A couple of years ago, ExplorersWeb did a story about Harrison Okene, the Accidental Aquanaut. It was an astonishing survival tale. Okene was a cook on a fishing boat off the Nigerian coast, when the craft sank. The others on the boat perished, but Okene managed to find a bubble of air in the sunken boat. There he sat, for over two days in the dark, until divers came to retrieve the bodies. They were astonished when this ghostly figure reached out and touched one of them. He was alive.

They brought him slowly and carefully to the surface. Harrison Okene had just weathered an astonishing ordeal.

This was 10 years ago. What has happened to Okene since then?

For years, he relived his time beneath the ocean through recurring nightmares. "When he is sleeping, he has that shock, he will just wake up in the night saying 'Honey see, the bed is sinking, we are in the sea,' " says his wife.

Too afraid to return to the ocean, the former cook on a fishing boat took a chef's job on dry land. But he was unable to put the event behind him. So he decided to face his fear head-on.

Becomes a rescue diver

In 2015, he returned to the ocean. This time, to become a qualified diver.

It wasn’t a hobby that Okene wanted. Rather, he was motivated to become a rescue diver, to save the lives of others who found themselves in desperate straits underwater, as he had been.

Now Okene is an IMCA Class 2 Commercial Air Diver. His Facebook page has become an unofficial search and rescue tribute feed. Here, he expresses passionately how he wishes for changes in safety at sea. His YouTube channel has more than 2,000 subscribers.

Some people in those emergency situations survive. But it's those who don’t who leave the deepest mark on Okene’s conscience.

Many journalists have reached out to Okene since his rescue. Discovery Channel made a short documentary about him.

Okene knows that he is very lucky to be alive. He does not take that for granted.

West Africa is known for music and dance, not pumping surf breaks. But in the Ivory Coast, surf culture is on the rise. It’s the kind of culture that could eventually see it mentioned in the same breath as Pipeline, Nazaré, or South Africa’s J Bay.

A new scene

Our household conversations often turn to the hunt for epic waves. When we think of Africa, it’s usually J Bay that springs to mind. But that might be about to change. The Ivory Coast rolls out fast, hollow beach breaks best ridden with small, clean swells. In some places, beginners can find long peeling waves ideal for building confidence. All this without the traditional rules expected at Western breaks where grommets can be hustled off waves and give-way rules demonstrate respect.

Ivory Coast surf culture reminds me of the small Indonesian island, Nias. A few years ago, before Covid halted international exploration, my partner and I were fortunate enough to witness Nias surf culture. Just like in the Ivory Coast, locals surf using whatever they can find. Riding dubiously mended broken boards or unwanted boards abandoned by visiting tourists. The quality of the surfboard is not important.

World-renowned breaks like Pipeline demand attitude. But lesser-known spots encourage freedom. Freedom to give it a go no matter your ability. Locals cheer each other along in a unique camaraderie.

A new wave of talent

Though not understood by everyone, Ivory Coast's surf culture is on the rise as more people get involved. It seems that it will only be a matter of time before the region produces a home-grown surf star. Down in South Africa, Mikey February proves practice and passion can lead to success and international recognition.

The Ivory Coasts' surf scene looks like it is here to stay.

Retirement used to involve less activity, not more, but times have changed. Among certain retirees, long-distance cycling -- and we mean seriously long distance -- has replaced gardening, golf, and lawn bowling. One elderly man rode from Scotland to Mongolia. Another man and his wife started cycling around the world the day that they retired.

Why the shift? Australian retiree Tilmann Waldthaler believes that at least some cases, 80 is the new 50.

"I don't look like an 80-year-old, I don't think like an 80-year-old, I don't act like an 80-year-old," says Waldthaler.

Waldthaler has cycled more than 520,000km through 143 countries. With “the body of a 50-year-old”, he shows no signs of slowing down.

For Waldthaler, the life-altering moment came in 1972. He was on his way from Cairns to Darwin when he noticed a person bike-packing. The sight fascinated him. Ever since 1977, he’s biked around world. During one stint, he rode more than 55,000 from New Zealand to the Arctic Circle in Norway via Asia and the Middle East. It took him five years.

Waldthaler has been held at gunpoint in Iran and hit by a bus in India. In 1982, he met his wife in the Sahara. The couple don’t have any children. But they have 14 bikes.

Nonstop duo

Another couple hopped on their bikes the day after husband Eric Jansen retired. They locked their door at 7:30 am, started pedaling, and haven't stopped since.

It was never the Jensens' plan to cycle around the world for their retirement. But after husband Eric had finished his 40-year career in industrial construction, their plans to return to the United States from Malaysia escalated. The following day, they began pedaling. Now they’ve cycled more than 10,000km over eight months.

They’ve explored Thailand’s ancient temples and been greeted by hundreds of village children in rural Laos. Chance encounters with other retiree cyclists re-energize them when homesickness, stifling heat, food poisoning, or punctured tires sour their mood.

Despite the occasional glum moment, the Jansens insist that the experience is the most joyful of their lives.

"You feel like your teeth are falling out"

Len Collingwood took to long-distance cycling at the age of 68. Now 71, the Edinburgh grandfather has even broken a world record -- okay, a pretty obscure one -- for the longest rickshaw journey. He rode from the Scottish capital to Istanbul.

Leaving in 2018, Collingwood cycled through 12 countries, including England, France, Belgium, the Netherlands, and Germany.

“The most difficult part was the cobbled streets in Belgium — you feel like your teeth are going to fall out,” he says.

For whatever reason, the chance to set a world record strongly motivated Collingwood. World records had always fascinated him, and when he realized that he wasn’t too late to hold one, he began planning.

He made a deal with his wife: She could train as a yoga teacher and he could become an adventure cyclist. Agreement in place, he started riding from Mongolia back to Edinburgh. Almost immediately, a snowstorm swept over the steppes. Hunkered down in his tent wearing all his clothing, he withstood the minus 18˚C temperature.

To fuel his 80km daily regime, he ate more than 4,000 calories for six months. He says that there was never a day he couldn’t face the saddle.

“There’s always something to be curious about,” he says. “And I’m very happy in my own company.”

A helluva high-school reunion

It seems ambitious ideas are a common theme for these retirees. American Merle Knotts of Georgia was also 68 when he was told that his particular idea was too ambitious. But he didn’t let skepticism stop him. Instead, the retired computer programmer left in 2007 on a 5,500km journey to his 50-year high school reunion.

Nowadays, if you look at the Facebook group Bicycle Travellers, you'll find everyone from a foursome in their mid-60s cycling for six weeks around Slovenia and Croatia to 84-year-old Horst Blancke who has just finished riding over 4,000km across Australia from Darwin to Perth. Chalk it up to the efficiency and low-impact nature of cycling -- Belgian cobblestones notwithstanding.

Lockdowns and closed borders have a way of redefining goals. After almost a year stuck indoors because of COVID, two Scotsmen decided to cut loose with a long canoe loop. At first, they planned to link three lochs together in a single expedition -- Lochs Maree, Fionn, and Fada. But by the time they set off, they were embarking on an entirely different objective.

Known locally as Scotland’s Last Wilderness, the Northwest Highlands have barely changed in hundreds of years. City dwellers find the 12-hour drive from London’s perimeter unworthy of the hassle. The wind-lashed snowy mountains, wildly long grass, cold rivers, isolation, and few creature comforts aren't for everyone. But Ian Finch and his friend Jamie Barnes found this an Ideal venue for a post-lockdown paddle.

The duo planned to complete all three lochs with land portage between. Barnes -- a cinematographer and outdoor guide -- documented the experience.

They started with the 22km-long Loch Maree. The fourth largest freshwater loch in Scotland, Maree has five large wooded islands and 60 small islands.

Little noise greeted the paddlers except for the call of tawny owl and chattering tree branches from stags wandering through. The only sign of humanity came from two fighter jets darting overhead through the grey sky.

After completing Maree, the duo carried their gear for the 10km commute to Loch Fionn, a smaller, shallow, freshwater loch. Here, poor weather constantly challenged the canoeists. Finch and Barnes had to hunker down after swells threatened to capsize them into the frigid water.

On land, they found an old hut where they enjoyed natural air conditioning through broken walls. But it was five-star luxury compared to the sodden countryside. When the bad weather broke, they resumed their paddle on Loch Fada, the smallest of the three. Fada ceremoniously rounded off the expedition without issue.

The pair's journey was about championing adaptation, the relentless need to change course based on twists and turns of nature.

Warrick Mitchell lives off the grid in paradise. His home in remote New Zealand is a four-hour walk to the nearest road. Life in isolation can be harsh. But he wouldn't have it any other way.

Fiordland is New Zealand’s oldest national park. Home to some of New Zealand’s Great Walks, the landscape is unusually complex. Its fiords, valleys, mountains, and forests draw thousands of hikers annually. But the weather is highly changeable. Strong winds can rise at any time. From May to September, snow is common. Fiordland is not to be underestimated. Preparation can make the difference between life and death.

Fiordland is Mitchell’s home. His cabin in Big Bay, 40km north of Milford Sound, was built by his father in the early 1960s. The Mitchells are one of a dozen families with grandfathered rights to live in the small World Heritage area. His lifestyle is vastly different from the common New Zealander's.

For a start, there is no road access to the community. When weather permits, a small plane periodically flies in basic food supplies. If Mitchell runs out of anything, he can’t whip down to the shop to re-stock. The ocean is his supermarket.

Mitchell is enviably self-sufficient but in an unexpected way. Most off-grid lifestyles carry an undercurrent of discontentment with society. But not here. Mitchell is the kind of 40-something-year-old whom any Mum or Dad would be thrilled for their daughter to introduce as her latest love interest.

He is educated in marine science and runs hosted experiences to some of New Zealand's most pristine wilderness. He's also a whiz in the kitchen.

Meals are usually freshly caught crayfish, whitebait, trout, or mussels –- all New Zealand delicacies. He doesn't just throw the kai-moana (seafood in Maori) into a pan, either. What he serves is worthy of a bestselling recipe book.

During the day –- when conditions allow –- Mitchell chooses between surfing some of New Zealand’s most remote breaks, kayaking, fishing, or sailing. His lifestyle is a smorgasbord of outdoor recreation.

Comforts of home

Since the 1980s, the Mitchell family has lived here practically full-time. Their cabin is warm, clean, and cozy. There is hot water, a flush toilet, and comfortable bedding. Even though it’s isolated, they're among a tight-knit community that look out for one another.

When Mitchell grew up, the family’s main source of income came from hunting. But they also started whitebaiting -- catching fish fry -- which is an important industry in New Zealand. Today, that’s a seasonal income for Mitchell.

“The thrill of whitebaiting is never knowing what you’re gonna catch and living hand in hand with the surrounding conditions and the environment,” he says.

For the past few years, Mitchell has also crewed fishing boats in the South Pacific (Vanuatu, New Caledonia, Fiji, Papua New Guinea, Samoa, Tonga, Tokelau, Wallis and Fatuna, Tahiti, and Hawaii).

Seasonally, Mitchell’s lifestyle could easily be too long for most people. Especially during the grey, wet, cold winter months that drag on for more than half the year.

But when he serves freshly caught crayfish with a sprinkling of herb and lemon, one can’t help but consider the benefits of living this way. There has to be something said for Mitchell’s glowing skin and relaxed smile too, doesn’t there?

An unusually dry winter followed by record-breaking summer temperatures has caused water levels to plummet in much of the world, especially in Europe. Italy’s River Tiber has dropped a metre. France’s longest river, Loire, has never flowed so slowly. The Rhine, which runs through six countries, is becoming impassable by barge.

Archaeologists and historians can be forgiven for looking at the silver lining in this summer's worldwide drought, the worst in 500 years. As waters recede in the baking heat, ancient cities, statues, and ships have emerged from the watery tombs in which they have hidden for decades or centuries. Here are some of them.

Hunger stones

A Hunger Stone is a stark reminder of drought’s hardship. There are dozens of Hunger Stones scattered throughout Europe. These are among the continent's oldest hydrological monuments, marking the drought years of 1417 and 1473.

Hunger Stones indicated bad harvests, lack of food, high prices, and hunger for poor people. One in Germany reads, “When this goes under, life will become colorful again.”

Spanish Stonehenge

For half a century, the so-called Spanish Stonehenge, or Guadalperal Dolmen, lay hidden in a corner of the Valdecanas Reservoir, in Spain's Cáceres province.

Believed to be between 5,000 and 7,000 years old, the prehistoric stone circle consists of dozens of megalithic stones. German archaeologist Hugo Obermaier first discovered it in 1926. It has only been visible four times since a rural development project flooded the area in 1963.

Reservoirs dry up, ghost towns re-emerge

Near the Portuguese border, the small town Aceredo has similarly reappeared. In 1992, the River Lima drowned the village to make room for a reservoir. As the reservoir has dried, the ghostly buildings have returned.

When the Scar House Reservoir was created in Yorkshire in the 1920s, it covered the remains of a medieval village. Now that water in the reservoir has receded more than 50 percent, the ancient settlement has reappeared.

Even more haunting is the emergence of an abandoned Roman fort in Spain's Ourense province. The two-hectare site of Aquis Querquennis was built between 69 and 79 AD and abandoned around 120 AD. It is usually underwater at the bottom of the As Conchas Reservoir.

Also in Spain, the gothic arches of a medieval bridge dating back to the 15th century began to peek out from the Cijara Reservoir in Extremadura in early summer. Now the bridge is fully exposed. It has been underwater for almost 70 years.

In Catalina, the small island off the north coast of the Península de Almina in Ceuta, the ancient Sant Romà de Sau church has resisted disappearing entirely by keeping a turret peering out of the water since the 1960s. Now the rest of the holy building has joined the turret on dry land.

World War II ships

In Italy, the extreme heat had been so bad that a state of emergency exists around the River Po. Recently, the river level became so low that an old German barge from World War II reappeared.

The Zibello sank in 1943 and has lain underwater until recently. Further south, the ruins of an ancient bridge from the Roman emperor Nero’s reign have resurfaced.

Europe’s second longest river, the Danube, has fallen to its lowest level in almost a century. More than 20 German warships have become visible in a Serbian section of the river near Prahovo. Some are partly buried in sandbanks. Others have bridges and turrets intact. The vessels were some of the hundreds scattered along the Danube by Nazi Germany's Black Sea fleet in 1944.

Bodies, wreckage thaw out of glaciers

In Switzerland, two sets of unidentified human bones have been discovered on an old path crossing the Chessjen Glacier. No one knows how long they have been there. But as glaciers melt, the bodies of people who disappeared long ago are coming out of the ice. Currently, the police in Valais have a list of 300 people who have vanished in their region since 1925. In time, descendants of the missing 300 may learn the fate of their relatives.

The Aletsch Glacier, for example, seems to have been particularly hazardous over the years. In 2012, the bodies of three brothers who disappeared in 1926 turned up. In 2017, the remains of a couple missing since 1942 showed up on the glacier. Debris from a 1968 plane crash also turned up recently. As the Aletsch melts away, we can expect more grisly discoveries.

An Asian river reveals its treasures

Further afield, three Buddhist statues more than 600 years old have emerged from China's Yangtze River. Built during the Ming and Qing dynasties, the statues may have blessed passing boats. Today, their presence is anything but a blessing, since the drought in the region has caused a shortage of hydropower.

The oldest find of all

North America may not have Roman monuments, but the hot summer has exposed something far more ancient: 113-million-year-old dinosaur tracks in central Texas. Exposed by the severe drought's effect on a river bed, the tracks may have belonged to a single acrocanthosaurus that walked the trail for about 30m. There are an estimated 140 tracks in total from this one dinosaur, with about 60 visible now. For years, they sat beneath water and sediment. They now rank among the best preserved dinosaur tracks in the world. The acrocanthosaurus looked similar to a T. Rex and was almost as big.

A 17-year-old has become the youngest person to fly solo around the world. Mack Rutherford set off from Sofia, Bulgaria, on March 23. Today, five months later, he touched down where he began.

Earlier this year, Rutherford's sister, Zara, became the youngest woman to fly alone around the world at 19. Their father, Sam, is a professional ferry pilot. Their mother, Beatrice, is a private pilot.

“I have been fortunate to have had a family that has been able to help me progress in my flying," said Rutherford, a dual citizen of Belgium and the UK. Rutherford is flying a Shark, one of the speediest ultralight aircraft in the world, with a cruising speed of 300kph. It is the same model that his sister used on her record-setting flight. His main sponsor, ICDSoft, loaned him the Shark for the journey.

Pilot's license at 15

Rutherford started young. Already at age three, he said he wanted to become a pilot. In 2020, at just 15 years and two months old he achieved his childhood goal by becoming the youngest qualified pilot in the world. With his father, he has completed two trans-Atlantic crossings.

Rutherford has faced sandstorms in the Sudan and extreme heat in Dubai. He dealt with airport closures in India and aircraft electrical failures.

The previous youngest pilot, Travis Ludlow, was 18 on his solo round-the-world flight last year. It took Ludlow 44 days.

When Rutherford left Bulgaria in March, he was just 16. He flew first to Sardinia, then to the Congo, Madagascar, and Mauritius in Africa.

“[Flying] is completely different in many parts of the world,” said Rutherford. “In Africa, I had quite a few problems with visibility, mountains, things like that. When I got to India, it was monsoon season so [there were] big storms...All these different places have different challenges.”

Next, he headed north to the UAE, India, China, South Korea, and Japan. In Unalaska, in the Aleutian Islands, Rutherford needed to make a second attempt at landing.

“To get over the mountains, I was at 7,500 feet. Then suddenly, I had to descend a huge amount because this is basically at sea level. Once I tried to do my approach, I was still too high. I had to go around and try again. The second time I was able to do it.”

He refueled, spent the night and then continued along the West Coast of America to Mexico.

Then Rutherford flew north again along the east coast to Canada, and crossed the Atlantic via Iceland and the UK before landing in Bulgaria.

Scariest moment

Rutherford's hairiest moment was on a Pacific Island.

"After 10 hours, I arrived at this small island, it was starting to get dark, so I landed," he said. "It was quite low cloud, it was raining, and no lights on the runway. It's actually an uninhabited island so if anything had gone wrong, I would be on my own...I landed there and had to sleep in a small shed on the side of the runway because it was completely abandoned for over 10 years."

Rutherford credits his sister Zara as inspirational to his success.

Europe’s summer-long heat and drought have had one positive consequence. Lower water levels in lakes, rivers, and coastal areas have exposed long-sunken treasures.

Rome's historic Tiber River now shows ruins built during Nero's reign. Water levels on the Tiber have plummeted more than a metre in the last year, to a record low, exposing the remains of what might be the Nero Bridge.

Built by the Roman emperor Nero, who reigned from 54 AD until he killed himself in 68 AD, the bridge connected the Field of Mars with Tiber's opposite bank. It led to Nero’s Circus on Vatican Hill.

A controversial sovereign, Nero was celebrated for building public structures and winning military victories abroad. But his darker side saw a man who focused on art, music, and chariot races rather than politics. He killed his mother and at least one of his wives. The Nero Bridge was destroyed at the end of the Western Roman Empire. It has lain buried in the Tiber River ever since.

Dispute over the bridge's origins

Some historians, however, dispute that it is the remains of Nero Bridge.

"The origins of the bridge are uncertain, given that it is likely a bridge existed here before Nero's reign and therefore the Pons Neronianus [Nero Bridge] was probably a reconstruction of an earlier crossing," said Nicholas Temple, professor of architectural history at London Metropolitan University.

In any case, the ancient brick now high and dry above a green riverbed is a stark reminder of climate change.

The Nero Bridge isn’t the only ancient emergence as a result of Europe's severe drought. In northern Italy, World War II shipwrecks have emerged from the River Po, the country's longest river.

The Po flows 652km from the northwestern city of Turin to Venice. In a section near the central northern village of Gualtieri, a 50m-long barge called the Zibello lies beached. It once transported wood during World War II and sank in 1943.

In recent years, the boat's rusted bow became visible. But this past spring, even before the major heatwave settled in, the rest of the vessel erupted from the waters.

Worst drought since the 1950s

This is the worst drought in the region in more than 70 years. Rain hasn’t fallen in more than 100 days.

"We are in a situation where the river flow is approximately 300 cubic metres per second here in [the riverside village of] Boretto, while normally in this area we have almost 1,800 cubic metres," explained Meuccio Berselli, secretary general of the Po River Basin Authority.

More World War II relics now jut out of the sand around the Po, including a tank that German troops pushed into the water in 1945. As the drought continues, more relics from the past are sure to emerge.

The Po valley experienced droughts in 2007, 2012 and 2017. Scientists agree that the climate crisis lies behind their growing prevalence.

Dubbed the last great imperial adventurer, Sir Francis Younghusband is ingloriously remembered for a savage slaughter of lightly armed Tibetans. The confrontation shamed the British Army, inciting the conclusion of the Anglo-Tibetan Treaty. Despite regretful wrongdoing, he was integral at mapping previously unchartered areas of Central Asia. Ironically, he later became known not just as a fearless explorer, but also something of a spiritualist.

Younghusband was born into a British military family in India in 1863. His upbringing was strict. At the age of 18, he entered the Royal Military College, where he received his first commission.

The Great Game was underway throughout Asia. Russia wanted to take hold of Britain’s power. Political confrontations were rife. The British Army had one overriding problem. Large unmapped portions of Asia rendered passage difficult.

Tough, driven

The driven Younghusband had a knack for assignments requiring austerity and strong negotiating acumen. In 1886, he took leave from the British Army and set off on his first expedition across Asia. His mission was to survey the unchartered Chambal Mountains and to detect the strength of the Russian Army.

Leaving Peking, Younghusband traveled on foot through Manchuria and the frontier areas of Chinese settlement around Changbal. He studiously documented the geography, returning information to the British Army. In particular, he found and chartered a new route through the vast Gobi Desert.

When Younghusband came to Changbai’s highest peak, he recognized a critical failing in previous reports. Baekdu Mountain was supposedly the region's highest, but Younghusband discovered that it only reached 2,400m.

He braved a harsh winter in the Himalaya with little more than a rifle for protection. Younghusband was in his element. Already, he was considered an expert in Central Asia. Later, he became Tibet Frontier Commissioner.

Vigorous mapping expeditions

On his return, he walked through the inhospitable Taklamakan Desert to Chinese Turkestan. When he reached Kashgar, he pioneered a route through the previously uncharted Mustagh Pass to India. He proved the range to be the water divide between India and Turkistan. Mapping the Upper Oxus earned him a place in the Royal Geographical Society as the youngest-ever member. He was 24 years old.

His mapping had helped the British establish better trade routes. By 1889, Younghusband was Captain. Next, he set off to investigate an unchartered area north of Ladakh, escorted by a small group of Gurkhas.

During the expedition, he met his Russian counterpart in The Great Game, Bronislav Grombchevsky. The two formed a friendship. Their meeting aided Britain’s confidence in Younghusband. His superiors felt that he was able to disarm confrontation while making strategic decisions to benefit his country.

It was the beginning of his intense political career. Then in 1903, he embarked on the expedition for which he is mostly remembered.

Tibetan slaughter

Amid fears of Russian infiltration, breaches of treaties, and minor border disputes, Younghusband left in 1903-4 on a British Army expedition to Tibet. He was there to settle border disputes. But exceeding orders, his mission became an unbridled military force that was described as the invasion of Tibet.

On their way to Gyantse, a confrontation ensued outside the hamlet of Guru, 160km inside the Tibet border. Younghusband and his team were victorious, slaying the Tibetan side. But the battle was not a fair match.

The British troops used guns while the Tibetan militia only had swords. More than 600 Tibetans died, many of them monks. Only a handful of British troops perished in action.

The confrontation was a heavy blow to Younghusband’s reputation as a cool-headed diplomat. Britain was desperate for a positive relationship with the Qing government, to negotiate profitable trade agreements. The onslaught was embarrassing and overturned the Treaty of Lhasa, which Younghusband had previously obtained.

Despite his uncompromising actions, Younghusband received praise and honors. That same year, he became a Knight Commander of the Order of the Star of India. For the next five years, he served as a British representative in Kashmir. Promotion to Lieutenant Colonel came during that period.

A 'premature hippie' in his later years

After returning to Britain in his later years, Younghusband championed British interests in Central Asia. He was elected president of the Royal Geographical Society in 1919. Later, he became Chairman of the Mount Everest Committee. He supported George Mallory on his famous, fatal attempt on Mount Everest.

From the outset, Younghusband appeared conservative. But beneath the bluster, he was fiercely spiritual, a “premature hippie” who believed in extraterrestrials.

Return from his 1904 slaughter of Tibetans, Younghusband claimed to have had a mystical experience that suffused him with love for the world. His reformed status left him with feelings of guilt for his recent butchery.

Younghusband published a number of titles with New Age themes such as Life in the Stars: An Exposition of the View that on some Planets of some Stars exist Beings higher than Ourselves.

He long outlived the British Empire under which he served and died of heart failure in 1942.

Shawn Hayes is one of the world's best falconers. Even though the sport has been around for decades, Hayes helps helps make it relevant for the modern day. Devoting his life to falcons, Hayes also shows young people of color not to be deterred when pursuing their dreams.

When Hayes was a child, school teachers told him that he should aspire to mow lawns as a profession. Or be a garbage collector. But he had other ideas.

His love for the outdoors propelled his decision to work with falcons. When he first encountered raptors, he was naturally attuned to their well-being. Eventually, he began training them.

“I might not have the fattest wallet but I look at these mountains and it’s cool to me,” says Hayes. "I just want to be outside."

Training is based on trust, not discipline

First, he makes the bird feel comfortable with him. That involves immense effort with seemingly small rewards in return. Falcons don’t react to discipline, so training is based on a trusting partnership.

The sport is all-consuming. You invest everything into a bird and “before you know it, its taken over your life,” says Hayes.

His work is now admired globally, but he still needs to keep a watchful eye for negativity that comes with his skin tone. Once, he had a falcon stolen. Another time he was confronted with a verbal racist attack.

Whether Hayes acquires his falcons through captive breeding or from the wild, he devotes himself entirely to them.

Hayes documents their weight, the temperatures they are exposed to, and the speeds they travel. He even checks their excrement to ensure that they are processing food properly. An unhealthy falcon is a reflection of the falconer, Hayes believes. In balance, Hayes also aims to have positive energy around his birds. “My energy matters,” he says.

He used to compete in falconry meets, which took him all over the world. He has now stopped competitive falconry. Instead, he often draws large audiences by lecturing about the birds.

He discusses the bond required between bird and falconer as the basis of performance. When he releases a falcon to catch prey, he trusts that it will return. In training, Hayes travels widely in order to introduce his bird to a wide variety of prey. If he releases his bird in places where there isn’t enough prey, the bird won’t trust him. It won’t return.

The fastest animal on earth

Historically, falconry was a way for villagers to gather food. They are exceptional predators. Built for speed, the falcon can fly at speeds up to 400kph. Their eyesight is 8-10 times more acute than humans. Pointed wings and a slender body allow the bird to fly quickly and undetected. Even early aviation was modeled on a falcon's form.

In those days, you wouldn't have seen someone of Hayes' color with a falcon. Today, it seems unfathomable that skin tone can affect how a person is accepted. But Hayes proves none of that matters when you pursue your dream to excellence.

In the northern Indian province of Himachal Pradesh, Rakchham is a small village with a big secret. It is home to a cache of boulders which are ideal for sport climbers. The rock forms are hidden from most of the world, but one Austrian climber has developed a way to mutually benefit the climbing community, locals, and nature.

Bernd Zangerl is a bouldering legend. He has accumulated more than 20 years as an alpinist and climber. For the past 11 years, he has returned to Rakchham for bouldering.

Sacred peaks, some of them destinations for pilgrims, surround Rakchham. Villagers live simply in this quiet spot. The fertile soil grows buckwheat, kidney beans, and potatoes.

