WEBVTT - Beau Miles on the Expedition That Changed His Life 0:00:00.320 --> 0:00:03.400 We'd like to acknowledge the traditional custodians of the land 0:00:03.520 --> 0:00:06.840 on which this podcast was produced, the Galligall people of 0:00:06.920 --> 0:00:10.440 the Urination. We pay our respects to Elder's past and present. 0:00:11.720 --> 0:00:16.920 Dear Diary, Today was quite rough and tough. The junes 0:00:16.960 --> 0:00:19.720 here are massive. The sea is not too bad that 0:00:19.760 --> 0:00:21.200 the wind's blowing the wrong direction. 0:00:21.760 --> 0:00:23.360 I'm over that. 0:00:23.480 --> 0:00:24.720 Think he's done in moderation. 0:00:24.880 --> 0:00:25.720 Everything's plenty of. 0:00:25.720 --> 0:00:28.880 One thing or the other. I've got a broken toe, 0:00:29.040 --> 0:00:31.680 chafed to the left arm and right nipple, and he's 0:00:31.760 --> 0:00:33.159 sure to stone the stink. 0:00:34.240 --> 0:00:37.839 It's two thousand and seven Women, Mozambique and Bow Miles 0:00:37.960 --> 0:00:39.800 is setting off on an epic. 0:00:39.520 --> 0:00:41.440 Journey around the coast of Africa. 0:00:42.479 --> 0:00:45.920 He's always been an adventurer, but this is his most 0:00:45.960 --> 0:00:49.960 audacious trip yet. His plan is to travel the next 0:00:50.000 --> 0:00:54.080 four thousand kilometers purely under his own steam in his small, 0:00:54.400 --> 0:00:58.800 one man kayak. For the next five months here faced 0:00:58.880 --> 0:01:02.680 huge swells, treacherous weather, and for six weeks of the 0:01:02.720 --> 0:01:07.760 trip he'd be entirely alone. He'll make it just over 0:01:07.840 --> 0:01:11.800 halfway before he decides to call it quids. But this 0:01:11.880 --> 0:01:15.200 half journey isn't the end more a beginning for a 0:01:15.280 --> 0:01:18.920 lifetime of adventures that will see Bow run six hundred 0:01:18.920 --> 0:01:22.440 and fifty kilometers through the Australian Alps, cross the bas 0:01:22.520 --> 0:01:27.119 Strait by kayak, run an hour a mile marathon, spend 0:01:27.160 --> 0:01:30.800 forty days eating only canned beans, and walk his daily 0:01:31.040 --> 0:01:38.200 ninety kilometer commute. I'm at Middleton and this is Headgame today, 0:01:38.600 --> 0:01:41.080 what it takes to live a life of adventure and 0:01:41.120 --> 0:01:44.000 how you can find it even in your own backyard. 0:01:48.360 --> 0:01:50.920 I'm extremely happy to say that I've got Bow miles 0:01:50.960 --> 0:01:56.760 in for my head Game podcast. You're an adventurer explorer. 0:01:56.840 --> 0:01:58.520 And when I say that to my son, because I'm 0:01:58.520 --> 0:02:00.960 the same, I say, oh Dad, what do you do? 0:02:01.040 --> 0:02:03.360 I said, I'm an adventurer and an explorer, and he 0:02:03.400 --> 0:02:04.280 says that that's not a. 0:02:04.280 --> 0:02:06.840 Real job, right. 0:02:09.600 --> 0:02:13.200 It's interesting that when I'm speaking to you, who is 0:02:13.280 --> 0:02:16.640 an adventurer and an explorer. Now take me back to 0:02:17.040 --> 0:02:21.400 what first ignited that sense of adventure in you bo? 0:02:21.520 --> 0:02:22.520 Where did that come from? 0:02:23.720 --> 0:02:26.760 I was my mum was pretty good at trying to 0:02:26.840 --> 0:02:30.520 keep me off the sporting field, so which are half 0:02:30.600 --> 0:02:33.359 worked and half didn't. But that involved things like golf 0:02:33.440 --> 0:02:37.280 lessons and books and things that weren't going to bang 0:02:37.320 --> 0:02:40.320 my head or injure my knees or legs or whatever. 0:02:40.720 --> 0:02:42.359 So your mom was keen to sort of wrap me 0:02:42.440 --> 0:02:43.720 up in a bit of cotton wool. 0:02:43.960 --> 0:02:44.840 Yeah, kind of. 0:02:44.840 --> 0:02:48.080 Well, she's a country kid, right, but she's also she 0:02:48.240 --> 0:02:50.840 was an emergency nurse, and so she just saw all 0:02:50.880 --> 0:02:53.720 the worst of humanity, I suppose when that comes across 0:02:53.760 --> 0:02:55.560 there in the et department. 0:02:55.600 --> 0:02:57.440 So which kind of worked. 0:02:57.480 --> 0:02:59.960 I didn't play much football as a kid, which I 0:03:00.000 --> 0:03:01.679 I think is great now I've got great knees and 0:03:01.720 --> 0:03:02.720 great ankles and whatever. 0:03:03.880 --> 0:03:06.040 But through the books that she bought me. 0:03:06.000 --> 0:03:08.280 I think from about I was never a reader until 0:03:08.280 --> 0:03:10.800 about fifteen, and then it sparked, and then I couldn't 0:03:10.919 --> 0:03:12.640 put a book down for five. 0:03:12.480 --> 0:03:14.040 Or I don't know, well forever. 0:03:14.160 --> 0:03:16.280 Really, I don't read as much now as I did 0:03:16.280 --> 0:03:17.919 as a kid, But as a kid I read lots 0:03:17.960 --> 0:03:21.800 of adventure stories the everest thing bit, you know, and 0:03:21.840 --> 0:03:23.520 I just thought, Wow, I want to go and have 0:03:23.560 --> 0:03:26.600 some grand adventures and go and see the world. 0:03:26.720 --> 0:03:29.760 So that's what really sparked your interests were books and 0:03:29.800 --> 0:03:34.400 then adventure through literacy, and yeah, did you read them 0:03:34.400 --> 0:03:36.920 and think I could do this, Yeah, exactly. Did it 0:03:36.960 --> 0:03:40.600 spark a journey for you to go out there and 0:03:40.600 --> 0:03:41.760 see what's about? 0:03:41.960 --> 0:03:45.040 Yeah, I can remember myself as a kid reading Roll 0:03:45.160 --> 0:03:48.400 Dahl and Danny. I think it was Danny the Champion 0:03:48.440 --> 0:03:50.360 of the World would go and he'd go and poach 0:03:50.480 --> 0:03:55.560 pheasants in some aristocracy, you know, in the behind the 0:03:55.720 --> 0:03:58.440 garden walls, you know. And I remember as a kid 0:03:58.520 --> 0:04:01.520 my heart rate rating thinking that is fun. 0:04:01.320 --> 0:04:01.920 That is cool. 0:04:01.960 --> 0:04:04.760 And I started to do little, smaller versions of that 0:04:04.840 --> 0:04:06.520 as a fifteen sixteen year old because I was a 0:04:06.520 --> 0:04:10.920 pretty meat kid. I wasn't overly adventurous, but yeah, that's 0:04:10.920 --> 0:04:13.120 where it started, and I can kind of trace it 0:04:13.160 --> 0:04:14.960 back to that, but it's taken me a lot of 0:04:15.000 --> 0:04:17.240 years to kind of redevelop my own form of it too, 0:04:17.320 --> 0:04:20.320 because I know you've been up Everest AWNT. But I 0:04:20.360 --> 0:04:22.960 went there as a nineteen year old, hiking around the 0:04:23.000 --> 0:04:26.240 place and doing some small little peaks, and it scared 0:04:26.240 --> 0:04:28.000 the heck out of me seeing those high mountains. 0:04:28.000 --> 0:04:29.080 I thought, Wow, this is scary. 0:04:29.120 --> 0:04:31.000 So I needed to go away and find my own 0:04:31.040 --> 0:04:32.640 form before I potentially go back. 0:04:32.760 --> 0:04:35.320 Yeah, I can imagine at nineteen Everest being scary because 0:04:35.520 --> 0:04:37.919 my first mounts in the iclone when I was seventeen 0:04:38.040 --> 0:04:41.599 was Snowden in the UK, and that was scary to me. 0:04:41.760 --> 0:04:45.360 So let alone seeing Everest at the age of nineteen. 0:04:46.120 --> 0:04:48.920 What was your first real adventure as a kid. 0:04:49.680 --> 0:04:51.760 Yeah, that it was the bursting the bubble. You know. 0:04:51.800 --> 0:04:55.880 So your circle of influence or your circle of where 0:04:55.880 --> 0:04:58.159 you're willing to go, gets bigger the older you get. 0:04:58.200 --> 0:05:00.600 Maybe it starts at the age of eight or ten. Hell, 0:05:00.680 --> 0:05:02.800 it starts at the age of too, right, you just know. 0:05:02.800 --> 0:05:04.839 It goes from twenty meters to fifty to one hundred 0:05:04.839 --> 0:05:07.760 to kilometer or whatever. And I remember at my dad 0:05:07.800 --> 0:05:10.800 was militant. He would never take me places if he 0:05:10.880 --> 0:05:14.000 didn't think it was worthwhile taking me there, and he'd 0:05:14.040 --> 0:05:16.800 be the only person that would know what's worthwhile or not. 0:05:16.880 --> 0:05:18.559 But he said, I can't go to a mate's place. 0:05:18.839 --> 0:05:20.120 You want to go there, go yourself. 0:05:20.160 --> 0:05:22.040 So I'm fourteen, maybe fifteen. 0:05:22.440 --> 0:05:24.919 I got a clapped out old bike and it's about 0:05:24.960 --> 0:05:27.520 thirty five ks to this friend's house over you know, 0:05:27.839 --> 0:05:30.320 several villages away, over mountains and through a bit of 0:05:30.320 --> 0:05:32.680 bush and some of it's dirt road and I thought, 0:05:32.720 --> 0:05:34.400 you know what, and I was scared the heck of 0:05:34.480 --> 0:05:36.760 doing it because I'd never done that. If I have 0:05:36.760 --> 0:05:38.360 a puncture, you know, what do I do? But I 0:05:38.440 --> 0:05:42.720 rode to this mate's place and feeling that, you know, 0:05:43.080 --> 0:05:46.560 I've gone beyond my boundary. This is full on and 0:05:46.600 --> 0:05:49.680 it's fantastic, and I'm using my body to do it. 0:05:49.720 --> 0:05:53.120 And so I recognized pretty early that, you know, the 0:05:53.120 --> 0:05:54.120 body is a really. 0:05:53.920 --> 0:05:56.920 Cool tool to just go places. And I've done it 0:05:56.960 --> 0:05:57.320 ever since. 0:05:57.440 --> 0:05:59.920 Yeah, your body's of the primary motor transport. 0:06:00.279 --> 0:06:02.480 You know. It's so easy nowadays to jump on a train, 0:06:02.640 --> 0:06:05.600 jump on a plane, jump in a car, where ultimately 0:06:05.600 --> 0:06:08.680 the adventure is with oneself. Right, is actually you know, 0:06:08.880 --> 0:06:12.840 moving yourself and getting into these locations yourself. 