef and then just here, that characteristic thing, thing, thing, thing, thing, thing, And that’s someone sort of tapping on their tank to tell you, [00:12:00] look out to the big blue and just looked.

And there was these sharks just gliding towards us. And naturally, I don’t know why, but I just wanted to swim towards them. So we just all kind of turned to just started swimming and there’s something speak to them. And they were gone in an instant and. That was, I think, amazing to see just how quickly they can move, you know, just can just disappear, um, as quick as they sort of appear, but just breathtaking to see such incredible creatures like that.

And I also had another beautiful moment where we were doing choral transects. And again, I heard the ding, ding, ding, ding there, and looked, and a two mantas were swimming directly towards me. And I had my camera and I forgot to press record because I was just so taken in by this moment. And Samantha came right up and did this borrower role.

Right in front of me, I could have, if I wanted to touch it, but of course never touch wildlife. Um, and just, yeah, can’t [00:13:00] quite put into words just how incredible. That was never as having never seen one before they are ginormous creatures, but they’re just gentle giants. Um, and it’s just the most magical experience seeing creatures like that in the water.

I think, um, there seems to be a sort of misconception about shock, where people are terrified that they will attack you. Um, but they didn’t, uh, well, they, they rarely do very rarely. Um, I remember someone saying. There were these two people about to gay diving and they were sort of speaking to the instructor, telling him, you know, what about the shark?

And he was like, well, statistically, more people die from coconuts falling on their head. So you should probably wear a helmet as you walked through the Palm trees. It’s so true. They’re completely misunderstood. I mean, Definitely when you get in the water with a Marine predator, with any predator, you get [00:14:00] complacent, any predator, you do need to respect that they are predators after all, but sharks are not out there to get you.

If anything, they’re just very, very interested in you. Um, and I had a wonderful experience. That actually getting in the water snorkeling with, uh, blue sharks this summer in the UK. And, you know, these sharks were coming right up to us and of course they don’t have any hands to work out what you are, their nose is their kind of their sensory organ to sort of work out and bumping is quite a normal thing to sort of ascertain what you are.

And, um, so yeah, it’s, they’re, they’re hugely misunderstood. And I think, um, the media does a brilliant job of trying to hype them up as these monitors, but they’re not. Yeah. Um, and so where else is the sort of Marine adventures taking you? So, um, it took me out to the red sea where I’d lived for a year in Saudi Arabia.

Um, and whilst I was living out there, I had the opportunity to go on a number of scientific cruises. And, um, that was [00:15:00] incredible, you know, just. Again, beautiful reefs, um, being at sea, just in, you know, the red sea is a, quite a calm sea in comparison to other areas. And so we’re quite often just beyond glassy, just glassy waters diving in like 28 degree water.

Sometimes even more, just like having a bath with lots of beautiful fish swimming around you. Absolutely incredible. But, um, More recently, I’ve been going on quite a lots of adventures, um, here in the UK. So as we’ve all been stuck, stuck at home, um, during everything that’s been happening with this global pandemic, I think a lot of us have had to refocus, um, you know, our kind of adventures at home.

And it’s been such a brilliant year of discovery from me because. I’ve been a culprit of dreaming of distant shores. Adventure is always entailed going abroad and going off to tropical locations. But actually what I’ve found is that you can have some amazing adventures right on your doorstep. Um, and so, yeah, [00:16:00] it’s been wonderful and I’ve gone off on a couple of really, really cool adventures, um, between lockdowns.

But of course, right now, marooned at home, I saw that you were sort of getting into wild swimming in the UK. Yes. Yes. I’ve been doing a lot of wild swimming and I’ve been actually getting in over winter, which is an incredible experience, uh, much different from getting in, in summer. That’s for sure. Yeah.

I’m not the best in cold water, but I do try and force myself into it. I mean, just as long as you’re doing that safely and not just, you know, throwing yourself in the water and shocking your body, because that can be pretty dangerous. But yeah, it’s, it’s brought me so much escape during this pandemic. Um, it’s been a wonderful way to sort of stay connected with nature, do something good for myself and for my mental health.

Um, And yeah, I have an excuse to get outside. Yeah, no, exactly. And so your plan, [00:17:00] um, after lockdown is to travel the UK. And Shay the best bits of it. Yeah. So, um, as I mentioned, you know, I’ve been going on a lot of adventures here on, on my home soil. So actually last year before, literally right before the pandemic hit, I was about to embark on a journey around the UK and my.

Idea behind it was to circumnavigate the UK under my own steam. It was meant to be, you know, carbon neutral or, you know, trip. And I wanted to raise awareness for Marine wildlife here in the UK and really showcase what we’ve got. Because like I said, I’ve dreamt of distant shores all my life, but actually I think if we want to make the biggest difference in our world, we need to be, you know, Aware of what’s around us, aware of what’s on our doorstep and need to fall in love with it to really sort of help protect it here is where we can make the biggest impact.

So unfortunately, COVID hit and I couldn’t go on that adventure and I still not been able to go on that adventure, [00:18:00] but I got to about July and just decided that. You know, there’s no, no light at the end of the tunnel for this. So why don’t I just go off and do these adventures? So I launched my salt water Britain series on YouTube, which is all about me going off on adventures to experience the, you know, the best Marine wildlife experiences out there, here in the UK.

Um, and so I went and swam with. Blue sharks. I went and, uh, Snell cored with basking sharks. I went and found auteurs on the Island mole, and it also went and dived with CEO’s in the foreign islands. Um, so yeah, for incredible adventures and it’s been such a hit people have absolutely loved the series. And that’s definitely part of the plan for this year is to continue that series on YouTube.

I see. Where whereabouts are you planning on going? All over. So at the moment, I’m looking at going to Anglesea to do some diving around there. Um, I’m also looking at going down to Cornwall and doing, doing a week down there, but I’m also going to [00:19:00] be doing quite a lot of diving in Pembrokeshire. So all over basically, um, I’m going to be leading an expedition around Pembroke Shira.

End of may, beginning of June on a sailing boat called Merlin, um, as part of, uh, so there’s an organization called sell Britain that take people out on expeditions around the British Isles and, uh, we’re going to be going and visiting Skomer Island and lots of different, you know, biodiversity hotspots down there in Pembrokeshire and hopefully go and see things like spider crab aggregations, um, and.

Go and see seagrass the new sea grass restoration that’s been happening down there. So yeah, it’s probably not necessarily going to be going in search of the big charismatic species. It’s going to be more about really showcasing the variety of ocean adventure that you can have, and even really singing about the smaller animals and the less, the less sexy species, because they’re equally as amazing being a Marine biologist has been.

Pretty [00:20:00] difficult working from home. I mean, can a Marine biologist work from home? Absolutely. I think there’s this huge misconception that to be a Marine. Well, I think we’d all love to spend a lot of time outside, but actually there’s this misconception that. In a Marine biologist is spend all their time diving, but really there’s, there’s lots of different data that we can get our hands on, that we don’t ever have to leave our offices, um, to attain.

So there’s, you know, for example, the research that I’ve been doing has been a big analysis of all of the published data on plastic in Marine sediments globally. So what we’re trying to answer is where is plastic going in operations? What is the ultimate sink of plastic pollution? Because we know that. A huge amount of plastic is entering orations.

There’s only a certain amount that can be accounted for floating. And so we want to work out where it’s going, and this obviously has implications for our understanding of like how we manage habitats. Is it being ingested? And so that’s. Essentially meant I’ve never had to [00:21:00] leave home. All I’ve had to do is just go online, collect all of the data from these papers and then do an analysis.

And this is of course, you know, research in the Mo the Marine science sphere. Um, and so, yeah, you don’t, you don’t have to leave home at all. And I suppose for people who are listening to this who are interested in Marine biology, what do they need? Well, there’s lots of different avenues into Marine biology.

I would argue though that now it has become a prerequisite to have a degree it’s, but like me, it’s not a necessity to necessarily go and do Marine biology. You can do a different kind of degree. Like me. I did conservation biology where you. You know, learn about lots of different habitats and methods for conserving biodiversity, but then you can go on to specialize after that.

And then that’s what I did for my masters. But if you want to be an academic, if you want to do research, definitely getting a degree is the way forward. But then, you know, there’s lots of different branches of Marine [00:22:00] biology. There’s lots of people that work in conservation. So some people, you know, end up.

Working for organizations or NGOs by just simply having a passion and getting in, in the door with, you know, rescue centers or all various different projects and sort of learn the skills on the ground. So, yeah. Really there’s no set recipe for getting into, into it. And like I said, there’s lots of different areas.

Like if you want to be an educator, for example, you don’t have to go and get a Marine biology degree. You can, you could simply, if you wanted to do Marine science communication, I know a lot of people that have got lit literary degrees, so they’ve done English literature at university, but have that passion for the ocean and have then moved in into communications.

So yeah, it’s it’s, you can, you can get into lots of different ways, but. I think the most important thing is just perseverance and passion. Okay. There we go. Um, and so with the conservation that you [00:23:00] do, are you hopeful about the future or are you slightly pessimistic? I think if I didn’t remain slightly hopeful, then I probably wouldn’t be able to keep doing what I’m doing.

I am hopeful because every day I do see people doing wonderful things. And, you know, for example, in Texas, there’s been loads of turtles that have washed up, uh, because temperatures have dropped so low that they’ve basically, you know, These turtles have just been rendered and mobile, but the local community has come together and just, you know, saved over 2,500 turtles.

And I see moments like that, where I’m like, look, if people just, if people kind of made this effort every day and you know, if when we come together for wildlife, we really can make such a huge difference and say, I remain hopeful because there are so many people out there that are doing so many great things.

And I feel like we are armed with the tools and the ability to, to connect [00:24:00] and communicate more than we ever have in our own history. And so we have everything that we need to make a difference. Um, we just need to have the will to do it. And that’s what I really hope to see in the next decade. People sort of really realizing their own value and that we need everyone.

We don’t need just Marine biologists. So people with science backgrounds, we need lawyers, we need engineers. You know, we need school teachers. We need everyone behind it. Yeah. I think when we had Lizzy daily on the show, um, we were speaking about the sort of coexistence between wildlife and humans and, you know, um, it’s a very sort of challenging time.

Because of the, um, you know, growing population. But I think, I think when there’s a will, there’s a way. Absolutely. And she’ll, you know, there are so many horrific stories out there we’re losing [00:25:00] biodiversity and astronomical rate. You know, the climate emergency is real and it’s progressing and we have a very finite time to make it, you know, make the changes that we need to really save our world as it is.

But I just I’m hopeful that hopefully people will really start to wake up. And as you say, where there’s a will, there’s a way, yeah. Well, Charlie, there’s a part of the show where we ask the same five questions to each guest each week. Um, with the first being on your trips, what’s the one gadget that you always take with you?

Camera. Absolutely take my camera everywhere. I mean, that’s my passion through and through is telling the story of my work and. The whole idea behind everything I do is, is going off on these adventures to showcase the wildlife with a purpose, to inspire people. And if I can’t capture it on film, then you know, I can’t take it back to [00:26:00] people and say, absolutely camera comes everywhere with me.

Yeah. I think I’m pretty much the same as well. Yeah, it’s a necessity. What camera do you use? So I pretty much rock on a GoPro. It is the most useful and easiest saying like you see people with these really expensive underwater setups, but I think people are quite jealous of me when I literally just without my GoPro or just in the water.

And that’s it, it’s just simple and I’m, the results are fantastic, but I would like to get more expensive kit in the future, but for now we’ll go pro does me just fine. Amazing. Uh, what is your favorite adventure or travel book? So I might be slightly cliche, but I absolutely love David Attenborough’s adventures of a young naturalist.

I read that in the last couple of years and it just resonated with me so much because he actually visited places that I’ve since gone on to visit and hearing his stories. And then kind of comparing that with the experience [00:27:00] that I had was just amazing. And, you know, he really is the inspiration behind why I got into what I’m doing.

And his accounts are just so raw and I have so much respect for how they manage to do anything that they did. And almost like the blind trust that they had in situations that now would terrify me. For example, there’s a beautiful part where he gets on a rickety wooden boat and travels. Between Java and Bali, and they find out halfway that the captain’s never done this before.

He has no idea what he’s doing. And they’re just on this boat in like in the sea, not knowing where they’re going, hoping that they’re going to find their way. And David thinks it’s a great idea. He’ll just tie a bit of rope onto him and just jump in and takes a look at all the coral reefs that skirt, you know, that they’re passing over.

Just, it fills me with just so much inspiration and I, I think I’m. In order of, you know, everything that he’s done, but also it’s like a time capsule. It’s a [00:28:00] world that I probably never get to see because of course we’ve lost so much. Um, and so it, it, yeah, it transports me back to a time when we had a lot more wild and I guess it, it makes me hopeful that one day we might have a wild Lake it again.

And, um, why are adventures important to you? Adventures are important to me because they. They provide me with an opportunity to sort of like break out of the ordinary and experience the extraordinary that’s kind of how I want to live. My life is I don’t want an ordinary life. I want an extraordinary life and I feel like it expands and broadens your mind.

Like every time I go away and learn something new, I experience something different and it completely gives you an entirely new and organic perspective on the world. And I think it makes you. Just think differently. Um, yeah, it’s just a beautiful thing. I think having lived and worked around the world and seeing the, you know, [00:29:00] everyone around the world, no matter if culture divides us, everyone’s a mother, father, sister, brother, you know, everyone laughs everyone, you know, has their quirks, their hobbies.

And it’s just, I think a beautiful thing event shake. You’ve see the opportunity to, to sort of learn about your place in the world. Yeah, sorry. I, um, no, I th I think you’re right there. I think, um, You know, emotions and are universal. I studied sort of psychology and we looked at sort of, even a blind person when he wins the a hundred meter race, we’ll put his arms up, like a person who’s won.