Since Zangerl visits so regularly, he has come to know the locals well. They understand that he also has a spiritual connection here. Zangerl describes it as a peaceful place where you can just “be”, without traffic, commerce, or distractions vying for your attention.

No Shangri-La

But Rakchham isn’t immune to the world’s problems. Litter despoils nature here just as over-tourism has threatened the nearby Himalaya.

Even though the environment is a global concern, small villages like Rakchham witness its issues magnified. It’s reasonable for the villagers to be cautious about foreigners coming to use their fragile land for climbing.

Zangerl doesn’t want to see Rakchham self-sabotaged, as other parts of the Himalaya have been.

As a way to create sustainability between climbing and nature, Zangerl founded a club. His Rakchham Climbing Adventure Club tries to benefit all. The climbers train local kids so that one day they may earn a living as climbing guides. Climbers support families by paying for homestays in a region that needs some outside income.

Most importantly, club members collect litter. "Climbers cannot forget that we are guests,” Zangerl says. "Tourism can only be sustainable when we have the support of the local population and respect their local customs."

In 2018, Danny MacAskill stands at the top of a trail in Graubuenden, Switzerland. With one foot on the ground, the other perched on his pedal, he is ready to rip straight down. Not one to stay in his comfort zone, the stuntman demonstrates his skills in this new playground. He balances over the ledge of a ravine and effortlessly pulls off front and back flips.

From mechanic to extreme athlete

You’ll remember MacAskill. He’s the trials cyclist from the Isle of Skye who broke into the mainstream in 2009 with his five-minute YouTube clip, Inspired Bicycles. He didn’t expect the video to go viral but when it did he almost immediately quit his job as a mechanic to ride full time. Red Bull signed him less than nine months later.

He’s now amassed more than 300 million views on YouTube, making him one of YouTube's biggest stars.

MacAskill continuously pushes his limits. At first, his stunts were mostly in the UK. Now, the world is his playground. Switzerland’s Graubünden region has the largest number of bike trails for an area of its size in the world. The network of trails covers more than 2,500km.

Seven-time Swiss-National Downhill Mountain bike Champion Claudio Caluori joined MacAskill in Switzerland. He’s evidently not as confident to push his limits as MacAskill. That’s not to discredit Caluori but rather shows how otherworldly MacAskill's abilities are.

MacAskill has since performed a back wheel-bump front flip over barbed wire. He summed up that insanity simply: “It’s amazing how much energy it generates when it’s timed properly!” He’s made headlines with a backward downhill wheelie too.

A dangerous profession

MacAskill sometimes spends between four and six days to land a trick, for just six seconds of film. He’s broken more than 20 bones, including a knee cap. One of his peers, Martyn Ashton, was paralyzed when a stunt went wrong. “As I age I’m going to have to start looking after myself a little better,” MacAskill says.

In his 2020 video Gymnasium, it took 199 failed attempts for MacAskill to jump from one slack-line to another on both wheels. “That’s why we put the mistakes in at the end of the videos, to break the illusion a little bit. There are hundreds of attempts. That’s normal for me. Not to do something the first time,” he says.

The 36-year-old has bucket loads of perseverance and determination, but his attitude to cycling is that it should be fun.

In Switzerland, fun is absolutely what comes across. MacAskill and Caluori put on a great show.

United States Air Force pilot David Steeves went missing for 54 days. When he finally emerged, barely clothed, malnourished, and with slashes to his body, he recounted an astonishing tale of survival.

The crash

In 1957, the Air Force sent Steeves on a test flight from San Francisco to Alabama. He had already served as an air force pilot for two years. Colleagues considered him studious and dedicated, a model lieutenant.

Piloting a Lockheed T-33A Shooting Star Two-Seat Trainer, his short test flight started like any other. But shortly after take-off, catastrophe struck. “Something blew up,” Steeves later recounted.

Steeves blacked out. When he came to, his aircraft was spiraling out of control. Quick to react, he ejected with a parachute. Behind him, the T-33 exploded into pieces.

Steeves landed in dense trees in the Sierra Nevada Mountains. The rough landing left him with gashes to his body and two sprained ankles.

But surviving the plane crash was just the beginning.

In the Sierra Nevada

His clothes were shredded during his escape. All he had left to protect him from the elements was his parachute. Although it was May in California, he was 3,500m up in the mountains and dangerously exposed. At night, the weather went below freezing. All he could do was wrap himself in the parachute and shiver.

Steeves needed to find a way back to civilization quickly. Disoriented, he crawled for 15 days across more than 30km of rugged mountain terrain. He was near starvation.

Finally, Steeves finally had a stroke of luck. He came across an abandoned ranger's cabin. Inside, he found canned beans, some ham, a pistol, a knife, and fish hooks.

Using the hooks, he caught fish. With the pistol, he shot a deer who was feeding at a salt lick. Regaining his strength, he attempted to walk out of the mountains. Instead, he almost drowned crossing the Kings River.

Wearing only his flight boots and tattered underpants, a group of people spotted him near Granite Basin. Fifty-three days after his plane crash, they carried Steeves out of the Sierra Nevada on horseback. He had lost over 18kg.

"My ankles are still swollen, otherwise I guess I'm okay," Steeves told reporters a few days after his rescue.

Foul play?

Everyone had assumed Steeves was dead. His wife had already ordered his death certificate. At first, the public treated him like a hero. Here was a handsome pilot who had survived against all odds. But this changed when the Air Force couldn’t locate his crash site. The Air Force came to suspect that his story might be an elaborate coverup for selling his plane to the Soviets.

He lost his reputation, and he and his wife split up. His life was in tatters. For years, Steeves attempted to clear his name. He rented small planes and crisscrossed the mountain range in search of his wreckage. But he found nothing.

Just eight years after the first, in 1965, Steeves was in another plane crash. This time he was not so lucky. He died in the crash, aged just 31.

In 1977, a group of Boy Scouts came across a broken airplane part while hiking in Kings Canyon National Park. The serial number matched the missing T-33A that Steeves had piloted. Too late, Steeves was finally vindicated.

The candiru may be as small as a toothpick, but the myth around the slender little fish is huge. A creature thin as a pencil lead, following a urine stream into the urethra of a man, where it erects spines and cannot be dislodged. Agg!

But is this centuries-old horror tale a myth?

One of over 130 species of parasitic freshwater catfish, the candiru can grow up to 40cm long. Most are 17cm. Some are 2.5cm and do have a diameter small enough to enter a urethra. They only live in the Amazon, especially in the murky, low-pH waters around the junction of Rio Negro, near Manaus.

As with all parasites, candirus live off their host. Typically, they attach to the gills of larger fish. Using spines on their gills, the eel-like vampires cling to their prey causing inflammation, hemorrhage, then death.

The legend begins

The legend of a candiru entering the urethra of a urinating man first emerged in the 18th century. Reportedly, the smell of ammonia in urine attracted them. Guided by the smell, they’d swim to their victim –- a boy relieving himself in a river, for example –- and take flight into the tiny opening of the urethra. Around that time, the fish was described as “very small but uniquely occupied in doing evil”.

Since then, evidence has shown candiru actually hunt by sight. They have no attraction to urine at all. But perhaps the story initially had a grain of truth. It is plausible that schools of candiru used their vision to follow the turbulent water around a man’s urine flow.

However, the first accounts of these parasites lodging within a human took place, surprisingly, in women.

The earliest report dates back to 1829. German biologist C. F. P. Von Martius only heard the story second-hand. From whom, no one knows. The local people of that region supposedly wore jock straps made of coconut shells when they bathed in the river as a preventive. Then in 1836 came the first actual report of a candiru entering the human body.

Female victims

A local woman needed the fish extracted from her urethra using the medicinal jagua plant. We never learned how it got in there in the first place. A second case occurred in 1891. By 1930, there were several similar cases. But no lodgings within other cavities.

The myth spread globally. From rural corners of New Zealand to large cities in the United States, the legend of a tiny fish swimming into terrified boys' penises has spread. Then in 1997, the myth took a dramatic turn.

A 23-year-old man claimed that a candiru had jumped from the water into his urethra as he urinated in knee-deep water in Itacoatiara, Brazil. The man –- intriguingly, known only as F.B.C –- hurried to Manaus for treatment. Here, a Dr. Anoar Samad performed a two-hour surgery to remove the fish from his body.

A modern 'incident'

His was the first real claim in history. Intrigued, American marine biologist Stephen Spotte went to Manaus two years later to investigate. He returned highly suspicious of the claim. Here’s why.

When Spotte met Dr. Samad, he was offered photos, original VHS footage of the cystoscopy procedure, and given a preserved candiru fish –- allegedly the one removed from the victim.

First, Spotte noted that the fish was 11.5mm in diameter – too wide to enter the urethra without significant force to pry the urethra open. That would be impossible because candiru don’t have appendages or other apparatus.

The victim claimed that the fish “leaped” out of the water. But Spotte concluded that “leaping” could not have allowed sufficient leverage to force its way inside.

Furthermore, Dr. Samad stated the candiru chewed its way through the ventral wall of the urethra into the patient's scrotum. But Spotte noted that the candiru’s teeth aren’t strong enough to chew through such tissue.

The preserved candiru which Dr. Samad kept had all its spikes intact too, which contradicts Dr. Samad’s claim of having to snip the candiru’s grasping spike, for removal. If the fish was removed (as the VHS footage implied), the spikes would not have been intact.

A peculiar video

The five-minute video of the procedure is grainy. In it, there is no telltale sign of exactly what body part the fish is in or even if it is a fish at all. But more than four million people have watched the video online. Not surprisingly, Dr. Samad and F.B.C’s story were also featured on an episode of River Monsters.

Even if F.B.C was telling the truth, it is impossible for candiru to leap out of the water like a miniature javelin and score a bull's eye into the urethra.

Part of the legend also suggested that if someone were to have the fish painfully lodged inside, the only way to remove it is by amputation. That’s because the spines on the candiru’s head make them too difficult and painful to remove. Unusual reports of scores of people with amputated penises in the Amazon seemingly confirm the candiru's legend. But it’s more likely that those amputations are due to piranhas, not candiru.

So, can men safely pee in candiru-infested rivers? Only if piranhas are not there, too.

No one has canoed the entire length of Newfoundland's Terra Nova River before. This wild artery in far eastern Canada demands both expert paddling skills and good luck. This film documents a group of experienced canoeists who attempted to make the first descent three years ago. They failed. To date, no one has completed it.

These weren’t your run-of-the-mill paddlers. They were all either founding directors or members of the Newfoundland Kayak Company. One of them, Richard Alexander, is one of only six people in Canada to hold the highest level of sea kayaking certification. If any group of canoeists could successfully bring this home, it's them. Apart from their individual expertise, they’ve worked together so long that they know each other's strengths and weaknesses and can rely on each other in a pinch.

The Terra Nova River spans over 200km through the northern end of Terra Nova National Park. Vigorous stretches of rapids invite skilled parties in decked canoes.

Canada is one of the best canoeing countries in the world. It features everything from the accessible Ottawa River, by the nation's capital, where you can hone your whitewater skills for an afternoon, to the many wilderness canoe rivers of the Northwest Territories, which sometimes require two-month expeditions. But Terra Nova is an elusive stretch of water that many enthusiasts herald as a holy grail.

Maneuvering boats averaging 5.5m long past haystacks, around sweepers, and through narrow passages between rocks would tax even this expert party. But there was one further issue they hadn't counted on. Because of recent rains, water levels were 50% higher than expected.

Rain, rain, rain

Heavy rain continued to fall relentlessly as they made their way downriver. As a river absorbs all the runoff in its watershed, its level, intensity, and difficulty rise dramatically.

At times, the party had to wait days in their soggy tents. When they eventually returned to their boats, some of these roaring sections caused major anxiety. Boats smashed, and sometimes the canoeists dumped in those cold Newfoundland waters and were swept downstream, their legs pinging off submerged rocks.

After weighing up the risk, the group made the call to abort the mission.

They admit that risk is part of what paddling is all about. “If you could remove all the risk, the activity would no longer be canoeing or kayaking. What we do carries inherent risk.”

Nevertheless, the time comes in some adventures when you just have to cut bait. At the end of their attempt, they agreed that they will need a serious amount of downtime before they try again.

Alexandra David-Neel sought freedom from convention, and preferred sleeping in caves and traveling barefoot. In 1924, the Buddhist scholar, travel writer, explorer, and former opera singer crossed the Himalaya in winter to reach the sacred city Lhasa. She became the first European woman to do so.

David-Neel was born in Paris during the Victorian era. Remembered for its prudishness and conservative beliefs, the epoch determined a women’s role within society. When this ended in the early 1900s, opportunities for self-expression and innovation slowly presented themselves. But only for men. Women were expected to marry and run a household. This did not appeal to David-Neel.

She desired unpredictability and insisted on creating her own rules. A strong sense of freedom led her to run away from home when she was only five years old. It was a characteristic she repeated during her lifetime.

Spiritual beginnings

In adolescence, she found her calling. Literature awakened her to Eastern beliefs, and she became a devotee of Madame Blavatsky's Theosophical Society.

Founded in 1875, the Theosophical Society sought to bridge the culture between East and West by emphasizing the commonality among humans. Different religions, it argued, are simply unique expressions of truth.

Enthralled by the idea of a simple lifestyle, she was led to Eastern philosophies, especially Buddhism and the self-restraint of the Eightfold Path. When she was 15, she also began studying music as a means to conform. By the time a tutor noticed her natural singing talent, she was already uncomfortable with the confines of her era and gender. Her second runaway followed: One day, she set out for a hike and continued through the Alps to Italy. Her frantic mother retrieved her from Milan.

The restless David-Neel spent the next few years trying to appease her mother by taking jobs more customary to women. In 1891, a sizeable inheritance offered her the first opportunity to live as she pleased.

She spent a year traveling through Ceylon (now Sri Lanka) and India. When she returned, she wrote her first book. Published privately, it failed to win an audience.

Opera singer in Asia

Her home in Brussels didn’t connect with her beliefs. Desperate to leave, she took an opera-singing position in Hanoi. Starring under the name Alexandra Myrial, she was a sensation. Her unique ability to connect with the feelings of her characters propelled her career. She sang opera through Indochina and Europe until her voice began to falter.

There was nothing more interesting to David-Neel than travel. Opera singing had invited her to experience other cultures, and she craved more. Deeply involved in the beliefs of Buddhism and the Greek stoic philosopher Epictetus, she wanted to explore their origins.

Marriage of convenience

In 1900, she wed Philip Neel. He was a wealthy rail engineer who needed a wife for respectability. She needed money to travel. There was little love between them.

The relationship was strained for David-Neel, in particular. She tried to live the life her husband needed. Eventually, she asked him to let her travel alone. He agreed. She left in 1911 and didn't see her husband for the next 14 years.

At first, David-Neel returned to India. She stayed in monasteries and zigzagged across the country. When she met the Dalai Lama in 1912, he suggested that she learn his native language, Tibetan. Studying this ancient language fit effortlessly into her spiritual practices.

In a Sikkim monastery, she met a 15-year-old monk, Aphur. Their spiritual connection was instantaneous and she adopted him as her son. Aphur became David-Neel's lifelong travel companion. Their first trip was north, into the Himalaya.

In a cave for three years

On the border of Tibet, at 4,000m, the two lived in a cave between 1914-1917. They braved freezing temperatures and scrounged for food. They spent most of their time meditating. Twice, they attempted to infiltrate the forbidden city of Lhasa in disguise.

Tibet was a common beacon for foreigners. But the country was strictly closed. David-Neel and Aphur entered illegally and were swiftly expelled.

With World War I at Europe’s doorstep, the pair set off in the opposite direction, first to Japan, then onward to Korea and China. For two years, they translated Tibetan books, living as monks in China’s Kumbum Monastery.

But again, David-Neel was restless. She struggled to stay in one place for long, and Tibet beckoned. She and Aphur set off again to attempt to enter Lhasa. This time, they succeeded.

Pilgrims in disguise

First traveling through the harsh Gobi Desert, then through China, the pair battled the elements. They navigated mountain paths and flooded roads, walked through jungles, and endured harsh Chinese winters. They ate whatever they could, and when there was nothing, they boiled the leather from their shoes. In 1924, they entered Lhasa their holy grail, disguised as pilgrims.

This time, they visited the Potala, the Dalai Lama’s winter residence. But their trip was cut short when David-Neel blew their ruse while taking a holy bath.

Before they could be apprehended, the penniless pair fled to Gyantse to enlist the help of a British trade agent stationed there. By now, David-Neel was a famous French explorer. However, some people assumed that she was a spy sent by the French government. With the aid of the British agent, they sneaked back to France.

Meets husband again after 14 years

It was 1925, 14 years since she'd first set out, when David-Neel showed up at her husband’s door with an adopted son. The couple separated, and David-Neel began work on her book, My Journey into Lhasa. She bought a home in Provence for her and Aphur. Here, she wrote many of her books. In 1937, her relentless legs again got the better of her. This time, she headed to China.

On the cusp of the Sino-Japanese war, David-Neel and Aphur ventured through Japan, China, and India. They witnessed the brutality imposed upon civilians unwittingly caught in the conflict. They maintained their spiritual disposition, unwavering from beliefs that seemed removed from the hostility around them. When David-Neel’s husband died in 1941, she had to return home to settle his estate. Because of World War II, it took five years for her to return to France. She arrived back in 1946.

Back in France

David-Neel’s reputation was primarily centred around her persona as a traveler and explorer. But David-Neel’s poor temper often took precedence. She quickly lost patience with those who didn’t live up to her spiritual expectations. Buddhism and teachings of the East had become more commonly practiced, and she only welcomed those paying homage to her as the author of books from which they had learned.

Together David-Neel and Aphur lived a quaint European life. But it wasn’t easy for them. Aphur indulged his unhappiness inside cafés, smoking and drinking. In 1955, he died of uremia.

David-Neel was grief-stricken. She and her adopted son were kindred spirits who had shared experiences that few people related with. She became reclusive and bitter. Housekeepers stayed only for short periods. David-Neel's temper drove them away.

In 1959, Marie-Madeleine Peyronnet became more than a housekeeper. She stayed long enough to support David-Neel like a member of her own family, nursing her until her death.

Final years

David-Neel’s final years were unhappy. She preferred living a nomadic life in the mountains, not settling in one place as an old woman. Shortly before her 101st birthday, she died.

Behind David-Neel’s unhappiness and agitation was a woman who adored the simplicity of Eastern philosophy. She was happiest searching for food instead of buying it in a store and preferred sleeping on hard wood to a soft mattress. Those monks who devoted their lives to something greater than commercial enterprise were her spiritual guides.

In turn, she inspired spiritual leaders Ram Dass and Alan Watts, and poets Jack Kerouac and Allan Ginsberg. In travel, she proved that one can easily overcome the lack of daily comforts when the mind is connected spiritually. She published more than 30 books.

Relentless surf, committing coastlines, and extreme weather. That’s how the few kayakers who have circumnavigated New Zealand describe their adventure. But when Fi and James Corfe paddled the North Island in 2017, they also discovered secluded beaches and warm hospitality, between days of horrifying landings and gale-force winds.

Paddling around the North Island wasn't the Corfes' first New Zealand expedition. In 2015, they circumnavigated the South Island. The experience taught them valuable lessons about New Zealand’s surf. But for a North Island expedition, “we knew we had to up our game.”

The couple darted back to their native England for bitter winter training off the UK coast. Then they flew to Auckland for their North Island debut. Less than 24 hours after arriving, they set off clockwise from Mission Beach.

A New Zealand circumnavigation is no vacation

The first kayaker to circumnavigate New Zealand was Paul Caffyn in 1979. More than 30 years later, Tara Mulvany became the first woman to do so. The small nation of five million people might be a dream holiday destination for many, but where kayaking is concerned, its coastal waters are no vacation.

Known to have "four seasons in one day", New Zealand's windless, sunny days can turn sinister without warning. Blue sky flips into a thunderous grey within minutes. At sea, surf from unexpected directions can capsize a vessel. Breakers and shore reefs challenge safe landings.

Paddling along the East Coast, the Corfes' enjoyed long stretches of remote beaches, simple landings, and no wind. The country’s first drought in years created dusty, dry weather. On land, the couple dug pits in river banks for scarce water. But after this early idyll, challenges reared at every turn.

The couple regularly had to make tough decisions. Should they set off in high winds and choppy seas or not? A wrong decision could be fatal.

Once, they paddled 130km in a day

North Island’s southernmost tip proved to be the first of many harrowing experiences. Cape Palliser is known for strong winds, and on that day, the couple encountered 60-knot gusts.

Once, high winds blew their tent to pieces, and they had to wait seven days on land for a break in the weather.

The West Coast is the most challenging part of any New Zealand circumnavigation. The couple arrived prepared for big swells and long stretches of unlandable coastline. Past New Plymouth, they paddled 60 and 70km days. A mixture of reef and surf kept them at sea. Every landing required fine judgment and timing.

Manukau and Kaipara Harbours posed such risk that even the Coast Guards warned them off. But they weren’t deterred. Concentrating on rogue breakers, they rounded Cape Reinga, then paddled their longest stretch: 130km over 23 hours. After that marathon stretch, they put their paddles aside and relaxed for a few days, enjoying one of the most secluded beaches in the world.

Once, they introduced themselves to a fishing crew. In a show of kiwi hospitality, they were invited on board for a night of local music and beer. It wasn’t the first kiwi hospitality that the couple encountered. Fascinated locals offered them crayfish, home-cooked meals, and showers or a bed for the night. That’s kiwi culture: Getting to know another person’s story without any expectations is part of the New Zealand way.

The Corfes ended their expedition at Mission Beach, 97 days after setting off. That might seem like a long time to spend in a kayak. But for them, "the end of an expedition feels quite sudden," they explained.

Ambitious trailblazer, innovator, and adventurer; Aloha Wanderwell was born to be a star. At 16, she responded to an advertisement that cast her in travel films. In a 1918 Ford Model T, she became the first woman to drive around the globe. Later, she produced and directed historically significant travelogues. Wanderwell defied the limitations of her era.

The turn of the century brought modern aviation, which allowed greater freedom to explore. A fledgling film industry provided new forms of entertainment and creativity. Wanderwell –- born Idris Galcia Welsh in Winnipeg, Canada in 1906 -- arrived in time to capitalize on the innovations.

After her father died in World War I, Wanderwell's family moved to Europe. Here, she attended schools in England, Belgium, and France. In 1922, Wanderwell applied to an advertisement that launched her career.

'Beauty, brains, and breeches'

She was 16 years old when she read "Brains, Beauty & Breeches – World Tour Offer For Lucky Young Woman…. Wanted to join an expedition… Asia, Africa…"  in a newspaper. The role involved working for the Million Dollar Wager, a round-the-world endurance race of Ford Model Ts. Interviewed by Walter Wanderwell (who later became her husband), she secured a place on the team. Using her new stage name of Aloha Wanderwell, she became the face of the expedition.

The adventure was grueling, but her adventurous spirit flourished in this environment. She toured the world under a variety of titles: filmmaker, actress, seam mistress, translator.

The Ford Model T was a breakthrough vehicle that enabled middle-class people to own a car. For many households, it replaced the horse or train. Durable, simple to operate, and affordable, the Model T was among the first mass-produced vehicles. Its generous ground clearance enabled her to drive harsh, rural roads. With the Wanderwell expedition crew, she set off from France, driving through 43 countries.

Model T escapades

Wanderwell motored across Italy, Japan, the Netherlands, Palestine, Poland, Portugal, the Soviet Union, Spain, Sudan, Switzerland, Turkey, and Yemen.  In India, oxen had to tow the vehicle across deep mud and rivers. In China, workers pulled the car for more than 120km when fuel was scarce.

Wanderwell braved hostility in Germany, disguised herself as a man in Mecca, and almost died of thirst in the Sudanese Desert. In Egypt, she camped at the foot of the Sphinx. She fueled her vehicle with kerosene and used bananas and elephant fat for oil. The far-flung corners of the globe that had fascinated her since childhood were now part of her daily routine. For such a free spirit, nothing could be better.

She arrived in Hawaii, then onward to the United States. Now married, Wanderwell and her husband welcomed their firstborn -- a daughter, Valri, born in Miami.

Capitalizing on her adventures, Wanderwell made films and travelogues which she showed on lecture tours.

The family then left for South Africa and welcomed a son, Nile, born in Cape Town in 1927. Then onward to the heart of Africa: Kampala, Uganda, Kilimanjaro, the Serengeti, and Nairobi.

World's most widely traveled girl

When Wanderwell arrived back in Nice five years after first setting off, she became the first woman to have driven around the world. She became known as -- or perhaps billed herself -- “the world’s most widely traveled girl".

The Wanderwells' first documentary, With Car and Camera Around the World, showcased their travels. Through it, they became respected filmmakers. Early on, Wanderwell had simply been cast in her husband's films. Over time, she led their production. In some, she was producer-director.

“Our motion picture editing was done in our hotel rooms. Rewinds consisted of pencils held through the hubs of reels...We would barter with local merchants and Ford dealers for gas and services in exchange for endorsing their products during our stage performance. It was a ‘finance as you go’ expedition,” said Wanderwell in a 1982 interview.

She was just warming up.

Takes up flying

Next, she traveled to the Mata Grosso region of the Amazon. In part, they were searching for Percy Fawcett, who had disappeared five years earlier. Ever the trailblazer, Wanderwell learned to fly a German seaplane and made several flights within the region. Once, their plane ran out of fuel and they had to make an emergency landing, then enlist the help of local Bororo Indians.

The South American expedition resulted in three films: Flight to the Stone Age, Last of the Bororos, and The River of Death (below). 

Husband mysteriously murdered

Then Wanderwell’s life changed dramatically. Her husband was mysteriously murdered. The couple was preparing to sail to the South Seas on their 33m yacht when he was slain on board the day before departure. No one was ever charged with his murder.

In 1933, Wanderwell remarried. Her new husband, Walter Baker, became Wanderwell-Baker’s new travel and business partner. Together, they revisited Australasia and South East Asia. Their travels were full of excitement. Once, Wanderwell had to shoot her way out of an elephant stampede.

The couple's first professional film collaboration was To See the World By Car. Then three more: Explorers of the Purple Sage, India Now, and Australia Now.

After the Second World War, she continued making films. When eventually she retired, she focused on preserving her legacy and sharing her story with the world. She was aware that what she caught on film over her lifetime was historically significant. Museums now display artifacts from her travels, and archives hold her vast collection of films and images.

Extroverted, flamboyant, iconic

Her final public lecture was in 1982 at the Natural History Museum in Los Angeles. Wanderwell-Baker dressed in full expedition regalia, as she had always flamboyantly done while presenting her films.

She died in 1996 as an icon. Men adored her confidence, women envied her bravery. Over 25 years, she had visited more than 55 countries -- a vastly harder task then than now. And the travelogues she created reflected the evolution of lecture filmmaking in the early 20th century.

The German-born Martina Demmel oozes natural talent. When she was four, she took up skiing. By 15, she skied with her regional team and carved an enviable racing career. She enjoyed podium success and continued to progress.

Then by chance, a friend invited her to the local climbing wall. Demmel immediately knew climbing was “something I wanted to keep doing”.

Leaving snow for dust, Demmel started indoors before quickly crossing over to outdoor rock. Although climbing differs from skiing, there are plenty of transferrable skills. For example, Demmel has spent most of her 19 years fine-tuning her physique for the purpose of moving on uneven surfaces.

Skiing requires plenty of core stability, strength, and balance. When she started climbing, she was already ahead of the pack.

Plenty of climbers will never manage the difficult routes Demmel achieves. Indeed, her ability and rapid progress have caught the world’s attention.

Recently, a national coach spotted her. Invited to a competition, Demmel landed in fifth place, qualifying for the World Cup in Briançon, France. At her first International Federation of Sport Climbing competition, she also made the semifinals, finishing 24th.

Less pressure than skiing

Demmel puts her success down to the fact there is less pressure in beginning as a rock climber than continuing as a competitive skier. She says she is simply climbing for the fun of it. The beauty of the environment, rather than rapidly advancing through the grades, is what drives her.