0:06:13.120 --> 0:06:17.440 Yeah, absolutely, And I look, hindsight's fantastic, and you have 0:06:17.680 --> 0:06:22.720 the sort of you know, you can articulate it as 0:06:22.720 --> 0:06:25.279 an adult that these are where these things were born. 0:06:25.400 --> 0:06:28.520 And I didn't recognize it then to some extent that 0:06:28.640 --> 0:06:31.560 it was just a young kid growing up. And I 0:06:31.600 --> 0:06:34.080 genuinely don't think I was a man until about twenty five, 0:06:34.160 --> 0:06:36.320 twenty six, so I still had sort of ten years 0:06:36.320 --> 0:06:39.640 of sort of boyhood, young adulthood still. 0:06:39.400 --> 0:06:39.880 In front of me. 0:06:39.920 --> 0:06:42.680 Where I was, I had no ambition, and now my 0:06:42.800 --> 0:06:45.480 outdoor stuff has turned into ambition and it has lots 0:06:45.520 --> 0:06:47.680 more layers to it. It was far more simplistic then, 0:06:47.760 --> 0:06:50.080 probably more pure, but of course it was a bit. 0:06:49.960 --> 0:06:51.640 Aimless as well. I was just doing it because it 0:06:51.640 --> 0:06:52.160 felt right. 0:06:52.200 --> 0:06:54.160 And what was the first adventure that you went on 0:06:54.240 --> 0:06:57.039 that gave you that sense of ambition that they gave 0:06:57.080 --> 0:06:59.600 you that sense of wow, Actually this is what it's 0:06:59.640 --> 0:07:00.320 all about. 0:07:01.120 --> 0:07:03.560 Well, I set off for Everest, you know. 0:07:03.560 --> 0:07:07.840 I read all the Everest literature and mountaineering literature from 0:07:07.880 --> 0:07:10.560 sort of the ages of sixteen through to eighteen, totally 0:07:12.480 --> 0:07:16.080 inspired by in some respects the tragedy of ninety six 0:07:16.120 --> 0:07:19.720 on Everest when all those people died this huge monumental 0:07:19.840 --> 0:07:24.720 May climbing season. So that I mean that in that 0:07:24.800 --> 0:07:28.120 tragedy inspired such interest, and so I went to Everest 0:07:28.280 --> 0:07:30.480 and that was that was one thing or another. But 0:07:30.520 --> 0:07:33.360 when I was truly I was never really at risk. 0:07:33.440 --> 0:07:36.000 There there's lots of villages around, there's other trekkers, hikers, 0:07:36.040 --> 0:07:38.600 other climbers, and I'm still just a young bloke. I'm 0:07:38.640 --> 0:07:42.280 not really being edgy yet My first edgy experience was 0:07:42.360 --> 0:07:46.200 solo sea kayaking off the Great Australian Byte, going out 0:07:46.240 --> 0:07:48.520 to see some islands off Sojuna, And that was where 0:07:48.560 --> 0:07:52.240 it was Rotto, okay, but you are you are accountable, 0:07:52.280 --> 0:07:54.480 you are everything, and you know you're going to have 0:07:54.520 --> 0:07:56.080 a good day or a bad day based on your 0:07:56.120 --> 0:07:59.400 decisions here. And that was I think I was twenty 0:07:59.440 --> 0:08:03.320 two or twenty so it was, like I say, emerging 0:08:03.320 --> 0:08:05.160 into that sort of I was no longer a boy. 0:08:05.240 --> 0:08:08.280 I was becoming an adult because I was making accountable decisions. 0:08:08.280 --> 0:08:12.040 And what sparked that decision to have that segue? You 0:08:12.080 --> 0:08:14.880 know it could because it's quite a segue to go, right, 0:08:14.920 --> 0:08:18.440 I'm going to hike around the Himalayas to then you know, 0:08:18.640 --> 0:08:23.120 jumping in a kayak and then putting yourself in that situation. 0:08:23.840 --> 0:08:26.520 I was by default. Really I really wanted. 0:08:26.560 --> 0:08:27.880 I wanted to do it, but it was supposed to 0:08:27.880 --> 0:08:29.880 be a friend's trip, me and a couple of mates. 0:08:29.920 --> 0:08:32.120 You know, we finished Uni, we graduate and let's go 0:08:32.160 --> 0:08:33.480 on a big sea kike trip for a couple of 0:08:33.520 --> 0:08:34.840 months around some islands. 0:08:35.640 --> 0:08:38.280 And they all pulled out. They got girlfriends. I did not. 0:08:38.600 --> 0:08:41.960 I was never much much good with girlfriends, and so 0:08:42.280 --> 0:08:44.760 off I went by myself, and so by default I 0:08:44.800 --> 0:08:48.760 was by myself, and I suspected I liked my own company, 0:08:48.800 --> 0:08:51.320 but it really hammered home then that Yep, I loved 0:08:51.400 --> 0:08:54.640 my own company. And so that was and sea kayaking 0:08:54.679 --> 0:08:59.160 is fantastic for that, that autonomy, your own speed, you know, 0:08:59.360 --> 0:09:01.520 you sort of go where the wind blows, literally, and 0:09:01.600 --> 0:09:04.760 so it was just great. I loved it and made 0:09:04.840 --> 0:09:09.240 enough mistakes to realize that I really liked improving, and 0:09:10.000 --> 0:09:11.920 made enough good calls to know that there was some 0:09:12.000 --> 0:09:13.319 really amazing moments in there. 0:09:13.480 --> 0:09:16.320 Yeah, and there's a there's adventure, and then there's you know, 0:09:17.240 --> 0:09:25.800 versatility in adventure, you know, hiking, kayaking, you know, going 0:09:25.840 --> 0:09:31.480 off by yourself. This segue thereafter again with this epic 0:09:31.559 --> 0:09:36.800 journey around the coast of Africa. What made you decide 0:09:36.880 --> 0:09:41.120 to do that? And where did that idea come from? 0:09:42.320 --> 0:09:44.160 I was still very much I had my head in 0:09:44.160 --> 0:09:48.120 the sand, really, and my early filmmaking stuff was pretty crap, 0:09:48.240 --> 0:09:50.120 and to be honest, it was very I was trying 0:09:50.120 --> 0:09:52.200 to look for heroic moments. So I was trying to 0:09:52.200 --> 0:09:55.679 look for something that was long winded enough to get 0:09:55.720 --> 0:09:58.000 respect just by sheer fact of doing it. You know, 0:09:58.600 --> 0:10:02.400 it didn't have it didn't have as much humility every day, 0:10:02.520 --> 0:10:06.800 no, nor creativity, you know. I think adventures need all those things. 0:10:06.840 --> 0:10:11.600 But Africa came about because of the relative success of 0:10:11.640 --> 0:10:15.199 me going six weeks alone across these islands in Australia. 0:10:15.280 --> 0:10:17.000 So I was in esperance. 0:10:17.120 --> 0:10:19.720 I was drunk in the pub and I thought, you 0:10:19.760 --> 0:10:21.880 know what, I'm going to up the ante here. And 0:10:22.120 --> 0:10:24.600 I came back home and this is Google it only 0:10:24.640 --> 0:10:26.959 really Google didn't really exist. But I did some research 0:10:27.000 --> 0:10:31.400 into people paddling in Africa, or South Africa, or around 0:10:31.440 --> 0:10:34.520 the sort of southern half of Africa, so you know, 0:10:34.720 --> 0:10:37.800 south of the equator, and very few big expeditions had 0:10:37.840 --> 0:10:38.720 been done there. 0:10:39.320 --> 0:10:43.600 Especially not alone. So I trained up for it and planned, 0:10:43.640 --> 0:10:45.600 and that all went out the windows. I hit Africa. 0:10:45.640 --> 0:10:48.200 But four years from when I did the Australian trip 0:10:48.200 --> 0:10:51.760 to when I did the African trip, and away I went, 0:10:51.840 --> 0:10:55.679 and yeah, I changed my life absolutely, that big expedition. 0:10:56.360 --> 0:10:57.720 Learned a lot about a lot. 0:10:58.000 --> 0:11:01.360 Yeah that's great, mate, because there's always a purpose and 0:11:01.400 --> 0:11:05.199 always a cause. And as much as the adventure was 0:11:05.280 --> 0:11:09.480 on your side, there's also filmmaking you love, you loved 0:11:09.520 --> 0:11:14.280 documenting and your adventures along the way. Was that another 0:11:14.360 --> 0:11:17.560 passion of yours? Did they sort of merge together or 0:11:18.280 --> 0:11:19.720 did one sort of lead the other? 0:11:20.760 --> 0:11:21.600 Yeah, they're kind of. 0:11:22.679 --> 0:11:25.640 I kind of used it to justify going away and 0:11:25.679 --> 0:11:29.560 instead of earning proper money doing all sorts of other things, 0:11:29.559 --> 0:11:31.600 I thought, how do I go and have an adventure 0:11:31.640 --> 0:11:33.680 but it maybe earn some money out of it, or 0:11:33.720 --> 0:11:36.320 maybe make a job of it. And so I was 0:11:36.360 --> 0:11:39.920 interested enough in you know, there's not many folks around 0:11:39.920 --> 0:11:44.000 that don't love a good story being told via a 0:11:44.040 --> 0:11:47.160 screen medium, whether it's cinema or TV or you know, 0:11:47.480 --> 0:11:50.640 a game show. There can be just great versions of it. 0:11:50.720 --> 0:11:54.360 So humans love it, and so I thought, how do I? 0:11:54.400 --> 0:11:57.439 And it's challenging too, you know, it's making films is 0:11:57.840 --> 0:11:59.960 freaking hard work. So I took that challenge on board. 0:12:00.000 --> 0:12:02.000 But I was not a natural sea person. I wasn't 0:12:02.000 --> 0:12:03.120 a natural filmmaker. 0:12:03.600 --> 0:12:05.200 So let's just see how they go. I knew I 0:12:05.200 --> 0:12:07.600 had to work at both of them. But I do 0:12:07.679 --> 0:12:08.120 love making. 0:12:08.280 --> 0:12:11.719 I love shot making, and yet I'm not a I 0:12:11.760 --> 0:12:13.520 think I'm a natural shot maker, but I'm not a 0:12:13.600 --> 0:12:17.400 natural technician in films. I've got partners now in Michigan, 0:12:17.440 --> 0:12:19.280 Guy I make films with. He's a much better shot 0:12:19.280 --> 0:12:22.760 maker than me because I'm so busy about bloody doing things. 0:12:22.760 --> 0:12:25.480 But I can recognize a good shot and I loved 0:12:25.520 --> 0:12:26.280 that from the get go. 0:12:26.840 --> 0:12:28.560 And you've got a PhD? Is that correct? 0:12:29.360 --> 0:12:30.000 Yeah? 0:12:30.000 --> 0:12:32.840 It's good for a doorstop, and I've got I've got 0:12:32.840 --> 0:12:35.200 a whole box of them. I worked at a university, 0:12:35.280 --> 0:12:37.800 and your currency at the university is to get a PhD. 0:12:37.960 --> 0:12:40.240 So that was kind of part and parcel of it. 0:12:40.320 --> 0:12:44.560 And it's about expeditionary life and about the benefits of 0:12:44.600 --> 0:12:46.120 that in an educational setting. 0:12:46.679 --> 0:12:48.120 So that's kind of what I wrote about. 