He’s already won the race in a hundred meters. He’s not blind. It’s sort of that these universal things that people, you know, whether you’re. From Saudi Arabia or the UK, they’re all the same. They bind us. Yeah. It binds us. Um, well that first part was a pretty good quote. I thought say this probably leads quite nicely onto the next [00:30:00] part, which is what is your favorite quote?

I mean, I don’t even know if that’s, that’s a quote. I feel like I’ve just kind of made it up for myself, but my favorite, one of my favorite quotes. This is from one of my favorite books, the Alchemist, and it’s wherever your heart is there, you will find your treasure. And I’m a true believer that if you are following your dreams or sort of, you know, doing what you love, that the world would transpire to sort of make things happen for you.

And. I couldn’t do anything else other than what I’m passionate about or what I love, you know, I think time is the most valuable thing that you have in your world and, you know, you need to use it wisely. And I really do believe that if you follow your heart, you will, you’ll find that treasure in your life.

Yeah, I, uh, I agree, although the, uh, extraordinary, uh, the ordinary to the extraordinary I thought was very good as well. So you could probably clean it. You could probably clean those yourself quite with the, uh, [00:31:00] Is your name under and go. I said this by the way, that’s how it works. Right. You just tell people that’s what you’ve said.

And then I, I think, and then people just share it online and then you’re like, perfect, brilliant. There we go. People listening are always keen to travel. What’s the one thing you would recommend them to get started? Is make a list and then take that first leap. I swear that it’s the hardest part of trying to plan an adventure.

I think quite often we live in our heads and until you actually get those ideas down on paper, they quite often don’t come alive and. You need to set time aside to just completely immerse yourself in thinking about what you want to go and do. And then once you’ve got this list and you’ve decided on something book that ticket or, you know, book that flight, and that will be the biggest hurdle.

And once you’ve committed to that, the rest comes. Um, but it’s just about taking that first step and taking that [00:32:00] plunge. Very good. Um, what are you doing now? And how can people follow you in the future? So, um, I am all over socials so everybody can follow along on my adventures on Instagram. My handle is magpie.

Um, and likewise, I’m now dabbling in YouTube and going to be really pushing all of my adventures on there. So I’m going to be going out and creating lots of adventure content, say, go and check me out on YouTube. Um, and please tune in and watch the salt water Britain adventures, and hopefully will inspire anyone here in the UK to go off and explore what’s on their doorstep.

Amazing. Um, why ocean magpie? Yeah, well it’s because one loved ideation, but my dad would call me his little magpie. Um, and it’s, I guess a kind of way, you know, I go off and search for awesome, shiny things in the ocean. I mean, not just shiny things, but I guess yeah. As I have a bit of a, [00:33:00] I guess, a magpie spirit that loves the Asian.

Oh, that’s really nice. Um, well Charlie, thank you so much for coming on today. Absolutely loves hearing your stories and, um, yeah. I look forward to seeing your YouTube channel and grow and the adventures that you get up to and salt, water breath. Thank you so much. And, uh, for anyone else, go check her out on YouTube and Instagram.

Enjoy. Thank you so much. Take care. 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 video.

EP.020: Katie L’Herpiniere

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katie l’herpiniere (EXPLORER)

On the Podcast this week, we have Katie, an adventurer and former model. It started as a chat-up line and turned into a life-changing trek along the great wall of China. This adventure sparked her adventurous spirit and led her to another record-breaking adventure across the Patagonian Ice Cap, which proved a near-death experience. She sat down with me on the Podcast to share her journey from model to adventurer.

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Transcript of our Conversation

Katie-Jane L’Herpiniere

[00:00:00] Katie-Jane L’Herpiniere: Hello, and welcome to another episode of the modern adventure podcast. Coming up on this episode, like a hundred K wins. It was no visibility were roped together. I, I didn’t see talker usually, unless it was a break, I would just see a rope heading into white and it was just a white box around me. I didn’t know if I was getting up down left.

Right. You felt sick all the time. No one could hear you cry, which was a bonus. Got a lot of that. But yeah, so it was really alien being in this white world when he’d fall down a crevasse. Cause he was usually in the front. I would just feel the rope, pull me to the floor and I’d just, faceplant the floor.

And then I know it’s for me to now get him out of the chorus. That was how you knew one was coming. Quite often we’d lay in a tent and hear the avalanche coming down and just look at each other and. Hope it’s not taken us out.

[00:01:00] my next guest is an adventurer, a former model. From her life-changing Trek along the great wall of China to her record-breaking adventure, across the path of Ghanian ice cap. She sat down with me on the podcast to share her journey from model to adventurer. I am delighted tinge. Jeez, Katie to the show.

Hi, thank you very much for having me. Katie great to have you on and thank you so much. I suppose your, I came across you back in 2014, and what I loved about your story was how you first got started in adventure. I suppose, for people listening, probably the best place to start is with you and about you.

Well yeah, absolutely. So my entrance into the world of adventure probably is quite different to most. It wasn’t something I kind of grew up with. It wasn’t something I even desired to do. I didn’t [00:02:00] have, you know, grand hopes growing up of seeing far from places or anything like that. I, I was outdoorsy.

I come from a horse riding background, so I was an event rider for many years of my youth. And you know, we did family walks and things like that, but definitely not. I wouldn’t call it adventurous. There’s no adventure. Yeah. A lineage in my family of any description. But then after I let you left university, I I was actually working as a model.

So again, probably as far removed from the world of adventure, as you can get, it was all over stilettos of makeup and not eating a lot. And then, and then I met a man. And he, his chat line was, did I want to walk to the North pole with him, which wasn’t one I’d heard before? So it was quite interesting.

Obviously I said, no you know, why, why now I want to walk to North pole. How on earth could I walk to the North pole? I was kind of definitely a girl of acrylic nails and things like that. But yeah, this guy [00:03:00] who was actually kind of polar Explorer, a Mountaineer kind of real, real rugged adventurer After a few days, weeks, months we got on, we became a couple and he still kept kind of going on about this North pole trick.

And eventually he, he just convinced me that that I was somehow capable. And in fact that we were all capable, that the human body is incredible. And to not. You know not play down how much it can do. And so I agreed with him that I would walk to the North pole with him under the condition that perhaps I had a go at something a little easier to kind of dip my toe in the water of this world of adventure.

That was completely new to me. And he agreed to that. And so, so yeah, so I. I th I had this bucket list, I suppose if someone said where in the workplaces in the world, did you want to travel? I had this bucket list, like many people do and. I expect the things on it were probably the same as many [00:04:00] people.

And one of them on there was to, to visit the great wall of China. I knew nothing of it other than it was some wonder of the world. And therefore it kind of just came onto this list. So completely naively stupidly off kind of off the cuff said, well, why don’t we walk the great wall of China?

That could be my, kind of have a go at this adventure world. And the moment I’d said it, he grabbed it, ran with it. And six months later, We heading off to walk the great wall of China, which I didn’t know when I suggested it, but we were going to be the first people to walk the entire length of it from the most westerly Terminus to the most easterly Terminus.

It was four and a half thousand kilometers. It was six months long. I went from plus. 35 degrees to minus 35 degrees. Yeah, it was hell of an ordeal. And I could have walked to the North pole five times and back in the direction I walked along the wall. So a bit of an error on my behalf, [00:05:00] but yeah, that, that’s how I got into adventure.

Wow. And I suppose with those sort of drastic temperatures, what what do you wear in terms of, or take with you on a sort of trip like that? So for China I, well, I had no experience whatsoever. So taco my partner, who I was doing it with had a lot of experience of mountaineering and polar trips.

So I just went with whatever he told me, but because of his kind of polar trip experience we actually wore I kind of sell a pattern smock outfit that you would wear in the Arctic. So designed for kind of temperatures of minus 40 that he actually he actually made mine. I was still very much stuck in a girly girly world and I wanted it to be pink.

And the only ones that were on the market that you could buy for PODER trips were like black or Navy blue. And. Yeah. Oh [00:06:00] God. It’s, it’s laughable and how to get around it. But yeah, I didn’t want to spend the next six months of my life in the one outfit I was going to have in, in black. So he bought all the fabrics and copied the design of the one he bought for himself and yeah, he made it in a bright future pink from head to toe.

And that that’s obviously layering underneath, had kind of Marie Reno, wool base layers and some mid layers kind of fleece mid layers, but yeah, it’s it’s a kind of fleece lined smock jacket and seller pets. And that is all I had for six months. One set of clothes for six months. Yeah.

And I suppose, I suppose, game taking six months of this ordeal as you call it how difficult was it to walk the great wall of China?

At the time for me, hellishly difficult, hellishly difficult. I cried every [00:07:00] single day of the journey. I can’t. Think back of a day where I didn’t cry at least once. But don’t get me wrong. It was still the best thing I’ve ever done in my life. It changed my life completely. I, I have nothing but wonderful memories, but if I strip that back and really boil down to it, yeah, it was, it was really tough.

I was carrying 35 kilos. On my back and my pack, which for somebody who was working as a model, you know, traipsing up and down, the cut was not coming from athletic kind of athlete background. That was, that was pretty hard going on my body. I, my knees, my back, everything suffered greatly. I.

I think day six, I was in hospital. So I was doing well. It’s definitely cut out for this adventure world. Yeah, day six side. So started in the Gobi desert in kind of plus 40 degree heat. Middle of nowhere. There is basically a rock that they [00:08:00] say was once the start of the great wall of China.

But if you arrive to it, it really is just a rock, completely surrounded by flats, desert salmons. But the guy book said, so off we headed and he got a taxi out to the starting point and Most people who would go there will either be Chinese, but be they’d go in the taxi. They’d get out, they’d stand with this big block behind them.

They’d have their picture taken and they’d get back in the taxi and head home. So, you know, you couldn’t really speak any Chinese. So we’d got out the taxi and start doing our kit and the taxi mounds waiting for us to kind of get back in the taxi. We’re like, no, no, no. Go go. You leave us with we’re heading off across the, across the country and, and he wouldn’t leave us.

And then other people gathered and then no one would leave us. And that was just to be left alone, to start was a hellish deal in its own own. Right. It took hours, but eventually they kind of all got in their taxis and headed away. I’m sure they were muttering that, Oh, they’re going to die. They’re going to die.

And I’m trying fighting back the tears because. All I want to do is get [00:09:00] back in that taxi and head back with them. But I was trying to be strong. I’m like, no, I’m an adventurer here. I am at the start. I can do this. And yeah, and obviously trying to hype back the tears, but as soon as the taxis left, the tears started and I headed off into the unknown and yeah, there wasn’t really any water for much of the first month.

So when we did find water you know, we tried to filter it and things like that, but somewhere along the line in these first few days, I got. Contaminated water and got gastroenteritis incredibly badly to the point that when talker left me to go and get help, I was unconscious. And he just had to make a makeshift shelter for me and head off, back into the deserts to try and find some form of help, which came in a bus, which he kind of stood in front, off on this dirt road, which could have got around him, but he was waving his arms frantically and Yeah, he got in there again, couldn’t speak the language, try [00:10:00] to try and basically sign language to explain that they needed to drive through the desert, through the sands to find me eventually they did.

And then it was like military fashion. I am, the, everything was whipped up, put in the, put in the coach and. Off. We went to the nearest hospital where I spent three days on a drip. My mum, obviously back in England at this point is also having a nervous breakdown thinking my little girl should come home.

Yeah, that’s just the first week. So it was, it was hard. I went off and we often went maybe three days without food. Food came and went in. It was all or nothing. A lot of the food didn’t agree with me, so I was ill a lot of the time. It was all very, very spicy. And my stomach lining. Yeah, I struggled with that.

It also got very cold to kind of minus 35 for at least three or four months of the journey. So battling with the cold, you know, going into the freezer to get out the peace was my, it was my experience of cold beforehand. So that was, you know, [00:11:00] it’s a whole learning curve. I had compression of the spine, so was in hospital again with that later on in the trip.

And basically they, the doctors said that my, my journey was over, but I. We’ve come so far. I didn’t want it to be over. So we actually sent back most of our kits, so I could carry with it, walk with a much lighter pack rather than the 35 kilos. And and then just took the amazing hospitality of the Chinese people.

We relied on that from then on, because we took, we sent our tent back and everything can just step slept in people’s houses and stuff like that, that they were incredible people. So, yeah, I mean, every day, something new, new came about the wall isn’t just. On the map. So most of the time there is no wall at all.

I think I only saw a wall for maybe 20% of the journey and maybe only 1% of the journey as the wall that you’ve got in your mind, the stone structure with all the steps that’s as a tiny bit. So. Yeah. Wow. Wow. What a way to [00:12:00] start your experience with venturing. Can I wait? That’s what I should have gone with.

I mean, for the great wall of China to sort of say that that was the more relaxed version of the North pole or the more chilled out adventure to start with, you must have really felt. Yeah, I’m, I’m under no illusion that the North pole wouldn’t have necessarily been easier, but it would have been one set, one environment, one kind of set of.

Day-to-day issues to deal with is where China, every day, every corner, every term was something completely unexpected. So for me as a person, I was just having to change and adapt and overcome by the hour. Like it’s just so much to take on. That’s where I think the North pole would have been much more, a suffer Fest, head down, suffer Fest deal with the cold look after yourself, you know, frostbite, that kind of thing.

But for shorter period of time that’s where China was. [00:13:00] Yeah, it was quite full on, but now don’t get me wrong. Like now, if I was to do it again, I probably wouldn’t feel it to be quite so hard because I’m a lot more experienced. I think it was just a hell of a first step, but it wasn’t doable. It was doable, quite, quite a drastic step from walking down the catwalks, just suddenly walking along the great wall of China.