At the same time, Demmel doesn’t seem like the kind of person to dabble in pursuits with mediocre drive. In the past year, she spent more than 200 days on rock. It’s fair to say she is a naturally driven soul.

Her 9a ascent last April isn’t a career pinnacle. It’s a career start.

Wee

It may come as a surprise to our readers around the world, but the number of continents remains a subject of debate. Depending on where and when you grew up, you may have learned that there are anywhere from four to seven continents. In some systems, Europe and Asia count as one: Eurasia. In others, North and South America is a single continent, America. Still others dismiss Antarctica as a mere island, a kind of super-Greenland.

Nowadays, seven is the most common: North America, South America, Europe, Asia, Africa, Antarctica, Australia/Oceania. Until recently, no one suggested that there might be an eighth continent. But that is what some geologists believe.

Before the 1960s, the definition of a continent was simple. Emanuel Bowen (a Welsh map engraver) defined a continent as “a large space of dry land comprising many countries joined together without separation of water”. But the too-broad definition frustrated many modern geographers and geologists.

Eventually, the criteria were updated. The geological area must have high elevation. It must bear a wide variety of rocks and a thick crust. It must also be "large in size".

Tiny pieces can't be continents

"You just can't be a tiny piece," says Nick Mortimer, a geologist for GNS Science, New Zealand’s leading Earth and geoscience research business.

In 2017, GNS Science studied a lesser-known area named Zealandia. Their research convinces them that Zealandia qualifies as an eighth continent. GNS Science is not the first to make this claim, either.

Zealandia once formed part of ancient Gondwanaland, but broke free millions of years ago, first from Antarctica, then from Australia. Now only satellites can detect the region, because 93% of it lies below the ocean, as an elevated piece of continental crust. At 4.9 million square kilometres, about two-thirds the size of Australia, Zealandia is the smallest, narrowest, and youngest continent in the world.

Arguments for Zealandia

Nowadays, Zealandia's dry land includes only New Zealand, the French islands of New Caledonia, and Australia’s Lord Howe Island and Ball’s Pyramid. Currently, they’re recognized as part of Oceania, but GNS Science believes otherwise.

American geophysicist Bruce Luyendyk claimed Zealandia’s existence in 1995. He also coined the name Zealandia. For more than 20 years, surveys have collected evidence that the type of rock found in Zealandia meets a continent's criteria for crust and variety.

During these studies, geologists dredged up rocks from the seafloor. They found that the crust surrounding New Zealand comprised different rock types, including granite, limestone, and sandstone. Some of them were incredibly ancient. “That is typical of a continental crust," argued researchers.

Australia and New Zealand: not the same continent

Mortimer goes further. He suggests that a narrow strip of oceanic crust separates Australia from the subterranean reaches of Zealandia. This means that Australia and New Zealand are undoubtedly separate continents.

“From a geological perspective, defining Zealandia as a continent makes sense,” says Luyendyk.

Even before GNS Science and Luyendyk, telltale signs existed of Zealandia’s mysterious presence.

Scottish naturalist Sir James Hector was part of a voyage sent to survey a series of islands off New Zealand’s coast in 1895. Hector concluded that New Zealand is "the remnant of a mountain chain that formed the crest of a great continental area that stretched far to the south and east, and which is now submerged…"

No official continent committee

"I hope Zealandia will now start to appear on world maps," said Mortimer optimistically. Alas, christening Zealandia our eighth continent is unlikely to happen anytime soon.

There is no official body to designate new continents, so Mortimer must hope to convince enough of his colleagues that Zealandia's existence can no longer be denied or ignored.

As a New Zealander who is familiar with New Zealand's rivalry with Australia, I'd feel a little smug if we were indeed one day part of a separate continent.

This vintage BBC film from 1971 profiled Bill Houston, a simple Scotsman. Undeterred by the world’s fast-moving pace, Houston marched to his own slow rhythm. He was the kind of chap who would spend long afternoons clipping blooms in his garden.

For nine months of the year, he pushed rubbish through the local tip with a bulldozer. He rather enjoyed the job’s solitude. The rest of the time, Houston cycled cross-continent. He roamed the world this way for 25 years. He was one of the early long-distance cyclists who explored the world on two wheels. He pedaled through over 30 countries.

Houston owed his cycling lifestyle to Kirkpatrick Macmillian. The bicycle inventor was Houston's idol and someone who shared a yearning for simple joys.

The freedom of the garbageman

Once Houston said of bulldozing rubbish, “I can look out the window. There’s no one pushing me. If I see something, I’ll go outside and have a look at it.”

Houston estimated that he covered more than 600,000km. “I’m a mechanized tramp,” he said of himself in the film.

"Tramp" referred to his travel style. He cycled with a stove, pot, and simple ingredients for meals. Then at dinner time, he propped his bike against less-frequented places like underpasses and heat up his food.

He was content to travel amid such simplicity and solitude. Once, he pedaled for 17 days without seeing another person. It was only after he began having conversations with his bike that he thought it was time to revisit civilization.

No more orders

Houston's cross-continent cycling began after he left the army in 1946. Vowing never again to be ordered about, he first rode his way around Scotland and Ireland.

Winter in Scotland is too cold for camping, though. So Houston bought an old-fashioned Youth Hostel membership. With more than 90 “weekend cottages” across Scotland alone, Houston considered himself better off than a millionaire “because I don’t think a millionaire has 90 weekend cottages,” he said.

After three summers exploring Ireland by bike, he ventured further afield.

He pedaled through Lapland, the Sahara, Turkey, and Sardinia. In those years, such countries were less touristy than today. Yugoslavia, for example, had only recently introduced an open-door policy, allowing visitors. Now Yugoslavia doesn't even exist. Hasn't since 2003.

“Morocco was a good adventure,” recalled Houston. Arriving on a Friday, he stumbled upon a local feast. Sword-wielding men insisted that Houston devour a local delicacy, sheep's eye. The Scotsman thought better than to object.

Vanished from view

Houston avoided main roads. He was a member of the Rough Stuff Fellowship, a gravel-biking, bikepacking association. In the early 1960s, he was also a founding member of Mountain Bothies, a voluntary association that maintained simple shelters in the wild countryside.

After BBC filmed Houston in 1971, his whereabouts became a mystery. An internet group searched for him ten years ago, intent on setting him up with a Wikipedia page. No one was able to find him, though. Presumably, he's deceased now.

In 1937, France considered wolves locally extinct. Yet in 2021, the population numbers an estimated 600. Perhaps cross-border migration helped flip the numbers, or perhaps the species evaded detection for years.

In this week's Weekend Warm-up, a team of snow riders and environmentalists track France's wolves and discover that they roam surprisingly close to humans.

An elusive predator

At the end of the 18th century, thousands of wolves lived in France. But they were unpopular. Locals thought they were a threat and hunted them to local extinction. Lynx in France suffered a similar fate.

Despite hunting in packs of up to 30, wolves can be tricky to find. Often, it is only their howl (used to communicate with their pack) that locates them. Wolves can run at speeds of more than 60kph. With more than 40 teeth, they can devour up to 10kg of meat in one meal. Large hoofed mammals like bison, moose, and deer are their preferred prey. Their keen sense of smell, which is more than 100 times more powerful than humans, helps them remain relatively invisible.

Today, killing wolves is illegal in France. The wolf population is rising, which means that wolves and humans will have to coexist.

Tracking wolves

Thomas Delfino is a snow enthusiast who spends his winter days skiing untouched snow. He shares his recreational territory with many wild animals but rarely sees them.

“I knew nothing of the wild world in which I would ride almost every day in winter,” Delfino explains. Working with Pierre Sellier, Lionel Tassan, and Guillaume Collombet, he now seeks a better understanding of his wild neighbors.

Tassen is a wildlife photographer who specializes in mountain environments. His image collection includesowls, wolves, and other alpine species in their natural habitat.

By tracking footprints, Tassen learns where wolves roam. When the footprints are sharp, he knows that they are fresh. Once he understands where the wolves move, he sets up camera traps.

The camera traps have provided plenty of great footage. One video shows a wolf carrying a severed deer head in broad daylight. When the animal nears the camera, it smells that humans have been close by and turns in the opposite direction.

Leaving no trace has become a common turn of phrase. Humans should strive to co-exist with nature, without spoiling it. Wolves have come close to mastering that. They coexist with humans and remain largely undetected.

Emmeline Freda Du Faur defied convention by pioneering women's climbing in New Zealand. But her sexuality and tragic suicide long overshadowed her achievements. Eventually, the first woman to climb Aoraki/Mount Cook had a memorial stone placed upon her previously unmarked grave.

Early life

Born in 1882 in Sydney, Australia, Du Faur’s childhood involved long days exploring Ku-ring-gai Chase National Park. Near her family home, the sprawling 150 sq km park was a welcome release for the highly strung Du Faur to explore pursuits atypical of women at the time. Instead of completing her nursing studies, she taught herself to rock climb. Rather than play with girls her age, she roamed with her dog.

For her summer holidays, Du Faur traveled to New Zealand with her family. During one holiday, she saw photographs of Aoraki/Mount Cook, New Zealand's highest peak. These photos inspired Du Faur.

In 1906, she took her first trip to the Hermitage Hotel. Nestled within Mount Cook National Park, at the foot of the Mueller Glacier, the Hermitage Hotel dates back to 1884. When Du Faur arrived, the snowy mountains captivated her. From the hotel windows, she gazed out at Aoraki/Mount Cook and determined to reach the summit.

Alpine climbing

On another trip to the Hermitage Hotel in 1908, Du Faur was introduced to Peter Graham. Graham, a pioneering guide in the area, had conducted expeditions up Fox Glacier and made 13 ascents of Aoraki/Mount Cook. He was perfectly positioned to introduce Du Faur to alpine climbing.

More than just a keen student, Du Faur was determined, strong, and capable. First, Graham tested her ability with a 10-hour traverse of Mount Wakefield and Mount Kinsey, at the southern end of the range. He quickly recognized Du Faur's competence. Building on her rock-climbing experience, he added ropework and snow and ice climbing to their sessions.

Beneath her bravado, Du Faur struggled with her sexuality in an uncompromising society. Homosexuality was illegal in the early 1900s, and society saw lesbianism as a psychological disorder. Climbing gave Du Faur an escape.

In 1909, with Graham guiding, Du Faur achieved her first significant ascent, 2,627m Mount Sealy. Despite the pair’s climbing competence, social customs dictated that an unmarried woman should not camp alone overnight with a male guide. They were forced to invite a chaperone to join them.

Two days later, Du Faur ascended The Nun’s Veil (2,736m). Within a week, she completed the first female ascent of the west ridge of Mount Malte Brun, crossing the famous Cheval ridge to the summit with Graham and another client.

Fighting convention

It wasn’t just sleeping arrangements that Du Faur had to worry about. The public also scrutinized her attire. Du Faur dressed in a skirt to just below the knee, knickerbockers, and long puttee leg-wraps to cover her ankles. She wore this on all her climbs, despite sunburn, discomfort, and the safety hazards that came with climbing in a cumbersome skirt.

In climbing, Du Faur had found her calling. After her successful first season, she returned to Sydney and embarked on three months of training at the Dupain Institute of Physical Education. This was important for two reasons. Muriel Cadogan trained her and became her romantic partner, and her training prepared her for a return to New Zealand, setting up her pioneering Aoraki/Mount Cook ascent.

In late 1910, Du Faur sailed back to New Zealand from Sydney and enlisted Graham once again. They had previously attempted Aoraki/Mount Cook via Earle's Route but a bergschrund defeated them. This time, Du Faur was certain that her extra training would ensure a successful summit.

They warmed up with climbs of Mount Annette and Mount Mabel. Then they knocked off a virgin 2,438m peak near Barron’s Saddle, at the head of the Mueller Glacier. Next, with the extra support of Graham’s brother Alec, they set off for Earle's Route on Aoraki/Mount Cook.

Aoraki/Mount Cook

This time, not only did they reach the summit, but theirs was only the second ascent of the west ridge. They completed the climb in record time, just six hours. Du Faur was now both the first woman to reach the summit and the first Australian.

In sharing her tent with her male guides this time, Du Faur also broke with needless tradition. “I was the first unmarried woman…to climb in New Zealand, and in consequence, I received all the hard knocks, until one day when I awoke more or less famous in the mountaineering world, after which I could and did do exactly as seemed to me best,” wrote Du Faur afterward.

Unstoppable, that same season she climbed Mount De la Beche (2,979m) and Mount Green (2,828m). Then, she became the first person to climb Mount Chudleigh (2,944m).

In the next two seasons, Du Faur scaled the virgin peak now named Mount Du Faur (2,389m) and made the first ascents of Mount Nazomi (2,953m), Mount Dampier (3,420m), Mount Pibrac (2,567m), and Mount Cadogan (2,398m). She also made second ascents of Mount Tasman (3,497m) and Mount Lendenfeld (3,192m).

But her most notable climb was a grand traverse with Peter Graham and David Thomson. The trio traversed all three peaks of Aoraki/Mount Cook in 1913. The traverse is now regarded as one of the classic climbs of New Zealand's Southern Alps.

Her final season

This would be Du Faur’s final climbing season. Cadogan (who had been a respected feminist in Sydney) had unwittingly cast their relationship into the spotlight. In 1914, the couple relocated to England. They intended to climb mountains in the European Alps, Canada, and the Himalaya.

In 1915, Du Faur published The Conquest of Mount Cook. It has proven vital for preserving her legacy.

World War I prevented the couple from ever achieving their climbing plans abroad. Over the next few years, their relatively contented life began to unwind. The government sent them to mental institutions and forcibly split the couple up because of their sexuality. In 1929, Cadogan committed suicide.

Du Faur returned to Sydney. But without Cadogan, she fell into depression. In 1935, she fatally poisoned herself with carbon monoxide.

An unmarked grave

Shunned by society, regardless of her contribution to mountaineering, Du Faur was not given a formal burial. Instead, she was buried in an unmarked grave.

Her private life with Cadogan rendered her seemingly forgotten until Sally Irwin released a biography in 2000: Between Heaven and Earth: The Life of Mountaineer Freda du Faur: 1882–1935.

New Zealand farmer Ashley Gaulter read a copy of Irwin's book and decided to put right Du Faur's final resting place.

“I read that she was over here in Manly Cemetery, and at the time, I was living quite close by, and I thought, well, I’ll go and find her,” Gaulter said.

“I couldn't find her in the first instant, and then found a map and tracked her down. I found this poor little patch of grass surrounded by other tombstones and there she lay in an unmarked grave. And that seemed like an injustice,” he said.

Gaulter enlisted the help of a local stonemason to make a gravestone. Finally, Du Faur has a marked gravesite in Manly Cemetery, Australia.

During Arthur’s first year of life, he toured Ethiopia while his parents climbed the Towers of Tigray. As a new mother, I watched in awe while imagining my daughter exploring the contrasting colors and cultures of life on the trail, like Arthur. Now his family are at it again. This time, bike touring France and climbing along the way.

Arthur's parents, James Pearson and Caroline Ciavaldini, are two of the most accomplished climbers of their generation. Based in France, they each started climbing as youngsters (Ciavaldini age 12, Pearson age 15) and quickly developed a global reputation. Their partnership intertwines a love of travel and scaling rocks. In 2018, when Arthur arrived, none of that changed.

Parenting is tough; traveling as a parent even harder

Ciavaldini says, “I am living the dream life now.” Most likely, she is referring to sharing her passion with her best friend, partner, and the father of her child. In my eyes, she and Pearson are inspirational. Parenting is tough, let alone simultaneously upholding pre-child ambitions.

Anyone with a toddler knows that the previously simple task of leaving the house becomes an elaborate affair with a phenomenal amount of baby paraphernalia. No matter how simple a family keeps child necessities, there are a ton of extras required. Throw in COVID-related travel restrictions, and any parent would be forgiven for putting family travel in the “too hard” category.

Not this family. On their recent adventure, Ciavaldini has the additional responsibility of being pregnant with Arthur’s sibling. Yet the family make a few adjustments and continue following their passion.

Solution-oriented people

When they become frustrated by cross-border restrictions, the family make transport a part of the adventure. They attach a trailer to the back of Pearson’s e-bike, turning it into Arthur’s mini-oasis. On the back of Ciavaldini’s e-bike is another trailer equipped with the family's kit.

Then, the couple ride for three weeks from the Alps to their home. Along the way, they visit some of France’s most highly regarded climbs.

Riding in southwest from Briancon, they first stop at Ceuse. Arthur rides up front near the handlebars on the long approach to Cascade, one of Ceuse’s oldest sections. Next, they follow single track through to Orpierre. When a trailer breaks, they have a local ironmonger fix it.

The family take time between climbing to find parks and ice cream for Arthur. Then they leave the Alps behind. The scenery becomes green valleys as they head toward Provence.

At Saint-Léger, Ciavaldini does a final lead climb. She decides to ease back on difficulty as her pregnancy progresses.

As I write this during my own final weeks of pregnancy, I can’t help but once again be in awe. The physicality of climbing during pregnancy is not lost on me.

Now or never

Timing wasn't generous for the family though. It was now or never, said Pearson as he weighed up waiting for warmer weather with second trimester pregnancy. Leaving later in the year would have offered fewer wet days. But the relentless rain doesn’t matter much. In any case, Arthur is warm and dry in his trailer, which is their main concern.

Toward the end of their journey, temperatures rise to the mid-30s Celsius and the terrain flattens. The family make a final stop in Gargantua, a local haven similar to an outdoor climbing gym where almost all holds are chipped and quickdraws in place.

Ciavaldini and Pearson seem to be solution-oriented people. Many families find it easier to hunker down at home until COVID restrictions ease. Some also choose to wait until their young form reliable behaviors and sleep patterns before traveling.

But Ciavaldini and Pearson seek out ways to overcome barriers associated with young family travel. Without letting life pass them by, they reward Arthur with new experiences.

In 2017, a team of climbers set off to self-film what it takes to climb Aconcagua. During their expedition, only three climbers top out.

Aconcagua

At 6,963m, Aconcagua is the highest peak outside of Asia. Towering above the Andes in Argentina, Aconcagua is one of the Seven Summits. In 1897, British mountaineer Edward FitzGerald recorded the first ascent. It took him more than eight attempts.

More than 100 climbers have perished on Aconcagua over the years. Some have died of heart attacks. The weather has caught others unprepared. Some fatalities haven’t been recovered, making it impossible to determine precisely what went wrong. And high-altitude pulmonary edema (HAPE) might affect more than 15% of climbers.

Change of plans

When the first team of the 2017 season set off, they allowed themselves a four-day budget, including rest days. Strategically placing rest days throughout the ascent would aid acclimatization.

Acclimatization doesn’t discriminate between fitness levels. Even the most experienced marathon runner can struggle with altitude. However, changing weather forced them to decide between speeding up or turning back. They chose to alter their plans to a three-day ascent.

Nieves penitentes, a high-altitude snow formation, on Aconcagua.

Illness and exhaustion

The increased pace prevented some of the team from completing the ascent. A medical exam found fluid in the lungs of one climber. He turned back.

By 6,500m, only three climbers remained. A combination of sickness and exhaustion had forced the rest down.

Although the standard route on Aconcagua is not technical, its altitude and weather can make it extremely challenging. If you've ever wondered about trying Aconcagua, this little documentary is a good intro.

When minors do extraordinary things, controversy follows. That rule was no different for Laura Dekker. Bucking opposition from the authorities because of her age, in 2012 she became the youngest person to sail solo around the world. She was 16 years old.

For her entire life, Dekker has been around the ocean. While her unconventional parents (a Dutch boatbuilder father and a German circus performer mother) were on a seven-year sail around the world, Dekker was born off the coast of Whangarei, New Zealand.

She spent her first five years almost exclusively at sea. Eventually, her family returned to the Netherlands. Dekker lived with her father after her parent’s divorce.

Being in her father’s care helped Dekker’s fledging sailing career. In those early years when it was just the two of them, Dekker's father was building a 20m Norwegian fishing cutter. She was eager to help, and her father obliged.

Receives her first boat, age 6

Those moments together were more than father-daughter bonding. They were inspirational for Dekker’s future. Soon, she began building a boat for herself. Then for her sixth birthday, Dekker received a boat of her own.

That first boat was an Optimist dinghy, designed for children’s use. As Dekker developed her skills on the ocean, her father sailed beside her in a windsurfer. Before long, she was sailing solo.

At nine years old, Dekker began competition sailing. She assisted her father in a 24-hour sailing race on board his friend's Hurley 700. When the race was over, she convinced the boat’s owner to let her borrow it in exchange for cleaning and maintenance.

The Hurley 700 gave Dekker a chance to learn how to handle a boat more aligned to her ability than the smaller ones she was assigned because of age. The boat also fell within the 7m size limit which Dutch law imposes on minors.

Never short of ambition, Dekker and her dog Spot took that boat on a seven-week voyage around Holland and the Wadden Islands. When she returned, Dekker put four years' worth of savings from odd jobs into a boat of her own.

By then, Dekker was 11 years old and owner of a Hurley 700. In it, she sailed around the Netherlands, spending all her free time either on the water or maintaining the craft. But Dekker had her sights set on an ambitious voyage. She wanted to sail alone around the world.

Not everyone was as enthusiastic about the idea as she. Her father tried to discourage her by suggesting that she first sail to England. The English Channel is particularly challenging for sailboats. Surely that would deter her, he figured.

Run-ins with child services

This was the first of Dekker’s run-ins with the authorities.

Leaving Maurik, she arrived first in Maassluis, then across the English Channel. Strong winds delayed her arrival into Lowestoft, but she eventually made it.

English authorities were stunned that a 13-year-old was left to sail alone on such a voyage. They placed Dekker in a children’s home but released her when her father arrived to collect her. He returned her to her boat and she sailed home alone.

Undeterred by the English Channel as her father had hoped, Dekker remained fixated on sailing around the world. Eventually, her father relented, offering to strengthen her skills before departure.

"He just taught me everything he knew about making the boat safe," she said. "He would sit down with me every night and tell me it would not be fun. Mum was worried but didn't say no."

Dutch authorities had other ideas.

Perhaps injudiciously, Dekker wrote of her plans in her local newspaper. That’s when Child Welfare stepped in.

Eight court cases try to stop her

Over the next 10 months, eight court cases brought by the government and Child Protection Services argued that she was too young to risk her life.

First, they placed her in the shared custody of her father and Child Protection, to prevent her from leaving. Then they combed through her upbringing for signs of mistreatment as a minor. When they didn't find anything, they released her back into her father’s custody.

"They thought it was dangerous," Dekker said after the court battle. "Well, everywhere is dangerous. They don't sail and they don't know what boats are, and they are scared of them."

Dutch maritime regulations prohibit a captain younger than 16 from sailing a boat longer than seven metres in Dutch waters. To avoid this, Dekker set off on her east-west journey from Gibraltar in 2010. She was 14 years old.

Away she goes

Sailing a 12m red ketch also named Guppy, which was adapted for solo circumnavigation, she first sailed the Caribbean, then through the Panama Canal and over to the Galapagos Islands. Then further across the Pacific: to Tahiti, Fiji, and through the Torres Strait to Darwin, Australia.

There, further controversy followed when she admitted that the hard work of sailing prevented her from keeping up with her studies. School officials said that she should be in a classroom.

Next, she spent 48 days crossing the Indian Ocean non-stop. Monstrous winds swiveled her boat from bow to stern. Although shaken when she arrived in Durban, she remained committed to her goal.

On her last leg across the South Atlantic, Dekker struggled against high seas and heavy winds. In 2012, at the age of 16, she completed her circumnavigation in St. Marteen. She was the youngest person ever to do so. The journey took her 17 months.

Hard times

At times, she doubted herself, especially when eight-metre waves washed over Guppy, flooding the cabin. Or when vermin infested her dry food supply. Or when sharks circled the little boat. As her father warned her, it wasn't fun. But her willpower pushed her through.

Although Dekker is a record holder, Guinness World Records and the World Sailing Speed Record Council would not verify the claim. They no longer recognize records for very young sailors in order to discourage dangerous attempts.

Abby Sunderland -- a 16-year-old American sailor –- had attempted the same goal two months before Dekker. Sunderland was rescued in the middle of the Indian Ocean. Australian Jessica Watson completed a 210-day solo journey. She was a few months older than Dekker.

Following in the footsteps of Freda Du Faur, three freeride skiers tour New Zealand’s most uncompromising terrain. They discover unresolved trauma, physical limits, and a changing landscape.

Du Faur was an Australian mountaineer. Although she never lived in New Zealand, she was the first woman mountaineer in the country. Criticized for her wildly inappropriate endeavors within a male domain, in 1910 she became the first woman to summit Aoraki Mt Cook. She climbed the 3,760m peak in a record-breaking six hours.

Pants are now acceptable

A lot has changed since then. Women mountaineers are a common sight. Climbing gear is less cumbersome and more robust. Pants are acceptable for both genders. The region’s glaciers have receded considerably since then, too.

Janina Kuzma, Anna Smoothy, and Ayako Kuroda are professional freeride skiers who don't need to appease society in the same way Du Faur had to. But their challenges in the same part of New Zealand are no less.

They'd already planned a Southern Alps crossing when they first learned of Du Faur’s earlier expedition. Du Faur then inspired them to revise their route.  As much as possible, they decided to tread in her footsteps along the Main Divide from East to West.

The Southern Alps is the mountainous spine that spans the length of New Zealand’s South Island. Forming the boundary between five regions (Marlborough, Canterbury, and Otago regions to the southeast, and the Tasman and West Coast regions to the northwest) is the Main Divide. This is where most of New Zealand’s glaciers are located.

Aoraki Mt Cook is one of New Zealand’s most prized features. Its iconic, dish-shaped peak, recognizable from afar, lords it over the Southern Alps.

Different challenges

But the Main Divide’s glaciers (classified as mid-latitude mountain glaciers) are sensitive to climate change. Glaciers are dwindling, and permafrost is thawing. The result is a mass movement of ice, rock, and debris in one of New Zealand’s best ski touring regions.

Kuzma, Smoothy, and Kuroda are among the best female freeriders of their generation. They have ski toured all over the world. Even they recognize that this unpredictable expedition poses risks. Theirs is over a century since Du Faur's expedition, yet strikingly close in terms of challenge.

When they fly into the Murchison Glacier, it’s already evident how much climate change has claimed the area. Just to access their starting point, they have to fly further into the range than expected, because the glacier has receded well beyond the old put-in site.

They set out expecting to ski clean lines of fresh snow. Instead, they instantly face hard snow that’s impossible to ski.

The terrain provokes their first problem. With unexpected amounts of scree walking, Kuroda’s boots cause her excruciating pain. Day one turns into a mammoth 14.5-hour expedition to Kelman Hut.

It’s exhaustingly hot. Progress is slow. Their goal simply becomes moving safely from point A to point B. In the Southern Alps, unpredictable changes such as these are dangerous.

It becomes too much for one member

Further on, the exposure reaches terrifying levels. On one of the shrinking glaciers, known as Suicide Alley, a wrong step can easily turn fatal. Poor weather relentlessly chases the group, and tempers rise between them.

They are forced to downclimb thin glacial ice, navigate extremely narrow ice bridges, and cross crevasses. It becomes too much for Kuroda. She breaks down, remembering past trauma. A helicopter airlifts her out.

Kuzma and Smoothy press on, successfully crossing all glaciers in Mt Cook National Park. They cross the Main Divide in an east-to-west direction.

Despite the 100 years between them, there are parallels between Du Faur's and the freeriders missions. Du Faur overcame the harsh landscape, telling herself it’s “only a hill, Earth set a little higher.” as she pressed on.

Kuzma, Smoothy, and Kuroda discovered that even with contemporary gear and skills, the harsh landscape imposed huge challenges. Sometimes, different challenges because of climate change.