0:12:48.160 --> 0:12:50.240 There's a lot of schools and programs out there that 0:12:50.320 --> 0:12:51.719 take young folks out there and. 0:12:51.679 --> 0:12:52.880 This sort of support of that. 0:12:53.040 --> 0:12:55.880 And talk us through what you documented for your PhD. 0:12:55.960 --> 0:12:59.280 It was the four hundred k kayak journey across the 0:12:59.320 --> 0:13:04.000 bas streets. Now, coh, that's that's some adventure. 0:13:04.480 --> 0:13:06.240 Well it seems like it, but it's a bit of 0:13:06.280 --> 0:13:09.360 a pussy cat really. It can get very yeah, I 0:13:09.400 --> 0:13:13.040 mean yeah, mate, you're yeah. The stuff you've done is 0:13:13.440 --> 0:13:15.800 well compared to that in some respects it was pretty 0:13:15.800 --> 0:13:18.880 tame in a sense that Bastra can get very angry 0:13:18.960 --> 0:13:22.320 very quickly. But otherwise it's very it's very paddleable and 0:13:22.440 --> 0:13:23.400 comes down very quickly. 0:13:23.440 --> 0:13:27.120 It's very shallow. So with our forecasting these days. 0:13:26.880 --> 0:13:29.880 And a smartphone in you in your hatch, you're fine. 0:13:29.920 --> 0:13:31.360 You just got to go on a good day and 0:13:31.440 --> 0:13:33.840 be willing to you know, if you if you cap 0:13:33.880 --> 0:13:36.160 out right, I'm willing to paddle in eiden knots, then 0:13:36.240 --> 0:13:38.880 you just you don't go out in anything other over 0:13:38.880 --> 0:13:41.080 eighty knots and that's it. You just that's that's your day. 0:13:41.200 --> 0:13:44.440 So you kind of try to draw a line in 0:13:44.480 --> 0:13:47.200 the sand and life becomes pretty easy as an expeditionary 0:13:47.200 --> 0:13:48.880 seat with good comms, you know. 0:13:48.960 --> 0:13:51.679 So you do that twenty five years ago. 0:13:51.520 --> 0:13:54.640 When you're relying on a barometer and looking to the 0:13:54.640 --> 0:13:56.240 sky a bit more and you're going to get into 0:13:56.280 --> 0:14:01.200 some more Gnali situations. But these days, with thephisticated stuff 0:14:01.240 --> 0:14:03.160 we have in our pocket, that's remarkably easy. 0:14:03.240 --> 0:14:06.000 What did you learn from that expedition? 0:14:06.600 --> 0:14:08.800 I learned lots in a sense that that's where the 0:14:09.400 --> 0:14:13.680 sort of the do things a bit differently bug might 0:14:13.679 --> 0:14:16.520 have bitten, you know, I thought these are you know, 0:14:16.600 --> 0:14:18.960 take Africa for example, that was a It was a 0:14:19.000 --> 0:14:25.360 six month expedition on single on dirt, poor. I'm having 0:14:25.360 --> 0:14:29.600 a grand, existential, amazing experience as a young bloke. But 0:14:29.680 --> 0:14:32.120 I come back and I've got twenty hours where the 0:14:32.160 --> 0:14:35.040 footage I end up making a fifty minute film takes 0:14:35.040 --> 0:14:37.640 three years to make the film. There's an awful lot 0:14:37.640 --> 0:14:40.880 of one experience that goes into just one idea in 0:14:40.920 --> 0:14:45.200 one story whilst out on you know, crossing bas straight. 0:14:45.400 --> 0:14:47.840 Ten years later, I wanted to make I want more 0:14:47.880 --> 0:14:51.120 bang for buck for my adventure. Nowadays, that doesn't need 0:14:51.160 --> 0:14:53.760 to be as long. It doesn't need to be as 0:14:54.680 --> 0:14:57.760 I don't need to be at the breadline of life 0:14:57.760 --> 0:15:01.360 and death. I can come back a notch and I 0:15:01.440 --> 0:15:02.960 kind of I want to be homeful. And I'm in 0:15:03.000 --> 0:15:05.960 relationships now too, you know. So I'm a married man 0:15:06.000 --> 0:15:06.480 with kids. 0:15:06.520 --> 0:15:08.040 I can't bugger off for six months. 0:15:08.080 --> 0:15:10.480 So I need to try and package my adventurous world 0:15:10.560 --> 0:15:14.040 into a long weekend or overnight or twenty four hours 0:15:14.120 --> 0:15:16.040 or a week, you know, rather than go on these 0:15:16.040 --> 0:15:19.720 big ones. So what's the difference between Everest and crossing 0:15:19.760 --> 0:15:23.120 the Spacific and coming back and doing your own boyhood 0:15:23.200 --> 0:15:25.320 river and sitting up a tree for a day. You know, 0:15:26.160 --> 0:15:28.880 you can you sort of trick yourself into thinking that 0:15:28.920 --> 0:15:31.440 these things are adventurous. And I think it's that's tough. 0:15:31.480 --> 0:15:34.480 True, But you had a six part series on YouTube 0:15:34.560 --> 0:15:38.440 which ultimately set the tone for you. It changed your life, 0:15:38.480 --> 0:15:40.200 not as in, you know, change your life, but it 0:15:40.360 --> 0:15:44.120 changed your way of of now thinking, Wow, this is 0:15:44.280 --> 0:15:46.480 this actually works. You know, this is this is getting 0:15:46.520 --> 0:15:48.120 a lot of traction. It's getting a lot of attention. 0:15:49.560 --> 0:15:51.000 Let's go on to the next. 0:15:51.480 --> 0:15:53.640 Well, I think what you've touched on there and is 0:15:53.680 --> 0:15:55.840 that I mean, I was an ever I was not 0:15:55.880 --> 0:15:58.160 an overnight success on YouTube, and even now I'm just 0:15:58.240 --> 0:16:00.440 a I'm kind of a small fish and a bit pond. 0:16:00.440 --> 0:16:02.600 But there's a lot of us watching YouTube too, so 0:16:02.840 --> 0:16:05.760 can we. But what it did do is. 0:16:07.360 --> 0:16:09.600 It kind of made me realize that I was always 0:16:10.200 --> 0:16:13.080 one of those grand stories and I was a filmmaker. 0:16:13.440 --> 0:16:15.400 You know, there was for ten years I wanted to 0:16:15.400 --> 0:16:17.000 make a grand story and be a filmmaker. 0:16:17.000 --> 0:16:19.400 And none of it was overly success. None of it 0:16:19.440 --> 0:16:20.400 was successful period. 0:16:21.360 --> 0:16:24.280 But the smaller bite sized chunks of bass by Kayke 0:16:24.320 --> 0:16:28.160 in ten minute installments on a platform that's very inclusive. 0:16:28.520 --> 0:16:32.960 You know, YouTube's are positive social media, and it's in 0:16:33.280 --> 0:16:35.240 most people's pockets. You know, most of the world now, 0:16:35.280 --> 0:16:37.080 I think it's seventy five eighty percent of the world 0:16:37.200 --> 0:16:43.080 has Internet capacity. You're in all of those people's lives potentially, 0:16:43.120 --> 0:16:45.440 And so I thought, you know what, rather than become 0:16:45.480 --> 0:16:50.120 this sort of cinema esque feature filmy filmmaker guy that 0:16:50.200 --> 0:16:53.880 takes yourself seriously, just produce stuff and put it in 0:16:53.920 --> 0:16:57.080 people's pockets. And I'm sort of I'm sort of half 0:16:57.080 --> 0:17:00.080 flipping on it now because there's also oppression in being 0:17:00.120 --> 0:17:02.920 a YouTuber because it's relentless, right, I've just got a 0:17:02.920 --> 0:17:04.960 big I've got to be a two week storyteller and 0:17:04.960 --> 0:17:08.560 that's freaking hard. But otherwise, the actual platform and the 0:17:08.600 --> 0:17:11.120 creative outlet I think is great and I love it. 0:17:11.400 --> 0:17:12.960 We've skipped over Africa. 0:17:13.040 --> 0:17:18.720 Take me impact to that adventure, that expedition. What was 0:17:18.760 --> 0:17:20.960 the idea, what what why did you set out to 0:17:21.000 --> 0:17:22.200 do that that expedition? 0:17:23.359 --> 0:17:24.880 What was the purpose behind it? 0:17:25.400 --> 0:17:25.560 Oh? 0:17:25.640 --> 0:17:28.320 Well, there's yeah, so there was no charity. It's just 0:17:28.480 --> 0:17:31.439 bo trying to do his thing. I must have been. 0:17:31.480 --> 0:17:35.040 I got nervous about six months out planning for this 0:17:35.760 --> 0:17:38.159 and invited then some friends to come along with. 0:17:38.160 --> 0:17:39.880 Thought, right, how do I sort of you've. 0:17:39.760 --> 0:17:41.320 Got nervous doing it yourself? 0:17:41.359 --> 0:17:42.840 You thought, do you know what it's too it's too 0:17:42.880 --> 0:17:44.679 big to take off by myself. 0:17:44.920 --> 0:17:47.520 But it's solo at sea. It's a bit like free 0:17:47.560 --> 0:17:52.600 soloing rock. You know, there's it's complete accountability. And the 0:17:52.680 --> 0:17:54.840 sea is a scary place. A big sea is a 0:17:54.880 --> 0:17:57.800 scary place. And you know I had I didn't have 0:17:57.880 --> 0:18:00.720 charts at aviation maps, and you know, I'm going and 0:18:00.800 --> 0:18:02.680 sort of half cooked because Google wasn't around. 0:18:02.720 --> 0:18:04.959 Then. You just got to do as much research as 0:18:04.960 --> 0:18:05.199 you can. 0:18:05.240 --> 0:18:06.240 And how did the expedition? 0:18:06.320 --> 0:18:06.560 Look? 0:18:07.600 --> 0:18:08.679 What were you trying to achieve? 0:18:08.840 --> 0:18:10.199 It was all set out to be. 0:18:10.280 --> 0:18:13.280 I'm going to paddle from the Tropic of Capricorn on 0:18:13.359 --> 0:18:15.359 the east to the Tropic of Capricorn on the west. 0:18:15.359 --> 0:18:18.640 So start in Mozambique and finish in Namibia. And so 0:18:18.800 --> 0:18:21.560 I started about I don't know twenty or thirty nautical 0:18:21.600 --> 0:18:24.920 miles north of the Tropic of Capricorn in them Barney 0:18:25.680 --> 0:18:27.679 and I go and I have with me for the 0:18:27.720 --> 0:18:30.960 first month or six weeks. This Kiwi bloke, he's a sailor, 0:18:31.280 --> 0:18:33.919 really good with the sea, and a lovely bloke too. 0:18:33.920 --> 0:18:36.760 And Kiwi's are hardy. Kiwi's are just they're just, you know, 0:18:36.880 --> 0:18:41.320 the bloody getting sort of folks. And so off we 0:18:41.400 --> 0:18:44.600 go and everything kind of works enough. You know, we 0:18:44.680 --> 0:18:47.360 make lots of rookie mistakes, and the trade winds kick 0:18:47.400 --> 0:18:50.439 our ass, and you know, the locals are very friendly, 0:18:50.520 --> 0:18:52.600 but we find it really hard just to get water 0:18:52.680 --> 0:18:54.119 and food, and you know, we go through all these 0:18:54.160 --> 0:18:58.840 sort of trials. Jared, my Keiwii mate, he gets malaria 0:18:58.880 --> 0:19:01.760 and we have to overh to visa, so we have 0:19:01.800 --> 0:19:03.240 to illegally get him out of the country. 