Exactly. Exactly. And so in terms of, I mean, especially after the first week, when you had sort of gone into hospital, what sort of motivated you to sort of keep going? Because I w I would have said a lot of people after a week of sort of jumping into this would have said, right. Undone that’s, that’s nothing for me.

I’ve tried a failed. That’s the end of it. I hated it. Yeah. Well, that’s quite interesting. Cause my, I definitely think my motivations of what keeps me moving forward in difficult trips has drastically changed over the years. So what motivated me then in [00:14:00] China is very different to now, but in China it was.

Rightly or wrongly. It was very much to prove people wrong. So I my wonderful friends and family back home, like kind of pretty much have a sweepstake on me. And this was for days, this wasn’t for weeks, you know? No one believed for a minute. I could do this. I’m I’m not gonna lie. I was pretty, I’ve been very lucky.

Fortunate growing up a bit of a daddy’s girl, you know, I don’t know. I hadn’t really been put through the ringer, so I don’t think anyone expected much of me, but I made sure that that fueled me basically. Once I’d said I was going to do this and I could see on everyone’s faces, they were like, she hasn’t got a hope in hell.

That was my motivation. And then on top of that, I also was raising money for the Make-A-Wish foundation which is Wonderful. Children’s charity. And so whenever you were feeling really low, which was most of the [00:15:00] time, but whenever I could get to a computer and check the blog and things like that, and you were, it was before kind of social media.

So we just had an old fashioned blog and, you know, we post Navy wants. Every three weeks or month and then get some comments. And those comments were just filled with just incredible encouragement from the families of the Make-A-Wish foundation and things like that. And I’m like, Oh crikey, what am I problems there?

Nothing. And it just put everything back into perspective. You know, I chose to be here. It was my idea. And so, you know, I had to remind myself that of a lot. So they would definitely, I would say I was, it was very. The motivation came very externally for that first trip. And I don’t think it matters.

What does drive you? There is no right or wrong. Just know what those reasons are and use them to your advantage, find out what they are. You know, some people are intrinsically motivated, they will get up rain or shine without anyone in the world, knowing what they’re doing and they’ll go out there and train, you know?

I’m not that person. And I know, I know that. So I have to use other things to keep [00:16:00] me moving forward. Yeah. So after sort of completing it and gain. How do you think that expedition sort of changed you?

You can’t say it without sounding completely corny, but unequivocally 100% changed my life, that, that journey. And therefore for me, it will probably always be the best thing I’ve ever done. I’ve done amazing adventures since and seen amazing places, but China will always be special because it definitely changed my life and it, it opened Pandora’s box.

Into this world of adventure and even on the plane ride home Taka and I were planning the next adventure and it has never stopped. And it, it is now my life. Like I can’t. There isn’t, I don’t sit at home and kind of do normal life and work and wait for the next adventure. Adventure is his entire life.

So whether I’m on an adventure, but I’m planning an adventure, whether I’m project managing and doing the district for someone [00:17:00] else’s adventure with our leading people, public speaking. Blogging. It doesn’t matter every day. It is part of my world and on the odd day where it isn’t part of my world, I feel very lost.

So as much as it wasn’t the notch, it wasn’t perhaps where I naturally envisaged my life to be. Now I’m in it. I definitely can’t imagine. I don’t know where I’d be or what I do. So it is me. Yeah. So you were planning your next adventure. Was that the Patagonia ice cap? No, that wasn’t that, wasn’t what I was planning.

I kind of remember, I think you’re planning to go to the North pole. I think that was always the plan. It never happened. Ironically had still not actually started at the North pole. No, it wasn’t Patagonia, but PA I, I think between them, I did various trips in the architect quite a bit in the Arctic.

But Patagonia was definitely the next. [00:18:00] Monumental kind of, again, life-changing in a different way trip it’s you wouldn’t, you couldn’t pay me enough money to go back. It was, China was incredible and taught me so much. Patagonia taught me so much. And it also taught me when I went to say no, not every adventurous for me.

And I learned that on that trip. So what happened. Yeah. Okay. So So the journey was to be the first people in the world to do a full traverse of the Southern Patagonia ice cap. So it’s on the border of Chile and Argentina and it’s, you’ve got Antarctica Greenland, and then the Southern Patagonia ice cup is the next, next biggest ice cap.

It’s not been mapped. It’s one of the few places in the world where we actually got satellite imaging from NASA to help us plan our route. You know, you can’t just go and go and order some maps and you also can’t get rescued. You can get rescued from the South [00:19:00] pole. You can get rested from the North pole.

You can get rescued from the middle of the ocean, but no one’s coming to get you on the Southern Patagonia ice cap. If you go on, you have to get yourself off. So it was. Another massive step up in the adventure world for me. So the plan was to ski across it Borga Oursland and a teammates had done a previous traverse of it, but they’d use kites to when we were on the flatter sections, they’d use the wind power to, to move them along.

And the plan was to do it without kites. So yeah, so it was predominantly skiing, pulling a small sled but to get onto the ice cap, we got lots of big gaseous to get on and glasses to get off. And so Carried a backpack with a kid’s little sled. It’s a little plastic sled for 10 pounds attached to the backpack.

And then once I was off on the top, I put my backpack in the sled. So before we’d even left, I mean like proper polar explorers we’re looking at are like Palm thinking, what are they doing? This, this doesn’t look right. [00:20:00] So, but it meant that going up on the glasses when you’re crossing a lot of crevasses, normally if you’ve got a big polar sledge, that’s like 120 kilos.

It takes a lot of effort and setting up police and stuff to get it across and things. Otherwise it will just fall down the crevasses, whereas with the backpack, although it was 50 kilos, which was as much as my body could. Absolutely. I mean, my knees are shaking with every step with 50 kilos, but it was going down by the day because most of it was food and fuel.

But with the backpack you could kind of weave your way trying to avoid falling down too many crevasses. So, yeah, so that was kind of the, the plan of the trip. It was also on skis and I wasn’t a skier, so that was also another, another thing to get my head around. And it was going well. I think about halfway into the trip, I got carbon monoxide poisoning.

From cooking in the tent and I mean, I’ve cooked intense. I know, I know technically you’re not supposed to go contents, [00:21:00] but when you’re in storms and you’re in really cold places, it’s what we do. You, you do it in the porch area. You keep doors a little bit open and, and it’s part and parcel of, of adventure life, I suppose.

But on this instance with a raging storm and a hundred kilometer winds there obviously had the door down too much and I didn’t before I knew it, I had a full seizure. Complete duration dilation of the eyes, blood coming out, my nose nears and was kind of a Ghana. And so Taka threw me out into the storm and resuscitated me.

And thankfully I just came back to him screaming, my name. So that was good. He gave me 12 hours off to rest and recoup before we’re off again. So that was the first kind of little incident. And then from there on it just became. Hourly incidents. The falling down crevasses became two or three times a day.

In [00:22:00] the 35 days I was on the ice. I saw the sky three times. So we were actually doing this expedition in winter. Bulgur did it in summer, but in summer you don’t get as much snow. So you don’t get the snow bridges, cross covering a lot of the craft classes. So you have to go round them all. Whereas in the winter, most of the time there’s enough snow that it’ll have a snow bridge and on your skis, you can cross without falling in.

But the flip side of that is winter is horrific weather and I mean, horrific weather, it was always. Always like a hundred K wins. It was. No visibility were raked together. I, I didn’t see talk usually, unless it was a break, I would just see a rope heading into white and it was just the white box around me.

I didn’t know if I was going up down left. Right. You felt sick all the time. No one could hear you cry, which was a bonus. Got a lot of that. But yeah, so it was really alien being in this white room weld when he’d fall down a crevasse. Cause he was usually in the [00:23:00] front. I would just feel the rope, pull me to the floor.

And I’d just, faceplant the floor. And then I know it’s for me to now get him out of the chorus. That was how you knew one was coming. Quite often we’d lay in a tent and hear the avalanche coming down and just look at each other and. Hope it’s not taken us out. So that was quite stressful. But then the main crux of the trip came 30 days into the yeah, 30 days into the trip.

We knew it was always going to be the hardest bit of the trip. There was a 400 meter, vertical ice wall. We had to repel down with our kids and for that, we needed to good weather. We needed to be able to see, see, see the wall. And so we were in a massive storm at the top of it. We waited five days in this storm on half rations.

Cause to keep the pack, even as light as 50 kilos, we had to be really, really stringent with how much food we took and how much fuel we took. So taking up extra days in the, in the. 10 [00:24:00] pounds as it were meant we were in half rations. So we would just have one bag of food between us and we’d take one spoonful at a time.

And despite being with, you know, the one you love, you analyze the size of the spoonful to make sure they’re not having any more than you sharing. Doesn’t seem to go so well when you’re that hungry. And yeah, so we’re in this tent for five days waiting for the weather to get better and it just got worse and worse and worse.

And. Eventually the snow was just literally just burying the tents. After like five or six hours would get out of the tent, raped together. Cause they’re still crevasses everywhere. You dig out the tent, move it on top of the snow, get back in and, you know, boil yourself with games and the 10 ice by whatever on your half rations and just keep this process.

And then on one of the times when out, and just under days of weight from all the snow within an instant, the, when moved the tent, the. [00:25:00] The poles snapped and sharp edges, 140 kilometer winds just shredded the tent in, in, in seconds. And so yeah, just into survival mode then, and they’re making some form of.

Shelter with the scraps of tent that we had left the bits of Polsky poles and everything else got inside, got the cooker on starting all the food we had. Cause this was like basically you need to eat to think straight. So first thing you do in a crisis, if you can, is eat and then you’ll think better.

So that’s what we did. And yeah, basically had a really difficult chat. Didn’t believe we’d see the night through had the discussion of whether you should we phone our parents and take a bike, or whether it’s better, they never hear us say goodbye. We decided not to call them. We thought it was better that way.

And yeah, kind of just sat, waiting, [00:26:00] waiting to be no more. It was just the most horrific experience of my life. But the next day came, he was still there. Marvelous. So yeah, we then. Kind of try to make a plan. Obviously we’re still in a, still in a storm. There’s no way we can go on there’s nowhere we can go back.

So we could go off the sides of the glass here. The ice pack is very long and thin, so our quickest way to rescue is off the sides. We haven’t really studied those. So we didn’t know much about it. And as I said, my map is just a satellite map. So it was going to be very much working out as we went and we chose to head towards Argentina.

We were actually in Chile, but Argentina looked best bet and it took us five more days to get actually off the ice cap and kind of to relative safety, which without a tent was, you know, interesting. I got snow blindness talk. I had frostbite, you know, Good old adventure stories. And then we eventually got to kind of [00:27:00] what looked like normal world would come down this glass.

Yeah. First people who’d ever been on this glass here. It was, it was incredible. If not terrifying, and eventually we were hoping a boat would come and collect us from the side of the, from the. Side of the ice, but it was just, I don’t know, you’ve probably seen pictures of in Patagonia where the ice is always falling into the water and there was no way they were kind of get boats to us.

So in the end the military came and got us with a helicopter. But they wouldn’t have gone and collected us from higher up. We had to be on, on a kind of sea level for them to do that. And that was sadly the end of our trip. Sadly, yeah, I mean,

Yeah, I struggled. I struggled with the failure of it. There’s no getting around that. I still struggle with failure. I’m getting better. I’ve done it a lot smaller now. But I Def that was the first time that I really hadn’t achieved what I’d set out to achieve. And it was hard to take, but I mean, gosh, [00:28:00] nowhere in the world.

We thought either, either of us thought we would be alive. So that that’s, that’s good. Thumbs up for that one. Yeah. And now, you know, retrospectively for talk of, you know, as soon as we’d kind of got to safety and, and we’re fattening back up and things like that, he was already thinking, how could we have done this differently?

Was it just an unfortunate instinct? Could we have, could you take two tents from blah, blah? And I’m already thinking. Nah, I’m never coming back that pick a new team mate. So that one for me, I don’t feel any desire to go and finish what I started. There’s not even an ounce of me. I’m I’m good with I did.

I did all, all I could do there. And it wasn’t to be coming away with my life will, will be my success story. In that one, you said that you. When the storm came, you ate all the food or as much as the theaters, just, just like as much food before my stomach was like, okay, we’ve eaten. Thank goodness for that.

Because [00:29:00] for five days I’d eat eaten, you know, a few spoonfuls of food each day. So. To try and make decisions on that. Yeah. I mean, do you want to say one ma many decisions to make cream one? We didn’t have a lot of options, but you just need to be thinking as clearly, clearly as you can. So I think we had kind of two or three freeze dried meals each in a row, which, you know, you wouldn’t do if the trip was going on.

But we knew there was no going on. So God, what a story. It’s unbelievable. You couldn’t, you couldn’t pay me enough money to do it again. No one’s done tried to since it’s there, it’s there to be done. And it’s definitely our method was working. I feel confident we had the right kit. We had the right strategy you know, luck of the draw where the weather window light, like mountaineering, really, you need a good weather window to summit and, and we didn’t have that.

And it all went horribly wrong, but I don’t feel we were Under-prepared or [00:30:00] inexperienced. It was just, it’s just, we were, we were thrown what Patagonia, I think would throw at anyone. I read a little before we went and you’re trying to get sponsors and you, you know, w when I plan an expedition, I plan it is if someone else is doing it, I never put myself there.

Otherwise I probably wouldn’t want it to go. So I do it kind of naivety as blessed as my method. So I was planning it and, you know, you’re creating exciting sponsorship proposals to try and get people interested in the trip. And I use this kind of. Quote that somebody who had done a trip over there had used.