In places, the landscape has become barely recognizable. In another 100 years, all those glaciers will likely no longer exist.

Kris Holm has a wacky pastime. He invented municycling, which is unicycling mountains. He’s not a clown or a historian dating back to the penny-farthing era. Holm is just an unconventional 49-year-old Canadian man who has found a unique way of enjoying the outdoors.

It all started shortly before his 12th birthday. He watched a street performer ride a unicycle and decided he’d like to try it. When he received his first unicycle in 1985, it was natural for him to ride single track with it. While other kids his age played He Man, Holm was mastering inverse pendulum control theory.

Contrary to widespread clownism (yes, that’s a real thing), unicycling is an intellectual sport. It combines math and physics to use a nonholonomic system to stay upright. For steering, the wheel needs to stay beneath its centre of mass. That's inverse pendulum control theory. Unicyclists subconsciously notice that they are falling, then correct themselves.

Holm especially appreciates these aspects of the sport. Every minor movement requires focus, skill, calculation, and accuracy. A second wheel isn't there to correct disruptions.

Unicycling volcanoes

A combination of unicycle trial riding and municycling has taken Holm all over the world. He attempted a unicycle descent of Licancabur (a 5,950m volcano in Bolivia), rode trade routes across Bhutan, and the uneven pave stones of China’s Great Wall. Inevitably, his next challenge was tackling high altitude.

El Pico De Orizaba (5,636m) is Mexico’s tallest volcano and North America’s third-highest peak. As you might guess, its glaciated, rugged slopes have never been unicycled. And that's only half the challenge. Holm first had to haul his gear to the top of the volcano.

For over 30 years, Holm custom-built his own unicycles. He began out of necessity. It was impossible to find a unicycle that could withstand North Shore Vancouver’s famously difficult trails. That first custom bike was a 26″ unicycle with splined BMX cranks and brakes. It cost about $2,500 and had a heavy steel frame.

“A good offroad unicycle typically has a high volume mountain bike tire, strong 24″ to 29″ wheelset, splined cranks, disc brakes, and it might even have a front handle and gears,” he says.

Since then, he's refined his models to lessen the physical burden. For El Pico De Orizaba, he used a seven-kilo alloy-framed custom model.

Beginning at midnight, Holm hiked with his unicycle in a backpack, reaching the summit at dawn. He was layered up with clothing to combat the bitter cold. He was unaccustomed to the altitude and needed a lot of concentration to stay balanced.

On the descent, some sections reminded him of downhill ski racing. Rocky obstacles darted out in all directions and required quick thinking. When his longest-ever section of “controlled falling” came into play, Holm was in his element.

Crazy speeds

Traveling at the fastest speeds he'd ever clocked on a unicycle, Holm described it as his “craziest fastest ride ever”.

To my unicycle-virgin eyes, this seems like one heck of a challenge: Staying relatively upright while hurling downhill at unstoppable speeds on uneven, volcanic rock. Yet Holm says the very reason he enjoys unicycling is its simplicity.

“It’s the simplest form of transportation possible,” he says.

I'm not so sure. Walking, I think, is the simplest form of transportation. But in the words of the world's most extreme one-wheel practitioner, unicycling is “fun no matter where you are."

While Fridtjof Nansen and Roald Amundsen sought fame and attention, Fredrik Hjalmar Johansen preferred obscurity. Yet Johansen was integral to their success. Only 80 years after his death did Johansen finally earn his place as one of Norway’s most important explorers.

Johansen’s life was turbulent. Struggling to find his place in society, he focused on sport. By the age of 18, he was a national gymnastics champion. By 21, he was a world champion in gymnastics. Preferring solo pursuits, he also excelled at skiing.

An athlete who disliked attention

Through gymnastics, he became a celebrity in Norway. But he didn’t like it. The publicity forced him into a depression. He drank excessively. But when a fresh opportunity presented itself in 1893, he took it.

Norwegian-born scientist and explorer Fridtjof Nansen had a plan to drift across the Arctic Ocean via the North Pole in a unique vessel, the walnut-shaped Fram. From the remains of another expedition that had washed up on Greenland's shores, Nansen cleverly calculated that the drift would carry him near the still-unvisited North Pole.

Nansen had already filled all his crew positions but he saw value in Johansen’s ski experience. He offered Johansen a place on the Fram in exchange for work as a stoker and dog handler.

Johansen relished his time away from the burden of city life and found peace in the wild Arctic. To him, it was an escape.

Nansen-Johansen's great trek

Nansen, in turn, recognized Johansen’s competence. When he realized that the Fram was going to miss the North Pole, he invited Johansen to join him in trying to ski and dogsled there. They didn't quite reach it, but they came much closer than anyone had before. Once, Nansen saved Johansen when he fell through the ice. On another occasion, a polar bear attacked Johansen. Nansen again saved him.

Eventually, the pair retreated, using the kayaks that they kept atop their sleds to bridge the open water when they had to. After many adventures, they landed in Franz Josef Land, off the coast of Russia. Here, they spent the long winter, well-fed on an all-meat diet of polar bear, walrus, and seal.

Their luck continued the following summer when Nansen miraculously bumped into the only other explorer in that region. They were saved.

Despite failing to reach the North Pole, the pair returned to a hero's welcome. Johansen was again uncomfortable with the attention. He publicly credited Nansen with their successful return. Perhaps naive about his capabilities, he undersold his expertise.

When Johansen was in the Arctic, he flourished. So over the next two years, he participated in four Svalbard expeditions, including wintering with German explorer, Theodor Lerner.

To Antarctica

Then in 1910, on Nansen’s recommendation, he was back on the Fram. This time, he was one of Amundsen’s men heading to Antarctica. Amundsen was famously racing Englishman Robert Scott to reach the South Pole first.

Respected and ambitious, Amundsen had a firm eye on his goal. He was expected to beat Scott in the South Pole race. Amundsen was unstoppable. But Johansen's own competence put the two at loggerheads.

When they first set off for the South Pole, Amundsen made a critical error. They began too early, still winter, and it was too cold. Some of the crew suffered frostbite. They made little progress and had to return to camp.

Amundsen showed little regard for his team. He sped back to camp with his dogsled, taking with him the cooking equipment and shelter. He wanted to stay ahead of an impending storm.

Johansen noticed an inexperienced lieutenant in trouble and came to his aid. Through the blizzard, Johansen carried his comrade 75km back to camp. He saved the lieutenant’s life.

Falling out with Amundsen

Tempers were high back at camp. Johansen argued with Amundsen, belittling a decision that might have cost lives. Scolding the proud and ruthless Amundsen in front of his men was a pivotal moment in the downward trajectory of Johansen’s career.

Johansen was demoted and assigned minor duties. Amundsen removed him from the next South Pole expedition and ordered the crew never to speak of Johansen or his accusations. Effectively, Amundsen ensured that when he penned his accounts of his eventual successful South Pole expedition, Johansen’s involvement would be omitted.

Back in civilization, unrecognized again, Johansen succumbed entirely to depression, seeking solace in alcohol. In 1913, he took a gun to his head in an Oslo park.

For almost a century, Johansen was forgotten. Amundsen enjoyed a celebrated career as an explorer and led expeditions until his disappearance in 1928. He not only reached the South Pole and traversed the Northwest Passage. Without realizing it, he was even the first to attain the North Pole, flying over it in a dirigible in 1926.

Nansen was a global superstar, not just in exploration but as a scientist and diplomat. He made early inroads into the fledgling sciences of neurology and oceanography and received the Nobel Peace Prize. Johansen received little more than a gravesite in his local cemetery.

Then in 1997, Norwegian journalist Ragnar Kvam published a biography of this forgotten man. Titled: Den tredje mann: Beretningen om Hjalmar Johansen, the book exposed Johansen’s true role in polar exploration. His legacy was finally restored.

Partly due to poor decisions and partly due to character, Johansen didn't make a deserving mark during his lifetime. But now he has rightfully joined Norway's great triumvirate of Nansen, Amundsen, and Sverdrup, as one of the great polar explorers.

When Dean Nicholson set off on a round-the-world bike adventure, the bearded Scotsman didn’t expect a cat to join him. But since a meek kitten meowed at him on a Montenegro roadside in 2018, the two have been inseparable. They have crossed continents, hunkered down through lockdown, and are now finally on their journey toward Thailand.

For two years, the unlikely duo rode Montenegro to Greece, Turkey, Georgia, Germany, and Azerbaijan. By the time they arrived in Austria, COVID-19 had devastated cross-border excursions.

Dean and Nala stayed in Austria for over a year. We were left wondering if their cycling adventure had instead turned into a full-time commercial enterprise. Cat puzzles and calendars featuring the irrepressibly cute Nala were flying out of the online store of their updated website. But more was happening outside than we knew. They were keeping as active as possible.

Dean took Nala for daily walks around the Austrian countryside. It was a strategy to keep her familiar with the outdoor lifestyle they’d resume when borders reopened.

On the other hand, Dean wasn't so lucky. He had been used to cycling an average of 50km daily, and lockdown drastically dented his cycling fitness. Dean hasn't let that hinder plans, though. Instead, he’s made minor adjustments to their route. Then, armed with a new passport for Nala, the pair resumed their adventure at the start of October.

Route change

Their revised route crossed into Slovakia, then onward to Hungary. Here, the pair are currently making progress to the Balkans, where they intend to overwinter. Once warmer weather arrives in spring, they will begin cycling to Russia.

Other stylistic adjustments: Dean modified his bike pedals to color match his panniers. Nala received a new cushion. For extra protection at night, Dean swapped his hammock from bright blue to camouflage.

They won't cycle across Russia but ride the Trans Siberian to Vladivostok. Then they pick up the trail to Japan and East Asia. “From there we will make our way through Vietnam, Laos, and finally end up on a beautiful beach in Thailand sipping from a coconut,” Nicholson told ExplorersWeb.

The new route re-invigorates the adventure which captured our attention in the first place. With Thailand’s recent announcement of open borders from November, we expect a calendar featuring Nala sipping from a coconut to be available in due course.

Mauli Dhan Rai harvested honey from cliff faces in northeastern Nepal. To do it, he dangled more than 200m from the valley floor using a handmade bamboo rope. Bees constantly stung hm. He had no protection. He didn’t even use a harness.

The traditional honey harvesting method is risky, but until recently, 'mad honey’ fetched more than $15/kg. On the black market, it sold for $160/kg. Rai enlisted others to help him. They used the proceeds to support their community. Without it, they couldn't afford items like salt or cooking oil.

Hallucinogenic honey from rhododendrons

What makes each harvest so lucrative is the honey’s hallucinogenic properties. Apis laboriosa bees (the world’s largest bees) produce honey by feeding on poisonous rhododendron flowers. Then it's exported for medicine. There are only two places in the world where this honey is produced. The other place is near the Black Sea, in Turkey. It’s equally precious there.

Even though honey harvesting is considered one of the most ancient human activities, the traditional method is under threat in Nepal. The government wants to profit from the practice. They are gradually claiming the land and contracting harvests. But the 57-year-old Rai didn't voluntarily choose this profession anyway. He believed he was cursed. Tired, he wanted to hand over the responsibility.

Twice a year, he hiked more than 20km through the dense jungle from his village. To scale the cliffs where the hives perched, he grabbed hold of foliage roots and winched himself upward. Even though a wrong root selection would be fatal, he didn’t use safety equipment.

To lure the bees from their hives, his helpers created acrid smoke below. As it billowed upward, Rai dangled in mid-air from his flimsy ladder and guided the honey into a basket using two long sticks. Not immune from the brutal stings, he received hundreds each harvest. Not even his mouth or eyes were spared.

"Just think of how much destruction I cause when I take even one hive," Rai said. "This must come back to haunt me somehow."

A spiritual burden

Rai's profession burdened him. He was the one person able to harvest honey in this area. The Kulung people believe a spirit called Rongkemi rules over the mountains, forests, and valleys, protecting the bees and their hives. Only Rai, who had a special dream, could safely harvest the honey without provoking Rongkemi.

As he climbed, he chanted a Kulung mantra: “You are Rangkemi. You are of the bee spirits. We are not thieves. We are not bandits. We are with our ancestors. Please fly. Please leave.”

Dying traditions like this one aren’t exclusive to Nepal. In Sri Lanka, ancient stilt fishing has become a tourist attraction rather than a means of feeding a community. In the case of Nepal’s honey hunting, ownership is gradually shifting away from local villagers to companies. Even if it wasn’t, the practice isn’t desirable to the younger generation, which seeks a more prosperous urban future.

In 2017, professional climbers Renan Ozturk and Mark Synnott joined Ben Ayers and Ben Knight to follow Rai on his final harvest. For 15 years, Ayers had visited Nepal, mostly for climbing. Over time, he built trust with members of the Kulung community, which allowed him to capture their dying tradition.

Ozturk and Synnott are professional climbers, and even they struggled to keep up with Rai as he scaled the cliffs. Their American bee suits with multiple clothing layers beneath couldn’t protect them from the stings of these large bees, either.

Soon after the film crew preserved this ancient tradition and Rai's grueling job, Rai took his own life. The curse, and the burden, had taken their toll.

Australia is the sixth-largest country in the world by area and features every type of landscape from dense rainforest to bone-dry desert. Temperatures can soar above 40˚C and plummet to 0˚C within hours. Its size and ruggedness invite adventure, and over the years, there have been some true Australian classics. Here is our pick of the country's hardest modern expeditions.

Jon Muir: Trekked alone and unsupported across Australia

Australia’s Outback is huge, largely unpeopled, and extremely harsh. It crosses three mountain ranges (MacDonnell, Musgrave, and Petermann) and four deserts (Gibson, Great Sandy, Great Victoria, and Tanami). During summer, the flats can bake at 45˚C. Water is scarce and hard to find.

In 2001, Jon Muir walked 2,500km alone across this formidable land. Starting in Port Augusta, he finished 128 days later in Burketown, without a GPS or resupplies. This is what makes the trip so remarkable: Over those months, he managed to scrounge most of his own food and water. It included scavenging dead cows found along the way, but also a lot of termites. Once, he dined on a feral cat.

Muir pulled his supplies in a cart. He had 55 maps, a compass, rice, muesli, and a gun. Mostly, he survived on rainwater. His only companion was his Jack Russell, Seraphine.

“It was a self-imposed isolation that came in the form of a quest to walk across Australia, hunting and gathering along the way, using only my own energy to get me there”, Muir said later. “But it wasn’t loneliness, rather an incredible sense of aloneness.”

For four months, Muir went without a shower. Sometimes the puddles he drank from were polluted with dead animals. When he finished his expedition, he’d lost a third of his body weight.

Paul Caffyn: Circumnavigated Australia by kayak

Paul Caffyn's circumnavigation of Australia might be the most incredible kayak expedition of all time. In 1982, he spent 360 days paddling 15,000km.

Caffyn had already kayaked around New Zealand and Great Britain. Paddling around Australia started as a joke but evolved into a bull-headed expedition to take on the seemingly impossible.

Australia is one of the most formidable sea kayaking circumnavigations in the world. Caffyn paddled alone, through the surf and big waves. He survived a cyclone and always had to stay alert for crocodiles. But the Zuytdorp Cliffs were by far the biggest challenge.

Considered impossible to paddle because it required covering 160km without landing, the Zuytdorp Cliffs required skill, determination, and planning.

He used caffeine pills to stay awake. He slit a hole in his wetsuit to pee and took anti-diarrhea tablets to subdue his bowels. Then Caffyn paddled the entire stretch of limestone in 36 nonstop hours.

He was the first person to kayak the Zuytdorp Cliffs, and eventually became the first person to circumnavigate Australia by kayak.

In 2009, Freya Hoffmeister became the first woman to kayak around Australia. It took her 322 days.

Andrew McAuley: Attempted to kayak the Tasman Sea

The 2,000km journey across the Tasman Sea between Australia and New Zealand is a direct route but not a simple one. The vast expanse of wind-whipped ocean and New Zealand’s unpredictable surf make this expedition both difficult and hazardous.

In 2007, Andrew McAuley set out from Australia, hoping to become the first person to make the crossing by kayak. He was highly experienced. He had already kayaked Bass Strait, between the Australian mainland and Tasmania, crossed the Gulf of Carpentaria in northern Australia, and paddled 800km in the Arctic.

Paul Caffyn had made two previous attempts to kayak the Tasman Sea. Both attempts ended unsuccessfully.

McAuley had made an initial attempt in 2006 but had aborted after just one night. He had struggled to stay warm in the cockpit and knew that such an early problem made it too dangerous to continue.

In 2007, he tried again. This time, the voyage cost his life.

More than two-thirds of the way from New South Wales to New Zealand, McAuley encountered horrific storms. The final third of the journey had been a concern. Approaching New Zealand, strong waves battered his kayak.

Despite McAuley’s little removable cockpit dome attachment, which would allow him to sleep and hopefully self-right the boat during the month-long voyage, his kayak was otherwise an off-the-shelf model. Unlike most "kayaks" used on such crossings, it did not include a cabin where he could stretch out. It was very hard for him to recline in the boat to sleep. Over the weeks, the sleep deprivation wore him down. It was likely responsible for his fatal lapse just 50km -- not even a day -- from the end of his journey.

The New Zealand Coastguard picked up a garbled distress call almost one month after he set off. At first, they couldn’t be made out. Eventually, the words “sinking” and “help” became clear.

They later found his intact kayak, but no trace of his body.

That same year, two Australians, James Castrission and Justin Jones, successfully crossed the Tasman Sea, although they used a custom boat with an enlarged aft section in which they could comfortably sleep.

In 2014, Australian Stuart Cleary attempted the crossing. After just 24 hours at sea, he called for rescue and had to abandon his vessel. His kayak washed up on Murawai Beach in New Zealand 18 months later.

Finally, in 2018, after 62 days of paddling, Scott Donaldson paddled from Coffs Harbour to New Plymouth and became the first person to kayak solo from Australia to New Zealand. It was his third attempt. Both Cleary and Donaldson's boats also had a cabin where they could take refuge and sleep.

Robyn Davidson: Went across Australia by camel

When she trekked across the Australian Outback, Robyn Davidson wanted to find meaning, away from the noise of modern society. It was 1977, and Australia was experiencing a political shift. With an election coming later in the year, parties were ramping up their campaigns.

Davidson was a left-wing liberal and soon tired of what she viewed as overly commercialized political discourse. To escape, she set off from Alice Springs with her dog and four camels. She headed west across Australia.

Mostly, she walked alone. Occasionally people joined her for sections of the 2,700km journey. A photographer from National Geographic commandeered snippets of her solitude. (The two also had a brief affair.) For a month, an elderly aboriginal man also accompanied her.

When they parted ways, Davidson confronted the most challenging section of her walk: the Gibson Desert. It took her a month to cross the Gibson’s vast, undulating sand dunes.

Davidson's complete journey to Shark Bay lasted nine months. She dealt with dehydration, sick camels, and her dog, Diggity, was poisoned -- as was Jon Muir's little Jack Russell years later.

This was a time before “constant observation”, as Davidson puts it. She traveled without a cell phone, sat phone, GPS device, SPOT, or other modern safety gadgets.

"It was the 70s and I think it was a time when a lot of young people were experimenting in their lives, and freedom was hugely important to us — the idea of freedom — and I think we knew that freedom would ultimately involve risk,” Davidson said years later.

Her bestselling book Tracks has inspired countless adventurers since, including Esther Nunn, who recreated the same journey in 2007.

Andrew Harper: Walked 4,600km across Australia

With two camels as beasts of burden, Andrew Harper walked across the Australian desert 22 years after Robyn Davidson. His quest, to follow the Tropic of Capricorn, was an exercise in “pure desert navigation,” he said. Australia’s Tropic of Capricorn passes through small settlements, the Gibson and Simpson Deserts, and outback Queensland.

Harper had a “strong aversion to following tracks or roads across deserts”. He used camels because they were practical for crossing large areas of wilderness. Without them, or at least without Jon Muir's supreme survival skills, the 229-day expedition wouldn’t have been possible.

When Harper completed his 4,637km journey, he was the first person to walk across Australia from west to east. He spent more than a third of his journey alone.

Terra Roam: 17,000km around Australia

Terra Roam was inspired by Robyn Davidson’s book Tracks.

“I simply wanted to walk around Australia, seeing as much as possible, and going alone was the most practical way,” said Roam.

Roam didn’t set out to achieve a world first. Two other women had walked the route before her, but both had enlisted support vehicles. About halfway through, when a news crew mentioned support vehicles, Roam realized that what she was doing was significant. While she resupplied at towns, she was on her own for much of the time.

“When I reached Darwin, I could confidently claim to be the first woman to walk the length and breadth of Western Australia solo [and] unsupported, because on my southern traverse, I took the scenic route via Esperance, Albany, and Cape Leeuwin,” Roam said.

Roam designed a 200-litre barrow (named Dory) to transport her essentials. She did not pull Dory, she pushed it. This employed bigger, stronger, muscle groups.

Starting in Tasmania, Roam broke off sections seasonally. Most nights she slept in a tent or hammock. On occasion, she’d find a room for the night.

Over the 17,000km journey, there were numerous setbacks. Early on, doctors found three tumors that needed removing. Later, she was hospitalized with heat stress. On one highway 1, a truck driver tried to run her down, and she battled to keep her mental health. Yet Roam persisted.

She walked through monsoons, dealt with scorching temperatures often above 40˚C, and survived a 289km stretch of outback between water resupplies.

In 2018, Roam completed the full Australian circum-walk that she had started in 2014.

Louis-Philippe Loncke: Unsupported winter crossing of Tasmania

Tasmania is small but wild, and over 20% of the island is protected. It’s also said to have some of the cleanest air in the world. But Tasmania's wild spaces can be seriously tough going.

In 2018, Belgian Louis-Philippe Loncke tested Tasmania’s brutality. He walked, without resupply, from the north of the island to the south. In winter.

Loncke created a unique set of rules: he was not to be resupplied with food or fuel, would not use roads, and could only sleep in his tent. Each condition pushed his physical and mental limits.

When he set off from the interestingly named town of Penguin, his pack weighed 60 kilograms. He carried enough food for 44 days. In retrospect, he may have packed too light. Some days, he had to ration so severely that he would only eat 30 grams of nuts. Other days he survived on warm water and aspirin.

During his expedition, torrential rain soaked him, and he waded through waist-deep snow. When he lost his headlamp, he navigated by moonlight.

Loncke emerged at Cockle Creek 52 days after he started. He had walked 550km and was 15kg lighter.

"A few friends and adventurers said it was completely mad," he said.

In 2009, Danny MacAskill posted a video on YouTube that changed his life. Filmed by his flatmate, Inspired Bicycles has been watched more than 200,000 times. He’s since featured in more than 20 videos, forging a career as one of the most recognized street trials cyclists in the world. Next, he plans to move into filmmaking.

Street trials (non-competitive freestyle bike tricks) is a sport of patience. It took MacAskill 12 years of relentless practice to master the skills in Inspired Bicycles. In the five-minute video, he flies backward with his bike down concrete steps, bounces over narrow ledges, and even somersaults up a tree.

From mechanic to trick rider

By using an ordinary piece of sports gear in a typical urban setting, he found a broad audience. After the video's success, he quit his mechanic job to focus exclusively on trials riding.

MacAskill was just 23 years old when that breakthrough video jumpstarted a professional bike career. For the last 13 years, he’s brought trials riding into the mainstream and inspired many young riders, including Fabio Wibmer.

At first, MacAskill created videos similar to his first success. Bouncing, twirling, and leaping with his BMX to a backdrop of popular music, he chose locations that practically anyone can find themselves in. Then in 2013, things ready heated up for the Scotsman.

His video Imaginate took two years to create. In it, MacAskill traded his usual urban setting to create a miniature world. Riding alongside giant card decks, blocks, and a Rubik's Cube, he invited viewers to witness his technical ability within a make-believe scene. More than 92 million people have viewed this fresh perspective to BMX riding.

MacAskill has ridden his way around the Playboy mansion, balanced on rotten trees and disused seesaws in an abandoned Italian village.

In a new era of long-form film, he starred in The Ridge and The Slabs. Both involved the dual challenge of mountaineering and technical riding.

Onto comedy skits

More recently, MacAskill tried his hand at skit-style videos. Using a comedy flavor, he casts New Zealander Rose Matafeo in Danny MacAskill's Gymnasium (2020). His dumb-bell and vault routines are probably bicycle firsts.

Danny Daycare is another MacAskill comedy. He's featured flying through a forest carting a toddler behind his bike. It comes with the caution, "Please don't try this at home [obviously]."

He’s won National Geographic’s Adventurer of the Year Award, and in 2012, he carried the Olympic Torch through Glasgow. He graced Hollywood as a stuntman. Twice he’s been nominated for Action Sportsperson of the Year at the Laureus World Sports Awards.

Not one to sit on his laurels, MacAskill revealed his latest plans earlier this year.

Since the pandemic shelved international projects, he plans to lay down permanent roots in his native land. He's currently looking to purchase farmland with dramatic scenery to create ground-breaking new films from home. Moving away from simply being a YouTube sensation, MacAskill hopes to run a filmmaking business.

“You can easily get swept up in how things are and how you have to travel all over the place and are constantly on the go to the next thing. It makes you question the lifestyle you were leading before, getting onto planes going all over the place,” says MacAskill.

“The last year has really made me want to try to get a place of my own in the country and make more stuff on my own doorstep. It’s nice to travel a lot, but I feel I can be more productive at home. It’s about extending my career, but it's also about having space to enjoy what I’m doing.”

In 2018, four-time world champion stand-up paddleboarder Casper Steinfath crossed one of the toughest straits in the world. His achievement was a perfect union of persistence, athleticism, and meticulous planning. But what motivates athletes like Steinfath to take on such risky challenges?

The 120km Skagerrak is a notoriously treacherous strait between Denmark and Norway. Aside from the bone-chilling temperatures, Skagerrak’s swirling tidal currents (which come from the English Channel) make it particularly hazardous. More so for someone balancing on a three-metre plank of fibreglass.

Steinfath’s crossing faced two possible outcomes. Success or failure. Failure could be fatal.

Crossing Skagerrak without a compass or GPS is risky. But that’s how Steinfath attempted his first crossing. All he brought in case of emergency was a flare. A flare, his mother questioned, would have little value if he was floating around in unpredictable currents.

First attempt

He aborted that first attempt in 2017 just 12km from Norway. Steinfath had paddled for 16 hours 23min and completed more than 50,000 strokes. By then, his body was in a state of extreme cold. The tides prevented his support boat from traveling within a safe distance to him. Yet he desperately wanted to complete his mission.

The next year, he researched meticulously. Forming a more robust plan, he consulted locals, strategized with his coach, and improved his rescue resources.

In the film, the expression on his face hints at someone who’s bogged down by the prospect of a second unsuccessful mission. He’s clearly not accepting of that idea. Here is a person who wants to succeed more than anything. He’s prepared to risk his life for it.

In the 28 days leading up to his second Skagerrak attempt, Steinfath rises at 3 am for training. That’s the best way to acclimatize his body for the challenge, which he decides will have greater chance of success with an earlier departure.

Second attempt

In March 2018, he puts his willpower, planning, and ability to the test.

Setting off at 1 am from Kjul Beach, he paddles from Denmark to Norway. The journey takes him 18 hours 26 minutes. He is the first person in the world to SUP the route.

Is he satisfied? Yes, his smile says so. Even though SUP has been around for decades, it’s only become a competitive sport on the world arena in the recent years. More than just a lazy beach holiday activity, it is a mechanism for pushing physical limits. Just like BASE jumping or free diving.

Steinfath can’t pinpoint what motivated him to take on such an audacious and risky challenge. He wonders if he’s just stubborn beyond belief. His friend decides, “There [was] high school. There [was] business school. Now we live in a time where you suddenly have your own ideas. Your own rules.”

He’s not wrong. Athletes like Steinfath are rewriting the rule book on what path to take in life. Within that, risk is quantified differently than before. New boundaries are being created for what motivates.