0:19:03.240 --> 0:19:05.719 And then I set off on my own for a 0:19:05.720 --> 0:19:06.399 couple of months. 0:19:07.160 --> 0:19:09.520 And that's where and that's where the Bo the Boy 0:19:09.600 --> 0:19:12.480 becomes Bo the Man, almost almost overnight. You know, it 0:19:12.520 --> 0:19:16.840 was sort of to make those decisions, and I've never 0:19:16.880 --> 0:19:19.479 been scared at moments during that. 0:19:19.680 --> 0:19:21.760 Take me through, Take me through a day by yourself, 0:19:21.840 --> 0:19:24.240 you know, when you've got other people, you're you know, 0:19:24.320 --> 0:19:29.479 you're collectively decision making this problem solving. You find yourself 0:19:29.520 --> 0:19:32.080 by yourself a trip that you didn't want to be 0:19:32.200 --> 0:19:35.680 by yourself. Right, let's be honest, and now you'll find 0:19:35.720 --> 0:19:36.720 yourself by yourself. 0:19:37.080 --> 0:19:38.760 Yeah, it was sort of careful what you wish for, 0:19:38.840 --> 0:19:42.160 you know. So the rule of thumb was with Jared. 0:19:42.320 --> 0:19:44.600 So the rule of thumb was, if one of us 0:19:44.640 --> 0:19:46.960 can get out through the shorebreak, then they wait out 0:19:47.240 --> 0:19:49.080 past the shore break until the other one can get it. 0:19:49.119 --> 0:19:51.800 And sometimes it'll take an hour for one or other 0:19:51.840 --> 0:19:53.800 of us to get out through the shorebreak, which is 0:19:53.920 --> 0:19:57.879 fierce in Mozambique. It's steep, it's relentless, and it's just 0:19:57.920 --> 0:20:02.640 always there. So by yourself going out through a shore break, 0:20:02.720 --> 0:20:04.639 I'd allow myself an hour each day to try and 0:20:04.640 --> 0:20:06.720 get out without you. So you get out, you get 0:20:06.720 --> 0:20:08.679 smacked and hammered and pulled out of your kayake. You 0:20:08.720 --> 0:20:11.520 can't roll because they just it's surf. It just pulls 0:20:11.520 --> 0:20:14.040 you out. You wash up on the beach and you 0:20:14.080 --> 0:20:16.320 collect or your crap up and you pump your boat out. 0:20:16.359 --> 0:20:17.520 You get back in in a way you go. 0:20:19.440 --> 0:20:23.080 And so every morning was okay, I'm sitting now, I'll 0:20:23.080 --> 0:20:25.159 have my whatever I'm eating and drinking that morning in 0:20:25.160 --> 0:20:27.800 the dunes, I slowly pack. I'll get up before dawn, 0:20:27.840 --> 0:20:30.560 you know, the first crack of bird, and then I'm 0:20:30.680 --> 0:20:32.560 just I'm down on the beach and at first light, 0:20:32.560 --> 0:20:35.560 I want to be on the water, and i'd sit 0:20:35.600 --> 0:20:37.920 there eating whatever I'm eating, and I don't take my 0:20:38.000 --> 0:20:40.680 eyes off the surf and my eyes off the water conditions, 0:20:40.720 --> 0:20:43.119 and where is the best spot to get out? Where's 0:20:43.160 --> 0:20:46.040 the low brake, what are the sets doing, where's the reef, 0:20:46.520 --> 0:20:50.520 what's the tide doing. Mozambique lacks a lot of and 0:20:50.600 --> 0:20:53.160 so does northern South Africa. Lacks a lot of headlands. 0:20:53.160 --> 0:20:56.200 It's just beach, and it's beach for twenty or thirty 0:20:56.240 --> 0:20:58.720 k's and there might be a small extinct headland which 0:20:58.760 --> 0:21:01.560 is basically just a a bulbous section of the beach. 0:21:02.480 --> 0:21:03.479 That's what you're gunning for. 0:21:03.560 --> 0:21:06.080 You're just looking for anywhere that's got the least or 0:21:06.119 --> 0:21:08.480 some sort of lea side, like a little fold point, 0:21:08.600 --> 0:21:11.120 or somewhere where the swell and the movement of water 0:21:11.240 --> 0:21:14.040 is less, or you're looking for something like a rip. 0:21:14.200 --> 0:21:16.480 You know, you're looking for water to be traveling back 0:21:16.520 --> 0:21:18.320 out to sea, and you want to get on that train. 0:21:20.160 --> 0:21:22.800 But it's all moving too, and low tide to high 0:21:22.840 --> 0:21:24.800 tide is always shifting. So you might have come in 0:21:24.800 --> 0:21:27.000 on a high tide, you got all this water in 0:21:27.000 --> 0:21:29.119 front of You're fantastic, But you get up in the 0:21:29.160 --> 0:21:31.399 morning and it's low tide and you've got four hundred 0:21:31.400 --> 0:21:33.159 meters of reef in front of you, you know. So 0:21:34.000 --> 0:21:36.119 I was often having to drag my kayak down to 0:21:36.200 --> 0:21:39.760 a small headland or somewhere that looks like it's. 0:21:39.600 --> 0:21:43.040 More well easier to get out. So it was the 0:21:43.080 --> 0:21:45.919 constant dance of that and the language barriers. 0:21:45.920 --> 0:21:48.680 I didn't speak the local languages, so asking a local 0:21:48.800 --> 0:21:49.640 was somewhat useless. 0:21:49.640 --> 0:21:52.560 And they're just seeing some alien dude rock up on 0:21:52.600 --> 0:21:55.360 their coast, you know. They the I'm not sure whether 0:21:55.359 --> 0:21:56.560 they should help you r rob you in. 0:21:58.600 --> 0:22:01.840 So how do you feel when you're by yourself and me? 0:22:01.960 --> 0:22:02.760 How you know? 0:22:02.880 --> 0:22:07.240 How how isolating is it? You've now by yourself, You've 0:22:07.280 --> 0:22:10.840 got quite a journey ahead of you. What you're feeling, 0:22:10.880 --> 0:22:13.480 are you're thinking about you know, turning it in or 0:22:13.720 --> 0:22:14.680 you just got you. 0:22:14.720 --> 0:22:16.399 Just say I'm going to I'm going to finish this. 0:22:16.920 --> 0:22:17.520 Bit of both. 0:22:17.560 --> 0:22:21.320 The trouble is I mean to to sort of I 0:22:21.359 --> 0:22:25.000 have an okay trigger, you know, as in, I'll pull 0:22:25.080 --> 0:22:26.960 the pin when I know that it's going to do 0:22:27.000 --> 0:22:29.399 either long term damage or I just can't go on 0:22:30.720 --> 0:22:32.919 with my run across the Australian Alps, it was very 0:22:32.960 --> 0:22:35.800 much the same. I plugged on because I knew my 0:22:35.880 --> 0:22:37.520 leg wasn't was still okay. 0:22:37.640 --> 0:22:39.520 It was okay. I was injured, but it was okay enough. 0:22:39.560 --> 0:22:41.080 And with Africa, if I'd pulled the. 0:22:41.040 --> 0:22:46.080 Pin anytime sooner, that was just an impatience thing or 0:22:46.119 --> 0:22:47.600 would have been a knee jerk thing. 0:22:47.640 --> 0:22:48.800 And I knew I kind of had to. 0:22:49.240 --> 0:22:52.520 I don't enjoy suffering, but I don't mind if it 0:22:52.600 --> 0:22:54.400 when it's sort of a means to an end either. 0:22:55.640 --> 0:22:57.720 And I started to think in smaller chunks then to 0:22:57.800 --> 0:23:01.280 get to Durban, re evaluate, get to Cape Town, see 0:23:01.320 --> 0:23:03.720 what happened, just just to use those chunks of time. 0:23:03.960 --> 0:23:07.760 And so that's what I do. It's, you know, and 0:23:07.760 --> 0:23:10.280 then that's a classic tale, isn't it of adventures. It's 0:23:10.280 --> 0:23:12.160 a breakdown time and movement distantly. 0:23:12.640 --> 0:23:14.239 When do you finish and how do you feel that 0:23:14.280 --> 0:23:16.720 you've you've you've you've you've finished this trip? 0:23:17.080 --> 0:23:20.160 You know, we have defining moments in our life, don't 0:23:20.160 --> 0:23:22.960 we and finishing Africa or getting to I got to 0:23:23.040 --> 0:23:24.399 Cape Town. 0:23:24.000 --> 0:23:25.200 I'd had to. 0:23:25.080 --> 0:23:27.479 Borrow a paddle at that stage because I'd lost a paddle, 0:23:27.600 --> 0:23:29.840 and so I was using this new fangled paddle of 0:23:29.960 --> 0:23:31.760 scoop paddle and I had ten and I was all 0:23:31.920 --> 0:23:32.440 through my arms. 0:23:32.440 --> 0:23:34.960 It was too stiff and too fast for I'll plug 0:23:35.080 --> 0:23:35.400 it here. 0:23:35.960 --> 0:23:38.320 And so I was, you know, and I was in 0:23:38.359 --> 0:23:40.840 love with like three women. I had negative money in 0:23:40.880 --> 0:23:41.600 my bank account. 0:23:41.720 --> 0:23:42.680 It was just shit. 0:23:43.520 --> 0:23:45.040 Talk to me about these three women. 0:23:45.600 --> 0:23:47.920 Well I one in England, one in South Africa and 0:23:47.960 --> 0:23:51.159 one in Australia. And along the way mate, Well no 0:23:51.359 --> 0:23:53.679 I didn't want to, but you know, these things just happened, 0:23:53.720 --> 0:23:55.560 you know. And so I'm in a bit of a 0:23:55.640 --> 0:24:00.760 rock and a hard place emotionally and physically economically, which 0:24:00.800 --> 0:24:02.919 is which is good for adventure, you know, when you 0:24:02.960 --> 0:24:05.880 push yourself into a corner. But I had to pull 0:24:05.920 --> 0:24:08.159 the pin. Then it's you know, the seasonal stuff, and 0:24:08.160 --> 0:24:09.520 getting up to Na Bibia was going to be a 0:24:09.520 --> 0:24:13.640 political nightmare too, So that was a relatively easy decision 0:24:13.640 --> 0:24:15.399 to stop the trip. It was a month short of 0:24:15.400 --> 0:24:17.080 when I wanted to be, but I was way I 0:24:17.119 --> 0:24:18.960 was way short of where I wanted to be physically 0:24:18.960 --> 0:24:20.120 anyway geographically. 