And that was probably not remember it now, but I think it’s the wind impact in Patagonia, the wind knocks you to the knee, to your knees and the snow berries you alive. And I used to everywhere thinking, Oh, that sounds great. That sounds really dramatic. I’m like, Nope. That is exactly what it did. It completely threw us on these and buried us alive.

So I wasn’t lying, but I hadn’t taken it literally. And so after these [00:31:00] two expeditions, you were still hooked, you were still ready to face more. Yeah. Yeah. I can’t even remember the order of things. Oh gosh. Actually. Yeah. Well, I plan next was even worse, but thankfully, thankfully it never never happens.

Yeah. So off the back of that trip, I think the next big trip was to do a circumnavigation of the globe from the North pole down to the South pole using only human powered. The two kind of bits I wasn’t looking forward to was ocean rowing. Drake’s passage from the tip of South America and start to go.

I’m not good with water. That one, wasn’t thinking my boat and wintering, we had a packed a winter on the Antarctic peninsula to then be there at the right time to have made it from the coast on that side. So that was a big project. It was [00:32:00] actually to 3 million pounds sponsorship project. It was got, got right down to the Signing of the deal day when all the banks crashed and yeah, we were being sponsored by a big bank.

So that, that kind of was a lot of time and effort, sweat and tears into putting something together that just fell away in a day. And that kind of changed my outlook again. Into adventure up until then it was kind of quite sponsorship, press media led not led, but it just happened that way. I think because Tara had done trips that were kind of polar or mountaineering, and that was the norm.

That was the way it was. And so our trips became that and I’m not saying it’s wrong. I’m not saying it’s something I’m, I’m definitely not into, but I. I after that kind of heartache of losing that sponsorship deal after all the money and time, we definitely took a bit of a turning and just were [00:33:00] like, do you know what?

We’ll just raise the amount of pennies we can raise and we’ll just go on an adventure. It doesn’t happen to be big. And, and yeah, life-threatening, it doesn’t have to be for the media. It doesn’t have to be for sponsors. It’s just go and, and enjoy adventuring. And that. Has by and large been more the route I’ve stuck down.

So after that kind of big trip fell through, I think we just got on yeah, I think we got on a plane. Yeah, that was that trip. We went to Africa, we went to North Africa to Djibouti on the edge of the Sahara desert and we bought a couple of. Very, very rusty old bikes. They must’ve been 40 or 50 years old, no gears, no brakes, just whatever.

I hadn’t thought through the fact that they weren’t going to be many bikes and as hard as it, but there really aren’t many bikes and as hard as it, but some locals found us some yeah, really, really rubbish old bikes, but and yeah, headed down towards South Africa and just taking it all in as we went lot.

Lot of [00:34:00] walking. Cause the bikes were pretty rubbish. Went through some trainers because that’s how we stopped because we had no breaks. We just put our feet on the ground. But yeah, so complete polar opposite to what we’d been doing, but just went purely for adventure. Yeah. And how did they sort of that compare when you have that sort of freedom to pursue an adventure of your own accord?

They both have their place. And I love both, and there are certain trips where I’ve had a wonderful time and I okay. But it’s almost been too enjoyable. I’ve seen wonderful things. I’ve experienced wonderful things, but I’ve become slightly addicted to a bit of suffering along the way. So. I think when you’ve got a big trip and people are watching and there’s definitely like finite goals involved, whether it’s a timeframe or distance you have to [00:35:00] get, it gives you, it provides motivation to push through the hard times.

Whereas when you just go heading out on an adventure and have no. Desire or need to do a certain distance each day. It can become very easy to stop and enjoy the town. And, Oh, we’ll have another day here, which is fantastic and still a wonderful experience. But for me personally, I like to be a little bit, have a little bit more.

Be a bit more driven. So I try and set goals a little bit beyond what I think I can do. Whereas Africa was, we just went for a cycle. Oh, it was quite a long way, but it was still there. You know, it didn’t matter how long it took us. So yeah, there’s a place for both, but I definitely tend to go to the. I think, I think sufferings.

Good. I think it’s good for you actually, you learn a lot when you’re suffering, when you’re pushing beyond your kind of comfort zone. Yeah. Katie, there’s five questions, which we ask the guests each week with the first one [00:36:00] being on your trips, what’s the one item or gadget that you always take.

It’s not very exciting, but I love my Nalgene bottle. That, yeah, it doesn’t matter whether I’m ski, touring, cycling, hiking, running, whatever. And now Dean for me is like, The best 10 pounds you can buy. Not only is it, you know, a great sturdy water bottle, but the reason why I love it is it is my hot water bottle.

And I feel the cold. I know it sounds like I go to lots of cold places, but I’m a real worst when it comes to the cold and I definitely can’t sleep if I’m cold. And on these trips, you know, sleep is so, so important that yeah, I fill up my when I’m doing my cooking, I bawl and actually to have water.

Put it in an algae, get it and sleeping bag. And yeah, I don’t know where I’d be without it. So simple one, but again. Okay. What’s your [00:37:00] favorite adventure or travel book? It’s a bit embarrassing, but I’m not really much of a reader. I know that sounds awful. Yeah, I don’t read many books. I love maps and I love atlases.

And when I open a page to me, there’s adventures everywhere. So that’s kind of adventurous reading. But no, I, I, I’m more of a, I listen to a lot of podcasts. I like to multitasking. I can listen to other people’s adventures and stories through a podcast while I’m training or even on an adventure myself.

So yeah, so. I, I, I spent hours doing that, but finding the time to actually sit down and get lost in a book, it just doesn’t happen in my life. I’m afraid. Why are adventures important to you? Well, I, I think I mentioned, probably answered this one earlier in the fact that. They all my life, I [00:38:00] can’t really separate an adventure life and a normal life adventure.

It is my life. And without it, I have absolutely no idea who I’d be, what I’d be, where I’d be. I just can’t. I can’t picture it. That’s all. Yeah. Do you have a favorite quote or motivational quote?

I love later quotes expect, you’ve heard, say a million times, but I don’t have one. I don’t have a quote as such, but what I do do is I write little like little words of mottoes. So like if I’m on a bike race, so I do a lot of ultra ultra distance bike racing. So it might be like two weeks on the bike.

I will print them out and I will. Tape them to my actual bite cannibals. So when you’re like suffering and you’re looking down there, just little words to kind of give you a boost. And I never really simple. But they work for me just simple as things like everything [00:39:00] passes. So if I know I’m suffering and you know, it’s just enough to read that and know it will go away or to, I, I write things like don’ts.

Don’t waste energy on things you can’t change. That’s usually at the weather when you know the swearing at it. So don’t rise to it. You can’t change it, go with it. ATF, you just, you know, all sorts of just little, little snippets that there are only a couple of words. But having them somewhere where I just looked down and glance, that really, really works for me.

And that’s something I do rather than have a specific quote for such. I think my sisters, which is on the sort of very similar lines is don’t wait for the storm to pass, learn to dance in the rain. Yes. So basically I’ve taken really good quotes like that and just turn them into like three words to remind me.

Cause I’ll never be able to remember the quake. Yeah, exactly. People listening, always keen to travel and go on these grand adventures. What’s the one thing you would recommend them to get started? Okay

[00:40:00] to get started. I know it sounds ridiculous, but so many people will go, Oh my God, I love what you do. Your life looks great. What I’d love to do that. I’m like, okay, go for it then. I think, I think the hardest. Thing for people is to physically start. And I think that’s because it’s really easy to not feel ready, whether that’s to not feel like you’ve trained enough, not feel like you got enough money, not feel like it’s the right time, but those things I’ve never, ever been ready for any trip I’ve done.

And if I waited to be ready, I still have, would have not have left the house. So I think. The simplicity of just starting is absolutely my best advice to anybody. And and just to remember that an adventure. I think of it as it’s an adventurous personal development. So I don’t know what you’re learning, but you’ll learn a hell of a lot along the way.

So you’re not supposed to know it all before you start and therefore get stopped. [00:41:00] Learn as you go train as you go. Yeah. Stop making excuses. Yeah, I think that’s probably my sort of for people starting and the best thing is just go for it and you’ll you’ll make mistakes, but you always learn from that.

And you’ll do it better next time. Absolutely. Absolutely. What are you doing now and how can people follow your adventures in the future? So right now, like many people, not a lot thankfully at the moment, very touch word. We’re not in locked down here in the front shops where I am. Although it is looming.

So on a day-to-day basis, I am fortunate that I can go outside and do a lot of ski touring and snowshoeing and things like that. So I’m actually training for my next set of qualifications. My IML guiding qualification. So that’s keeping me occupied. But with regards to kind of adventures and expeditions.

Oh, [00:42:00] Who knows. I’ve got two races in the diary. I’m supposed to be doing the tour divide, bike, race, mountain bike, race in, which is from Canada to Mexico four and a half thousand kilometer race supposed to be in June. I reckon I’d get there. They’re here. So maybe next year and I’m also supposed to be doing the Atlas mountain race and Morocco, but again, that’s moved from February to.

October. So, yeah, there’s not a lot. I’ve got a lot of adventurous plans, but who knows, which one’s coming first. So I just keep planning because I enjoy the planning stages, but and a blog. So Katie Jane endurance.com is where I. Do you mind? Geeky thing. I love kit lists. I love weighing kit and working out the lightest possible, you know Pat quakes for things.

So yeah, I write all about that on my website. And other than that on my Instagram, which is also cater to insurance. Amazing. Well, Katie, thank you so much for coming on the show today and you know, telling your stories. I have to say this incredible [00:43:00] to listen. Thank you so much for having me. It’s been a pleasure.

Well, that is it for today. Thank you so much for watching and I hope you got something out of it. Hit that like button, if you did, and subscribe, if you haven’t already, and I will see you in the next video.

EP.019: Alex Staniforth

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Alex Staniforth (ADVENTURER)

Alex Staniforth is an adventurer and charity ambassador from England. In this episode we are talking about the back to back disasters that happened to him on Mount Everest, what went wrong and the fallout from it. He has completed numerous endurance challenges raising money for mental health charities. In today’s podcast, we talking about mental health. He is no stranger to adversity – suffering epilepsy and bullying in early life. He now uses this as motivation for outdoor challenges; now helps others to overcome theirs.

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Transcript of our Conversation

Alex Staniforth

[00:00:00] Hello, and welcome back to the modern adventurer podcast coming up. I think being in the Hills, it’s just inspired me to dream bigger than ever before. Just to question all these limits and these doubts that we put on ourselves. And I came home and of course being a millennial, I went on Google and I just became captivated by the idea of climbing the world’s highest peak.

my next guest is an adventurer and charity and Busta. He has made two attempts to climb Mount Everest and has completed numerous endurance challenges throughout. He is no stranger to adversity. He suffered epilepsy and bullying and early life, but uses this. Now it’s motivation to drive himself forward in these outdoor challenges.

I am [00:01:00] delighted to introduce Alex standing forth to the show. Hi John. Thanks for having me. Hello. Great to have you on the show. You are no stranger to adversity and challenges, and I think it’s great that you use these life challenges. Through your outdoor adventures, probably the best place to start is with how you got into these adventures.

Yeah. So to, I guess, to take you back it, like mostly saying sense of style and childhood, um, At a very normal normal start in life. If you can call the call at that way, uh, my parents gave me a great start. I was brought up near Chester and harder. Yeah. I said I had a pretty normal start in life, but when I was about nine years old, everything kind of changed because I had a mild form of epilepsy, which was quite a terrifying thing for, in person to go through such an important age.

Now that itself is only very mild. Fortunately, it was brought into control, uh, but led to lots of different challenges. [00:02:00] I was, you know, I was relentlessly bullied all the way through school where, which just shattered my confidence and left me feeling worthless, uh, suffering with anxiety and panic attacks, you know, where even having a seizure in McDonald’s meant that just the smell of fast food could trigger a panic attack many years.

So that made school pretty challenging. And I hated sport at school. You know, I hated PE very far cry from, from around now and most way level I’ve had a stomach ever since I’ve been out to speak. I mean, I’ve never known life without having a stammer, which is pretty unusual when I’m now a motivational speaker for a living.

Um, but that kind of sums up really my journey is that it’s, it’s all been about overcoming adversity and using physical outdoor challenges. So overcome personal challenges, you know, never really settling for base camp, never following the beaten track. And I guess trying to make the biggest difference that I can along the way.

Um, so I [00:03:00] think finding the outdoors by chance at about 14 years old, uh, is really that, that changing that, uh, that was the kind of pivot point for me, um, that really set me on a different direction in life. And. 10 years later. Uh, I’m very lucky that now I can combine this passion for personal challenge, with inspiring others, to combat us as a speaker, as an author of two books.

Uh, I’m a brand ambassador for a few charities and organizations and started a charity last year based on mental health, trying to restore mental health through outdoor experiences. So it’s been a very unusual journey. Um, You know, from the early challenges, it’s important to say that it’s not like I’ve completely reasonable for them.

Um, my stomach is still very much there. I can go and speak to 500 people, you know, in a presentation and then not be able to ask for a train ticket on the way home. Oh, I’ve smashed it. Phones at home. Just for the frustration of being able to say my own [00:04:00] name. Mental health has probably been my biggest challenge at all.

And I think that’s the important message is that we all have those peaks and troughs. The most important thing is just to keep on going amazing. And so when did you get the idea for Everest? When did I get the idea was actually about 14 years old, not long after I kind of found this escape of the outdoors.

And I was always aiming for the big things. Not exactly a very strategic, you know, start small, but it really was all inspired by the adversity. And although it wasn’t much compared to what some people go through at that age. Um, at the time I was invited hillwalking in the Lake districts from a friend and, uh, something I’d never really done before my parents.

What particularly outdoors minded. My dad was a runner, but besides that, we didn’t do anything massive and I’m not walking the latest streets one day, 2010. I just [00:05:00] remember asking the question to myself. Where’s Mount Everest. I think being in the Hills, it’s just inspired me to dream bigger than ever before.