Steinfath puts it achingly simply. “I love to be in a situation where there is challenge.”

John Colter was one of the best hunters of the 19th century. He mapped uncharted parts of Blackfoot territory in the western U.S. with Lewis and Clark. When their expedition ended, he spent six years trapping, often alone, and may have been the first explorer to see Yellowstone National Park. But his daring escape from the Blackfoot cemented his legacy.

A fateful meeting with Meriwether Lewis

By the time that Colter was 35, frontier living had already given him impressive skills. Meriwether Lewis met him accidentally in 1803. Recognizing Colter's value, Lewis swiftly offered him five dollars a month to join his and William Clark's expedition. This chance encounter began Colter's career as an explorer.

President Thomas Jefferson commissioned the Lewis and Clark expedition to cross the Western United States, mapping and creating practical routes.

Colter wasn't immediately diligent. Often, he larked about drunk with other men. When his captains were away, he disobeyed orders. Once, he was court-martialed.

At the same time, Colter was one of the best hunters on the expedition. His skills fed the crew, and he routinely scouted new trails.

As he became increasingly focused, Lewis and Clark increased his responsibilities. When Clark needed to send a message to the absent Lewis, he chose Colter for the job. When horses went missing, Colter tracked them down.

Colter didn't mind hunting alone. During the winter of 1805-1806, he focused on elk. These big animals had become increasingly rare.

Cool under pressure

Even more critical was Colter's ability to stay cool in emergencies. Once his horse buckled beneath him during a river crossing. They drifted downstream, rolling and crashing over top of each other. Escaping with minor injuries, Colter even saved his rifle.

With Lewis and Clark, Colter was instrumental in finding passes through the Rocky Mountains. He was a focused hunter who enjoyed navigating uncharted territories. The wilderness was his preferred environment.

Three years later, the expedition was returning to Missouri, but Colter wasn’t ready to leave. Fur trappers Forrest Hancock and Joseph Dickson were headed toward Yellowstone and Colter was eager to join them. He requested a discharge from Lewis and Clark to join Hancock and Dickson. But the new trio didn't last long.

First, they turned back up the Missouri River toward Yellowstone country. For six weeks, they trapped beaver before disagreements forced Hancock and Colter to carry on without Dickson. Soon after, Colter split up from Hancock and continued solo down the Missouri River toward St. Louis.

Although he was content exploring alone, a fresh opportunity was on the horizon. But it came with risks.

Adventures in the fur trade

Manuel Lisa of the Missouri Fur Company stumbled upon Colter paddling alone up the Platte River. Lisa's party was heading up the Yellowstone River and he hired Colter to guide them down the Big Horn River. Lisa knew Colter’s skills would be critical to securing trade deals.

Colter first led the party to the Yellowstone River, where they built Fort Raymond. Soon after, he left alone to meet with local Indian groups and explain the fur company’s desire to trade.

With just a pack and rifle, Colter traveled over 800km through Crow country, building relationships with tribes as he went. He crossed the Wind River Mountains and the Teton Range during winter.

He witnessed geysers, braved sub-zero temperatures, and spent most of his time alone. When he arrived at Jackson Hole and Yellowstone Lake, he was likely the first white man to do so.

Returning to Fort Raymond, he described the geothermal activity and splendor of Yellowstone Lake to disbelieving ears. In 1808, he set off again, this time with colleague John Potts from the Lewis and Clark Expedition.

Blackfoot hostilities

The pair was traveling west toward the Three Forks of the Missouri when the first of two Indian attacks occurred.

As the men were leading 800 Crows back to Fort Raymond, a rival tribe of 1,500 Blackfoot set upon them. Despite a wounded leg, Colter continued to return fire while sheltering beneath scrub. Overpowered, the Blackfoot retreated and Colter returned to Fort Raymond to recover.

Blackfoot warriors were intolerant of white men. Years earlier, the Lewis and Clarke expedition had killed one who was found stealing a horse. Since then, the Blackfoot had sought revenge.

The following year, when Potts and Colter were hunting beavers, they knew they were at risk of Blackfoot attack. But the trapping was too good to pass up.

Carefully, they devised a plan to set traps after dark when the Blackfoot were sleeping. But one morning, while pulling out traps which they had set the evening before, a sound startled them.

Unsure if it was buffalo or Blackfoot, they continued paddling their canoe upstream. Within moments, they were surrounded by Blackfoot Indians beckoning from the river bank.

As Colter and Potts came to shore, a Blackfoot grabbed Potts' rifle. Colter acted quickly, wrestling the rifle free. He returned it to Potts, who then shot the Indian. Instantly, Potts received a fatal flurry of arrows.

Keeping his cool, Colter looked for a chance to bargain for his life. The Indians stripped him naked, discussing among themselves how to kill him.

Colter's run

Colter didn't know their language well but he understood enough. They wanted to save him for their chief to use as a moving target. Colter lied, explaining that he was a poor runner. He hoped that it would buy him an opportunity.

The chief set Colter loose with Indians running after him. For 10km, Colter ran naked through cactus fields, with more than 100 Blackfoot on his tail. He was such a swift runner that he eventually out-distanced them all, except for one spear-wielding man.

Wheeling around unexpectedly, Colter caught his pursuer by surprise. The Blackfoot man fell to the ground, snapping his spear. Colter picked up the broken lance and held it to the Indian’s throat.

But the rest of the Indians were approaching quickly, and Colter needed to make a quick escape. Drawing on all his speed and strength, he managed to outrun the tribe, eventually plunging into a river. He submerged and hid beneath driftwood, breathing pockets of air.

Colter waited until it was dark and the Blackfoot had abandoned the chase. He was naked and a long way from the nearest trading post. It took Colter a week to return to camp. When he did, he was sunburned and starving.

More close calls

His encounters with Blackfoot weren’t over. In the following years, they pursued him many times. Each time, he emerged a little more battered. Eventually, he tired of the chase and quit trapping altogether. He’d spent more than six years in the wild.

Eventually, he and Clark created a comprehensive map of the region they'd explored. It stood as a model of detail and accuracy for the next 75 years.

Colter tried to settle down to quiet farm life in Missouri with his new wife. But when the United States fought Great Britain in the War of 1812, a restless Colter enlisted. It was his final expedition. He succumbed to jaundice while at war.

Nowadays, we mostly remember Colter for his miraculous escape from the Blackfoot. He was also one of America's first true "Mountain Men".

More than a century later, in the 1930s, a farmer west of the Tetons discovered a stone with “John Colter" carved on one side and "1808" on the other. Historians still hotly debate whether the stone is authentic.

Climbing, paddling, hiking, running, swimming: Five epic long-distance adventures in New Zealand, and what it takes to complete them.

Kiwi culture is about embracing the great outdoors. With more than 3,000 glaciers, 100 mountains, and national parks covering 11 percent of the country, it’s easy to see what the lure is. Although a relatively small country, New Zealand has been the scene of some epic long-distance adventures. Here are the five hardest.

Running the length of New Zealand

This is one of the few ultra-distance land routes in this relatively compact country. In 2011, the 3,000km Te Araroa Trail opened along New Zealand’s innermost spine.

Unlike tramping tracks, this trail isn’t entirely marked. It passes scenic volcanoes and open beaches. It crosses private farmland, enters small towns, large cities, and requires a ferry crossing between North and South Islands.

Despite its brushes with civilization, the trail shouldn’t be underestimated. An unforgiving high-country climate makes the Tararua Ranges one of the toughest parts of the trail. Elsewhere, the intense sun can easily dehydrate. In some areas, the trail crosses rivers up to three kilometres wide.

It didn’t take long for adventurers to set personal challenges on the Te Araroa Trail. The year after it opened, Richard Bowles ran it in 62 days. He averaged 50km a day. This included several tumbles down steep mountains and knee-deep mud wading.

But Bowles was experienced for the task: He’d already run the world’s longest marked trail, the National Trail of Australia. He also spent almost half a year running the equivalent of 127 marathons from Melbourne to Cooktown, Australia.

Since Bowles, plenty of others have set out to best his time. In 2020, George Henderson surpassed him with the fastest time of 49 days, 14 hours 26 minutes. Local runners joined him along the trail, and his Mum and Dad followed in their campervan for moral support.

Henderson says that the final 300km through Southland were the toughest. Trails were slow, and he was mentally and physically exhausted. He wore through six pairs of shoes during the run.

Fastest woman

Brooke Thomas, who broke the women’s fastest time earlier this year, also wore through six pairs of shoes. She gave up a rowing career 10 years earlier when she was fitted with a pacemaker. Eight broken bones in the intervening years delayed her opportunity to give Te Araroa a chance. She completed it in 57 days, 12 hours 16 minutes.

“It’s not an easy running track. There are times when you’re right out in the challenging high country and it's very remote and you spend a lot of time on your own,” said Thomas.

In 2019, nine-year-old Elizabeth and seven-year-old Jonathan Rapsey became the youngest kids to walk the trail. Elizabeth even carried her own pack, “to slow her down”, her mum said. It took them and their parents six months to complete.

Cook Strait double swim crossing

Between New Zealand’s North and South Island is one of the most challenging stretches of water in the world. The Cook Strait connects the Tasman Sea with the South Pacific Ocean. The distance is only 22km across the narrowest points, but strong cross-currents make it further when swimming.

In 1962, Barrie Devenport became the first person to swim the Cook Strait. It took him 11 hours 20 minutes to complete. Since then, countless swimmers have taken the challenge but only two have dared a double-crossing.

Philip Rush first swam from South Island to North Island and back again in 1984. It took him 16 hours 16 minutes to complete. He repeated his effort four years later. This time, it took Rush almost two hours more to swim the same distance.

“It is a bit frightening when swimming Cook Strait in the middle of the night”, said Rush. "It's pitch black. You have a big boat in front of you and two small IRBs [inflatable rescue boats] beside you. You can't see anything."

Rush also holds the record for fastest two-way and three-way swim of the English Channel.

A defiant double

Inadvertently, Rush also spurred on a defiant 21-year-old mother of two, Meda McKenzie, by suggesting that no woman would be able to do a double-crossing for at least a decade after he did.

McKenzie had already swum the Cook Strait one-way in 1978. She actually swam the one-way twice that year. Then twice in 1984. Her third time that year was a double-crossing which took her 23 hours 6 minutes.

"On my first Cook Strait swim, I saw someone [support crew] with a shotgun pointing over me. They said, 'There might be a shark.' That was a little bit scary,” said McKenzie.

Still the only woman to swim a double-crossing of the Cook Strait, McKenzie claims that she’s not a particularly strong swimmer, she’s just very stubborn.

The Cook Strait is one of the events in Oceans Seven, a list of seven difficult channel swims. It includes the Strait of Gibraltar and the Kaiwi Channel.

The youngest person ever to swim the Cook Strait is 12-year-old Caitlin O’Reilly.

100 Peaks Challenge

In 1991, the New Zealand Alpine Club (NZAC) celebrated its centenary by setting a new challenge. Designed to encourage climbers of all abilities to get off the beaten track, the 100 Peaks Challenge features a mixture of easy, extremely difficult, and wildly remote peaks.

"We want to capture the imagination of NZAC members," the club wrote. "Selection of the 100 peaks has aimed to provide a wide spread of peaks both geographically and in difficulty so that there is a challenge for every club member."

The first person completed the 100 Peaks Challenge only this year. Don French, now 62, took 30 years to work through the list. His final mountain was Mt. Unicorn in the Southern Alps. It has 26 pitches and is likely the longest rock climb in the country.

Once he reached the top of Mt. Unicorn, French allowed himself a moment to enjoy the glory.

"But when you're on top of a mountain, you've only done half the job," he said. "Getting down is the other, so you have to remain focused on the job and not let yourself get too carried away with the situation."

One of the most challenging aspects of the 100 Peaks Challenge is that 95 of the climbs are on the larger but sparsely settled South Island. And the geographical spread of the 100 makes it tough to knock off a few over a weekend.

Currently, about 70 people are working on the list, but the next closest to French has 90 (!) left to climb.

Of those on the list, Jagged Peak in the Arrowsmith Range is one of the most challenging ice routes in the country. Aoraki, or Mt. Cook, is the tallest peak (3,724m). Fiordland’s Mitre Peak (1,692m) is one of New Zealand’s most photographed peaks.

Circumnavigation by kayak

New Zealand might be small, but its coastlines are rugged and oceans unforgiving. On the South Island’s West Coast, wild surf requires good technical paddling. Then there are the sharks. New Zealand’s oceans abound in great whites.

In 1979, legendary kayaker Paul Caffyn became the first person to paddle completely around New Zealand.

He and a friend, Max Reynolds, initially spent 27 days paddling partway around the South Island in 1977. When Reynolds pulled out, Caffyn continued alone for the remaining 49 days. The following year, he spent 86 days paddling solo around the North Island. He was on the water for 63 of those. Finally, he and Reynolds again teamed up for the Stewart Island section.

The southwest corner of New Zealand was particularly gnarly. There, Caffyn survived “capsizes in surf at night, some huge swell days, not to mention the sandflies”.

This was the first of Caffyn’s kayaking achievements. Later, he circumnavigated Britain and then made history circumnavigating Australia.

It wasn’t until 2014 that the first woman circumnavigated New Zealand. Tara Mulvany spent five months first circumnavigating the South Island. She then took almost four months to complete the North Island. Stewart Island was next: That took her five weeks.

Over the grueling 10-month expedition, Mulvany credits the South Island for teaching her the necessary technical surf paddling skills to help her through the rest of the expedition. She put her skills to use during a particularly horrendous Stewart Island section. Deteriorating weather forced her back to where she started, after paddling for nine hours.

“It was one of those days when I didn’t care that I’d gotten nowhere,” she says. “I was thankful just to be on land.”

Walking New Zealand's entire coastline

Only one person has walked New Zealand’s entire coastline. Sheer cliff faces, harsh climates, and uncompromising gorse make trekking nearly impossible. There’s also private land, some of which is sacred to Maori, that walkers must contend with.

In 2015, Brando Yelavich was just 19. Facing relentless depression, wondering which direction to steer his life, he stuffed a 50kg backpack with food and gear and started walking. He expected to be trekking for eight months. Instead, it ended up as a 600-day journey of self-discovery. In the process, he became the first person to walk the entire coastline of New Zealand.

He began his 8,700km adventure in Cape Reinga, New Zealand’s northernmost tip. Those first few days became a crash course in outdoor stoicism. Yelavich suffered crippling leg cramps, could barely see more than 20m in front of him because of bad weather, and had to contend with hundreds of mosquitoes. But he wasn’t about to give up.

“[Every day] I’ll probably raft across three different rivers,” he said. "When I started, I would build all my rafts out of driftwood...And I’d paddle across. Now I’ve got a [pack]raft, so that’s a lot easier, and not as dangerous. But I’ve had to teach myself how to abseil without a harness and still be able to retrieve my rope.

Yelavich walked, swam, climbed, and packrafted. He’d never lived in the wild before. Yet armed with a copy of A Field Guide to the Native Edible Plants of New Zealand, he lived off the land by hunting and gathering.

Several times he almost drowned. He fell off cliffs and faced near hypothermia. "Each near-death experience has made me appreciate something in a new way," he says.

Isabelle Eberhardt explored North Africa disguised as a man. The enigmatic Swiss-Russian writer relished Algeria's underbelly. She seduced men, narrowly escaped assassination, and abused drugs and alcohol. Long after her ravaged body finally broke down in the Sahara, she was championed for living out her dreams, regardless of gender norms.

Eberhardt was born in 1877. At that time, female sexual experimentation was, shall we say, not a thing. This did not deter Eberhardt. Dressed as a man, she shattered traditional gender expectations.

Eberhardt's stepfather introduced her to boyish habits. Presumably, he did not wish society to treat her as a second-class citizen. He dressed Eberhardt in boy's clothes and cropped her hair short. Eberhardt came to prefer identifying as a boy.

Identified as a boy but romanticized Arab men

But her upbringing lacked childish adventures. She and her siblings worked long, laborious days on her stepfather's estate. Eberhardt's relationship with her stepfather was always strained. Eberhardt dreamed of one day escaping Geneva. She became fascinated with North Africa and the Sahara. She romanticized Arab men.

Through a French-Algerian penpal in the Sahara, Eberhardt learned about Saharan life. She hung on every word, using the information to publish short stories.

She published her first story in 1895 under the pseudonym Nicolas Podolinsky. Infernalia is about a medical student's physical attraction to a dead woman. Next, she published Vision du Moghreb, a story about North African religious life.

Considering that her information was second-hand, her stories were remarkably detailed. They captured the interest of French-Algerian photographer, Louis David. Eberhardt confided to David that she dreamed of escaping Geneva and he gave Eberhardt the opportunity.

In 1897, Eberhardt and her mother moved to Algeria. David welcomed Eberhardt into his home.

Disguise and vice

In Algeria, Eberhardt assumed a new identity: Si Mahmoud Saadi. She dressed, acted, and wrote as an Arab man. Wasting no time, she wound her way through darkened dens, drinking with sailors, smoking hashish, and seducing men. Quickly, her relationship with David soured.

Writing remained an important part of her life. She penned the first draft of her novel, Trimardeur. Then Yasmina, a story about a young Bedouin woman who falls in love with a French officer. But she blew the little money she made through writing on hashish and alcohol.

In 1897, Eberhardt’s mother died. Overcome with grief, she claimed she too wanted to die. When her stepfather arrived for the funeral service, he coldly suggested that Eberhardt do just that.

The event irreparably severed Eberhardt's family. One of her brothers committed suicide. Augustin, her closest brother, had been estranged from her in recent years. Her stepfather banished her sister after she married a suitor that the family didn’t approve of. Finally, her stepfather died before he could relocate to Algeria. Eberhardt was now free from family constraints and pursued life as she pleased.

Relentlessly, she roamed the Sahara. Her addiction to drugs and alcohol worsened. Consequences didn't concern her.

Turns to spirituality

Fair-skinned with a slim physique, Eberhardt's shaved hair and boyish clothes were not enough to fool most people, and European settlers shunned her for mingling with Arabs. Eberhardt was an outcast.

Already feeling alienated, she found solace in spirituality and religion. She sought out the Qadri religious sect, an order combining Islamic mysticism with pre-Islamic beliefs. The leaders granted her membership, recognizing the depth of her interest in Islam. For Eberhardt, the sect provided a sense of community but aroused further suspicion from the French administration. They already thought she was a spy, sent by the English to foment anti-French sentiment in the region.

In early 1900, Eberhardt met a young Algerian officer, Slimene Ehnni. She fell hopelessly in love. He was the first suitor she felt comfortable enough with to resume a feminine role.

Together, the couple traversed Algeria. Their partnership furthered speculation that Eberhardt was working undercover. The following year, Ehnni received a new posting. It was a deliberate attempt to separate the couple. For Eberhardt, more trouble was around the corner.

Near-assassination

While Eberhardt was with the Qadri, a member of a rival sect burst into the courtyard wielding a saber. The assassin's saber blow was aimed at her head, but a wire clothesline deflected the blade, narrowly saving her life. Instead, the blow almost completely severed her arm.

Eberhardt believed the attack had been the work of the French administration, which had long despised her. The government sentenced her attacker, Abdallah Ben Mohammed, to a life of hard labor. But they ordered Eberhardt to leave Algeria. As a foreigner, she had no choice but to follow orders.

Eberhardt fled to Marseilles and Ehnni joined shortly after. There, they married in Muslim and civil ceremonies. The marriage entitled her to French citizenship.

Believing God had spared her life for a greater purpose, Eberhardt renewed her spirituality. The event also restored her confidence in her writing. A diary entry read: “Before, I had to wait sometimes for months for the right moods to write. Now I can write more or less whenever I want.”

Soon after the attack, an Algerian newspaper invited Eberhardt to contribute as a war correspondent. They sent Eberhardt to cover clashes between Berber tribes and French forces on the Morocco-Algeria border. Here, she met French officer Hubert Lyautey.

Becomes a spy

Once again living as Saadi, she and Lyautey became close friends and confidants. Eberhardt had been anti-colonial, but Lyautey swayed her. She believed that his diplomatic focus might be good for the region and acted as an intermediary between him and the locals. She even carried out intelligence missions for him.

But Eberhardt’s lifestyle was catching up with her. At just 27, she had already lost all her teeth. She was riddled with health issues, permanently pained from her wounded arm, and had contracted malaria. Years of substance abuse had taken a toll. Time was running out. Pain and death didn't worry her. Her spirituality instilled the belief that pain was not suffering.

In 1904, Eberhardt rented a small house in the Algerian village of Ain Sefra. She asked her husband, whom she had not seen for months, to join her. The day after he arrived, a flash flood swept down from the mountains and demolished their house. The flood swept her husband away, although he survived. Eberhardt was not so lucky. Her body was found crushed beneath the ruins of their home.

Eberhardt's lifestyle had swayed between vice and spirituality, between hedonism and journalism. After she died, her manuscripts inspired plays, films, an opera, and the New York musical, The Nomad.

Her celebrity comes not from her stories, but from her uncompromising lifestyle. She experienced parts of North Africa rarely witnessed by European women. She challenged the social norms of sexual expression. For Eberhardt, gender created no barrier that could not be overcome.

Exploring West Africa in the guise of a trader was far from normal for a 19th-century English woman. But not for Mary Kingsley.

Kingsley lived with local people, met tribes rumored to indulge in cannibalism, and traipsed through previously uncharted jungles. Later, she published her unconventional views on African customs and became a celebrity. However, she disliked the narrative of the "empowered woman" that the press foisted upon her.

Kingsley’s isolated upbringing acclimatized her to a life of adventure. Her parents wed just four days before her birth. Her mother, who had been her father’s cook, didn’t fit into his aristocratic social circle. He traveled extensively, sometimes for years at a time, and was seldom home. Kingsley’s mother claimed to be ill and imprisoned herself at home. She kept a silent house. The shutters stayed permanently closed.

Her father's library was her most precious resource

Kingsley's father chose not to formally educate her. Instead, she cared for her mother. Kingsley found solace in the books that her father collected during his travels, stacked floor to ceiling in his library. When he returned home, Kingsley marveled at the wonderful travel stories he’d share.

"The whole of my childhood and youth was spent at home, in the house and garden," Kingsley explained in Katherine Frank’s A Voyager Out. "The living outside world I saw little of and cared less for. I felt myself out of place at the few parties I ever had the chance of going to, and I deservedly was unpopular with my own generation...The truth was I had a great amusing world of my own [that] other people did not know or care about—that was the books in my father's library."

Book smarts seemed to run in the family. Kingsley's uncle authored the famous children's novel The Water Babies. Her father was partway through writing his own book when he died suddenly in his sleep.

When Kingsley’s mother died within weeks of her father, she was free to embark on any unconventional journey her imagination could conjure.

Off to Africa

In 1893, dressed in Victorian spinster attire (a high-necked black blouse, long black woolen skirt, buttoned leather boots, and small sealskin hat), she set off for West Africa.

"You have no right to go about Africa in things you would be ashamed to be seen in at home,” she later wrote of her formal attire.

Africa was an unlikely choice for a European woman. This “white man’s grave” was not considered a safe destination for male visitors, much less for women. Indeed, those who traveled there were usually wives of government officials or missionaries. Always, a husband escorted them.

Kingsley was direct, poised, and confident. Motivated by the prospect of finishing her father’s book, studying law, and investigating African religions, she wasn’t concerned about potential risks.

Initially, she spent four months living with locals in Sierra Leone, learning their customs. Realizing that local villages might be more accepting of a trader, she promptly took up this new profession. Trading allowed her to gain access to otherwise inaccessible people and places while remaining independent.

When she returned to England, Kingsley accepted a book deal and was granted funding for her next trip. In 1894, she returned to Africa.

Second major journey

This time Kingsley planned to explore the Ogowe River, which ran through the Congo's Gabon area. The area was largely unknown in England, and her journey involved wading through dense rainforest in which dwelt little-known tribes.

Kingsley did not shy away from confrontations. Only one European man had ventured through the area before, and he had vanished. But Kingsley believed that traveling as a trader would make her less threatening.

Accompanied by several men and an interpreter, Kingsley traveled more than 100km through the dense forest of the Ogowe River region. When she met with aggressive tribesmen wielding weapons, she resolved the conflict with ease. Eventually, Kingsley won the respect of these Fang people.

"A certain sort of friendship soon arose between the Fang and me," she wrote. "We each recognized that we belonged to that same section of the human race with whom it is better to drink than to fight."

On one occasion, while sleeping in the house of a Fang chieftain, she noticed a foul odor. Upon investigation, she came across a bag with a human hand, three big toes, four eyes, two ears, and other human remains.

First European to explore the area

Kingsley carried a knife and revolver but never used them. She emerged for her expedition as the first European to successfully explore the area. To her credit, she didn’t take kindly to the idea she had “discovered” its people.

Because of her unconventional upbringing, Kingsley was never one to follow the crowd. She successfully confronted some of the toughest tribes known to man. She was comfortable challenging popular European views on African customs too.

Kingsley thought that colonialism was harmful to Africans, that witch doctors were beneficial, polygamy necessary, and domestic slavery not entirely bad. At a time when Europeans believed Africans needed both Christianity and colonialism for survival, Kingsley publicly expressed the opposite.

Her interest in traditional African religious practices led her to a chance encounter with another European woman. Mary Slessor was also traveling Africa without a husband.

Slessor had chosen to focus on stopping the tradition of twin killing in Okoyong, an area of modern Nigeria. Locals believed that twins were the result of an encounter with the devil. Without knowing which of the twins to sacrifice, both were often killed. So was the mother.

When the women met, Slessor was caring for a mother and one surviving twin. Kingsley and Slessor became fast friends and confidants.

Uninterested in women's suffrage

Kingsley's writings, on her travels and African customs, were so articulate and profound that she became a celebrity. Some in the media linked her to the European feminist movement, but Kingsley was uninterested in women’s suffrage. She was interested in Africa.

Kingsley didn’t just hobnob around Africa. She engrossed herself entirely. She canoed past crocodiles, encountered supposed cannibal tribes, and traipsed steamy jungles. To fund her adventures, she bartered rum, gin, and fish hooks. She collected beetles and fish specimens for British museums. Some fish species were new discoveries and were later named after her. Once she returned with a previously unknown snake and eight new species of insect.

When the Boer war broke out, Kingsley was dismayed. She volunteered as a nurse in Cape Town. But caring for injured patients in a dirty makeshift hospital took its toll.

Typhoid ravaged the hospital and struck Kingsley down. Knowing she was short on time, she expressed her preference to die alone and be buried at sea. She died two months after she had arrived in Cape Town, at aged 37. Her coffin was cast to the ocean floor off Cape Point.

In 2009, two men drifted helplessly inside an icebox for 25 days. Miraculously, they survived a disaster that killed their 18 crewmates.

The two Burmese men had been working on a commercial fishing boat. The day had started innocuously enough but turned into a nightmare when the weather changed. Rough seas splintered their 9m wooden vessel. The boat sank, and the crew was forced into the ocean.

The two men found a 1.5m square icebox that usually stored fish. Seeking refuge, they clambered inside. The rest of the crew (mostly Thai nationals) had no flotation devices.

“We saw a Thai man floating past us but we couldn't reach him to help,” one survivor told the rescue team.

There had been no emergency beacons or life rafts on the fishing boat. The men were now at the mercy of the ocean, praying for rescue.

“We drifted for hundreds of miles, and although we think some ships saw us, they didn't come to help,” said one of the survivors. “Even when the fishing boat we were on sent out distress signals, no one responded. When the boat sank we had to grab what we could or we would drown.”

Drank rainwater

For 25 days, they survived on rainwater that pooled at the bottom of their icebox and ate chunks of fish that had been left inside. Wind and waves threatened to capsize them as they drifted.

In a stroke of luck, an Australian Coast Guard aircraft spotted the icebox during a routine flight. The shipwrecked men removed their shirts and waved furiously to the crew above. The Coast Guard then radioed a rescue helicopter to retrieve them.