0:24:20.280 --> 0:24:21.080 So you pull the pin. 0:24:21.880 --> 0:24:23.840 Was that quite a bittersweet moment where you were just like, 0:24:23.880 --> 0:24:27.440 pull the pin, forget about the footage? You know? Did 0:24:27.480 --> 0:24:30.680 you feel disappointed? Did you feel like absolutely yourself down? 0:24:30.720 --> 0:24:32.719 Did it? And the more that you, you know, the 0:24:32.720 --> 0:24:34.960 more that you sort of sit and dwell on it, 0:24:35.040 --> 0:24:37.800 the more it agitates you, the more the deeper that 0:24:37.840 --> 0:24:38.600 footage gets. 0:24:38.680 --> 0:24:42.000 Right, totally, it was a bit of a festa. And I, 0:24:42.280 --> 0:24:44.520 you know, this is where this whole notion of success 0:24:44.600 --> 0:24:48.240 comes in. There was there were lots successful about that trip, 0:24:48.320 --> 0:24:50.359 but more unsuccessful I felt, you know. 0:24:50.480 --> 0:24:51.520 So I came home with a. 0:24:51.440 --> 0:24:53.600 Bit of a I don't know, a bit of a 0:24:53.640 --> 0:24:56.800 debbie down atmosphere about me. I just thought that what 0:24:56.920 --> 0:25:02.200 I'd taken on was overly ambitious, not enough training or research, 0:25:02.400 --> 0:25:05.000 and just a bit a bit ad hoc. And I thought, bo, 0:25:05.160 --> 0:25:07.280 you've probably pulled the trigger on this a bit early. 0:25:07.880 --> 0:25:09.280 You probably need to be a bit more of a 0:25:09.320 --> 0:25:11.480 salty to do this for a longer period of time, 0:25:11.520 --> 0:25:12.880 in a different phase of your life. 0:25:12.880 --> 0:25:13.080 You know. 0:25:13.160 --> 0:25:15.480 I just I felt like I cocked it up my 0:25:15.640 --> 0:25:19.919 sort of one opportunity to have a grand adventure before 0:25:20.280 --> 0:25:21.479 serious life kicked in. 0:25:21.560 --> 0:25:23.800 I'd sort of miss misstepped on. 0:25:23.920 --> 0:25:27.679 I thought, and so I was pretty cross at myself 0:25:27.680 --> 0:25:29.760 with that, and sort of that's why the footage sat 0:25:29.760 --> 0:25:31.320 in a box and I went off and did shorter 0:25:31.400 --> 0:25:33.119 stuff and then some money and whatever. 0:25:33.320 --> 0:25:35.000 You done six weeks solo paddling. 0:25:35.440 --> 0:25:39.560 It's being an adventurer. Did you not just think, right, 0:25:39.600 --> 0:25:42.840 let's just take the take the positives from the journey, 0:25:43.800 --> 0:25:46.000 implement them and use them for the for the next 0:25:46.000 --> 0:25:47.880 big adventure, because ultimately that was. 0:25:47.800 --> 0:25:49.000 Coming right, Let's be honest. 0:25:49.080 --> 0:25:52.119 Yeah, I do now, I absolutely do now. But I 0:25:52.160 --> 0:25:54.359 was I suppose I sulked a bit, you know, I 0:25:54.400 --> 0:25:56.480 was still I've always been a positive dude. 0:25:56.480 --> 0:25:58.680 But I think I got home and I was. 0:25:58.640 --> 0:26:02.720 A bit of woe is me because I didn't climb 0:26:03.280 --> 0:26:06.440 climb the peak that I wanted to climb. So I've 0:26:06.480 --> 0:26:09.520 had to learn that maturity. And yeah, that was sort 0:26:09.560 --> 0:26:11.359 of where it all set off from. 0:26:11.440 --> 0:26:14.240 When did you think, right, let's get this switchage out, 0:26:14.320 --> 0:26:17.480 let's actually make something of it. Unless you bring something 0:26:17.480 --> 0:26:18.680 positive from the journey. 0:26:19.480 --> 0:26:22.119 Well, as we know, some of the best stories of 0:26:22.160 --> 0:26:25.880 all time are created with animosity or when you don't 0:26:25.880 --> 0:26:31.000 succeed thought right, and so humility then percolated to the surface. 0:26:31.040 --> 0:26:35.000 It wasn't I failed at my trip. I failed at 0:26:35.000 --> 0:26:37.720 my original intention. Whereas you're right, there was so much 0:26:37.760 --> 0:26:40.719 good stuff in there. The people were amazing, the landscape 0:26:40.800 --> 0:26:43.800 is remarkable. I scared the bollocks out of myself. I 0:26:43.840 --> 0:26:47.000 went lots of highs and lows and all that great stuff. 0:26:47.480 --> 0:26:49.800 It just didn't quite have the end result that I wanted. 0:26:49.800 --> 0:26:53.359 But after a year or two of getting on with 0:26:53.400 --> 0:26:55.600 things and sulking somewhat, it was like, right, come on, 0:26:55.760 --> 0:26:58.400 make something of this, and positivity kick back in. I'm 0:26:58.400 --> 0:27:01.520 a natural optimist, and let's make a story out of 0:27:01.200 --> 0:27:02.080 this thing. 0:27:02.119 --> 0:27:05.959 And you're an incredible storyteller as well. So you know, 0:27:06.280 --> 0:27:08.359 looking back at that footage, sure, I'll. 0:27:08.200 --> 0:27:10.840 Tell you what well, and maybe you stumbled upon it. 0:27:10.920 --> 0:27:14.040 I wasn't until I started making that film, because I 0:27:14.080 --> 0:27:17.320 realized I had to be a humble I didn't do 0:27:17.480 --> 0:27:19.320 all the things I set out and I told people 0:27:19.359 --> 0:27:21.200 I would just do I thought I'd do all those things, 0:27:21.280 --> 0:27:23.440 and I didn't, and so I had to eat my 0:27:23.520 --> 0:27:25.879 humble pie and become a different kind of storyteller. 0:27:25.880 --> 0:27:27.560 And I think that sort of started me off on 0:27:27.600 --> 0:27:29.160 this path of. 0:27:30.640 --> 0:27:32.240 You don't have to be a hero bo, just go 0:27:32.359 --> 0:27:40.280 and have a great time and shoot the every day. 0:27:43.800 --> 0:27:48.400 Did you receive some bad news about a fellow kayaker 0:27:48.720 --> 0:27:53.760 that passed away trying to paddle from Australia to New Zealand? 0:27:53.840 --> 0:27:55.600 How did that hit you? Join that? 0:27:55.680 --> 0:28:00.200 And was that one of the defying moments that sort 0:28:00.200 --> 0:28:04.960 of defleated you and gave you made you decide to 0:28:05.400 --> 0:28:06.040 call it a day. 0:28:07.160 --> 0:28:10.320 It was part of it. It's probably where doubt started 0:28:10.320 --> 0:28:13.920 to trickle in of this confident young bloke who was there. 0:28:13.960 --> 0:28:16.200 And Jared was still with me at that stage. He 0:28:16.280 --> 0:28:20.760 was he wasn't yet sick, and he filmed me being 0:28:20.840 --> 0:28:23.520 I used to do a live radio across Australia each 0:28:23.560 --> 0:28:26.960 week and I'm alive on radio to ABC in Australia 0:28:27.880 --> 0:28:31.040 and the presenter says that Andrew who'd set off a 0:28:31.080 --> 0:28:35.080 similar time to me, and I talked to before he left, 0:28:35.359 --> 0:28:38.320 and he's a world class He was like the Alex 0:28:38.360 --> 0:28:41.520 Honold of the solo sea kayiking world at that time, 0:28:41.600 --> 0:28:45.440 you know, really kind of edgy ballsy stuff, willing to 0:28:45.480 --> 0:28:46.520 go longer. 0:28:46.240 --> 0:28:49.160 Further, with few commns. 0:28:49.160 --> 0:28:52.200 It just sets off on these big, massive trips across 0:28:52.200 --> 0:28:55.040 the golf of Carpenteria Tazzy in one hit and now 0:28:55.160 --> 0:29:00.680 in New Zealand. And for such a for such good, 0:29:01.000 --> 0:29:03.160 you know, for all of my failings as a sea kayaker. 0:29:03.520 --> 0:29:07.480 If I'm impulsive, he's patient. If I trained fifty ks, 0:29:07.520 --> 0:29:09.480 he trains a hunt. You know, he was very good. 0:29:09.480 --> 0:29:12.760 He was kind of the blueprint of what a mountaineering 0:29:13.880 --> 0:29:17.520 sea kayker would look like in a sense. So to 0:29:17.600 --> 0:29:20.760 hear him live on radio or by the presenter say, look, 0:29:20.800 --> 0:29:24.400 Andrew's gone missing, presumed dead. They haven't found his kaykit 0:29:24.480 --> 0:29:27.360 at that stage, I don't think I was. And I 0:29:27.400 --> 0:29:29.400 was quite surprised by how emotional that made me. 0:29:29.440 --> 0:29:35.360 I thought, Gee, how's this bloke, Who's who's so good? Die? 0:29:35.600 --> 0:29:40.120 And I'm just doing a co steering trip, you know, geez, 0:29:40.880 --> 0:29:42.440 what are you doing? Mate? You know? So I was 0:29:42.480 --> 0:29:43.360 pretty sad about that. 0:29:44.160 --> 0:29:46.440 Wow. And so you're dealing with all of that, and 0:29:46.680 --> 0:29:50.200 were you dealing with that? Was there a morning a 0:29:50.280 --> 0:29:53.840 morning process within that as well? That just in your 0:29:53.880 --> 0:29:55.560 head sort of tarnished that trip. 0:29:56.400 --> 0:29:56.880 I think so. 0:29:57.360 --> 0:29:59.840 I mean I didn't know Andrew personally at all, but 0:30:00.000 --> 0:30:03.480 but he was out there as a kind of he 0:30:03.560 --> 0:30:06.440 was sort of representative of the zenith of what we 0:30:06.440 --> 0:30:10.040 were doing. And my sat phone at that stage where 0:30:10.040 --> 0:30:12.200 people were able to text, it lit up with texts 0:30:12.200 --> 0:30:14.520 saying are you okay? You're okay because all the headlines 0:30:14.520 --> 0:30:18.320 in Australia where Australian kayaker goes missing, And like I say, 0:30:18.360 --> 0:30:20.479 the hindsight thing, absolutely, I look back at it now 0:30:20.480 --> 0:30:22.480 and it's a sort of a change of tone in 0:30:22.520 --> 0:30:26.440 that expedition based on that knowledge that Andrew was likely 0:30:26.520 --> 0:30:30.120 dead and that he'd made a mistake or he got 0:30:30.160 --> 0:30:32.280 so close. You know, they found his boat and in 0:30:32.360 --> 0:30:34.080 it was one camera and. 0:30:34.040 --> 0:30:37.040 He's got a photo of Matt Cook. 0:30:37.080 --> 0:30:38.480 You know, he's got a photo of the peaks of 0:30:38.840 --> 0:30:40.760 New Zealand, so he saw landfall. 0:30:41.440 --> 0:30:43.160 And then, as we know, so. 0:30:43.160 --> 0:30:47.440 Many drivers make those fatal mistakes five ten k from home, 0:30:47.480 --> 0:30:47.720 you know. 0:30:47.680 --> 0:30:50.120 Their faculties just ease a bit. Now. 0:30:50.120 --> 0:30:52.840 He was strung out like all buggery by that stage too, 0:30:52.880 --> 0:30:56.080 but you know, he did so much of the journey 0:30:56.120 --> 0:30:58.320 and then it all just came to put and yeah, 0:30:58.320 --> 0:30:59.440 they played on me for weeks. 