Just to question all these limits and these doubts that we put on ourselves and. I came home and of course being a millennial, I went on Google and I just became captivated by the idea of climbing the world’s highest peak. I found other people like me that had done it. And especially those with kind of that normal background, you know, they didn’t have wealthy parents just to pay for the trip because that’s often the biggest barrier they’ve managed to find the funds and make it possible.

And I think knowing that other people are gonna, can, it gives you permission to try. I think at that age, I just committed to myself that one day I was going to climb Everest and it just seems to me the ultimate way to really fight back. I guess I never mentioned at that point that actually four years later, I’d be at Everest base camp about to make my first attempt.

Good. And so [00:06:00] you’re at, um, Mount Everest base camp. Uh, what happened. Well, I’ve got caught up in the two biggest disasters in every history, executive years. Um, and yeah, it didn’t go to plan. These things rarely do. That’s a pretty much the same as life. And we got to base camp, um, after three weeks of tracking in, I mean, I was with a team led by, uh, the same climate wrote to route first taught me rock climbing and the likes and we, yeah, we, we spent three weeks walking from local or then a day before we arrived.

A huge avalanche in the eyes for kill 16 climate Sherpas. So it all went Patchett. We had to pack up and go home obviously without stepping in a single for all the mountain. So I think, I guess my immediate reaction 18 and that kind of naivety was that the harder I work look here at gap. I’m thinking that’s true in some, some instances, but.

Also sometimes failure is completely [00:07:00] inevitable. You know, doesn’t matter how hard you work. I mean, I don’t think there’s a give it down and COVID, doesn’t give it down to that. All of our plans. And it’s being able to reframe failure and think, okay, what can I learn from this? How can I use this experience to combat stronger?

So after a bit of soak, can, you know, you take responsibility. And then another year of training and a year of fundraising, it went back to a verse in 2015. And this time we were on the same team, same format. And then. We were in the Khumbu Icefall, which is just above base camp, moving to camp one for the first time and the earthquake hit Nepal.

So we were in the Icefall about 6,000 meters. When the ground started shaking, we got hit by a big powder over lunch. We’ve been trapped on the mountain for two days. Base camp down below is pretty much wiped out by a much bigger avalanche triggered by the earthquake and, uh, Yeah, it was, um, well, how to describe it, really?

We were stuck at camp one of the two days with, [00:08:00] after, you know, after shocks and other lunches. Um, not, not knowing that actually we were in the safest place at all, you know, and that we’d lost three of our team done at base camp, along with 21 people in territory. So yeah, I think had we not left base camp that morning, I would probably want to speak to you now.

So that having that experience 19 kind of puts a lot of things in perspective. So obviously after that, we eventually got helicoptered outcome form and yeah. Headed back to camp, come and do wow. And as such a young age to have that happen, not once but twice. Um, what was the, what was your initial feelings when you got back to the UK from it?

I think the first time round, obviously it was very different, you know? Dreams can be replaced lives can’t you know, and, and you’ve, you’ve got to keep that perspective second time round. It was, it was more about the kind of trauma, the guilt that why then you [00:09:00] know, why, why not me? Uh, this shouldn’t have happened, you know, base comes meant to be the safe, safest place.

So I guess there was a, from a mental health perspective. Yeah. I think I was really suffering with a trauma for a long time. And, um, I just threw myself into fundraising for the victims. Uh, doing some more challenges and, uh, decided I couldn’t climb Everest. I was going to cycle it. So there’s, um, a challenge notice Everest thing where you cycle up and down a Hill to do 29,000 feet within 24 hours, uh, to raise money for people at DePaul.

I wrote my first book Icefall, which really helped me to kind of put her kind of process at all. Um, and then speaking, you know, kind of fell into motivational speaking, which. It was never part of the plan, but it’s the most rewarding thing in the world. But I think at the time, um, I was just running away from it.

I wasn’t really dealing with it. Um, cause nobody else can really understand, you know, the only friend that could really understand was those have been on the trip with me, who didn’t really wanna talk about it. And [00:10:00] then also a friend who’d been in the army, you know, he’d seen a lot worse. So even today to be honest, it’s still kind of bad.

You know, you still never forget that moment of thinking. This is it, you know? And by the end of that year, uh, I kind of really hit a low trough, probably the lowest I’d ever been, you know, and just that sense of loss of everything, loss of purpose that we spoke about before. I think that loss of purpose, you know, it was really hard to pick yourself up from got to the point, man, running has always kind of kept me doing some things, you know, kind of gave me some feeling, but I remember entering a half marathon and, and just.

Bailing halfway round, I just quit stopped and watching sports home. And that was when I kind of realized I had to reset that, you know, I need some help. I couldn’t manage this on my own. Um, I think he was when all those other things like the fundraising and the writing and kind of gone, you know, I had to face up to it.

Um, [00:11:00] but I think the underlying feeling was that I’ve got to make the biggest difference. I can. I owe it to the guys and hopefully that I’ve got out to a cheaper. Did you feel that, um, the sort of purpose of Everest was to, I didn’t know how to sort of phrase this was to sort of show that. I don’t know how, how can I say this?

The idea of Everest was very much about conquering the demons from a young age. I think so. Yeah. I think. And you engage. It was about proving myself wrong and proving the police wrong. But then actually I realized that that was never going to get me anywhere. It’s the same with many goals in life, if we’re always chasing that next thing success, but whenever we’re never content, because we always want the next thing.

And I think I kind of realized that I had nothing left to prove anymore because I’d already got to Everest, which was the self was probably the hardest [00:12:00] challenge. And I wasn’t really being true to myself and therefore we’re never going to be happy. I think the real, the next big, yeah, good point in the journey was actually in 2016, when I went back this time trying to climb a chair or human Tibet, which is a six-five speak in the world.

I think that was more to put Everest to bed, but also at the time it was actually for training for making a third attempt Everest. Um, that was my best chance of getting over 8,000 meters getting smell to you experience because I don’t, you know, I only been to 600,000 number. See, um, And obviously I know for us, we didn’t get high and then come on.

So that trip went a lot better. There was no disasters. I got some 7,000 to, uh, to, to, to meters camp one, uh, sorry, come to, and then it was the altitude that as always has always got me. I’ve always been rubbish altitude. I remember that night in the tent at 7,000 meters. So thinking to myself, you know, why am I really here?

What, what difference am I making? On average, we saw our tents buried under a [00:13:00] foot of rock and ice and snow, you know, and I thinking, what would I have left behind? Had I been in that tent? And then that was when I was able to let go of Everest and actually realized that it wasn’t just about the top. Um, and I kind of lost the drawer.

It wasn’t about fear. It wasn’t, you know, it was just acceptance. I think that’s kind of where it sent me to where I am today. And where are you in terms of your, your sort of challenges today? Well, since that it inspired me to, to kind of stay close to home for challenges and adventure. I mean, I’ve always loved running.

That’s probably been the only sport I’m marginally good at, or don’t feel, um, I’m useless in the gym and everything else. And I’ve always enjoyed brooding kind of, kind of, uh, competing level, you know, opt up up to. Probably marathon’s probably my strongest distance. So I’d have to sacrifice all that forever, just cause the injury risk and everything else.

And I just [00:14:00] enjoyed that just to keep you ticking over. But I was inspired by Elise Downing, um, who ran around the coast of the UK the year before. And I loved how you kind of carry people on the journey. You know, people were joining her along the way in various parts of the country and it was just a really good way to.

Raise awareness and to see what we have here in our home soil, um, something that I’d always taken for granted. So I came up with the idea, the idea of a whole new challenge called called climate UK, which is climbing to the highest points of all 100 counties in the UK. And that was a human powered, 4,000 mile journey, cycling, walking, running kayaking, uh, in Sempra two days.

And that was all raising money for your minds and mental health charity. And I threw myself into that and it kind of became my new Everest and I realized then that that was what it was all about. It was about the journey. Um, and that was the hardest thing I’ve done. It was the only thing where I’d ever actually achieved what I set out to do.

So that gave me a really big confidence boost and, [00:15:00] and. From then on, I spent a year basically, um, training front, you know, training, training, training for a marathon, um, because I was writing my second book, uh, another peak and didn’t really have time to go off for months and months doing a big challenge.

So I just ran and tried to bring my times down for, you know, a suffering marathon. And then, uh, since then, I mean, 2019, um, I moved up in the Lake district. So that kind of took my energy for year. Just did a lot of fell, running a lot of races. Um, I’ve done the odd spontaneous thing. I mean, the end of 2017, I tried to cycle from home to Attenborough in one hit, which from Chester originally was about 310 miles.

Um, so I kind of liked the sporadic spontaneous in Jordan stuff. Um, but in terms of big projects, I felt I needed, I was overdue like a big, big challenge. So last year in August, I, uh, I run the national free pigs. So we’ve probably, most of us have probably heard of the national [00:16:00] free piece, but never score for pike and Snowdon, but normally you would drive between them in 24 hours.

And I did that when I was 16. That was probably my biggest challenge at the time before Everest and after Mont Blanc and everything else. Um, and, uh, I decided to run the entire distance between them. So 450 miles in, uh, nine and a half days. So it buses 17 orphans, and I was trying to break the fastest time, which I didn’t do.

Uh, but that was, that was my focus for last year. And I think definitely for the next, for the Sable ultra running is my thing. Um, I really love, I’ve always lived in Jordans and those really long painful things. Um, but I think that’s where I want to focus. My energy now is close to home and just trying to do things differently.

I’ve never really interested in. In the conventional challenges, um, that that’s going to really rewarding change. Really? What was that a three [00:17:00] peaks challenge, like, cause you’re over nine days, were you self supported or were you doing it sort of solo and just sort of relying on, I’d say sort of credit card touring types.

Originally on the national free peaks run. Um, I had planned to be self-supported, but I realized that I’d never, I’d never run an ultra before. Well, I’d never raced an ultra before I’d done one 46 miler in training. Um, and then a lot of long runs, but that was it. So that was a bit ambitious, you know, I was, yeah, I was being very ambitious there, so I kind of changed the plan and I had bits of support.

I had friends and cars and a friend Richie was there for the first three days. And. Various people at similar stages. There was definitely a lot of challenge when I was on my own and I had planned and trained to have everything on me in a rucksack and then sending things ahead. Um, but with the mileage and everything else that just didn’t work.

So I didn’t have a still kind of barrier support cars, but it was self-sufficient as much as it, as much as it could be. You know, [00:18:00] I didn’t have like a dedicated vehicle all the way. I was still having to fuck around in hotels and BnBs picking my own food, picking my own supplies. Um, I think when you’re doing so nearly 50 miles a day on tarmac, you kind of really that, and I wouldn’t have got, I wouldn’t have got there without that for people listening and watching mental health is a huge part of what you do.

And. Cause it’s sort of sometimes creeps up on people without them even realizing, you know, someone who you see on a day-to-day every day looks like they’re doing well, but behind sort of closed doors or behind. Uh, the sort of exterior deep down, there are always issues that sort of creep up on people.

How does mental health sort of affect you and for people listening, you know, how can it be spotted? Well, that, that, that person that you described, you know, that kind [00:19:00] of looks like they’re okay. Was, was me and still is me. Um, I mean, I guess it all triggers back from angina to you when I was younger and the panic attacks with epilepsy, but in terms of a more diagnosed problem, uh, I first had depression pressure when I was about 16.

That actually happened when I was injured, I couldn’t run and losing my outlet. My escape suddenly just completely free me combined with fewer things. I think I’d always been very prone to it because being a perfectionist and very high achieving mindset, um, I think I was always very vulnerable to low mood and low self worth.

Um, and then as always running kind of got me back out of it, uh, having challenges, having purpose. And I think I’ve, I’ve had sort of peaks and drops since then, but it got a bit more challenging. The second, you know, the second time round I got injured. Um, and again, I was about 16 and. That was when the meeting sort of started.

And [00:20:00] that made things a whole lot more complicated because I’ve always loved food. And obviously as a runner, as an athlete and you need a lot of it. Um, but then that became my coping mechanism, that the cave, my only control and that quickly got out of hand led to eating soda, you know, that was academia, uh, binge eating disorder.

And that’s kind of been with me ever since, I mean, eight, eight, nine years later. Um, it’s never gone away. You just learn to deal with it. You know, I’ve never seen food in the same way again, and there’s definitely risk for roughly. So we need to be more aware of now is this whole culture of earning calories and training.

It’s it’s, it’s very, it’s, it’s quite risky. Cause I fell into that now. I was able to recover from that, but ultimately I wasn’t really managing it very well. I had episodes where I struggled. Sometimes I was fine. And have a bout with depression after Everest, when everything went wrong, standardly. Um, and that was when I went the help.

You know, I realized that this isn’t an, I couldn’t manage on my own. And I guess [00:21:00] that was when it got so bad that, you know, I need a medication. Um, but I think I I’ve always believed in kind of purpose, not pills and it didn’t work for me, you know, before that could really help. I’ve been able to. Almost get myself out of it by finding a new purpose, finding a new challenge.

Um, and I’m not saying that it’s not for everybody. You know, people have to find what works for them. But, uh, what, what really inspired the climate UK challenge is the fact that it took me longer to get an appointment for my mental health than it did to cycle around the UK. Um, that kind of highlighted just the lack of support available.

You know, I was always able to kind of pick myself up for the outdoors. Um, but as for today, I mean, at the end of 2018, after that year of competitive again, training and trying to race and not my times down over the marathon, I’d fall into the trap of, of under-eating over training. Um, and I guess the eating disorder still, it still manifests itself now, you know, I still have to be very careful.