“They were ecstatic to see us,” reported the helicopter pilot.

The men (aged 22 and 25) thought they had been approximately 300km off the coast of Australia when their ordeal started. They may have drifted hundreds of kilometers before being winched to safety 110km northwest of Horn Island.

Onboard the helicopter, the parched fishermen downed almost two liters of water each. They were lucky to be alive. All 18 of their crewmates were presumed dead and no further searches were conducted.

"The information [the men] provided to us was that they witnessed other crew members in the water, none of whom had a flotation device, so we've done an assessment and we don't believe anybody would be able to survive 25 days actually in the water," said one of the rescuers.

The survivors were hungry and dehydrated but otherwise in good health. They were released from the hospital the following day.

The Torres Strait between Australia and Papua New Guinea is fished both legally and illegally. It is unknown if the crew was permitted to fish when their boat sank.

Few explorers radiate the unassuming, endearing, and gentle image of Naomi Uemura. His beaming smile is recognizable globally. First, as an outstanding achiever who made the first solo ascent of Denali, the first solo rafting journey down the Amazon, and the first solo to the North Pole. Later, when he disappeared on winter Denali, he reminded us that even the best are not invulnerable.

When Uemura was born in 1940s Japan, the notion of world travel did not exist. A pegged exchange rate meant that modest workers like Uemura couldn't afford such privilege. Although Uemura enjoyed tending his family farm in northern Hyogo Prefecture, he was curious about what other adventures lay beyond.

Uemura's farming life sometimes involved working in harsh weather. Heavy winter snows and icy coastal winds were part of the job. He relished these aspects of life, and his bred toughness proved helpful on future expeditions.

Uemura studied agriculture at university but more significantly, he first began climbing here. Naturally shy, he joined the alpine club, hoping it would help him make new friends and gain confidence.

A humbling first climb

His first climb, up Mount Shirouma, was disappointing. He learned that long days of farmwork were no match for the physically demanding elements of climbing. But this humbling event did awaken Uemura's undercover competitiveness. Instead of feeling beaten, he vowed to be better.

He spent the rest of his university years honing his climbing skills and working on his fitness. When Japan's floating exchange rate began in 1973, he was ready to search abroad for the elusive adventures he craved.

With $110 in his pocket, Uemura boarded a ship to Los Angeles. Over the next four-and-a-half years, he traveled the globe, notching visionary firsts.

He joined Pemba Tenzing in the first Ngojumba Kang (Tenzing Peak) ascent. Next, he rafted 6,000km alone down the Amazon. He climbed Mont Blanc (then considered Europe’s tallest peak), Kilimanjaro, and Aconcagua. Already, he had an eye toward the world’s Seven Summits. In between, he crossed the Arctic.

Briefly, Uemura returned to Japan. Then in 1970, he joined Japan's Everest expedition. He became the first Japanese man to stand atop the world’s highest peak.

Barely three months later, he completed the world’s first solo climb of Denali. He also became the first to climb five of the Seven Summits. He longed to climb Vinson, but never got the chance.

Four epic dogsled journeys

Not even 30 years old, Uemura already understood that he preferred solo expeditions. Long captivated by polar regions, he went to Greenland in 1973 and completed a 3,000km dogsled journey along the North West coast.

Continuously pushing his physical limits, he set off in 1976 on his most grueling journey yet -- 12,000km by dogsled from Greenland to Alaska.

His mega-traverse took 18 months, with a break during the un-dogsled-able summer. No one had dogsledded from Greenland to Alaska since Knud Rasmussen's epic Fifth Thule Expedition decades earlier. Uemura dealt with polar bears, bad ice, and brawling dogs. Against all odds, he reached Alaska. The expedition -- funded by National Geographic Magazine, a Japanese newspaper, a television station, and a dog food company - cemented his reputation as a world-class explorer.

North Pole solo

In 1978, he returned to the polar regions for a shorter but even more difficult dogsled journey. He became the first to solo the North Pole, dogsledding the 760km of broken ice in 57 days. Then almost as impressive -- and something which showed his bottomless appetite for adventure -- he took a short charter flight from the North Pole to northern Greenland. Then he started dogsledding the length of the Greenland ice sheet.

Uemura never rested on his laurels. After each personal glory, he immediately set out to top it. His next adventure in 1984 was sadly the one that ended his life.

No one had ever soloed Denali in winter. To this day, only 13 people have summited the highest peak in North America at the harshest time of year.

Uemura carefully prepared. He slung bamboo poles over his shoulders to arrest potentially deadly crevasse falls. He slept in snow caves, eliminating the need for a weighty tent. To minimize fuel, he ate cold meat. The day after his 43rd birthday, Uemura reached the summit.

He radioed his success to a local bush pilot and photographer. He returned to 5,500m and expected to be at base camp in two days.

High winds at the summit raised concerns for his welfare. But Uemura’s reputation and experience had seemingly rendered him immortal. If anyone could make it down, he could.

News spread quickly of his ascent, and a flurry of reporters excitedly awaited his arrival. When he failed to show, excitement turned to concern. Short relief came after a plane spotted him at 5,100m. But those were the last sightings of Uemura.

Vanishes on winter Denali

It is unknown exactly what became of him. He had abandoned his bamboo poles higher up and perhaps fell into a crevasse. Thirteen days after he’d reached the summit, two experienced climbers searched the slopes for him, beginning around 4,000m. They found a snow cave, in which he'd left gear, including his bamboo safety poles, to lighten his load. He also left his diary there.

Uemura's last entry read simply, "I wish I could sleep in a warm sleeping bag. No matter what happens, I am going to climb McKinley." More gear was located around 5,200m, but his body has never turned up.

Almost 40 years later, Uemura’s legacy continues. Adventurers active on the world stage may receive the Naomi Uemura Adventure Award. In Japan, two museums foster his memory.

But most of all, Uemura is remembered as the high achiever who pushed physical limits while remaining enviably gentle and unassuming.

When you hit rock bottom, they say you find your soul. For one man, hitting rock bottom was the catalyst to reuniting with his wife. Now together with their three children, they experience life through the art of running in the wild. One son even ran 50km when he was just 10 years old.

Silverton, Colorado is a small village that forms part of the San Juan Skyway. It’s a recreation paradise born of the mining area. One of the most intact historical mining villages in the country, Silverton is a National Historic Landmark. Today less than 550 people call Silverton home. Of those, just 149 are separate families. Needless to say, Silverton is a sort of refuge between its residents and the rest of the world.

The region features alpine valleys, meadows, and the peaks of the San Juan range. Strewn throughout three national forests are a matrix of trails that vary in distance, ascent and terrain. You can run in any direction, but it won’t be flat.

Something needed to change

When Cody Braford-Lefebvre realized that he was making poor decisions because of alcohol abuse, he knew it wouldn’t be long before the love of his life could no longer cope. The couple’s therapist suggested they write their own obituary. Something needed to change.

One day, when Braford-Lefebvre's wife Ivy tied her laces for a casual run to clear her head, Braford-Lefebvre decided to join her. Since then, the couple has run together as therapy. But their running has grown from healing into a lifestyle.

The silent meditative nature of running kilometre after kilometre, day after day, has been lifesaving for the family. Now they also run with their three children. What started as just a few kilometres is now often more than 150km, with the children happily joining the family sport. “[It] focuses a lot of our energy on being totally wild,” says Ivy.

Far from striving to achieve personal bests, the family spend their time chatting. In the wild, the conversation is natural. Discussing feelings is part of the running rhythm. “There’s a lot of space to self-reflect,” says Braford-Lefebvre. Winter in Silverton, he says, is especially pleasant.

The perseverance and discomfort have helped the parents stay sober. “My son ran 130 miles at 13 and my daughter ran 50km at the age of 11,” says Braford-Lefebvre.

He’s not showing off his offspring's superiority on an imaginary running barometer, but rather is proud at the level of ease they show for the unusual family outings. They don’t even remember a time when they weren’t doing it.

When Braford-Lefebvre’s son says that he wants to be just like his dad, Braford-Lefebvre responds, “No, I want you to be better than me.”

Some would call them crazy. I would call them united.

Deborah Kiley's gruesome, five-day ordeal in 1982 began as a routine sailing trip in the Atlantic. Soon, she would be forced to feed her friend to sharks and watch helplessly as two others leaped to their deaths.

Kiley was a confident sailor. By the age of 23, she already had years of experience crewing yachts. She earned her big break sailing in the 70,000km Whitbread Round the World Race (now The Ocean Race). In 1981, Kiley became the first American woman to complete the event. Her sailing future appeared prosperous.

The following year, she was hired to crew an 18m yacht called Trashman, during its transfer from Maine to new owners in Florida.

When the crew -- Kiley, Captain John Lippoth, his girlfriend Meg Mooney, and sailors Brad Cavanagh and Mark Adams -- set off from Maine for their six-day, 2,000km trip, conditions were perfect.

“The weather was beautiful, the boat was fun to steer,” recalled Kiley years later.

On their second day, they began to run into trouble.

A storm, and a drunken captain

A violent storm hit Trashman with 110kph winds and 10m waves. A heavily intoxicated Lippoth lay asleep at the wheel when the voices of her terrified crewmates woke Kelly up. Cold water gushed into the cabin. In a matter of moments, their situation turned desperate.

The yacht, now off the coast of North Carolina, was sinking quickly. The crew's only option was to throw themselves into the ocean.

Adams managed to inflate a small rubber dinghy. As the crew clambered into their life raft, Adam felt a nudge on his leg. They were completely surrounded by great white sharks.

“The minute we got in, there were fins everywhere in the water. I don’t mean like two or three, I mean 10, 20. They were everywhere,” said Kiley.

They realized that Mooney had gashed her leg severely during the capsize. The smell of blood drew sharks to the helpless crew. One shark clutched the dinghy’s bowline in its mouth, pulling the terrified crew along. When that didn’t tip them into the ocean, the sharks started nudging the boat.

Kiley resolved to stay focused. She covered her body in seaweed for warmth. To stay in control, she recited prayers.

Mooney was in agonizing pain. Her leg quickly became infected, and blood poisoning set in. By day three, everyone was severely dehydrated.

Out of desperation, a delirious Lippoth and Adams began drinking from the ocean. Toxic saltwater accelerates dehydration and shuts down the kidneys. In different circumstances, both men would have understood this.

Lippoth was the first to go. Convinced that he saw land, he suddenly threw himself overboard.

A blood-curdling scream and the captain was gone

“All of a sudden, we just heard this shrill scream. Blood-curdling,” said Kiley. “Then it was over, silence. There was no crying, nothing. There was no doubt what got him. The sharks got him.”

Shortly after, Adams suffered a similar fate. He babbled incoherently of heading to the shop to buy beer and cigarettes before hurling himself over the side of the dinghy.

“It was by far the most horrifying moment of my entire life,” Kiley said as she watched sharks eat him too. In their frenzied attack on Adam, the sharks butted the raft, tipping it precariously. Somehow, it managed to stay upright.

Hallucinations weren’t yet over for the surviving crew members.

Mooney succumbed next from the blood poisoning. She was dying before Kiley and Cavanagh’s eyes, but there was nothing they could do to help. When the pair woke in the morning, she was dead.

Starving and dehydrated, Cavanagh considered eating Mooney’s remains. Focused, Kiley talked him out of it.

A third perishes

Mooney’s infection had wept all over the dinghy's floor, which was now sodden with a mess of seaweed, blood, and pus. Feeling that they were risking infection themselves, the two survivors threw their friend overboard.

First, they undressed her, saving clothes and jewelry to give to her family, if they survived. Then they recited a prayer and pushed her over the edge of the boat.

'We tried to sleep so we wouldn't see Meg being eaten by sharks," said Kiley.

The pair had now been at sea for five days. Three of their friends had died. They tried to clean the boat from Mooney's infection. While doing so, Cavanagh slipped and fell into the shark-infested waters.

A desperate Kiley used all her strength to try to pull Cavanagh back into the boat, but she was just too weak. Then the pair spotted a cargo ship on the horizon, and a surge of adrenalin came over Cavanagh. Summoning the last of his strength, he managed to haul himself back on board.

Deliverance

When the pair were picked up 140km south of Cape Lookout, they'd drifted almost 150km off course.

Kiley and Cavanagh's five days in the Atlantic Ocean shifted the course of their lives irreversibly. It took years for Kiley to stop hearing her friends' screams as the sharks ate them. Returning to her previous life no longer made sense.

Kiley became a motivational speaker and penned two books about her ordeal. Albatross: The True Story of a Woman's Survival at Sea (1994) and No Victims Only Survivors: Ten Lessons for Survival (2006).

She married twice and had two children. In a cruel irony, her son drowned at the age of 23. When Kiley was 54, she herself died at home in Mexico. The cause of death was not made public.

Before she died, Kiley and Cavanagh featured in a 2005 Discovery Channel episode of I Shouldn't Be Alive. In the documentary, Cavanagh admitted, "It's not something you just turn off when it's over. You keep living in that survival mode. I don't know if you're shellshocked or what...but it's impossible to just go back to being the way you were before."

Although his outlook on life changed, Cavanagh returned to the water as a professional yachtsman.

For more than 10 years, Miriam Lancewood and Peter Raine lived free from society as hunters and gatherers in New Zealand’s remote mountains. They survived happily without timepieces or timetables, but now the couple have to adapt to the changes wrought by time.

Their story is almost unbelievable. They grew up more than 18,000km apart, Raine in rural New Zealand, the son of a sheep farmer. Lancewood (her pen name) was born three decades later in the Netherlands, the middle of three siblings born within three years.

Lancewood's home was lovingly filled with music and theatre. In adolescence, her athletic career took off. For six years, she represented her country in pole vaulting and competed in the youth Olympics. She established a fitness acumen that helped her for years, and not just in sport. At the same time, she learned early the perils of a full schedule.

Revolt against scheduling

“My life in the Netherlands was based on time, running around the clock, jamming my studies and training and seeing friends, all in one day. It was stressful,” Lancewood told ExplorersWeb. “But because it is so normal in modern society, I never questioned it.”

Her parents introduced her to the joys of nature. Sometimes they camped wild near a river, sleeping under the stars. “That, I loved,” Lancewood recalls. "I always dreaded going back to my flat and crowded home country."

By contrast, Raine spent much of the 1970s living in the forest, protesting against commercial logging operations, which were a national concern in New Zealand back then. He bought land on the West Coast, preparing for a nuclear apocalypse which never came. He married and studied for a Ph.D. in environmental studies.

Shaped by the philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche, Raine believed that people didn’t need government or authority for survival. When Raine encountered Raimon Panikkar’s Cosmotheandric Intuition (a theory that dissolves the idea of separate realities between man, God, and world), his view on reality transformed. He quit his job as a university professor in New Zealand and moved to India to live like a "modern nomad". That’s when Raine and Lancewood's worlds collided.

Lancewood had just completed her university degree and was in India after a year in Zimbabwe. With a chessboard under her arm, she was looking for company when she met Raine in a local chai shop.

Thirty-year age difference

The connection was instantaneous. The 30-year age difference was no barrier. His stories of adventure captivated Lancewood. What Raine had in intellectual curiosity, she complimented with physical prowess.

Despite inner words of caution, Lancewood moved in with Raine the following day. The pair then spent years traveling together through India, climbing mountains, and exploring South East Asia and Papua New Guinea. Eventually, they settled in Marlborough, at the top of New Zealand’s South Island.

They briefly settled into a house. Lancewood taught phys ed for at-risk youth while applying for New Zealand residency. But they soon knew that this wasn't a lifestyle they aspired to.

They decided to see how they would cope with living in the wild, away from society. They sold their belongings and headed into the mountains, armed with little more than a tent and bow and arrow.

“We spent a lot of time tramping in the wilderness, but then we decided we wanted to be a part of it, not just observers. We decided to spend four seasons [there] and see how we'd survive,” says Lancewood.

Seven years in the bush

The experiment lasted seven years.

“We saw no reason to come back to town or to settle. We felt completely at ease in the wild mountains of New Zealand. Sometimes we didn't see anyone for months,” Lancewood recalls. “I never missed anything.”

I can’t help but be enthralled by Lancewood and Raine. New Zealand has plenty of self-sufficient, off-grid stories, but Lancewood and Raine’s style is vastly wild and authentic.

Outwardly, they embody health. There’s no strain or sadness shown on their faces. No filth in their clothes, although Lancewood promises that all their belongings smell of campfires.

They lived in small, compact tents. Their few possessions fit into one backpack each and they spent their days hunting and gathering. In a bit of a gender turnaround, Lancewood took responsibility for hunting while Raine cooked and gathered wild food.

Hunting hare and possum with a bow

For the first two years, Lancewood hunted exclusively with a bow and arrow. She mostly stalked hare or possum (an unprotected animal in New Zealand), which were easy to carry back to camp. Later, she acquired a rifle.

When they first entered the bush, they left their pasts behind and had no plans for the future. They said goodbye to schedules and calendars. Not knowing what time, day, or month it was, they found it easier to focus on the present.

“Peter and I made a radical shift in our thinking and therefore in our life,” Lancewood said. "We went off the beaten track, to live an adventure. Not just going on a challenging holiday and returning home.

Every year, they approach their lifestyle differently to break up the monotony. One year, they walked the 3,000km Te Araroa Trail, which spans the length of New Zealand. Sometimes they spent one night in each place, sometimes four months. Occasionally helicopters dropped them food buckets in the rugged Southern Alps. It was a change from possum and a thrill to see visitors.

Lancewood isn’t like anyone I’ve encountered before. She’s a breath of fresh air. Her 38-year-old skin is flawless, without a wrinkle. Her effortless smile could appear in a toothpaste ad. Her shiny hair bounces enviably. She’s personable, grounded, and somehow relatable. When she speaks, her words make sense even to mortals like me, even though she barely spoke English when she and Raine first met.

Not for everyone

Raine worries about what will become of Lancewood when he is gone, although she certainly has a survivor mentality. In general, Raine is not as public or open as she is. Although she enjoys life without distractions, she also wants to share their lifestyle for others to learn from. Scores of people write her, saying that they want to do the same. But Lancewood knows that the challenges aren't for everyone.

“Last summer was pretty cold,” she admits. “Sometimes it's hard to keep warm in the snow in the mountains. Worst thing is endless rain. Our year on the West Coast was hard. Rain is no good when you live in a tent.”

To put her words into context, the West Coast is one of the wettest regions in the country. Annual rainfall regularly exceeds 10,000mm, and their lifestyle is at the mercy of the weather.

When it’s sunny, they walk, exploring lakes and waterfalls. When it's raining, they read in their tent. During their first winter, spent up at 1,200m, even the waterfalls sometimes froze.

Lancewood says that one of the major benefits of their lifestyle has been improved senses. But learning to do nothing has been one of her biggest challenges.

“It takes about two weeks for the mind to slow down in order to meet with the rhythm of nature. And in that time, you go through a period of boredom and restlessness,” she says.

Bestselling author

In 2017, after seven years, the couple left the New Zealand backcountry. Before they left, Lancewood penned her first book, Woman in the Wilderness. It became an international bestseller, translated into five languages.

The title made her a reluctant celebrity, especially in her native country. Since then, she’s been invited to book festivals around the world, including Dubai and Hong Kong. Although the festivals are exciting, she says that she can't ever see herself returning to life in a city.

They next flew to Europe and began a new adventure, walking 2,000 km across the continent, then on to Turkey.

Lancewood has always known that her days with Raine are a blessing. But in Turkey, the physicality of their life began to show on Raine’s then 64-year-old body.

They were having a bite to eat. Then Lancewood stood up and put her pack on, ready to continue walking. Raine didn’t do the same. The strain of shouldering his pack further was showing on his older body. When they went on to the Australian desert, things took a drastic turn.

“Peter got kidney failure in the desert in Australia," Lancewood said. "The doctors told him to live near a hospital in town and go on dialysis. He said, 'I rather die.' "

Dialysis? "I'd rather die," he said

Medics told Raine that he had a three percent chance of survival without a new kidney. When Lancewood offered hers, he declined. They told Lancewood to say her goodbyes.

“I have much respect for Peter's courage, he is not afraid to die,” Lancewood said.

Raine wanted his remaining time to be in the wild. A three-hour walk from cellphone coverage isn’t the smartest idea for someone with serious health concerns. So instead, they elected to recover in a hut back in New Zealand.

For the couple, the hut was restricting. Suffocating even. Diminishing their heightened senses and preventing the breeze from brushing over their cheeks.

Last November, Lancewood released her second book, Wild at Heart. It adds to her life story of living in remote areas of New Zealand and walking long routes, such as the 2,000km across Europe.

Eventually, when Raine’s health improved earlier this year, they returned to the backcountry. But they recognized that they had to adapt their lifestyle for the sake of Raine's health.

“It’s too cold at night, even with a possum duvet and yak blanket,” says Lancewood. Even in the height of summer, they were snowed in for five days.

Raine can't walk with a pack anymore, but they have found a new way of living.

Against medical advice, they flew to Bulgaria last year. For the summer, they lived in a shepherd’s cottage that they purchased in the Rhodope Mountains three years ago. They lived off-grid at 1,200m, a 2.5km walk from the nearest village. Their closest neighbor was a bear. A wild cat shared their hut, wolves scouted the mountains, and the couple ate from their vegetable garden.

From hunter-gatherers to nomads

Their new plan is to become nomads. Where? They don’t know yet. But Raine’s kidneys prefer warmth, especially in winter.

“One day we will end up in Tajikistan, or living in a hut in the Himalaya,” Lancewood said. “The main thing for us is to live free. To live without obligations, without many possessions. The more stuff I have, the more stuck I feel.”

Despite an innate fascination for survival in extreme conditions (Lancewood is currently reading One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich, by Alexander Solzhenitsyn; Raine is rereading Nietzsche), their future will likely involve buying small cottages in different countries, and moving between each. Lancewood says that although it takes more planning to live that way, they are happy, and it’s another adventure.

“Living without security is healthy for the mind," she insists. "That is what keeps me sharp, alive, and happy. It is, by the way, also the secret for a long-lasting relationship.”

Nellie Bly was such a dedicated journalist that she had herself committed to a mental asylum for an undercover exposé. The story earned her a rare byline outside of the “women’s pages”, exposing conditions best kept secret from society. Journalism took her to exotic places, including an around-the-world race.

Born Elizabeth Cochran in 1864, Bly created her pen name when she began working for the Pittsburgh Dispatch in 1885.

She’d been offered the role after writing an angry rebuttal to the editor's uncomplimentary article entitled What Girls Are Good For. Bly’s letter was so good that she was offered a job.

At first, she covered local stories for the women’s column. Then she branched out into human interest stories, which were her primary focus.

Often, she tackled confrontational topics that were usually brushed beneath the surface. Bly was treading new ground, particularly as a woman in a profession typically left for men.

Expelled from Mexico

Eventually, she earned opportunities to tackle wider stories. First, she covered Mexico's corruption under dictator Porfirio Diaz.

On this seven-month assignment, she sent back regular reports to her editor. But Mexican officials did not receive her scathing reports well, and they expelled her from the country.

Within two years, Bly was ready to report on more explicit stories. She moved to New York, hoping to gain a notable position. Instead, she spent four months facing gender-based rejection. She finally won a position at Joseph Pulitzer’s New York World, one of the most popular publications of the time.

A 23-year-old Bly threw herself into her first assignment. Working to expose patient conditions at the Women's Lunatic Asylum, she went undercover, faking insanity. She was successfully committed.

For 10 days, she reported on the cruelty and neglect suffered by in-patients. It was worse than she expected. Sixteen hundred patients were crammed into a 1,000-capacity facility. Barely trained staff with little compassion ordered brutal treatment of those considered “mad”.

First investigative journalism

Patients had to take ice-cold baths and remain in wet clothes for hours. Others had to sit still and silent on benches for 12 hours at a time. Some patients were tethered together and forced to pull carts around like mules. Food and sanitary conditions were horrific.

Worst of all, many patients were not actually ill. Some had been victims of language barriers during immigration. Others were poor and had fallen through the cracks of society with nowhere to turn.

When she was committed as a patient, there was no promise she’d be allowed to leave. But her courage earned her a captivating story.

“Nearly all night long I listened to a woman cry about the cold and beg for God to let her die. Another one yelled, ‘Murder!’ at frequent intervals and ‘Police!’ at others until my flesh felt creepy,” she wrote about her first night in the asylum.

Bly’s editor secured her release and the report that followed shocked readers. It prompted a grand jury investigation, which led to long-overdue improvements to mental health patient care.

She later published her report into a book called Ten Days in a Mad-House. Already this secured her legacy because it was the beginning of what we now know as investigative journalism.

The exposé shot her to fame as the leading woman journalist of the time. She was taken into sweatshops, jails, and other institutes where people were desperate to tell their stories. But her best story was on the horizon.

Around the world in 72 days

A decade earlier, Jules Verne’s adventure novel Around the World in 80 Days hit bookshelves. It was born of the age of global tourism that was exploding after the Suez Canal opened, the linking of the Indian railways, and the first transcontinental road across America. Times had shifted from exploration to world travel.

Verne’s book sparked a sensation, inspiring pioneers to cross boundaries and attempt new adventures. Bly was no different.

With difficulty, she convinced her editor to let her turn Verne’s book into reality. "No one but a man can do this," he insisted.

"Very well," she replied, "Start the man, and I'll start the same day for some other newspaper and beat him."  In 1889, she set off around the world to challenge the novel.

Unknown to her, a rival woman journalist was actually competing against her on the same mission. Elizabeth Bisland of Cosmopolitan magazine traveled in the reverse direction and was hot on her heels.

It took Bly 72 days, 6 hours, and 11 minutes to traverse the globe by train, ship, horse, rickshaw, and any other mode of transport native to the place she was in. Her project attracted worldwide attention, and she broke the record for the fastest time around the world. Bisland returned four days after Bly, awarding Bly the record and international stardom.

Bly's courageous, bull-headed approach to confronting the narrative that female journalists faced was singular for its time.

Becomes an industrialist

When she married millionaire Robert Seamen in 1895, at the age of 31, she retired from journalism. He was more than 40 years her senior and he died eight years after they wed. Bly was left with control of his substantial manufacturing firm, Iron Clad Manufacturing Co.

She took up Seamen’s business with the same vigor and pioneering spirit that she had applied to journalism. She patented several inventions at the iron mill, some of which remain in use today.

If anything, she surpassed her great name in journalism and adventure and became a leading women industrialist in the United States. But soon the financial aspects of running a large company suffocated her, and the company filed for bankruptcy.

The timing was not all bad for Bly, though. World War I provided plenty of opportunities to return to her roots and pen human interest stories. Journalism took her offshore again as the first woman to visit the war zone between Serbia and Austria.

When the Women’s Suffrage movement rose, Bly was once again in her reporting element. Her provocative article, Suffragists Are Men's Superiors, stopped readers in their tracks. Within the piece, she accurately predicted when women would win the right to vote in the United States.

In 1922, two years after that momentous event in women’s rights, Bly died of pneumonia.

Bly’s stories have inspired countless books and films, including The Adventures of Nellie Bly (1981), 10 Days in a Madhouse (2015), and the 1946 Broadway musical, Nellie Bly.

In 1998, she was inducted into the National Women’s Hall of Fame. In 2002, she was one of only four journalists to be honored with a U.S. postage stamp in a Women in Journalism set.

Jellyfish can turn a fine time in the ocean quickly into a catastrophe. One particular jellyfish species is even the most venomous marine animal in the world.

Jellyfish aren't fussy. They live both at the deepest depths of the ocean and on the surface, in arctic waters and in tropical ones. Their bell-shaped head can be as small as one millimetre or as large as a car. Sometimes you’ll feel them before you’ve seen them.

These creatures are recognizable by their bell-shaped head and long, dangling tentacles. One bell can have eight groups of tentacles attached, with up to 150 tentacles in each group. Those tentacles are the worrisome aspect of their anatomy.