0:31:00.160 --> 0:31:04.600 Revisit the footage. When you actually realize what you've got 0:31:04.840 --> 0:31:08.040 and what you achieved and you know the moments that 0:31:08.080 --> 0:31:13.120 you had, does it reignite a positive spik within yourself 0:31:13.160 --> 0:31:15.680 to not only get this footage out, but also to 0:31:15.720 --> 0:31:19.480 get back out there and give things another crack, whether 0:31:19.520 --> 0:31:21.720 it's another expedition, another task or whatever. 0:31:21.800 --> 0:31:25.600 It was absolutely, yeah, get over yourself boat. There's plenty 0:31:25.600 --> 0:31:26.160 of life to go. 0:31:26.480 --> 0:31:29.720 You know. It was this success in so many ways 0:31:29.720 --> 0:31:32.200 and a failing in so many ways, and that's cool, 0:31:32.240 --> 0:31:35.440 that's fine, get over it and make. 0:31:35.400 --> 0:31:36.520 Up for it with other ways. 0:31:36.760 --> 0:31:39.720 And I realized too then that that was all self 0:31:39.760 --> 0:31:42.920 shot and only probably about a fifth or you know, 0:31:43.120 --> 0:31:45.600 every five films I shoot these days a self shot. 0:31:46.240 --> 0:31:49.960 There's real craft in just how you go about you 0:31:50.040 --> 0:31:52.959 every day or every week when you're expeditioning. And it 0:31:53.000 --> 0:31:55.680 was just learning your craft, learning what you're doing out there, 0:31:55.680 --> 0:31:58.640 and you know what, don't take it so seriously, mate, 0:31:58.680 --> 0:32:00.640 nor yourself. Just go out there and have a go. 0:32:00.920 --> 0:32:02.360 Yes, So it gave you the kick up the ass 0:32:02.360 --> 0:32:06.840 that you needed to, Yeah, ignite yourself back into back 0:32:06.840 --> 0:32:08.960 in the game, get your sort yourself up by get 0:32:09.000 --> 0:32:09.920 your head back in the game. 0:32:10.240 --> 0:32:12.520 Yeah, you're all right, mate, there's plenty of people suffering 0:32:12.680 --> 0:32:15.360 real problems and you're moaning about your trip around Africa 0:32:15.400 --> 0:32:16.640 didn't quite go like your thought. 0:32:16.880 --> 0:32:17.640 Come on mate, you know. 0:32:17.720 --> 0:32:18.400 Yeah, but when. 0:32:18.280 --> 0:32:21.360 You're when you're engulfed with it is. Yeah, it's a 0:32:21.400 --> 0:32:25.480 lot more it's a lot more dramatized than it is 0:32:25.640 --> 0:32:28.760 in your head, isn't it. So Yeah, once you engulf 0:32:28.800 --> 0:32:31.640 yourself with something like that, and you know you give 0:32:31.720 --> 0:32:34.200 so much of your time to it, it's normal that 0:32:34.240 --> 0:32:37.760 you do that of in the same headspace. Were you 0:32:37.840 --> 0:32:40.960 surprised or did you forget about some of the footage 0:32:40.960 --> 0:32:43.600 that you had and when you revisited it with you like. 0:32:43.680 --> 0:32:45.200 God, this is actually pretty cool. 0:32:45.240 --> 0:32:46.400 So I've got to get this out there. 0:32:47.320 --> 0:32:49.920 Yeah. If I edited it now, I'll be fascinating. 0:32:49.920 --> 0:32:53.200 And I've contemplated it actually, and make make a mini 0:32:53.280 --> 0:32:56.360 series of Africa again, just in little nuggets and make. 0:32:56.240 --> 0:32:58.840 It sort of youtubeable. Yeah. 0:32:58.880 --> 0:33:01.320 Absolutely, yeah, And there's some real gems in there the 0:33:01.400 --> 0:33:04.080 year that I would tell a very different story now, 0:33:04.280 --> 0:33:07.160 you know, I put myself kind of I protected my 0:33:07.480 --> 0:33:10.960 ego a little still in the first edit, and I 0:33:10.960 --> 0:33:13.320 wouldn't do that now, No way I'd go to town 0:33:13.360 --> 0:33:13.600 on it. 0:33:13.680 --> 0:33:17.920 Which journey more expedition really stands out for you that 0:33:18.000 --> 0:33:20.160 you learn the most from. 0:33:20.280 --> 0:33:24.160 I mean, I'll talk more recently. I ran the McMillan's 0:33:24.160 --> 0:33:28.840 Walking Track. I ran that twenty twenty one, early twenty 0:33:28.840 --> 0:33:30.760 twenty one. The film series. It only just came out 0:33:30.760 --> 0:33:33.880 because it was a problematic story to tell because I 0:33:33.920 --> 0:33:36.080 was no longer just running for the sake of trying 0:33:36.120 --> 0:33:38.280 to run the fastest or longest or whatever it was. 0:33:38.760 --> 0:33:42.680 It had a complicated story behind it, and so I'm 0:33:42.720 --> 0:33:44.920 proud that I went back and did that. 0:33:45.120 --> 0:33:46.400 And I'm a better. 0:33:46.280 --> 0:33:48.320 Runner now than I was two years ago, and so 0:33:48.360 --> 0:33:50.400 I'm sort of I look back on the footage and think, 0:33:50.480 --> 0:33:52.400 to you, I was sort of training fifty or eighty 0:33:52.440 --> 0:33:55.640 hours a week, you know, in kind of hills, not mountains, 0:33:55.680 --> 0:33:59.000 and was able to make that work on sort of 0:33:59.040 --> 0:34:00.000 a subpar body. 0:34:00.120 --> 0:34:02.360 So I'm really proud of that. And they're hard days. 0:34:02.360 --> 0:34:05.440 They're just hard days days on end where you just 0:34:05.680 --> 0:34:08.560 suffer fest And so I'm proud for that of that 0:34:08.600 --> 0:34:10.040 two hundred and twenty k run. 0:34:10.480 --> 0:34:13.080 Yeah, you've done. There's so many adventures that I want 0:34:13.120 --> 0:34:16.439 to talk about because you've done so many. But you 0:34:16.440 --> 0:34:21.000 you're almost the epitome of letting people know that you 0:34:21.000 --> 0:34:23.600 can have an adventure in your own backyard. Right. You know, 0:34:23.640 --> 0:34:26.480 you don't have to You don't have to seek your everese's, 0:34:26.560 --> 0:34:29.840 you don't have to seek yourr you know, your cape horns, 0:34:29.880 --> 0:34:33.160 you don't have to. There is literally adventure to be 0:34:33.320 --> 0:34:37.480 had in your own backyard. And one of you, one 0:34:37.520 --> 0:34:40.759 of your adventures which I love, and I don't know 0:34:40.760 --> 0:34:42.719 if we could call it an adventure. I suppose it 0:34:42.800 --> 0:34:46.800 is was eating your body weight in canned beans. 0:34:48.120 --> 0:34:51.680 Yeah, do you know? And here it is, so I've written, 0:34:51.840 --> 0:34:52.520 like what a guy. 0:34:52.640 --> 0:34:53.239 I love this? 0:34:53.480 --> 0:34:56.200 You know, Ah, I've had all my book signings that 0:34:56.239 --> 0:34:58.279 I've had in the past, I've almost signed as many 0:34:58.320 --> 0:34:59.319 tins of beans as I have. 0:34:59.800 --> 0:35:02.280 Just you could just talk us through that, mate, because honestly, 0:35:02.280 --> 0:35:04.000 when that's why I say about adventure. 0:35:04.040 --> 0:35:04.880 Normally people sick. 0:35:04.800 --> 0:35:06.520 To one adventure and they're like, I'm going to hike, 0:35:06.680 --> 0:35:08.520 I'm going to kayak, or I'm going to run or 0:35:09.160 --> 0:35:14.640 you know, you literally the most versatile adventurer I've ever met. 0:35:14.760 --> 0:35:18.720 What made you want to eat your body weight in beans. 0:35:19.160 --> 0:35:20.680 I don't know what film it was. 0:35:20.480 --> 0:35:25.600 It was Dennis Quaid, I think where he miniaturizes himself 0:35:25.640 --> 0:35:27.799 and he goes in this little capsule like a submarine, 0:35:28.000 --> 0:35:30.440 in a body, and he's in a body, in a 0:35:30.520 --> 0:35:36.240 tiny submarine, just cruising around someone's lymphatic system or veins. Anyway, 0:35:36.800 --> 0:35:40.640 I suppose there's a bit of a long bud to draw, 0:35:40.719 --> 0:35:44.319 But I do love the idea that I mean, our 0:35:44.320 --> 0:35:46.319 body and what we put into it is going to 0:35:46.360 --> 0:35:49.239 make us feel and think a particular kind of thing, 0:35:49.640 --> 0:35:52.319 which is all we go adventuring for anyway, right, is 0:35:52.360 --> 0:35:55.200 to feel something physically and to feel something emotionally and 0:35:55.600 --> 0:35:56.600 spiritually in your. 0:35:56.480 --> 0:35:57.480 Mind, whatever it might be. 0:35:58.520 --> 0:36:01.200 So we've got all these things that we can manipulate 0:36:01.239 --> 0:36:04.560 ourselves with. And of course food is such a huge one. 0:36:05.200 --> 0:36:07.040 What would I think and feel and how would my 0:36:07.040 --> 0:36:11.399 body react to just eating beans for however many days 0:36:11.400 --> 0:36:15.319 it took, and I scratched out the figures, and forty days, yeah, 0:36:15.360 --> 0:36:17.319 well thirty nine in the end, thirty nine days of 0:36:17.360 --> 0:36:20.319 eating only beans, which was four to seven tins a day. 0:36:21.040 --> 0:36:23.239 It was liberating and in the fact that I never 0:36:23.280 --> 0:36:25.920 had to think about food, as in, if I was hungry, 0:36:25.960 --> 0:36:28.000 I would just eat a tinner beans and that was it. 0:36:28.120 --> 0:36:31.080 I'd never think about what I'm eating, how I'm going 0:36:31.080 --> 0:36:33.279 to prepare it. I just crack it in and just 0:36:33.400 --> 0:36:36.719 crack on. It was really quite liberating. But the body. 0:36:37.080 --> 0:36:40.560 I went from an emotional state of sort of seven 0:36:40.600 --> 0:36:43.320 to nine every day, which is my regular kind of life, 0:36:43.440 --> 0:36:46.160 to just a six all the time. I was a six, 0:36:46.360 --> 0:36:49.080 and so I got to view what it is like 0:36:49.200 --> 0:36:53.719 to in some way be oppressed by food and what 0:36:53.800 --> 0:36:56.640 the hell does adventure look like when you're only. 0:36:56.400 --> 0:36:57.400 A six all the time. 0:36:57.520 --> 0:37:02.440 And it was fascinating, was a fascinating insight into humanity, 0:37:02.560 --> 0:37:05.319 into my what my body is capable of and what 0:37:05.400 --> 0:37:08.880 my mind. You know, where does optimism come from? Bloody 0:37:08.880 --> 0:37:11.960 comes from what you eat? Because I was just beige 0:37:12.000 --> 0:37:15.440 all the time. And yeah, so it was an adventure 0:37:15.560 --> 0:37:18.920 of somewhere. I didn't go anywhere, and that itself was 0:37:18.920 --> 0:37:21.400 really challenging for me too. I didn't have the motivation 