[00:22:00] Um, I got, yeah, I got injured at the end of that year. Uh, run again, a few of things are going on and, and yeah. Then I had a really bad year in and out therapy and things and, and yeah, I mean, I’m very open about it as you can tell, because I think I’ve realized that everybody’s dealing with something. And if my story helps other people too, to put their hand up first, I know that it has a positive multiplier effects.

Um, you know, I’m, I think I’m in a really good place now. Um, Some of the, you know, some help of how it has been fantastic. And I’m very grateful for that. And I still have to work on that. You know, I’m still my own therapist now. Um, I still have to watch out for the triggers and, and take action. And then I’m very grateful that I can, I can run stouts and I now have a much healthier relationship with food, but I think starting a charity has all been about trying to help people find those tools because, uh, People could see me speaking on stage very confidently and looking fine.

Um, when really they don’t know what’s going on behind. [00:23:00] And, uh, one of the guys inspired me to open up was, um, Tom Fairbrother who set up a project called a train brave. And I saw he does. He does such a positive response to speaking openly that I had nothing to be afraid of really. I think what I love about your story is how you’ve used something negative in your life and moved it into such a positive sort of, uh, community and, um, sort of passion that you have.

I. I guess that’s been my default response from a young age, from that first walk in the lakes. It’s like that realization that we don’t always get to choose our challenges. We just choose how we respond to them. Um, and that happens by default now. And, and whether it’s on an expedition or just day-to-day life, um, just an attitude we have to take and same with COVID.

I mean, I sat down and started, locked down and said, okay, what can I do in this time to make a difference? Uh, [00:24:00] cause I can’t control this and can’t control that. Um, yeah, adversity is the best teacher and it’s it, you know, th th th there’s the old quote by Bruce Lee, you know, obstacles or opportunity in disguise, because if we focus on the problem, which is making it bigger, so we’ve your projects?

What are you doing now in lockdown? Well, interesting times, here we go again. Um, I said, I just have before, I think the first time round in lockdown was sunny and sunny and warm, and people really appreciated nature. But to get a bit of background on the charity, um, you know, might’ve, you know, actually might’ve, uh, the mountains is, is basically trying to combine the outdoors and hillwalking with coaching, you know, so again, it, you know, we, uh, combine hillwalking and coaching, uh, mindfulness and counseling and inspirational speakers into a safe, and, you know, it’s a safe, confidential space for people to walk and talk.

And not to try and fix, but just to [00:25:00] build the resilience and the self-help skills that they need. And we were doing walks and rambles residentials, obviously until the summer, we have to cancel all those because of all the rules. So we really kind of scratch our heads together as to how we could. So help people when so many people have just lost hope that just needs that support.

Um, so we adapted our programs in the end of last year to work with small group sizes, just doing a one day rambled, rather like a, a weekend event. And that works amazingly well, you know, really was able to reach six new areas and a lot of people. But then second, obviously then the second lockdown came again and we had to cancel our events and we had 40.

40 programs planned for this year. We’ve got to have to cancel the first few and the hope, and we can get back to them as soon as possible. But what we’ve been doing as a charity in the meantime is a lot of virtual things. So we have like a, a virtual gathering space where people can come and be a part of an online group guided [00:26:00] by a coach just to share that story rules and joys and just get some mindfulness.

And I’ve just started our base camp sessions as well. So we’re in spot, you know, interviewing inspiring. Yeah, outdoors people and adventurers and athletes just to share what they’ve learned from their adventures. And, uh, combining that with some outdoor skills from our team. So we’re having inspiring and educated people just to keep them connected whilst we can’t get together in our normal events.

And as always, you know, we have bursaries so people can. Can you access our work for free if they’re having hardship or financial circumstances? Um, so that’s taken of a lot of my energy, uh, and the charity, but got a great team behind it. And, um, my free peaks raised 11,000 pounds for Nazi forest. So hopefully can sustain.

A lot of our work for your ad. Um, and then personally, um, speaking, uh, has obviously all gone virtual. I not spoken to a live audience since March last year, and that’s going to probably last a bit [00:27:00] longer. Um, so enjoying the challenge of speaking to companies virtually, and just grateful to have that, I guess, from an adventure point of view, um, it took me a long time to get back to normal.

After three peaks turns out it’s not a good idea, running 50 miles on the tarmac. Um, so just ease himself back into running and, uh, keep me sane during lockdown. And, uh, we’ve just started a new virtual challenge called the lockdown lap. Cause I think people have lost races. They’ve lost goals. So football, what can we do to keep people motivated?

So to get the benefits of being outside, even when it’s dark and wet and cold. Um, so this lockdown lap was an idea that people can virtually log their miles and look, and try and get around the coast of the UK, which is 11,000 miles. We did that in two weeks with sort of 200 people. So we’re now go around the world.

Um, and then personally, you know, I’m just building up my mileage again for the next challenge in the summer. Amazing. Well, I have to say I’m a big fan and [00:28:00] absolutely love what you do. I think it’s absolutely amazing and truly inspiring. No worries. Well, there’s a part of the show where we ask the same five questions to each guest each week with the first being on your trips.

What’s the one item or gadget that you always take on your trips or expeditions? It depends, you know, it can be a local run in the Hills, or it could be a yarn expedition to the Himalayas, but, uh, it’s probably sounds very obvious, but I’d always have my phone because I love music and. It really is the soundtrack to my life.

I’ve always got music playing when I’m running, when I’m in the Hills, having music can just take me to a different place and help me to think and inspire me and motivate me, give me the energy. So as long as I’ve got access to music on my phone or a player, then that’s, that could be my reset Anthony to just escape.

Okay. Very nice. Uh, what is your favorite adventure or travel book? [00:29:00] Um, Well, I mean, I was very lucky, bad girls did endorse my first book, ice fall. So I was searching about that, but his book, mud, sweat and tears came to me a really important part of the journey because it was when I, when I mentioned the fall, when I was in a really low trough, I was injured.

I was depressed. I couldn’t run. I couldn’t welcome. Yeah. And I was told I may not be trained properly again. Let alone train for Everest. Um, I’m a friend rich recommended that book and I’m so grateful because, uh, it’s all about the story about that grills breaking his back just 18 months for a climbed Everest at 23.

I’m not book gave me the hope that I needed just to see the light to keep moving. And, uh, and it’s also a great book, really engaging. So you say you were offered a year. Was that. What was that after that was, that was new. Yeah. So that was just after my blond and [00:30:00] for Everest. So Everest was 2014. This was the end of 2012.

So I lost it. I thought you said you were injured. I was injured for nearly a year, um, before Everest. So, you know, I, I, I couldn’t do any ruining anyway for quite a while. Um, so that was, yeah, that was a big setback. And whilst hard is every school in mine. What’s that what shin splints or broken ankle or interestingly, it, it was like shin splints, but, um, it was actually, uh, you know, it was a growth spurt.

So I had this undiagnosed shin pain, every scan and tests in the book that you can have. And it was basically a gross book causing inflammation. Um, but yeah, it, it taught me a lot and it was a really tough time because I couldn’t escape that. Um, and I’ve had various, you know, various injuries since like most athletes.

Just a lot more Catalytics Oh wait, why are adventures important to you? I think [00:31:00] challenges make w make life worthwhile. I think staying in our comfort zones during the same old cause kills our potential, you know, quite literally, if we’d stayed at base camp on Everest, it probably would have killed us.

Um, I think for me, it just makes life rich worthwhile. We see things in a different light. You realize what’s important. Well, this could go on Reddit. That’s very true. Um, what about your favorite? Quate have got lots and lots of them. Um, you can, well, I mean, I can’t claim any my own cause I pinch them off, off the internet, but, um, one of the most important ones to me, I think was.

Came to me from one of my, one of my inspirations, uh, Becky bell bellwether you, she some conduct rest when she was 20. And, uh, you know, a few years before me and she passed on a quote, which is the greatest suffering, brings the greatest successes and actually wrote it on my wall and big [00:32:00] pen in front of my bed.

So every, every day I saw I woke up and saw it. And that was like, my motivation for Everest is actually realizing this was worthwhile. Um, And then if I could put, if I could throw in a second one, probably probably, it always seems impossible till it’s done by Nelson Mandela. And that was so true. You know, sometimes it feels so impossible, but, and then before you know, it you’re there.

Um, yeah, I could go on and on really. No, they’re they’re good quotes. Very good. Indeed. Uh, people listening are always keen to travel and go on the sort of grand adventures. What’s the one thing you would recommend for people wanting to go on an adventure like you? Well, interestingly, today I got another post about, um, flying to Europe this summer, which is a bit optimistic considering the current lockdown and what we’ve got to keep thinking forward some way, um, because I’m sure all of us are missing travel.

I mean, obviously my ventures have been in the Himalayas in the pool, which are quite far-flung, they’re quite big. And I’m, I’m so [00:33:00] lucky to, to, uh, I’ve been over that. Um, I think sometimes if the guy, I also think it can be quite daunting. I think you just got to sometimes take the small steps, you know, not necessarily throw yourself into it.

Yeah. So for the shorts, I know them as well. It might not be bad advice just to stay in the UK, go to a completely different part of the UK or your home country, uh, wherever that could be. And. I think you really get an appreciation for, for what we have here as well. And some places the UK just blew me away.

But I think if that doesn’t appeal, you know, if they do want to go on a big grand adventure, then obviously it all the fundraising and everything, there’s a lot of things to commit, but I think you’ve just got to set the date until you set a date, put something in the calendar life gets in the way. Um, and it doesn’t become a most.

It comes at once. So I think realistically, you know, be, be realistic, you know, put then set a date, um, scare yourself a little bit. And just, there’s a little bit of fear there in terms of [00:34:00] getting out your comfort zone. Cause that’s the most rewarding thing. Yeah. I think one of my favorite quotes was if it’s scares you and excites you at the same time, then it’s probably worth doing.

Yeah. And if it doesn’t scare you, it’s not enough. Um, but yeah, I think, uh, it might be more realistic. The short-term to do something in the UK. That’s not a bad thing. No, I th I think, uh, international travel is probably very much out the window for the next six months, unfortunately. Yeah. I mean, looking forward to that, but in the meantime, we’re just very grateful to be in the lakes and have mountains.

There are not, they just put things back in perspective. Yeah. I’m very jealous of where you are at the moment. Um, the legs there’s pro. The lakes are probably one of the most spectacular places in the UK. So although I’m very grateful to be down here, uh, I have to say the lakes is just stunning. So I’m slightly envious of you up there.

I mean, I think, um, I, I [00:35:00] moved here for that reason. Just the Hills gives me hope and being able to run in the Hills while I’m not working. Um, just to have that life balance to me is kind of what I need. I needed mentally as well as to really reset myself. And it’s been kind of a therapy as well. Um, After after Everest, I came up here for awhile and just, um, spending time in the lakes really helped me to overcome that.

And just every day, you know, I, it, it never gets boring even after the Himalayas. It’s, uh, it’s magical. Yeah. Well, what are you doing now? And how can people follow you and your adventures for the future? Um, at the moment, like everybody else I’m working at home. Um, so. There’s still some plans for the summer, you know, just keeping those in mind.

Uh, another, another attempt, uh, fastest known time. Um, and then until then, um, the best way to follow me on social media, uh, among all the main channels, Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, if anybody has any questions or wants to ask any advice, my [00:36:00] inbox is always open, um, visit my website, outstanding thought.com.

And then when I come up with some, some more challenges or virtual things, uh, great to have people involved. Uh, so I’m sure everyone’s wondering what, what adventures lay ahead. What’s next? Um, nothing confirmed. I’ve got a few ideas in the pipeline and, and after the three peaks, um, my body wasn’t having anything for awhile and that’s, that’s perfectly fine, but I think I’ve got a, I’ve got a running based record attempt, which is going to be something very different to what I’ve done before.

Quite sort of short and sharp. Um, I’m looking into that at the moment. I think it would be in the UK for, for the next, you know, at least in the next two years. But, uh, this one will hopefully be this summer. Um, um, I’m definitely back in challenge mode now and looking for the next target, but, uh, I’ve never doubted myself as much as the free peaks.

So when after it really pushed the boat now, and I’m looking forward to that. Absolutely amazing. Well, Alex, I can’t thank you enough for coming on the show [00:37:00] today. You have a truly remarkable story to tell. And really inspiring to many. And, um, I just want to say thank you. Yeah. And I suppose John, and it’s great to have the chance to now to share the journey, you know, hopefully give some peoples, you know, a bit of inspiration as well.

So thank you for having me. Well, that is it for today. Thank you so much for watching. I hope you got something out of it. And if you did hit that like button and subscribe, if you haven’t already. And I will see you in the next video. Okay.

EP.018: Lucy Shepherd

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LUCY SHEPHERD (EXPLORER)

Lucy Shepherd is at the forefront of modern exploration. From mountains to rainforests, to the Arctic, she has plotted a thrilling, inimitable path for herself. She documents her endeavours, both to share them with captivated audiences, and to show the effects of climate change. On today’s podcast, we talk about what is the Amazon Rainforest like to live in and the daily life in the jungle.

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Transcript of our Conversation

Lucy Sheperd

[00:00:00] Lucy Sheperd: Hello. And welcome back to another episode of the modern adventurer podcast coming up. And these, the snakes will actually chase you and they are, you must never go near them because they will. They will chase your scent and things like this. These stories will just get the nightmares. It, snakes is still a Western thing around us and the two guys are going to their hammocks.

They’ve got a fever we’re trying desperately to try and get all these fires and well I’m sure anyone who’s listening will just be like why or what motivates you to go back. And all the guys absolutely terrified because they had told me when I asked him what he may scared about doing this adventure.

Oh, she must have snakes.