How jellyfish sting

Each tentacle comes loaded with microscopic barbed stingers. Each stinger has a tiny venomous tube. When the stinger activates by contact, it penetrates the skin, releasing venom. A person feels an instantaneous burning sensation. In some cases, the sting is so severe that it can cause someone to pass out or even suffer cardiac arrest.

Jellyfish aren't deliberately hunting or attacking humans. Their venom is for protection and to kill prey. But if a human touches a tentacle, the affected area becomes irritated. Sometimes the venom enters the bloodstream. A single jellyfish can have enough venom to kill 60 adults.

Mostly, they drift with the ocean, but in the case of the box jellyfish -– the deadliest species –- they actively swim.

Box jellyfish prefer the warm waters of the Pacific and Indian Oceans. Their bell is a transparent four-sided box, making them hard to detect. Like other species, they have a cluster of six eyes, but for the box jellyfish, those clusters are on all four sides. Victims of box jellyfish stings can die within four minutes.

Recent fatalities

That’s exactly what happened to a seven-year-old girl in 2006. She’d been swimming in Australia’s tropical North Queensland when she came out of the water and collapsed in front of her parents. Resuscitation efforts failed.

A few years before, a young boy died in North Queensland after coming out of the water screaming. He had visible tentacle marks all over his body and died of cardiac arrest. His was the fourth box jellyfish fatality in three years.

Earlier in 2021, a 17-year-old Australian became the latest victim of a box jellyfish while swimming near Cape York, at the northeastern tip of Australia. The unnamed victim died in hospital a week after being stung.

One 11-year-old girl narrowly escaped death in 2010. But she was left scarred for life and needed skin grafts. The venom had burned both her legs, forearm and part of her stomach. Still, she lived to tell the tale.

"Box jellyfish, or chironex fleckeri, are known worldwide as being the most venomous marine creature and probably arguably the world's most venomous creature full stop," said one leading Australian expert.

Plenty of water enthusiasts coexist with jellyfish, applying caution. Note that a dead jellyfish on the beach can still sting you if you touch it.

Treatment

Aside from the box jellyfish, treating jellyfish stings is the same regardless of species. First, get out of the water. Then flush the stung area with water to remove the tentacles. If tentacles are still attached, protect your hands and remove them with a dry towel. Next, immerse the stung area in hot water for 15 to 20-minute intervals. In the case of a stung torso, jump in the shower.

When the sting comes from a box jellyfish, act fast: Remove the barbs with tweezers. Rinse the stung area with vinegar to stop the venom spreading. Contact emergency services for medical treatment. There is box jellyfish antivenom on the market which can save lives. Noe that defibrillators don’t work with box jellyfish stings: Their venom essentially locks the heart.

The best prevention however, is to stay clear of unprotected waters, especially in the Pacific and Indian Oceans between November and May. This is jellyfish season, when more float about.

One Australian stinger expert called swimming in unmarked waters Russian roulette. Although plenty of locals have swum in the such waters for generations, they are lucky that they haven't been critically injured.

Jellyfish may be older than dinosaurs, yet remain elusive to humans. In New Zealand, for example, where jellyfish are prevalent and so is an ocean lifestyle, not one scientist specializes in them.

NASA first started sending jellyfish to space onboard the Columbia space shuttle in the 1990s. Scientists wanted to discover whether baby jellyfish developed the same sense of gravity when born in space as they do on earth. It turned out that although the jellyfish developed normally, they had difficulties discerning up from down later.

Have you ever watched a child on a climbing wall? Their vertical dance is effortless as their muscles relax and contract perfectly to the requirements of defying gravity. As we grow up, our environment reduces our ability. Sometimes climbing has the ability to send climbers back to that physical freedom of childhood. For some, it’s even healing.

Healing is exactly what each of these five diverse groups of climbers has in common. Daniel Pohl, the Keithley family, Kathy Karlo, Jumbo Yokoyama, and Dario Ventura all face struggles in life which dissipate when they climb.

Of all the climbers in the group, Pohl’s story is the most captivating. Most likely because he’s not your everyday person. His lifestyle contrasts the most with the lives that almost all of us choose.

Pohl has been living in the Avalonia wilderness, near Herdecke, Germany for 12 years. He arrived after struggling with the mental health system in Germany. The system told him that he was ill, but he disagreed. Being different doesn’t necessarily mean being ill.

"What is life without climbing?"

Where Pohl lives now, he is free and unjudged. He climbs as though vertically dancing, without limits. Just like children do on a climbing wall.

“What is life without climbing?” Pohl says. “Without climbing, I wouldn’t exist”.

During the day, he builds terraces and steps so that climbers can use the area without compromising nature. He earns a living creating and selling topo maps for climbers. His work is impressive. He’s clearly a gifted artist and a committed servant to rock climbing.

In Avalonia, he is able to live like a child, which is his preference. “It’s a magical place. You will feel it,” he says of Avalonia.

The child-like parallel to climbing is fascinating. While climbing, we often chase the freedom from responsibility and pressure that we experienced as children.

Raised on rock

Melissa and Jimmy Keithley made a conscious decision to raise their children with rock climbing at their core. Although the family often encounters criticism for their choice, Zoe (19) and Noah (14) enjoy their world. Melissa wants to install ownership of the outdoors in her children, and it seems to be working.

Noah appreciates how it unites the family. When Zoe struggled with teen depression, climbing helped her find contentment.

In Red River Gorge, Kentucky, Ventura grew up with climbing parents. Their pizza shop is like a second home to climbers who frequent the area. They eat, sleep, and meet there. It’s been that way for the last 35 years. The pizza shop unites the “ungodly strong” community. While they are there, their time is carefree and fun.

For Karlo in Chattanooga, Tennessee, and Yokoyama in Yamanashi, Japan, climbing isn’t as carefree as it is for the others. They both relentlessly pursue climbing goals. Karlo is motivated to disconnect from a traumatic sexual assault. Yokoyama’s motivated to be the best father possible for his children.

Driven by different things, they are each united by a common objective to escape their external responsibilities in the moments they climb. Like a child dancing up a climbing wall, they vertically dance with pure freedom.

I can’t help but wonder what it is specifically about climbing that has the ability to heal so greatly. Maybe it’s not just climbing, it's outdoor challenges in general. Or maybe it’s that climbing parallels child-like movement on such a level that we remember and integrate it with the freedom we experienced during those years.

Often people who appear outwardly bizarre are anything but. In the case of Dr. Geebers, who left a trail of stone sculptures while walking more than 10,000km around Britain, he was simply misunderstood. Geebers was an artist exploring his craft. At the same time, he was trying to figure out how to fit into the mold of common society.

We first came across Geebers (real name George Barnett) while sharing a news story about a walk around Britain. While investigating how many people have walked around Britain’s coastline (as few as 53 people), an unusual name popped up on the shortlist. Geebers, it turned out, had a rather unique story.

Geebers first hit headlines in 2011. It had taken him two years to walk Britain's perimeter. He slept rough and walked alone. Along the way, he left a trail of 44 pebble sculptures on beaches.

Originally from Northern Ireland, the then-37-year-old man saw himself as an artist trying to make a living. Society, on the other hand, saw him through a different lens.

He’d been homeless for seven years.

“Many homeless people in life hit rock bottom, and the only way is up,” he wrote in an online journal that offered some insight into his thoughts. "When I came up with the idea of creating pebble sculptures, I knew I had a chance to change my life around for the better."

How it all began

He began his immense walk serendipitously after police ordered him to move on from his usual rough sleeping spot. He documented parts of his journey in an online blog.

“Yes, I am Dr. Geebers. A crazy man who fell on hard times. Yet I pulled myself out of the gutters of life by creating loose pebble sculptures on UK beaches and poetry rhymes. From being no one with nothing to walking the coast of the UK 6,800 miles, creating on 40+ beaches, and moving over 2,000 tonnes of pebbles/stones. While living outside with no sponsorship or funding,” his blog's home page declared.

In Bexhill, East Sussex, he left a pebble field of balancing stones. Some of the intricately balanced towers reached half a metre tall with one rock sitting atop the other. His sculptures sometimes seemed to defy gravity.

In one busy café, he left pebble towers between tables as patrons sipped coffee.

He left “crazy stones in crazy little places” at Egerton Park. Publicly uploading clips of his work to his blog, he probably hoped that one day his sculptures would be appreciated.

They say that one of the toughest aspects of being homeless is being invisible to passersby. Although people admired Geebers' work, an exchange of words was uncommon. Though when words did pass the lips of strangers, they often left a lasting impact on Geebers.

One such supporter's words were the inspiration for his next project.

Brighton Beach work

After completing his walk around Britain, Geebers turned his attention to Brighton Beach. “My inspiration was the Mods and Rockers. It is coming up to the 40th anniversary of that movement in Brighton and I wanted to do something musical,” he said at the time.

Some of his most iconic sculptures included a guitar, a piano, and gulls. All created in a place that he said once brought him luck.

But his luck didn’t change. Despite a growing reputation as The Pebble Man, who created joy and entertainment for passersby, Geebers leaped off Brighton Pier, ending his life in 2015. He is survived by a daughter.

Most likely his sculptures have suffered similar fates, tumbling to a rocky floor or succumbing to the tides. But copycats continue his legacy along coastlines worldwide.

His alias may be coincidental, but the Urban Dictionary describes Geebers as "somebody who is unknown to others, but feels obligated to act a fool."

Frederick Marshman Bailey achieved great success as a British intelligence officer. His shooting skills earned him an improbable reputation during numerous undercover missions. He was a leading combatant in the Great Game and undertook important explorations in Tibet. This included tracing the course of the Tsangpo-Brahmaputra, which had previously baffled explorers. But his pastime of netting butterflies was more interesting to him than anything else.

Studies Tibetan

Born in India, Bailey relocated with his family to England at a young age. He was groomed to follow in the footsteps of his military father, who had been an officer in the Indian Army. By the age of 20, Bailey was an army lieutenant. After he studied Tibetan, his career catapulted.

At the time, Tibet had been an elusive land for the British. Previous unsuccessful attempts had sought both to form alliances and to ambush the country. Thomas Manning had successfully entered 90 years earlier but failed to return with anything of geographical significance. The British still needed to build relations with Tibet and especially to map the Tsangpo River.

In 1904, Francis Younghusband led a controversial attempt to invade Tibet, in which Bailey took part, thanks to his language skills. A monumental force of 1,200 troops marked the last grand imperial swing of the British.

By far the biggest challenges were the rugged, high Tibetan plateau and the gnarly weather. Pack animals died, altitude illness flourished, and guns malfunctioned in the cold. Ink in pens froze, and even kerosene needed thawing. But when it came time for battle, the war was unfair. The British military was the most powerful on earth, while the Tibetan force was almost nonexistent.

In less than four minutes, 2,000 British bullets mowed down the Tibetans. Over 600 died and more than 200 were wounded. There were no British fatalities.

Yet despite the importance of Bailey’s military work, he preferred stalking and killing animals.

Helps Dalai Lama escape

It didn’t matter that Tibetans considered all living beings as sacred. Bailey shot gazelles and blue and argali sheep for his own amusement. The Dalai Lama had earlier placed a ban on shooting creatures, but Bailey took no notice.

In 1904, the British triumphantly entered the west gate of Lhasa. Bailey blithely summed up those days in his diary: “Went to monastery. Lama ran amok.” Or “Auction of silks. Football. Out Fishing.”

Bailey seemed able to detach himself from reality. The lama he referred to had in fact broken into the British camp and slashed two officers in an act of revenge for his dead brother.

When the rest of the troops withdrew, Bailey stayed behind. Swiftly, he transitioned from soldier to explorer.

Bailey was now a junior officer on a mission to western Tibet. He was excited for the opportunity. "There ought to be very good shooting along the way,” he wrote exuberantly. Before long, he assumed another position. This time he became a Trade Agent in Gyanste, historically the third largest town in Tibet.

Although mapping was never his primary interest, Bailey took the opportunity to begin charting the long-coveted route along the Tsangpo River. The task momentarily occupied him until he returned to Gyantse to resume his Trade Agent status. He spent almost three years there.

Discovers world’s only high-altitude snake

Most British soldiers found Gyantse boring, but Bailey had endless fun shooting things. Locals could never understand his joy in murdering sentient beings. To supplement his income, he sent his trophies to museums in India and England. One of those was a new snake species he’d captured at 4,000m. Known as Thermophis Baileyi, it is the world’s only high-altitude snake. It was one of a few specimens named after Bailey.

Soon he started a small exotic animal collection. It mostly consisted of wounded animals he’d shot and attempted to nurse back to health. He kept a couple of Tibetan wolves, a monkey, spaniels, a gazelle, and a badger. None survived very long. The three snow leopards he held captive in 1908 also perished within weeks.

Despite his persistent disrespect for Tibetan customs, Bailey did the Tibetans a good turn. In 1910, when Chinese troops stormed into Lhasa, Bailey had the brilliant idea to disguise the 13th Dalai Lama as a post runner. The Dalai Lama was able to flee safely to India.

Bailey briefly returned to England, where he took particular interest in dining ladies at the Ritz or the Trocadero. His adorations were fleeting. His interest in civilized Western lifestyle was fleeting too. He made his way back to Asia.

After an excursion on the Tsangpo River that was mostly for the joy of netting butterflies, he joined another expedition to Sadiya, in India.

More killing

During this expedition, Bailey and his 25 troops and 90 porters annihilated several villages. Showing as much empathy as he did to the snow leopards he’d caged years earlier, he speared his way through everything in his path. Then it was back to the Tsangpo River once again to net butterflies.

For such a stalwart explorer, Bailey’s preoccupation with butterflies was unusual. Those who met him found him exuberant and eccentric. But his pastime indirectly reaped great rewards.

His multiple short, frivolous attempts to explore the Tsangpo River proved especially useful after he enlisted a surveyor in 1913. Captain Henry Morshead helped him map the region more thoroughly.

Morshead had spent six years surveying India and was deemed one of the world’s best at the task. The pair set off to track the unknown area between Tibet and Assam and solve the basic riddle of the Tsangpo River: Where did it flow?

Naturally, Bailey was more interested in collecting specimens. He led the pack, keeping watch for butterflies, while Morshead trailed behind mapping.

As they followed the Tsangpo River through difficult mountains, Bailey netted a collection of rare species. Over six months, he collected 2,000 butterflies from 200 different species. Some of them were previously undiscovered.

Tsangpo explorations

Some of the flora and fauna he preserved for science. Others, he ate. When he encountered wild goats the size of a buffalo, he shot several of them for his guides to eat. Not all species were welcome, though. They also combated leeches and ticks. Once, Bailey plucked 150 leeches from his skin.

They slept in caves at night and followed wild goat trails by day. Sometimes they struggled in the slippery snow.

In the end, the pair mapped some 600km of the Tsangpo River and solved the riddle of the Tsangpo-Brahmaputra connection.

By the time they emerged, they’d been robbed and were flat broke. They managed to borrow fare for a train ticket to Calcutta. Bailey brought with him 37 rare bird specimens. He also became recognized as an authority on the butterflies of the region.

Laurels followed. In 1914, the Royal Geographical Society awarded him the Patron’s Gold Medal. In 1915, King George V bestowed on him the prestigious Companion of the Indian Empire award. The following year, he received the Livingstone Gold Medal from the Royal Geographical Society.

Disappears for 16 months

Bailey’s antics took a peculiar twist when he went AWOL for 16 months. Hiding in Central Asia after fighting broke out between Bolsheviks and British Troops, he managed to escape prison or worse. His elusiveness was a testament to his skills of zigzagging seamlessly between explorer and secret agent.

In 1921, Bailey married Irma Hepburn. The couple promptly set off by ship to Sikkim, in northeastern India. Here, Bailey took up a prestigious new position as the region's Political Officer. In their two-storied mansion modeled on an English country house, they also began breeding dogs.

Breeds Tibetan dogs

The couple never had children. When Bailey wasn’t engaged in duties, they indulged in travel. In 1929, when he bumped into Younghusband on the streets of London, they had with them 13 Lhasa Apso dogs. They’d successfully introduced the breed to British society.

Bailey continued to work in His Majesty’s Service, though his career was tapering off by then. When he was 56 years old, he retired. This led to even more recreational travel with his wife.

As an expert on Tibet, Bailey was made honorary librarian of the Royal Central Asian Library in London.

The Baileys bought a new country estate in England that was large enough to house Bailey’s butterfly and stuffed animal collection, which included stuffed Tibetan pheasants in glass cabinets. Preserved heads of wildlife from his hunting trips adorned the walls.

In 1967, Bailey died from natural causes. Perhaps taking a tip from Sir Richard Francis Burton's spouse, Bailey's wife burned much of his papers in an attempt to preserve his reputation.

Bailey is commemorated through three specimens that were named after him: a Tibetan snake, Thermophis baileyi, an ungulate called the red goral, Naemorhedus baileyi, and the renowned Himalayan blue poppy, Meconopsis baileyi. He published four books on his expeditions, including Mission to Tashkent about his bizarre 16-month hideout.

The American Museum of Natural History in New York currently holds Bailey’s personal collection of 2,000 stuffed bird species. His papers and extensive photograph collections are in the British Library, London.

I’ve decided that Albert Einstein was incorrect when he said that the definition of insanity is repeating the same thing and expecting a different outcome. In my eyes, insanity is bike-packing 3,000km in Siberia where temperatures plummet to -50˚C. On a good day, they’ll reach a balmy -5˚. Therefore, I must conclude that Lorenzo Barone is insane, by definition.

It’s not that spending 50 days on a bike through nature's harshest elements wouldn’t be thrilling. I can see the merit in trying something physically demanding outdoors. It’s just that the cold makes me miserable.

Waking in my conservatively insulated home on New Zealand’s rugged coastline, when the sky outside my window is bleak grey, makes me grumpy. No matter how many layers of thermal, merino, and down I can muster, nothing prompts me to smile when forced to set foot outdoors. Barone appears to sing a different tune.

Barone is 23 years young. He’s spent the last six years traveling around the world by bike. Initially, he wanted to "step outside my comfort zone". When he turned 18, he took his first big bike adventure, 8,000km from his home in central Italy to Portugal. And back.

The following year, during an eight-month ride from Terni, Italy to North Cape (the northern tip of continental Europe), winter struck. Barone instantly became fascinated with riding in extreme places –- the Himalaya, Sahara, and recently, The Northernmost Road, Siberia.

Blown tires, knee injury

It took three attempts for Barone to pedal this road. His first attempt in December 2020 lasted just one day before his tires burst. That’s one of the issues with carrying 77kg on a bike in subzero temperatures.

He set off again nine days later, and the same thing happened. Finally, in February 2021, Barone gave it a third attempt. Partway through, he suffered a knee injury. He left his bike at a village and headed home briefly to recover. After 21 days, he returned to complete the journey.

The road took 50 days to cycle. Some nights, Barone slept in hostels or as the guest of hospitable locals. It's clear that Siberians greet these sorts of antics warmly. The old Russian love for the holy fool, perhaps. But mostly, Barone slept in his tent which he surrounded with small red flags to deter wolves. In case that didn’t work, he also carried a cap gun.

Wolves aren’t the only risk of riding in these conditions. One major obstacle for Barone was sweat. He carefully monitored how much clothing he needed. Too little, he froze. Too much, he sweated and froze later. Striking the right balance was important.

Unsurprisingly, the road Barone biked on –- if you can call a space laden with snow a road -- is considered one of the most dangerous in the world. When trucks pause to check if he’s ok, they do so out of genuine concern.

Barone understands the risks involved, but he’s clearly elated by his adventure. When he rides into grey bleakness, with no signs of life around and barely any clue that he’s traveling in the right direction, I recall my own sense of distaste with winter. Yet he looks utterly glowing.

Although, who knows, that could also be because he met and married his wife, Aygul, during this trip.

Komodo dragons are the heavyweights of the reptile world. These dinosaur-like creatures can snap a person’s legs in two using only their jaws. In the last 15 years, there have been several devastating attacks on humans, some deadly.

You won’t find Komodo dragons wandering around the volcanoes of Oahu, like on the set of Jurassic Park. They only live on five Indonesian Islands. Komodo Island and Rinca Island have the largest populations of them.

With bodies encased in bone-like armor, it’s nearly impossible for a Komodo dragon to feel the impact of, say, a fist of someone fighting to survive. They’re proportionately powerful too. They grow up to three metres long and weigh more than 70kg. Even with such mass, they can run up to 20kph.

Their jaw and throat muscles are designed for devouring large chunks of meat and their 60 serrated teeth measure up to 2.5cm each. They can eat up to 80% of their body weight in one meal. Under threat, a Komodo dragon can vomit the contents of its stomach to lessen its weight in preparation for the confrontation.

Slow-acting venom

Komodos are stealthy stalkers who hunt for almost any kind of meat, from rodents to buffalos. Sometimes they hunt and kill quickly. Other times they spend hours stalking until just the right time to attack. Then, using their monumental power, they bite their victim, releasing bacteria and a slow-acting venom. After the prey has died –- which can take up to four days -– the Komodo dragon uses its powerful sense of smell to locate the body.

Although attacks on humans are uncommon, they do happen. In 2007, an eight-year-old boy had been playing with friends in scrubland near his Indonesian village. Attacking from behind, the dragon held the boy in his jaws until he bled to death. It was a Komodo dragon's first fatal attack on a human in 33 years.

A living nightmare

The following year, another tragic meeting between human and dragon occurred.

A group of scuba divers was swept onto the shores of Rinca Island after their boat blew off course. Immediately, they endured a living nightmare that lasted two days and two nights, where Komodo dragons repeatedly tried to prey on them. More than 1,000 of the creatures live on Rinca Island, which is less than 200 square kilometres in area.

During one attack, a dragon came at one of the diver’s bare feet. Even a weighted diving belt swung at the powerful lizard couldn't deter it. Thankfully, the group was rescued before a fatality occurred.

A year later, Muhamad Anwar wasn’t so lucky. He’d been collecting apples from high in a tree when he lost his balance. Circling below, a group of Komodo dragons waited to profit from Anwar’s misstep. When bystanders ran to the commotion, it was already too late. Anwar suffered fatal bites to his hands, body, legs, and neck. He died shortly after.

So how might one avoid being killed by a Komodo dragon? The best defense is to stay clear. Certainly, don’t underestimate them.

But as always, the dragons have more to fear from humans than we have to fear from them. Less than 3,000 of the giant lizards remain. In 1980, Komodo National Park was founded to help protect these primeval creatures. Now tourists can watch them under the protection of park rangers for a yearly membership fee of $1,000.

"I think that's cheap," said the region's governor.

Aside from visiting Komodo dragons at the zoo, that’s the safest way to see them.

What to do, if...

But if you come across one in the wild, you could try running in a zigzag pattern. Komodo dragons are good sprinters, but they are terrible at sharp turns, possibly because their tails are as long as their bodies.

Keep your distance to avoid an ambush and avoid sudden movements. If you find yourself being bitten, find a heavy or sharp object to fight back with. Bare hands won’t do much.

Adult Komodo dragons are too heavy to climb trees too, so heading upward could help. There is currently no Komodo antivenin on the market.

But even this venom isn't all bad. Recently, an Australian researcher discovered that it can be useful for treating blood clots. The scientist is currently working on a formula that includes the venom as a type of blood thinner.

Annie Smith Peck was an American teacher who became a pioneering mountain climber during the suffragette movement. She famously hung a “Votes for Women” flag on the summit of Peru's Coropuna. Although she remains the only woman ever to make a first ascent of a major peak, her choice of climbing attire often overshadowed her climbing accomplishments.

Born in 1850, Peck was the only sister to four brothers. She grew up with a competitive streak. Like pioneer woman traveler Ida Pfeiffer, she felt that she could do anything her brothers did. However, education was one area in which, despite her persistence, she was forced to stop early.

Eventually, when she was in her late twenties, and after years of unwavering pleas, her father supported her desire to enroll at the University of Michigan. Enrollments for women had only opened three years earlier.

Her late start didn’t hold her back. Peck graduated as a teacher of mathematics and languages. She then furthered her studies in classical languages, which is how her world eventually collided with climbing.

The Matterhorn

While traveling from Germany to Greece to attend the American School of Classical Studies in Athens (the first woman to do so), Peck saw the Matterhorn for the first time. The chance encounter changed her life. From then on, she would use her career to support her love of travel and mountaineering.

It wasn’t normal for women to climb mountains. In the 1880s, one deterrent for women was how difficult it was to find practical clothing for sport and outdoor endeavors. It was another 40 years before the first mountaineering and climbing instructional book included a chapter titled For the lady mountaineer. When Henriette d'Angeville summited Mont Blanc in 1832, she wore a petticoat over men's pants and a boa. The outfit weighed more than six kilograms.

Peck and other women climbers faced the same dangers as their male counterparts, with the additional challenge of climbing in socially appropriate clothing. When Peck was starting out as a climber, she was expected to dress as though she was going to the market.

Peck didn't let these restrictions stop her. Her first ascents of moderate peaks in Europe and the United States aimed at building strength and skill level. She climbed in pants and quickly grew an unwanted reputation as the “trouser-wearing climber”. Undeterred, she began looking for a bigger challenge. In 1895, she summited the Matterhorn.

The Matterhorn earned Peck celebrity status. However, her steely determination, strength, and remarkable courage continued to play second to the controversy over her attire. She climbed in a hip-length tunic, tall climbing boots, baggy-kneed knickerbocker pants, and a felt hat secured with a veil. Her decision to wear pants left many people questioning why she hadn't been arrested, a legitimate possibility in 1895!

The first ascent of Huascaran

After the Matterhorn, Peck was unstoppable. Over the next few years, she climbed Orizaba in Mexico (at the time, the highest climb by any woman in the Americas), Cristallo in the Italian Dolomites, the Jungfrau in the Swiss Alps, and the Funffingerspitze in Austria.

In 1902, she and three other women were among the founding members of the American Alpine Club (AAC). By now, Peck was over 50 but she showed no signs of slowing down. She was ready for another record-setting climb.

In 1903, she began the first of two attempts on Illampu in Bolivia. Then in 1908, at 58, Peck climbed the north peak of Huascaran in Peru with two Swiss guides. The 6,768m achievement had taken her four years and five failed attempts. Because Huascaran had never been accurately measured, Peck believed she had broken two records: the highest mountain in the western hemisphere, and the world altitude record for both men and women.

Conflict over the record

Her summit was a world first and the north peak was later named Cumbre Ana Peck, in her honor. But the climb generated controversy.

Fellow AAC founding member, Fanny Workman, had held the highest altitude record. Workman didn’t much like the idea of having the title taken from her and paid engineers to recalculate Huascaran's altitude. The engineers triangulated the peak and established that Peck had misjudged her calculations by 600m. Workman retained her record.

Public conflict ensued. Peck was accused of purposely exaggerating the mountain's size. She described the controversy as harder than the climb itself, during which one of her Swiss guides lost a hand and half a foot to frostbite. The climb had been "a horrible nightmare," but the public arguments were worse. To help her cope, she even contacted polar explorer Robert Peary, who was no stranger to controversy.

The suffragette movement

Peck, an ardent suffragist, had perhaps inadvertently been shining a spotlight on women’s rights. Her male climbing attire and leadership role at the ACC was helping break entrenched gender norms. Now, she took a more direct stand. In 1911, at the age of 61, Peck headed to Peru and climbed five of Coropuna’s peaks. On one summit, she placed a “Votes for Women” banner.

Her banner was one of many links between the suffragettes and mountaineers. The first was Cora Smith Eaton’s “Votes for Women” banner, planted on Mount Rainier’s summit. Eaton also wrote “Votes for Women” after her name in the register at the top of Glacier Peak.

Peck continued to push boundaries well into her twilight years. In 1929, she set off on a seven-month trip around South America. Using commercial aircraft, her trip was the longest by air of any North American traveler at the time. At the age of 82, she climbed her final mountain, Mount Madison.