0:37:21.560 --> 0:37:24.360 to go running or paddling. I didn't have the energy 0:37:24.400 --> 0:37:25.759 to do it as much, and so I had to 0:37:25.800 --> 0:37:29.280 make a story out of feeling pretty shit and doing 0:37:29.320 --> 0:37:31.799 something really different and so there was challenges coming at 0:37:31.800 --> 0:37:33.960 me from all over the place, and it was it 0:37:34.040 --> 0:37:34.680 was kind of cool. 0:37:35.040 --> 0:37:37.680 No, I love I love the humor in adventure as well, 0:37:37.760 --> 0:37:40.960 because when we talk about adventure and we look at adventure, 0:37:41.600 --> 0:37:44.480 everyone thinks it's going to be sort of really arduous 0:37:44.520 --> 0:37:49.000 and you know, you know, hardcore, and there's got to 0:37:49.040 --> 0:37:53.919 be some kind of traumatic sort of experience in there 0:37:54.000 --> 0:37:56.200 that's going to change you for the rest of your life. 0:37:56.200 --> 0:38:00.680 But ultimately the humor and adventure is super import as well. 0:38:01.000 --> 0:38:02.480 You know, you've got to be able to look at 0:38:02.520 --> 0:38:06.440 adventure from the bright side and be able to smile 0:38:06.480 --> 0:38:07.880 at it and be able to laugh at it. 0:38:08.000 --> 0:38:11.360 Right, Well, yeah, I look, I suppose so. 0:38:11.800 --> 0:38:14.480 And yet I've you know, when your producer reached out 0:38:14.480 --> 0:38:17.360 to me for our chat and I looked you up 0:38:17.400 --> 0:38:21.040 on Wikipedia, and just because you know you wear similar age, 0:38:21.120 --> 0:38:24.120 I think I've got a year on you. And in 0:38:24.200 --> 0:38:27.040 terms of and you've done things that are far more 0:38:27.239 --> 0:38:29.520 they're just so different to mine too. You know, your 0:38:29.560 --> 0:38:33.719 life fascinates me incredibly because of the kind of I 0:38:33.719 --> 0:38:35.840 think you have had all of these high end things 0:38:35.840 --> 0:38:39.200 that are scary as hell and have different deeper meanings 0:38:39.200 --> 0:38:41.839 and you've been told to do things and whatever. It's 0:38:41.960 --> 0:38:45.440 just I think you create humility and fun out of 0:38:45.440 --> 0:38:50.279 yours because you've had this counter experience and maybe you're 0:38:50.320 --> 0:38:53.160 still having them. And I'm trying to just find my 0:38:53.239 --> 0:38:55.839 own middle ground too. I haven't had the counter experiences 0:38:55.880 --> 0:38:58.280 you have, and if I have, they've been self inflicted 0:38:58.600 --> 0:38:59.880 and probably mistakes. 0:39:00.280 --> 0:39:01.560 And so I'm. 0:39:01.200 --> 0:39:03.960 Often thinking to you, how do I just milk? Because 0:39:04.000 --> 0:39:07.759 I love all the fantastic positive aspects of adventure and 0:39:07.760 --> 0:39:10.200 they're often really good hard work, but they're not death 0:39:10.239 --> 0:39:13.480 defying anymore. And I think that's healthy. And so yeah, 0:39:13.680 --> 0:39:15.880 that's where the smiles and the laughs come in, because 0:39:15.920 --> 0:39:17.480 you know you're just out here by choice. 0:39:17.560 --> 0:39:19.839 And they say that beans, beans are good for your heart. 0:39:19.960 --> 0:39:21.520 The more you eat, the more you far. 0:39:22.040 --> 0:39:22.799 That's totally true. 0:39:22.840 --> 0:39:23.360 That correct. 0:39:23.640 --> 0:39:25.280 I needed no help in that department. 0:39:25.360 --> 0:39:28.719 And I'm one of the bloody windiest blokes I know. 0:39:39.680 --> 0:39:44.560 How do you go from kayaking to running? Are you 0:39:44.640 --> 0:39:49.560 just a naturally fit individual that's got a super resilient mindset? 0:39:49.600 --> 0:39:50.600 What made you switch up? 0:39:50.880 --> 0:39:55.720 And why? Six hundred and fifty koments through the Australian Alps. 0:39:55.680 --> 0:39:58.520 Well I like, I'm probably more of a runner than 0:39:58.560 --> 0:40:01.640 I was a paddler. Even that that was my release 0:40:01.680 --> 0:40:03.520 as a fourteen fifteen year old kid. I thought I 0:40:03.600 --> 0:40:06.680 can run and burst the bubble of my home. Lived 0:40:06.719 --> 0:40:10.000 on a small farm with dad, So that was a 0:40:10.040 --> 0:40:12.080 good release for me as a young bloke going through 0:40:12.160 --> 0:40:15.440 kind of puberty, I suppose. So I became a runner 0:40:15.440 --> 0:40:18.640 before well and truly before a paddler, and so that 0:40:18.719 --> 0:40:22.040 was always my default, and I was always okay, you know, 0:40:22.360 --> 0:40:25.719 I've got a good heart, good strong heart. The only 0:40:25.760 --> 0:40:27.759 thing I can say about my body is that it's 0:40:27.840 --> 0:40:29.919 kind of an abusible body in that I just don't 0:40:29.920 --> 0:40:34.480 get injured all that much. I have a strength, So 0:40:34.480 --> 0:40:36.400 I'm lucky. I've got my mum's body. She was a 0:40:36.400 --> 0:40:39.279 great athlete. And once you kind of know that, you 0:40:39.440 --> 0:40:41.560 sort of lean into it a little. And so I 0:40:41.640 --> 0:40:45.040 was able to run longer and longer distances when I 0:40:45.040 --> 0:40:47.799 started to get into it, and I do things, you know, 0:40:47.800 --> 0:40:50.160 I did it as a twenty Well, I did the 0:40:50.160 --> 0:40:52.120 Big Run as a thirty something year old bloke, but 0:40:52.160 --> 0:40:54.680 it was on ten years worth of just training ad 0:40:54.680 --> 0:40:55.839 hoc but always running. 0:40:55.840 --> 0:41:00.400 I've always run, and it would been was. I was 0:41:00.440 --> 0:41:01.359 so surprised. 0:41:01.440 --> 0:41:03.200 You know, this is when the Pacific Crest and the 0:41:03.239 --> 0:41:06.880 Appalachian and a lot all the European big famous walks 0:41:06.960 --> 0:41:09.960 are being run for fastest known times and it's becoming 0:41:10.040 --> 0:41:11.520 a bit of a thing. And I was shocked to 0:41:11.560 --> 0:41:14.200 know that the Australian ups walking track had never been run. 0:41:14.320 --> 0:41:16.520 It had been attempted for four or five years by 0:41:16.719 --> 0:41:20.160 a bunch of blokes and it had been knocked back 0:41:20.200 --> 0:41:24.120 with weather and snow events and landslides and fires and 0:41:24.160 --> 0:41:27.040 all sorts of stuff, you know. And I just got lucky. 0:41:27.239 --> 0:41:29.200 I just picked my time and away I went and 0:41:29.400 --> 0:41:31.480 was able to get the job done on a bit 0:41:31.520 --> 0:41:35.400 of a shonky leg. But it was remarkable. Yeah, And 0:41:35.600 --> 0:41:38.680 like Africa, like Day sixty two in Africa, big waves 0:41:38.719 --> 0:41:40.399 and being scared to death. I learned a lot about 0:41:40.400 --> 0:41:43.120 myself out there with the body demise, more than. 0:41:43.080 --> 0:41:43.640 I'd ever had. 0:41:43.680 --> 0:41:44.520 How long did it take you? 0:41:45.760 --> 0:41:47.440 Thirteen days? Ten hours? 0:41:48.160 --> 0:41:50.400 I think maybe a couple of minutes and that, but 0:41:50.440 --> 0:41:53.239 it's down to now eleven eleven days and something so 0:41:53.760 --> 0:41:55.200 and look, people will pop. 0:41:55.400 --> 0:41:57.239 You were the first to do it. You broke that moll. 0:41:57.320 --> 0:42:01.399 Yeah, yeah, yeah, first to get first to string it toget. Yeah, yeah, 0:42:01.440 --> 0:42:03.480 and so and that held for four or five years, 0:42:03.480 --> 0:42:05.919 and now people are whittling away five and ten hours 0:42:05.920 --> 0:42:07.719 at a time every time they do it. But it's 0:42:07.760 --> 0:42:10.120 a long lots of wheels can come off, you know. 0:42:10.200 --> 0:42:15.719 There's twenty eight thousand meters of vertical terrain and a 0:42:15.760 --> 0:42:19.399 lot of sections that are bush bashing blackberries or hot 0:42:19.440 --> 0:42:22.719 bush or just just thick jungle for kilometers at a time. 0:42:22.800 --> 0:42:25.560 So it's it's hard. It's not like the at of 0:42:25.560 --> 0:42:28.360 the PC that's pretty slick. 0:42:28.080 --> 0:42:28.919 In a sense. Yeah. 0:42:28.960 --> 0:42:32.080 And how did you sleep? Were you just literally sleeping 0:42:32.080 --> 0:42:32.640 off the trail? 0:42:33.320 --> 0:42:34.279 Yeah? Yeah, I had. 0:42:34.320 --> 0:42:36.360 I was fully supported, so my brother in law and 0:42:36.400 --> 0:42:39.839 my parents pinch hit for a couple of nights. Yeah, 0:42:39.880 --> 0:42:42.880 it was good, and I was sort of averaging fifty 0:42:42.880 --> 0:42:45.000 odd k's a day because I did the longer route. 0:42:45.000 --> 0:42:47.400 There's lots of various I did the easier route. 0:42:47.440 --> 0:42:49.240 So whenever there was an up and over a mountain, 0:42:49.280 --> 0:42:52.799 over single track, or go around contoured fire trail, I 0:42:52.880 --> 0:42:56.000 do the contoured fire trail. So I kind of cheated 0:42:56.080 --> 0:42:59.000 in some respects but attacked on an extra fifty k's. 0:42:59.120 --> 0:43:00.520 But I had. 0:43:00.640 --> 0:43:03.520 I had relatively good access by Charlie, my brother in 0:43:03.600 --> 0:43:05.719 Laura full drive, so I'd just yeah, I'd just roll 0:43:05.719 --> 0:43:07.560 out of swag and sleep in a swag or a 0:43:07.600 --> 0:43:10.319 tent and just snorm my head off and get up 0:43:10.320 --> 0:43:13.000 in the morning. And it was I was roughly twelve 0:43:13.040 --> 0:43:15.920 hours on trail each day and four hours of just 0:43:16.120 --> 0:43:18.120 mosing around a meal, and I had eight. 