On today’s show. We have an [00:01:00] adventurer who is at the forefront of modern exploration from the Arctic to the rain forest. She has pursued all sorts of expeditions around the world. On today’s podcast. We talked particular about the Amazon rain forest and the hostile environment she had to encounter on one of her expeditions.

I am delighted to introduce Lisi shepherd to the show. Hi, John, thank you for having me. Absolutely pleasure. Well, your background is very much in TV at the moment. But I suppose the best place to start is. About you and how you got into doing all these adventures? I suppose I was always quite well, I was always labeled the adventurous child.

I was the one who used to like climbing trees as high as I could. And I used to really get a thrill from looking at adult spaces. And making them scared. And that was like my little kick. But other than that, when I was at school and things like that, people would label me [00:02:00] shy and quiet, which I really hated.

And then I always felt that when I came back into the garden, when I was exploring on my own, then that’s when I really felt adventurous. And like everyone else, when I got to a teenage year, I tried to try to fit in, try to do what everyone else did and stopped climbing the tree, stopped getting that sort of adults being shocked by what I was doing.

And I kind of lost my mojo, lost that thing that made me, you know, a bit different. And I was about 15 when I went up to Scotland to something called the Ridgeway adventure school, which is a Scottish, they sort of teach you how to survive in the wilds of Scotland. You go kayaking, you go hiking.

And it was there that I actually heard the word expedition for the first time. And I found that I was actually quite good at going on to, into the mountains and being like uncomfortable. And I really enjoyed all that sort of thing. So after that, I latched onto that word expedition [00:03:00] and I was sort of determined to go on and to find how, how else could I do more expeditions that weren’t just these mini mini things of an adventure school in Scotland.

So that’s where it really started. And that was, it was my mission to go find, find expedition really. And I was, I was probably about 16 or so when I started looking properly. So you’ve been doing this for the last 10 years or so. So my first proper expedition I suppose, was where it was, I was lucky enough to get onto one of the British schools, exploration society trips when they were doing these extreme ones.

So it was just myself and 10 that nine other people. And we went off to Svalbard for 10 weeks when I was just 18. And that really. Had a massive impact on me as I’m sure it would most people, but the big thing for me was I found that I could be this person that I never knew I could be. And I really wants to hold onto that because as soon as I got back, everyone kept saying, you know, wow, what an amazing [00:04:00] once-in-a-lifetime experience that was, you know, you must be so proud to have done that once a lifetime adventure.

And the only thing I could think of is you serious. Like if that was a once in a lifetime, then I’m only 18, then it’s all going to be downhill from here. And that was like the start of me realizing maybe you shouldn’t listen to people. What other people say? Because I did listen to people for a while and I believe them and I sort of went low.

I’ve got quite low for a while. Thought that, you know, I just had this best experience. That was just not going to happen again. You know, how could that ever happen again? No one was saying it could and it wasn’t until I met. Author explorers. You know, it wasn’t like I was exposed to explorers when I was younger or anything like that.

My parents very ordinary jobs that I realized that actually, if I wanted this enough, then I could really persevere. It’s not like I had the main massive skills or anything like that. It wasn’t skydiving when I was a kid. [00:05:00] So I just sort of made it. I just tried and tried and tried and expose myself to as many adventures as I could from a young age.

Really. Got it. And so what was the sort of kick that lifted you out of what you’re doing now and into adventure? Was there something that sort of triggered it? I suppose it was when I, when I was getting quite low, I met Neil Lawton. Do you know Neil? Oh, you must. You must know. Who does the scientific exploration society?

And I met him when I was about 19. And I heard about what he was doing. I heard about his adventures that he’d done. He’d done all the seven summits and he does some eccentric expeditions as well. And we swapped contact details. And then a few months later I got an email from him, inviting me on Expedition to the hydrangea bidder in Norway with him himself, and a bunch of other ex [00:06:00] special forces guys and me.

So I’m just 19 and he’s invited me and I’m thinking, wow, this guy is really taking a risk on me here to invite me on something like this with. This team. And I went on that and either pulled my weight. It was, you know, more than capable and came out thinking, right, this is something I am going to do.

I think I can do it because the main thing is believing in yourself. Isn’t it? And we all have our off days, but if you can put your energy and motivate yourself as much as you can, then I think you can. Slowly slowly move forward. So that was just it. I just started doing little, little, and often all the time, gaining more skills started mountaineering started just knowing how to look at myself in different environments, because they never really wanted to specialize.

You know, I love, I love the cold and now I love the jungle as well, and I love high altitudes. So yeah, I’ve maybe I’ve got no, they get all the gear. No idea who knows, but I just, I just can’t cook it enough [00:07:00] for every environment. I think. So the jungle is one of your recent expeditions that you’ve done.

What was that about? So when it was about 2014, when I first went to the jungle and that was in Guyana as well. And it was on that trip. I had a maybe few years of doing Arctic expeditions and high altitude exhibitions. And then I thought at 2014 I want to go to the jungle because this is an environment of always wants to go as a kid.

You always want to go to the jungle with all these, the wildlife and the the fruits on the trees, the beautiful waterfalls. So I thought that’s what I’m going to do. I’m going to go on a expedition there. I’m going to. Meats and tribesmen, and I’m going to join them on a hunting trip. So I did that for a month and long story short on the first day of being with these guys, there was a Jaguar outside, my hammock and the guys there were, I was only with two of them.

They had CA they had put their hammocks like [00:08:00] quite far away. Cause they want us to like respect privacy. They thought that that would be fine. And there’s this check. You are making all these noises when I’m stuck in this hammock and bearing in mind first night, my machete, my bow and arrow is outside and it turned out there had been an Armadillo, had gone underneath my hammock.

And it was using my hammock as a sort of shelter and things like this. And this Jaguar was search, circling me going in and out, making all these horrible noises that it makes. And it finally like pounds for it and went for it, went off into the bushes and in the morning cause I was too, too afraid to.

Scream or yell or anything like this. And I said to the guy, I heard this now he says, what could it be? And they come up to me and they look at the ground and look up at me and they just see Jaguar. Okay. And that kind of. Gave me a little bit nervous nerves throughout the whole jungle experience.

You know, if you’re ever tracking in the jungle and I [00:09:00] don’t know if you’ve been, but it’s, you know, it’s claustrophobic, it’s dark, you can’t get to the fruits and the trees they’re high up. It does take a lot of sort of non you say, you never, you always say like you don’t fight in the jungle, you have to go with it.

And so I put the jungle aside for a few years and it was last year. Or maybe two years ago now I started to think I’m doing all these expeditions, but it’s not making me scared enough. You know, I feel like I kind of know what to expect. Even it needs pretty frightful situations. I thought, Ugh, I’m just going to have to go back to the jungle at night.

It’s it’s, it’s that thing that is missing and I didn’t have much time to go. So I started thinking of where I could go sort of in a four week period and they got in contact with it. Guy who I knew out there and he suggested this mountain range in the canoes. And that’s where it all started. I, I really liked starting expeditions.

I’ve [00:10:00] never been places I’ve never heard of, or they sound quite magical and remote and you know, all of this and the canoe mountain range ditch did just that for me. And I got managed to get someone who had gone to the country. Cause you can’t paste service doesn’t work. You have to get someone who goes to the country to come back with a map.

So I got this really old map. I think it’s from the 1970s or something like that, they trusted this and that isn’t a credit on the table and was just a full of bullshit full of mountains and telling you, and obviously the jungle mountains are different to the mountains. We, we sort of familiar with but it makes with a bit of jungle on it.

It just makes it so much harder to travel through. So jungle is hard to get through obviously at a mountain and really, really hard to get through. And so I was looking at this map and I say, okay. And I basically headed out there last this time last year. [00:11:00] I was meant to only go with two Amerindians.

That was the idea. I was meant to go and find them when I got that. But as soon as I did get there, the last point in civilization, I get a knock at the door and there’s two Amerindians who are not expecting, you know, I’m not expecting anyone and they are looking very, very pissed off and very angry. And they have heard that I’m coming to their jungle, their area and they live underneath the NICU in the shadows of this Canadian mountain rage.

And they’ve heard them coming to cross this mountain range and they think, you know, who am I to cross a mountain range that they’ve lived under their whole life lives and always dreamt of doing, which is completely fair point. I hadn’t even considered that maybe other people want to join me in this quest.

And they’re just very, very, very angry that I’m coming here. And so I’m like, okay, let’s sit down later. Let’s see, see what you’re at, what you’re doing. And I agreed to take them with me [00:12:00] as long as they can leave tomorrow. So this thing they’ve been dreaming of their whole life, they have to go and tell their family that they’re going to go do it suddenly.

And also that one guy from a sort of tribe that they don’t get on with so much can also come because he’s someone who I chatted to beforehand. And they agree to that, but they also say, well, they want to other friends to come as well. So suddenly I’ve gone from a team of three to a team of six and I go and pick them up.

And we, we drive in a four by four to the last tribal village where I’m picking the guy I plan to get. And this guy that I plan to get he’s a, he was just absolutely drunk out of his mind. And just falling over himself. And so there I am thinking, Oh gosh, I’m glad I’ve got all these other guys as well because my plan didn’t go, go, go to plan.

But sure enough, you know, just before about to get into the deep, deep jungle. The re the rum runs out. [00:13:00] Rum is a very popular one there. And the dynamic of the team improves. We will get on like a house on fire, and it’s an amazing thing that having that common goal of adventure and exploration can bring people who know maybe, I mean, one there’s me who obviously is the complete outsider in terms of where I’m from in terms of race, in terms of gender, all these things.

But also the guy who’s from the different tribe who, you know, those two, those two have a history of just not getting on. And, you know, that’s the beautiful thing about being in these environments and having that adventure together and sharing these experiences can do because by the end of it, it was just awesome to have.

Friends, you know, friends for life that, you know, we, we’ve all shared that we all know what everyone went through on those weeks. And yeah. Now planning on going back with the same guys and doing something much, much bigger. So when is the plan to [00:14:00] go back? So if lockdown and COVID lets me I’m meant to be going out in September this year.

So 20, 21. And I mean, it’s a one way ticket, cause I have no idea how long it’s going to take. No, one’s no, one’s done it before. So I mean, I’m, I’m expecting between. Five to 10 weeks. That’s how broad it is. We really don’t know what we’re going to encounter. But basically me crossing the whole of the canoes, but East West, which is basically spans the whole entire country of Guyana instead of just going from South to North.

So got my permissions and all that sort of thing. And now just got to be allowed to fly. Right. Wow. That, that would be absolutely incredible. Yeah, no, I’m, I’m very excited, but it’s, I have those moments of thinking of what am I doing? Like, I think the Junco the longer you expose yourself to it. The more dangerous it becomes, I think so.

[00:15:00] Yeah. W we’ll see. For people listening. What is the jungle like to be in? What’s the sort of environment on a day to day? It’s the first few days slash weeks of being in the jungle. It’s very overwhelming. There’s so much to think about. And your brain is on overdrive, very different from being in the cold environment.

To give you an example, we all know that we have to watch out for your feet where you’re stepping because snakes and things like that. Then you’ve got to w when you’re tracking of the jungle, you will go in a single file, but you have to keep quite a lot of distance between each other. In case someone goes into a wasp nest or bees nest, or snake or Jaguar, and you don’t know you’ve got to have enough distance.

And because you need that distance, you need to be paying attention where they’re going all the time. So they, you go through very, very dense jungle and they can move like. Just anything they can go really quickly. [00:16:00] So don’t go. But someone like me just takes a bit longer to figure out one where they’ve gone.

Cause you’re ducking under and you’re go, you’re not making many tracks at all. So you’re doing that at the same time. You’re trying to use your hands to hold onto the trees and things like that. But the trees often have. These massive, massive spikes on them that you just do not want, you know, if you touch it, the spikes literally come off into your hand and it just hurts.

So how’s that, you’ve got all these things that you have to worry about. And so, but then after a while you realize that your brain subconsciously takes it all in without you having to think suddenly. And it’s a beautiful thing when that happens, because you can only constantly get to concentrate on one thing and your brain is taking care of everything else.

Your brain is sort of. Realizing that that’s got spikes on without you even looking. And it is amazing how powerful that can be. And then once you’ve got it, then it’s just, it’s just a great, great experience once you know, how [00:17:00] to, how to live and not just survive, but thrive in the jungle as well. We had Benedict Allen on last week and on the show.

And he had quite an interesting story from the Amazon and how hostile it can be at times that everything has a defense mechanism because it needs to just survive and everything kind of. Had some sort of fight in them, no matter how tiny they are and you realize you need that too. So yeah, no, it’s definitely survival of the fittest.

And the most adaptable, I guess. Yeah. And say we’ve the sort of trips and expeditions, I mean, you must sort of come across some incredible sort of moments. Like when you are traveling through the jungle, did you come across sort of remake tribes or was it. There was actually I have to say this has never, it’s [00:18:00] never the intention to go and find the remote tribes in these areas because they are uncontacted, you know, you’re not meant to contact them and things like that, but.

I had heard that there was potentially about two dozen, three dozen people living in these mountains uncontacted that used to be in a tribe that the guys I was with were, so they would probably speak a similar language. And so we didn’t come across them. Like specifically, but we found writing on the trees that would have been, then we found some old pottery and I think their trip, the expedition that we do next year, this year now high chance of.

Bumping into them. So I, I, it’s a little bit nerve wracking, but it’s not, I know, I think you said Benedict dad and he he’s bumped into these guys a lot in his expeditions, but now I think that the moments that really stand out on the trip [00:19:00] last year weren’t necessarily tribal things, but it was. Wildlife, we just had one day of everything just felt like it was against us.

And it was just in the worst place possible, right in the middle of the expedition. And my, I had a little inReach dotting where I was on the GPS that people could try and look at them. And that hadn’t been working for a few days and suddenly we’re just there’s Jackie is nearby there’s Bushmaster snakes whistling at us everywhere.

So these Bushmasters snakes whistle when they know you’re there and that they get to come and attack you. And thinking back to what. Happened that day. Cause we basically just encountered so many snakes and at the same time, and I think we may have run into like a breeding ground or something or a nest.

And we, we ended up camping so it could have gone very, very wrong very quickly. [00:20:00] But we had that night, we had so many fires going because fires Put off the animals, the Jaguars and the snakes. So, but boy, it was a, it was a scary night. That was for sure these snakes whistling at you while you know that there’s, there’s been two Jaguars that you’ve seen.

Yeah, no, I just kept putting more logs on that fire. And so you’ll have to forgive my wildlife knowledge, but Bush. Bush snakes. And Jackie was, would they go for you? Yeah. So Bushmaster snakes are the most ferocious sinks that you can find. I that’s very little about them on the internet at all.

And I, I kept thinking, well, maybe all these things that the Amerindians telling me, maybe it’s just. Myth and things like that because they talk about that. What they told me about the whistling. And first I hadn’t really heard of whistling snakes before. They told me that [00:21:00] they chase humans, they actively chase them.

And they sleep under your hammock in the warmth and then strike when you least expect it and that they can outrun a galloping horse. And so these things, and of course that they’re poisonous. So a bite from them will kill you. And then of course, then we. We hear the snakes whistle like mad and the whistling means that they know that you’re there, so stay away or they’re coming to get you.

And this were sort of, so, so haunting it. I was hearing it for weeks after I got back. And so I know that that that’s true, but then I went and did some proper digging and research to see if everything else they said was right too. And I did, I found papers from I really, really long time ago. I think maybe 1902 or something like that.

And it talked about how these snakes, you have to go very, very remote and you have to go very deep. Whether I know humans in the middle of [00:22:00] the jungle and these, the snakes will actually chase you and they are, you must never go near them because they will, they will chase your scent and things like this.

And they do have this whistle and the paper even described this whistle exactly how we had it. So it was amazing to think. Like there’s so much not on the internet. It’s nice and refreshing to know that as well. It’s going to say,

I mean, especially when there’s about 10 of them around you, we basically, what had happened is we heard one. And at 3:00 PM in the jungle, in that area, we were always stopping and stopping to get our hammocks up. It goes dark at six. That gives you enough time to sort of get everything sorted before it gets dark.

And also at three, they kept seeing all the wildlife come out at three. So you have to just, you have to stop. And I thought, okay, the abstract who they can’t tell the time. And there was one point [00:23:00] where it’s just so, so dense jungle, we were going down a slope. So we, it wasn’t very good place to put up a hammock.

So we thought we’ll push on. We’ll keep going until we can find somewhere suitable 3:00 PM on the dot there’s that we spot a Jaguar and. It’s the worst place to see a doctor and then suddenly there’s this whistle. And I don’t know what the whistle is. Cause you know, we hadn’t talked about, you know, how this would sound and all the guys absolutely terrified because they had told me when I asked you what you may scared about doing this adventure and there’s the top Bushmaster Bushmaster snakes.

And they hear this West or another can terrify him. And I even filmed it on my girlfriend and I’m like, what, what they said, Bushmaster go. And so we are going as fast as we can. And this dense jungle with a Jaguar just by our side. And we go, go, go, and we can still hear the West too. And then we hear a whistle in front of us as well, which is not what you want to hear.

Cause then you might bump into it. And so we made the decision. We’re just going to [00:24:00] have to cause clear and make some wear for hammocks. So we will go out machetes and start trying to. Clara space on this slope while these Wessling thanks. They’re going. And one of the is one of them is trying to get a fire, going to put, push them away while he’s doing that.

He gets stung by a bullet, which is suppose you, you know, I have seen an episode of someone being bitten by a bullet and, and. I think it’s like 10 Hornets, so something horrific it’s. I know someone, I mean, this may be an exaggeration, but he’s a, quite a serious guy and he’s, he was blown up in the military once and he said being stung by Lance was worse.

I think the pain is just very, very in one area and just feels like it’s absolutely on fire. And it also gives you a fever for 24 hours. So it really like. [00:25:00] Just does no good to be agile. So we’ve got one man down. The other guy goes to see what he’s up to. He gets stung level and as well. So now two men down The snakes are still wasting around us.

And the two guys are going to their hammocks. They’ve got a fever we’re trying desperately to try and get all these fires. And yeah, no, it was just, it was one of those moments where it’s like, okay, it’s lit. It’s just up to us to make this, get us through the night. But it was really the worst place to encounter all these things.

But the profit place for Bushmasters apparently is right. As far as way as far as way as the CAD from any, any civilization, I’m sure anyone who’s listening will just be like why or what motivates you to go back. I know it is weird, isn’t it? I, when I tell that story, I think why, but I, that was an amazing thing that happened after that night and that morning, we, as a team really [00:26:00] bonded and trusted each other because we’d got through this sort of thing, that sounds like it’s from a horror movie and it just felt like, okay, if that’s happened and we’re okay, then we can do this.

And yeah, there are things that I’m. You know, out of my control and the terrified of that I’m going back to, but I think I think I’ll be okay. I hope I did. I, I, the, the pros outweigh the cons, I suppose. Yeah. Yeah. So we’ll say other than the sort of bonding, what were the sort of moments which you look back on and such fondness?

I think it, it really was those moments I shared with the, with the guys, but also the, it doesn’t, it doesn’t vote well when I say the end, but we had been in such like dark jungle the whole time, and everyone told us that we couldn’t do it. And [00:27:00] we came out and the finished point of this expedition, the sort of thing that marked it was this Big river.

And we came out suddenly and out of this dark dense jungle and this beautiful, beautiful site where it’s like, Oh, this is where all the wildlife had. Like the nice birds and fish are hanging out in the monkeys and the trees. And it just was like, Oh, and there’s this sense of relief, but also pride. Of failing, Oh my God.

It’s it’s it’s over was was something that I haven’t quite felt as much on other trips in, even though I’ve had other trips that have been so much longer and in a way more difficult, but this one just had something about it that felt very, especially for me, who hadn’t had so much experience in the jungle that just felt very special, really.

Wow. What a story? Oh, sorry. You broke up there. Say. [00:28:00] Oh, I was sort of saying what a story of just such a hostile environment and then coming through at the end. Yeah, no, I it’s. The jungle is a hostile environment. But I’d hate to be the person who puts anyone off going there. So, and no, I’m sure. I’m sure you’ve really sold it to everyone so sorry.

No, it is amazing. And I mean, everyone wants to go to the Duncan. I feel like everyone does. You’ve got this picture in your mind, what it’s going to be like, don’t you, and I’ll tell you, it’s not like that most of the time, unless you’re doing a river river journey. It’s on the rivers. I think you see the most UT but if you want some hardships, then go by foot.

Yeah. Yeah. Me and my sister went to LA TCA in Columbia and we were the tracking three for three days in the Amazon and it is. Truly spectacular. It’s such an amazing place and it’s just so [00:29:00] diverse. And you, you realize all these things that you just had, no idea existed.

Sorry. Did you encounter any wildlife or mammals while you were doing it? I think we I suppose our biggest memory that we take from that trip is the trenchless, which, which, where I can’t describe, but it was about the size of someone’s head, if not bigger. I mean, I mean, it was so big and I was brushing my teeth.

And suddenly just above my head is this giant trench and I’m not even scared of spiders. But for that moment I could not speak. Oh, I know. I know. I feel you don’t worry. They’re they may, I don’t know if it might have been what [00:30:00] I’m thinking of a type of spider called the Goliath Bernita. Is that what it would have been?

They could well have been, I mean, it was like as big as your head, like you’re saying it’s just. It’s amazing. They actually, they actually catch birds, obviously. I mean, please, in the name, but yeah, scary. There’s a part of the show where we asked the same five questions to each guest each week. With the first is what’s on your trips.

What’s the one thing or item that you bring with you every time. This sounds so wrong when I say it, but I’m going to say it anyway because I have a reason. But it is the trustee. I know you’re meant to get away from technology when you go away, but the iPhone as a camera, I always take an, it sounds like an awful thing to say.

Cause yeah, I should be saying something like a knife or things like that, but I love taking the iPhone as a camera. [00:31:00] And as a video camera, if you really look after it, you put it on your airplane mode and like that you can fit it in any. Clothing so easily. And it just means, I mean, I love big cameras as well, but you’re going to just capture those moments that you might not capture otherwise night.

I find it very special to be able to save moments and share them and look back on them afterwards. So I always take, always take my iPhone as a form of memory, memory, holding memory, locking. Yeah, it’s a very sort of easy thing to just suddenly whip out if you need to capture a moment. Yeah. And even in the freezing cold, like if you do switch it off at night and put it in your sleeping bag and just really, really the crafter and just a simple battery can charge it.

So yeah, I definitely underrated for that stuff. What’s your favorite adventure or travel book? I actually did a video about this a few weeks [00:32:00] ago. My favorite one is mad, bad, and dangerous to know. By runoff fines because as a book of adventures go has got so many, so many adventures that you, you do realize why he’s called the greatest living Explorer.

Once you read that book and you know that he’s, he’s named that for a reason, so it’s definitely worth a read. It’s insane. Well, there’s all these stories. Yeah. That’s I’ll have to check that one out. Yeah, it’s definitely good. Why are adventures important to you? Advances to me do a few things.

I think as on a personal level, they help, they, I know that they actively help me grow my character each time. And I felt like I become a better person, not just for myself, but for other people afterwards. So that’s something I really love about it, but I also love the feeling. It gives you I love feeling vulnerable [00:33:00] in a world that sometimes you feel that we don’t get often enough.

I think that we should feel vulnerable. And we should realize how beautiful this world is. And so by feeling vulnerable and. Being in these big landscapes is something that I I feel very special to experience as much as I can. Yeah. I agree with that. Sort of the idea of putting yourself out there and showing vulnerability is sort of what I always think helps you grow.

Definitely. And knowing that it’s not all about you, you know, you don’t matter at the end of the day in the terms of the world. So. Yeah, very insignificant. So just appreciate the time that we have now make the most of it now, because honestly it does the world doesn’t care. If you level of dice and make the most of what you were at the time, we have very true.

What’s your favorite quote? Am [00:34:00] I allowed to that by the same person you I’ve got they’re both by Amelia Earhart. On the first one is I have to get these great adventure is worthwhile in itself, which I think is a very good thing, you know, I think it’s. Always good to have adventure with purpose, but don’t, don’t forget to always do adventures, even if that’s what you really want to do.

So don’t let it hold you back. And the other one is the most effective way to do it is to do it.

So that just means go out and do it just go and stop. Yeah. I think a lot of people sort of spend so long trying to plan their so, and they, they sort of get overwhelmed by the sort of. I don’t know how sort of say they sort of get overwhelmed by how much stuff might have to go into it. But actually most of my trips is literally just putting something in a bag and just going for [00:35:00] it and figuring out later that’s not the best idea.

Yeah. But as long as you said yes to it and you, you know, something’s happening then. You’re going to make it work because none of us want to not make it work. So you will put in place the things. And then you’ve already, you’ve already done the hard work. Cause you said yes. I think on episode four we had Jody Stewart and one of those where make a financial commitment that’s always a good way to motivate yourself.

Yeah, definitely. Definitely. Definitely. People listening to always keen to travel and go on these grand expeditions. What’s the one thing you would recommend for people to get started? Well, I suppose it links back to the last question is just to, just to start don’t let other people’s negativities or worries get in the way listened to them, but trust yourself.

And if [00:36:00] you want to do something, then. You’re the best person to know to do it. And if you need a bit more inspiration and motivation, then use yourself as that. And so be your own inspiration, really. So going go and do it very good. What are you doing now and how can people follow your expedition in the future?

What am I doing now? Well now during Roxanne I’m home, sadly. But I am meant to be guiding some Arctic expeditions in the spring. So who knows if that will happen, but if anyone wants to join me on any Arctic expeditions, then you can get in touch with me on any social media website. But currently I am making YouTube videos.

And sort of trying to make adventure more accessible and give some tips and tricks for anyone starting out, but also hopefully provide some insight for those who are seasoned adventures or just the Ontarian Vedra as well. So you can find me on Lucy [00:37:00] shepherd. And my website is Lyft shepherd.net and all the, all the normal social media is Lucy.

Shep’s amazing. And I suppose everyone listening is wondering what’s next. What’s next. Well, I hope, hope, hope, hope it will be the Arctic in a few weeks. Taking some guests out there and then after that, and it will be the big expedition that I have planned for autumn in the jungle. So fingers crossed.

We still see how how the world pans out until then. Did you see the Arctic in a few weeks? Yeah, so I meant, I meant to be going out there in March and April. So it doesn’t, this isn’t the two from us. No, I was going to say no, I’m optimistic. Good. Yeah, that is very optimistic on sort of looking at I’m looking at may and being like, Hmm, say that to me.

Don’t do that. I’ve got all my fingers [00:38:00] grasped. I’ll swim there if I have to. Yeah. That’s the best way. Yeah, I know that it could be a, that could be an adventure in itself. I think that or a death wish. Yeah. Well, Lacey, thank you so much for coming on today. Thank you very much for having me the pleasure, listening to your stories and especially trying to inspire people to get to the Amazon rainforest.

I think you suddenly I didn’t know if I did that. I’ll put them off. It was. But yeah we’ll, I’ll be following your trip when you eventually go and Conway to see the videos that come out on YouTube. Thank you very much. Well, that is it for today. Thank you so much for watching hit that like button.

If you got something out of it and subscribe, if you haven’t already and join us next week for another fascinating tale of adventure.

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