0:43:18.000 --> 0:43:20.200 Square hours of sleep every day. It was good. 0:43:20.560 --> 0:43:25.600 Wow. So that and the trip around Africa keep Horn, 0:43:25.920 --> 0:43:28.520 those are two that that really stick out to you. 0:43:29.760 --> 0:43:32.600 Yeah, I mean they're the bigger, longer range things that 0:43:32.719 --> 0:43:35.840 saw a mind and body demise or where you you 0:43:35.840 --> 0:43:39.360 know where you have those. You know, every three or 0:43:39.360 --> 0:43:41.279 four days you have a questionable moment in your mind. 0:43:41.320 --> 0:43:43.279 You why am I doing this? What's the point of this? 0:43:43.800 --> 0:43:46.680 And why why do you do it? I answer that question, 0:43:47.560 --> 0:43:49.680 what is the point in it? There must be for 0:43:49.719 --> 0:43:50.839 you to keep doing it? 0:43:51.600 --> 0:43:53.560 Well, I suppose it's a bit like when I pass 0:43:53.640 --> 0:43:57.120 something that's that's usable or good loot on the you know, 0:43:57.200 --> 0:43:59.080 someone has hard rubbish on the side of the road 0:43:59.120 --> 0:44:00.759 and I pass it, and I see it, and I 0:44:00.840 --> 0:44:03.400 have room in the car. I can't unsee it, and 0:44:03.440 --> 0:44:06.480 I go back and I genuinely get it. And when 0:44:06.520 --> 0:44:09.120 I have these moments of clarity where I think, oh, 0:44:09.120 --> 0:44:11.719 you know what that trail I'd love to run or 0:44:11.719 --> 0:44:15.480 walk that trail or paddle that particular coast. If I 0:44:15.520 --> 0:44:17.279 still have that thought a day or two later, and 0:44:17.320 --> 0:44:21.239 I write a hundred words about it in a notebook 0:44:21.320 --> 0:44:24.000 or a thing, it just manifests it in beds and 0:44:24.040 --> 0:44:26.240 that's it. And then it says, the pride thing, Let's 0:44:27.000 --> 0:44:30.080 let's do this. I've had the thought, it's got it's 0:44:30.080 --> 0:44:32.360 got legs, let's see it through. And so then I 0:44:32.480 --> 0:44:37.520 just and I'm genuinely excited about new places, both real 0:44:37.560 --> 0:44:41.480 and imagined. Absolutely so that once once a story has 0:44:41.520 --> 0:44:44.319 struck and I'm keen to do it and it excites me, 0:44:44.400 --> 0:44:45.759 then away I. 0:44:45.800 --> 0:44:48.480 Go, yeah, what fascinates me about you? Bo is? 0:44:49.640 --> 0:44:52.480 You know the extent of your adventures, like you said, 0:44:52.480 --> 0:44:57.240 the big ones, you know, paddling Cape Horn and running 0:44:57.280 --> 0:45:01.040 the Australian app through the Australian out the six hundred 0:45:01.080 --> 0:45:05.680 and fifty kilometer to a ninety kilometer commute to work, 0:45:05.719 --> 0:45:08.560 where you just thought, I've got ninety kilometers to commute 0:45:08.560 --> 0:45:08.799 to work. 0:45:08.840 --> 0:45:10.640 I'm not going to drive in. I'm going to walk in. 0:45:10.840 --> 0:45:13.640 I'm going to run in. You do that as well, 0:45:13.640 --> 0:45:13.960 don't you? 0:45:14.239 --> 0:45:16.120 I did. Yeah, that was it was part of my 0:45:16.200 --> 0:45:18.360 commute series. I only did two of the four. 0:45:18.480 --> 0:45:21.719 It was going to be walk, then paddle, then ride 0:45:21.719 --> 0:45:25.319 a horse, then take a balloon. The last two were 0:45:25.320 --> 0:45:28.320 a bit harder to arrange, and I got made redundant 0:45:28.360 --> 0:45:31.160 in between, so perfectly I didn't have to do those 0:45:31.239 --> 0:45:34.880 last two. But the paddle at was the hardest adventure 0:45:34.880 --> 0:45:38.240 I've ever had, hands down. So I took four days 0:45:38.280 --> 0:45:40.960 to get to work, which it usually takes me seventy 0:45:40.960 --> 0:45:42.640 five minutes to get to work, and that took me 0:45:42.760 --> 0:45:47.120 four full on days dragging a kayak. It was sort 0:45:47.120 --> 0:45:50.319 of almost like an Arctic trip of glaciation. You know, 0:45:50.360 --> 0:45:53.360 you're just having to drag this kayak through everything and 0:45:53.440 --> 0:45:57.320 anything and then paddle certain sections. It was fricking hard 0:45:57.640 --> 0:46:01.400 and brilliant too. It was brilliant, one of the best 0:46:01.440 --> 0:46:04.360 adventures I've ever had, and it was often ten or 0:46:04.400 --> 0:46:05.600 twenty meters from the road. 0:46:05.600 --> 0:46:07.120 I always drive amazing. 0:46:07.239 --> 0:46:10.320 So where is your mindset at? On a daily basis? 0:46:10.800 --> 0:46:13.399 You could because you're one of these people. You could 0:46:13.400 --> 0:46:17.399 step outside your door. You're seeing adventure and you'll want 0:46:17.440 --> 0:46:17.839 to do it. 0:46:18.680 --> 0:46:19.279 Yeah. 0:46:19.320 --> 0:46:21.919 I'm far more disciplined now, and I write things down, 0:46:22.120 --> 0:46:24.120 and I'm a family man with two little girls and 0:46:24.120 --> 0:46:26.480 a wife, and so things are far more strategic. 0:46:26.960 --> 0:46:27.960 Yeah yeah, But. 0:46:29.840 --> 0:46:32.560 You know, I am intimidated by life in a sense 0:46:32.600 --> 0:46:35.280 that while I'm scared of death, and two I'm scared 0:46:35.280 --> 0:46:37.880 of not doing enough in my years I have left. 0:46:37.920 --> 0:46:41.799 So it's always for me now it's about what are 0:46:41.840 --> 0:46:45.239 the best ideas? Because ideas are cheap, and the hard 0:46:45.280 --> 0:46:47.719 part is to make good of your best ideas. And 0:46:47.760 --> 0:46:51.520 so I'm constantly trying to whittle down the best ideas 0:46:51.520 --> 0:46:54.200 into the best stories which give me the best day 0:46:54.239 --> 0:46:55.359 to day bang for buck. 0:46:55.760 --> 0:46:58.080 And how important is it to get your story across? 0:46:58.120 --> 0:47:01.360 How important is storytelling? Because ultimately that's all we have 0:47:01.400 --> 0:47:03.760 to leave behind, right I suppose. 0:47:03.800 --> 0:47:09.480 So, although I'm becoming more of a skeptic of legacy, because. 0:47:09.239 --> 0:47:11.000 I suppose once I'm gone, I'm gone. 0:47:11.040 --> 0:47:14.000 And I think of all the people I greatly respect 0:47:14.000 --> 0:47:16.560 to left stories and artwork and things, and I think 0:47:16.560 --> 0:47:20.279 they're magnificent. But I love their artwork, but i'd much 0:47:20.320 --> 0:47:23.640 rather them be here too. So the legacy between a 0:47:23.719 --> 0:47:26.200 legacy and a person, I'd much rather take the person. 0:47:27.920 --> 0:47:31.120 So yeah, the thing with stories for me now is 0:47:31.160 --> 0:47:33.440 that that's how I own my money. So it's just 0:47:33.760 --> 0:47:36.239 honing my craft. I'm just a carpenter that wants to 0:47:36.280 --> 0:47:38.239 become better on the tools, you know. So I'm just 0:47:38.320 --> 0:47:41.200 trying to create and I want to burst the bubble 0:47:41.239 --> 0:47:45.360 of It's about eighty percent male thirty to fifty that 0:47:45.400 --> 0:47:47.600 watch my stuff online and I want to I want 0:47:47.600 --> 0:47:50.239 to crack out of that and get more genders and 0:47:50.320 --> 0:47:54.160 more age diverse and more and more, you know, just 0:47:54.200 --> 0:47:56.040 people in weird corners of the world. 0:47:56.080 --> 0:47:57.600 So that's a real challenge. 0:47:58.080 --> 0:48:01.800 Our final question before we wrap up, if your daughters 0:48:02.000 --> 0:48:06.960 want to go on some crazy adventures, No go with them? 0:48:07.320 --> 0:48:09.840 Does that go with them? Does he stay at home? 0:48:10.640 --> 0:48:17.200 I trust them, I think to either have me along 0:48:17.280 --> 0:48:17.520 or not. 0:48:17.760 --> 0:48:20.560 I reckon I'd be a pretty good support crew, pretty handy, 0:48:20.600 --> 0:48:24.239 good at taping up wounds and reading maps for them. 0:48:24.360 --> 0:48:26.719 I hope they want to go on adventures. I think 0:48:26.760 --> 0:48:30.840 my oldest particularly will love it. But I love that 0:48:30.960 --> 0:48:32.680 idea too, of being able to go out and have 0:48:32.760 --> 0:48:36.479 a full blown real sweatfest of an adventure that's hard 0:48:36.520 --> 0:48:40.120 with the girls when they're up for it. Jeez, it'll 0:48:40.200 --> 0:48:40.680 keep me young. 0:48:40.800 --> 0:48:41.000 Yeah. 0:48:41.000 --> 0:48:42.080 I'm the same with my children. 0:48:42.120 --> 0:48:45.440 I've got my fourteen year old son now, and my 0:48:45.560 --> 0:48:48.640 wife has always told me be careful what you ignite 0:48:48.680 --> 0:48:51.000 within them, because now he wants to climb the seventh 0:48:51.000 --> 0:48:53.359 summits and guess what Dad's going with him? 0:48:53.520 --> 0:48:55.160 So that is brilliant. 0:48:55.200 --> 0:48:57.440 Now what about the military though, would you happily have 0:48:57.520 --> 0:48:58.320 him go to the military. 0:48:58.360 --> 0:48:58.560 Yeah? 0:48:58.560 --> 0:49:03.680 Absolutely, yeah, yeah, the right person to point in the 0:49:03.800 --> 0:49:04.320 right direction. 0:49:04.440 --> 0:49:06.959 Eh yeah, yeah, yeah, I suppose I was done. You good, 0:49:07.000 --> 0:49:08.239 So I suppose that makes sense. 0:49:08.480 --> 0:49:11.800 But listen, thank you so much for coming on my podcast. 0:49:11.840 --> 0:49:14.640 You've been fascinating and talk about adventure I think you 0:49:15.000 --> 0:49:18.960 home the true sense sense of adventurer because the versatility 0:49:19.400 --> 0:49:22.600 and the scalability that you that you go out and 0:49:22.640 --> 0:49:27.279 explore is phenomenal. It's humorous, it's inspiring. Mate, keep doing 0:49:27.320 --> 0:49:29.759 what you're doing, and I look forward to logging in 0:49:29.840 --> 0:49:32.640 and subscribe in to your YouTube channel mate, to see 0:49:33.280 --> 0:49:34.880 plenty more to come and listen. 0:49:35.040 --> 0:49:39.600 No more beans, no fair enough thasm Oh jeez, I 0:49:39.640 --> 0:49:40.719 get the beans thing a lot. 0:49:41.680 --> 0:49:42.760 Thanks Mane, Thanks man. 0:49:44.120 --> 0:49:45.960 Thanks so much for joining me on Headgame. 0:49:46.320 --> 0:49:49.120 If you enjoyed this episode, make sure you're subscribed so 0:49:49.160 --> 0:49:52.239 you don't miss any of our incredible stories, and leave me. 0:49:52.360 --> 0:49:56.360 A review wherever you're listening. I'm Att Middleton. Catch you 0:49:56.400 --> 0:49:57.760 again next time.