When Peck died at age 84, she was in the midst of a world tour. She became ill while climbing the Acropolis in Athens. She returned home but died of pneumonia.

Although her climbing accomplishments aren’t widely known, Peck’s legacy remains. In her lifetime, she published four books about her travels: The Search for the Apex of America (1911), The South American Tour (1913), Industrial and Commercial South America (1922), Flying Over South America: Twenty Thousand Miles by Air (1932).

She received several awards including the Decoration al Merito by the Chilean government and a gold medal awarded by the government of Peru for her contribution to South American trade and industry.

“Climbing is unadulterated hard labor,” Peck once wrote. “the only real pleasure is the satisfaction of going where no man has been before, and where few can follow."

Thomas Manning was a remarkable scholar and master linguist, but his eccentricities and single-minded drive to reach Peking gave him a reputation as a bumbler.

Although Manning didn't graduate from Cambridge (the idea of passing tests was preposterous to him), he had excelled. He was probably England’s first Sino-maniac. He had tired of studying Latin, Greek, mathematics, and philosophy. Instead, he set his mind to the ultimate linguistic challenge: Chinese literature.

Starting at the Centre of Oriental Studies in Paris, Manning soon became obsessed with reaching the language's source. He planned to travel to Peking (now Beijing). There was just one problem: Foreigners were forbidden from entering China. They weren’t even allowed to study the language.

So Manning concocted a scheme. First, he enlisted a Chinese tutor from Macau, hoping to avoid unwanted attention. The pair set off from Canton (modern-day Guangzhou), on an East India Company Ship.

Tried to pass himself off as Vietnamese

For every ounce of academic intelligence, Manning seemed to lack common sense. His first hare-brained scheme to enter mainland China involved passing as Vietnamese. He disembarked off the coast of Northern Vietnam in a long traditional gown. Unfortunately, it didn't matter how authentic the gown was. Tall and pale, Manning had no hope of fooling anyone. They were forced to find another route.

Manning looked to Tibet for an alternative. However, he did very little research into the 5,000km journey. Since the 1788 war between Tibet and Nepal, Tibet was only open to Tibetan nationals, Chinese diplomats, and Chinese troops. Eccentric Englishmen had not made the shortlist. Chinese troops were stationed in Lhasa and other large Tibetan towns.

Many explorers longed to visit Tibet. Some had come close, but no one had made it as far as Lhasa. Manning was not fond of traveling, was ill-prepared for the journey, and had no financial backing. Yet he was attempting a world first.

His knowledge was so limited that he brought a pair of ice skates to take advantage of the Himalayan winter. Adding to the farce, Manning and his tutor continuously argued.

In 1811, the pair departed from Calcutta, India, by horseback. Though Manning was a hopeless rider, they persevered through the Himalaya to Tassisudon (now Thimphu, the capital of Bhutan).

Altitude wreaked havoc on Manning’s temperament. Uncharacteristically calm, he noted blandly in his journal that he felt a “strange sensation coming along: warm and comfortable.”

Fixated on filth

The small village of Phari was Manning's first introduction to Tibetan customs. It should have been an honor, but he found it displeasing. Instead of remarking on the surroundings, language, or customs, he fixated on the filth.

The village was strewn with waste. Rubbish was piled so high that people had dug holes to reach their doors. The eye-watering stench attracted vultures. In the distance were views of Tibet’s snow-capped mountains. But Manning didn't even notice.

When they had arrived, a Tibetan official greeted them. Bizarrely, Manning assumed the character of a pilgrim from Bengal. Aside from the obvious appearance discrepancies, the tall, pale-skinned, bearded man with an English accent was accompanied by a Chinese tutor.

Thoroughly perplexed, the official didn't know what to make of the duo. He left the matter for a high-ranking military officer who was due in town shortly. However, the officer needed a place to stay, so Manning and his tutor were downgraded to a place of “dirt, dirt, grease, smoke, misery, but good mutton,” as he recounted in his journal.

Thankfully, two of Manning's skills played to his advantage. He was by now fluent in Chinese and knowledgeable about medicine, which the Chinese troops desperately needed.

Dr. Manning, I presume?

Manning had studied medicine hoping it would pay off in the Orient. Now he was positioned to set up an impromptu clinic for Chinese troops. Manning’s luck was on the rise.

The Chinese officer invited him to proceed with them as far as Gyantse. Naturally, Manning decided to assume another comical disguise. This time he cloaked himself as a Chinese physician, with spectacles and a long gown.

The trek was no holiday. Manning suffered from bedbugs and repeatedly fell from his horse. Undeterred, they arrived in Gyantse. Manning was the first Englishman to make it that far into Tibet in 28 years.

George Bogle and Samuel Turner had been the last Englishmen in Tibet. Both men were sent to improve trade relations but had come up short. Manning should have been an ideal candidate to continue their task, but he was overlooked for the role. His wacky character was considered unsuitable for negotiating deals. Regardless, it was hoped that he would return to Britain with valuable data. Instead, he traveled on his own agenda.

Impressed with Manning’s medicinal skills, the officer eventually granted Manning permission to enter Lhasa, accompanied by Tibetan monks. Manning even managed to acquire a cook in the arrangement.

Finally enters Lhasa

Manning became the first Englishman to enter the city, a momentous occasion. Unfortunately, he could barely string together a sentence to describe his experience. “Our first care was to provide ourselves with proper hats,” were his first written words. Unaware that Tibetan headdress denotes rank, he trundled off to a hat maker.

Other descriptions from the explorer included calling prayer wheels “whirligigs”. And when he encountered the Tsangpo (a river that had preoccupied geographers for a century), he was more focused on seating arrangements than geography: “I could not sit still, but must climb about, seat myself in various postures on the parapet, and lean over,” he penned in his journal.

The Holy City was just another unimpressive sight for Manning. The city had no plumbing, garbage was piled up, and mangy dogs roamed the streets. The garbage was only collected annually. “If the palace exceeded my expectations, the town far fell short of them. There is nothing striking, nothing pleasing in its appearance,” he wrote.

Manning bumbled his way through an official greeting with the Chinese Emperor's representative in Lhasa. To look the part, he donned as much local clothing as he could garner, hoping it would help him enter China.

The Dalai Lama

He even met the Dalai Lama. The Dalai Lama asked Manning if he’d met with any “molestations and difficulties on the road.” Manning answered without hesitation, “Many.”

Despite Manning's attitude, the locals were besotted with him. He became the talk of the town and many Tibetans traveled long distances to see this peculiar and exotic personage in the flesh.

With the meager earnings from his medical practice, Manning stayed in Lhasa for several months. But when he began to suffer from rheumatism, he rushed to leave. He sold off his gear cheaply, which aroused the suspicion of local officials. They suspected that he was a spy, or worse, a missionary.

Frightened that he'd be discovered as someone wanting to learn the Chinese language, Manning saddled up and bolted back to Calcutta and then on to Canton by boat. His tutor remained in Lhasa.

Lhasa had finally been visited by an Englishman but Manning had never wanted to be there. He simply wanted to visit Peking. In 1817, he had his opportunity.

By joining a British Embassy delegation as an interpreter, he could enter Peking. To appear more diplomatic, he ditched his gown but elected to keep his beard. It had taken six years but Manning had reached his holy grail.

Perhaps predictably, his visit was fleeting. Almost immediately, an argument about protocol broke out. Soon after, his team was put on a ship to England without the chance to explore.

Bitter about the experience and tight-lipped on detail, Manning settled back in England. He had no furniture but possessed the best Chinese library in Britain. Until 1903, Manning remained the only Englishman ever to enter Tibet.

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In 2016, a 72-year-old woman and her dog were rescued after spending nine days lost in the Arizona desert. Her smart thinking led to the pair's unlikely survival.

Technically their chances of getting out alive were “statistically abnormal”, said one professional survival instructor. Gila County's wilderness covers an extensive 1,214,000,000 hectares and is the largest of the six national forests in Arizona. One thing the area doesn’t have is outstanding mobile phone coverage.

Rodgers was on her way to visit her grandchildren in Phoenix with her pet dog when her hybrid car ran out of power and gas reserves. She’d noticed a gas station sign earlier but when she turned off the main road to locate it, quickly became lost. Now out of mobile phone coverage, she and her small house dog left the vehicle and climbed several ridgelines, hunting for a cell signal to call for help.

Abandons her car and begins walking

"I waited until sun up the next morning hoping a truck or car, anybody, anything would go by, even a steer! I didn't care, anything alive," Rodgers recalled. But nothing and no one came. After two days, she abandoned her vehicle and headed for a stream she had seen from one of the ridges.

For the next nine days, Rodgers and her dog survived by eating desert plants and drinking pond water while waiting for rescue. Rodgers had read a book on the edible plants of the Southwest, which informed her choices of food.

Under normal circumstances, leaving a vehicle behind when lost is a certain way to evade rescue attempts. But this resourceful Gran came up with ways to be detected by authorities.

After they had spent three days without food, Rodger’s made a sign across the canyon floor from rocks and bones from a bleached elk skeleton, spelling out the word, “HELP”. Under one of the rocks, she put a small note outlining her predicament. At night, when the temperatures dipped below freezing, Rodgers built a fire. Her lifelong smoking habit helped her on this occasion. Then she made shelter for the pair.

"I was eating desert plants. My dog was too, diving into clover and finding all the places that were the easiest path for me to take. She was my pathfinder on that journey," Rodgers said.

When Rodgers had been missing for three days, a multi-agency search began after someone finally noticed her car on a remote stretch of road. Even with two separate helicopter searches and multiple ground searches, they found no trace of her during those first few days. A breakthrough only occurred after nine days, when a Game and Fish officer found her dog wandering in the canyon. Rescuers then spiked their aerial search efforts.

Help sign spotted

Next, they spotted the “Help” sign and handwritten note.

“The note said she had been without food for three days and that she was going to continue looking for a ranch and going downstream,” one of the rescuers said.

Shortly afterward, from the helicopter, they noticed an abandoned shelter Rodgers had made. After rounding a bend in the canyon, they saw Rodgers herself waving next to a signal fire.

"When that helicopter, that air rescue police copter landed, I just sat down and bawled," Rodgers said. "Remarkable, remarkable, remarkable."

She had escaped unscathed and was able to board the helicopter. Rescuers agree that after leaving the vehicle behind, she was smart to create a trackable trail for rescuers to follow.

“If it was a different season, she would not have lived,” said a survival expert. “Arizona can be a brutal state to stay alive in because we have mountains and deserts and everything in between.”

Flown to hospital for treatment, Rodgers was released later that same day.

Ida Pfeiffer was the world’s first solo female travel writer. Pfeiffer spent 16 years traveling, covering more than 20,000km by sea and 30,000km on land. She was an improbable trailblazer. Neither wealthy, beautiful, or educated, she lacked attributes thought essential for women travelers of her era.

Pfeiffer’s quest was simply to experience travel the way men do. Over 100 years since her first adventure, her legacy has endured.

Childhood

Born in 1797 in Vienna, Pfeiffer was the first daughter in a family with four sons. For the time, her father was unconventional, allowing Pfeiffer to flourish in boyish activities, which she much preferred over girlish alternatives. Instead of wearing dresses, she wore trousers. Instead of learning to sew or play the piano, she played with swords and fired guns. Encouraged by her father, she even had the same education as her brothers. Her early years prepared her for traveling later in life.

“I was not shy,” she wrote of her childhood decades later, “but wild as a boy, and bolder and more forward than my elder brothers.”

When she was eight, Pfeiffer’s father died and her life changed. Her mother began enforcing typical female behaviors. During her teens, Pfeiffer was under the charge of a tutor, whom she fell in love with. He was the only person for whom wearing dresses and learning needlework or piano was worthy. But Pfeiffer’s mother disapproved of the budding relationship and instead arranged a more suitable partner: a doctor, 24 years Pfeiffer’s senior, widowed with a grown-up son. They wed soon after meeting.

Dr. Reyer may not have been Pfeiffer’s preferred husband, but she was a respectful wife and wasn’t unhappy. Shortly after their wedding, her husband had to resign from his prestigious job. For the next 18 years, they were almost penniless, the first time in Pfeiffer's life that she experienced true economic hardship.

With Reyer, she bore two sons, raising them with unequivocal commitment. Then, once her boys grew up and settled into careers of their own, she was free to begin a life of travel that she had always dreamed of.

A travel trailblazer

Before Pfeiffer, there had been two well-known women travelers who had profited from writing about their adventures: Lady Hester Stanhope, an aristocrat, and Isabella Frances Romer, who had traveled with a male companion. The idea of a woman traveling unescorted was preposterous at the time.

In the Victorian era, women were considered too fragile for the long, unpredictable, and uncomfortable nature of long-distance travel. They were also thought to be an easy target for thieves and pickpockets. Women had to abide by a strict set of social rules: speak only when spoken to, dress appropriately, hand money over to male companions, and to only select seats in carriages next to other women or elderly gentlemen. An audacious solo adventure was not something women of the age were thought capable of.

Pfeiffer didn’t accept that boys were issued with a different set of rules. She longed to unravel the diverse cultures and customs outside of Vienna.

Using a small inheritance, Pfeiffer funded her first solo trip. Under the guise of visiting friends, she sailed along the Danube River to Constantinople (now Istanbul) then continued on to Palestine, Greece, Cyprus, Lebanon, and Egypt. She was 45 years old.

In the eyes of bystanders, some of whom pestered, mobbed, and ogled her, she had no business undertaking such an audacious journey. She spent hours riding by camelback, met artists and botanists, and engaged in customs she’d never seen before.

When she eventually returned home two years later, she wrote an anonymous account of her travels. She found instant success and it was later republished in her own name: Journey of a Viennese Lady to the Holy Land.

With the book’s proceeds, Pfeiffer funded her next adventure, traveling north to Scandinavia and then to the great geysers of Iceland.

Expedition funding

She soon began financing expeditions by sourcing rare minerals and specimens, which she sold to museums in Vienna. With sales from her Iceland trip, she launched her biggest adventure yet, an around-the-world trip.

This time Pfeiffer traveled for two years, first by sailboat (the cheapest mode of travel in 1846) to Brazil, then onward to the Pacific Islands, India, and Iran. She befriended the Queen of Tahiti, accompanied a tiger hunt, and battled Cape Horn’s swells. As a woman, she was prevented from entering places reserved for men and she endured more than one brutal attack. But mostly, she was a curious sight to those who spied her.

She didn’t ride first class with other female travelers. instead, she was content to forfeit comforts in favor of seeing more on her shoestring budget. Occasionally, her notoriety awarded her free stays on ships or in hotels.

She was confident, deliberate, and austere. A woman with the ability to stand up for herself, these strengths had been ingrained in her since childhood.

She also funded her second around-the-world trip by selling specimens, but also with a government grant. Despite her obvious aptitude, she only received the grant after her male counterparts lobbied on her behalf.

In 1851, she left Berlin on a four-year journey from Britain to Palestine, Africa, Malaysia, Indonesia, and the Americas. After, she returned to Europe and published My second trip around the world. The following year, she set off once again, unaware that the trip would end her life.

A coup and malaria

In 1857, Pfeiffer was accidentally involved in an attempted coup. The Queen of Madagascar uncovered a plot to depose her that involved her son and French nationals in the capital. Somehow, Pfeiffer was implicated. Sent to trial, Pfeiffer was exiled from Madagascar.

While making her way from Antananarivo to the coast for her departure, Pfeiffer became seriously ill. She had most likely contracted malaria. Shortly after her return to Vienna in 1858, she died in her brother’s home.

Her grave can be found in Vienna's Central Cemetery. Some of her specimens are still in the British Museum and Berlin’s National Museum.

Pfeiffer’s fearlessness was not only uncommon for the Victorian era but centuries after, until commercial airlines drastically changed travel.

She wrote more than a dozen books, some of which became bestsellers and have been translated into several languages. She became the first woman to become an honorary member of the geographical societies of Berlin and Paris.

In 2000, a Munich street was renamed in her honor. In 2018, the University of Vienna established the Ida Pfeiffer Professorship, which combines earth sciences, geography, and astronomy.

Charles Waterton proved that being eccentric was no barrier to becoming one of the world’s greatest conservationists. He invented the bird-nesting box and created the world’s first wildlife sanctuary. He also introduced Europe to curare, a revolutionary plant extract that reduces animal suffering. In 1839, he won the earliest known case against pollution.

Waterton was born in 1782 to a prominent English family. During the Reformation, his family lost their titles. Locals fondly began calling Waterton Squire instead of Lord. He was kind and charming, but undoubtedly unusual.

His eccentricities first surfaced at Stonyhurst College, Lancashire. He skipped lessons in favor of killing vermin around the school grounds, running afoul of his teachers. He later wrote in his autobiography:

"I was considered rat-catcher to the establishment, and also fox-taker, foumart killer... I followed up my calling with great success. The vermin disappeared by the dozen; the books were moderately well-thumbed; and according to my notion of things, all went on perfectly right."

Waterton was comfortable in his eccentricity and exuded confidence. When his uncle died, he seized the opportunity to travel, first to British Guiana (now Guyana) in 1804 to take over the estate. Then between 1812 and 1824, he made three more trips to South America to collect specimens that he brought home.

Walked 600km barefoot

On one journey he walked barefoot for 600km to Brazil during the rainy season. On another occasion, he captured a caiman by jumping on its back and tying his braces around its mouth.

In South America, Waterton's taxidermy skills evolved. He created a new method of soaking specimens and hollowing their insides. But it wasn't enough to simply display his creatures. He'd often create comical characters of them too. On one Bottom Howler Monkey, he made a human-like face labeled The Nondescript. You can still view the wacky bust at Wakefield Museum, along with some of his other specimens.

When his father died, Waterton returned to Britain with a plentiful supply of curare, which South American natives used for arrow poison. He thought the drug would be useful for curing rabies, but he soon realized that it had other uses.

Over a series of experiments to see how curare affected animals, Waterton injected a female donkey. Curare paralyzes the muscles, preventing breathing, but Waterton used a pair of bellows through a tracheostomy to kept her alive through artificial respiration. The donkey lived for 25 more years.

Curare's usefulness

The experiment's success propelled curare's introduction to Europe. It had medical uses against tetanus and eventually as a paralyzing agent during medical procedures.

In 1825 he began his next project; a book aimed at introducing Englishmen to the tropics. Its title Wanderings in South America piqued public curiosity. The book prompted visitors to visit his peculiar world at Walton Hall.

He built a three-metre wall around the five-kilometre perimeter of his estate, creating the world’s first nature reserve. Here, he held species he’d brought back from South America, as well as fledging native birds he’d nursed at home. When he wanted to increase his bird population, he invented the first nesting box.

Visitors flocked to see his specimens, especially the caiman they’d read about in his earlier book. Over 30 years, he recorded more than 120 species of birds in Walton Park. He often opened his estate to villagers and gave them free refreshments during their visit.

Used a block of wood as a pillow for penance

In 1829, when Walton was 47 years old, he married his 17-year-old bride. Sadly, one year later she died after birthing the couple’s son, Edmund. As a “self-inflicted penance", Waterton slept on the floor with a block of wood for a pillow for months after her death.

Almost 10 years later, tragedy struck Waterton again. This time, it was pollution. Chemicals from the nearby soap factory damaged the trees on his estate and polluted his lake. He took the factory to court and spent years litigating to have the soap works removed. His was the first known fight against pollution. He won the case.

Charles Darwin, who spent time at Walton Hall, numbered among his many friends. Well-respected among his community, no one minded Waterton's sometimes peculiar behavior. While entertaining guests he was known to crawl around on all fours, pretending to be a wild animal. He hollowed out a large tree in his driveway and camped inside it at night to birdwatch.

Invited vampire bats to bite his toes

When he slept in South America, he sometimes had one foot out the window so that vampire bats could bite his toes -- a particularly strange practice for someone who had been obsessed with rabies since he was a child.

In 1865, one of his escapades killed him at the age of 82.

While clambering around Walton Estate one evening with his good friend Norman Moore, he fell heavily on a branch. Immediately the pain was intense, but he carried on until the next morning when the situation's gravity sunk in. "This is a bad business," Waterton said to Moore, before retreating to his room to die alongside a reverend and his grandchildren. The fall had fractured his ribs and pierced his liver.

Sir David Attenborough once described Waterton as “one of the first people anywhere to recognize, not only that the natural world was of great importance, but that it needed protection, as humanity made more and more demands on it.”

His estate is now a charming hall and gardens with a children’s zoo, a high ropes course, an outdoor theatre, and a wedding venue. The history section on the estate's website sadly omits to mention Waterton. But Waterton Lakes National Park in Alberta continues his legacy through its name.

This might be an overwhelming assumption, but I suspect that most of the women reading this page are -- like me -- free to make life choices based mostly on what we prefer. For example; I choose when (and if) I want to get married, what sports I want to do, and visit the places I fancy.

But this modern luxury isn’t the case for all women. Wafaa Amer, who was born in Egypt, didn’t have the privilege to make such decisions until she moved to Italy where the art of climbing liberated her entirely.

Until she was nine years old, Amer lived in a small village in Egypt where streets were unpaved and there was no electricity. She watched from behind windows, stuck indoors as her male cousins celebrated birthdays, or kicked a ball. Although she wanted to join them, she was brought up with the strict religious belief that those activities were not available to women.

Amer was acutely aware that her life instead was about getting married young, then devoting herself entirely to her husband's wishes. But none of these things made any sense to her. Why should she be restricted because of her gender, she wondered?

“I was wondering if there was something wrong with me since I had different thoughts,” she said of wanting a lifestyle different to the world women around her were accustomed to.

When she eventually joined her parents in Italy, it shone a spotlight on a different lifestyle for girls. Although her father strictly forbade her from participating in sport, she could now see this wasn’t the case for all girls.

Throughout the world, just one country completely bans women from sporting activities, but there are many more cultures, religions, and ethnicities that create an alienating environment for women in exercise and sport. Amer wasn't so much alienated as tormented by a sense of being imprisoned in her own life.

One day a friend introduced her to an indoor climbing wall, and her prison began to fade. “it was a very strong feeling,” Amer describes of that moment, “and that strong feeling pushed me to continue.”

In secret, she visited the climbing gym regularly and entered competitions where she achieved podium results.

“We didn’t have a lot of money, we were five people, and my father had to take care of all of us," she said. "But my best friend, who was a climber already, wanted me to try that discipline and she gave me the membership card to the gym as a gift.”

When she turned 18, she left the family home to pursue climbing.

Going against her father’s wishes had serious consequences for Amer, but sacrificing family gave her freedom.

It took Amer two years to find a stable home and a job but the decision paid off. Her climbing skills have reached a level where she has become one of La Sportiva's sponsored athletes. She's also rekindled a relationship with her family, although an unexpected one by her father's standards.

Amer is just 25 years old. If she had of remained in her pre-climbing reality, she’d probably have been married for eight years. In the year 2000, three percent of all Egyptian women married before the age of 15.

For Amer, climbing is a backdrop for something far more important: It is the art of reaching freedom, transcending judgments and prejudices.

“Freedom for me begins when I tie the knot on my harness," she says. "It is finding myself again, it is thinking more deeply about what I would like to do and create.”

Hura -- the title of this film -- means "being free" in Egyptian.

Louis Zamperini first gained fame as one of the greatest middle distance runners of all time. He represented the United States in the 5,000m at the 1936 Berlin Olympics.

Then World War II broke out, and his life took a drastic turn. He spent 47 days drifting on a life raft in the Pacific. He battled years of starvation, disease, and torture from sadistic Japanese prison guards. Eventually, after the President had officially declared him dead, he returned home.

Zamperini was born to immigrant Italian parents shortly after World War I. A delinquent child, he fought, committed petty crimes, was smoking by the age of five, and drinking by age eight. Once after a teacher disciplined him, he deflated her car tires. On another occasion, he threw tomatoes at a cop.

Then one day, a couple of charming ladies encouraged him to try athletics. He quickly discovered that he had a natural ability as a runner. He soon channeled his energy into sport and turned from local terror to local hero.

Delinquent to runner

While running for the University of Southern California, he set a national record over the mile -- four minutes 21 seconds. After graduation, he switched to the 5,000m distance. He was the youngest athlete ever to make the team at the Berlin Olympics.

Although he didn’t have a podium finish in Germany, he returned to a promising running career. He planned on chasing the elusive sub-four minute-mile at the 1940 Olympics, 14 years before Roger Bannister actually achieved it.

But Zamperini never had the chance to try. World War II broke out in 1939, and the Olympics were canceled. Instead, he joined the U.S. Army as a lieutenant in 1941. He never ran competitively again.

Zamperini approached his military training with the same energy and discipline as he had in athletics. He was one of just 15 attendees out of thousands invited to a survival lecture. Although he didn’t know it at the time, the techniques he learned that day later saved his life.

He served as a bombardier on a B-24 airplane and flew several missions. On one, Japanese fighters attacked his plane and riddled it with more than 600 bullets.

The B-24s were ahead of their time but they weren’t without issues. In another sortie off Hawaii in 1943, Zamperini and his crew ran into serious trouble.

The plane crash

They were searching for lost crew members and aircraft when their plane suffered mechanical issues. Both engines lost power, and they plummeted into the ocean south of Oahu.

The impact killed 11 of the crew, leaving just Zamperini, pilot Russell Allen Phillips, and tail gunner Francis McNamara as the sole survivors. But their ordeal was just beginning. For Zamperini, it lasted almost two more years.

Amid the burning fuselage, the three men managed to clamber aboard two life rafts. With no means of communicating, they floated aimlessly in the Pacific Ocean, hoping for rescue and to evade capture.

They drank rainwater and ate fish and birds. Once they managed to capture two albatrosses that landed on their raft. They ate one and used the other as bait to catch fish.

They endured constant famine, blistering heat, and were in dread of capture by the enemy.

Enemy bombers attacked them from above and punctured one of their rafts. Everyone managed to transfer onto the second. When sharks brushed up against it, they fended them off with a paddle.

The outcome appeared bleak, but Zamperini had an inner strength. “When I was on that life raft, I was the only one who was prepared," he said later, referring to the attention he'd paid to survival training.

After 33 days, McNamara died. The two survivors had little choice but to throw him overboard.

Prisoner of war

Eventually, after 47 days at sea, Zamperini and Phillips managed to steer their raft into the Kwajalein Atoll in the Marshall Islands. They finally set foot on land but were far from safe.

The Japanese captured them almost immediately and separated the pair. Zamperini spent his first six weeks on Kwajalein. Then his captors transferred him to mainland Japan. He was confined in three different POW camps and interrogation centres.

Zamperini’s athletic abilities made him an easy target for a sadistic Japanese corporal named Mutsuhiro Watanabe, who took particular joy in torturing him.

Initially, starvation, disease, exposure, and near-daily beatings from guards were the primary issue. But Watanabe quickly upped the ante, which caused nightmares to Zamperini for years to come.

Watanabe beat him with clubs, bats, and fists, threatening to kill him. He forced Zamperini to punch other prisoners until they were nearly unconscious. He once even forced Zamperini to hold a heavy wooden beam above his head, threatening to shoot him if he dropped it.

Guards forced the starvation-weakened Zamperini to run foot races against Japanese soldiers. If he dared to win, they beat him.

By this point, he’d been given up for dead back home. The United States War Department assigned Zamperini an “official death date,” and President Roosevelt signed a condolence letter to his family.

Then Japanese officials tried to have him read propaganda messages over Radio Tokyo, denigrating the U.S. government.

In September 1945, more than two years after Zamperini's plane crashed, Japan surrendered and he was liberated.

"None of us believed [he was alive]. None of us. Never once. Not underneath, even,” Zamperini’s sister Sylvia said.

The long aftermath

Zamperini arrived home famous. He had been an Olympic hero thought to have perished at sea. “After being declared dead and finding that we’d crashed and survived the 47-day drift and nearly 2,000 miles, you get quite a bit of publicity,” he later said.

But the damage he received during his time as a prisoner was irreversible, and the years of malnutrition and torture rendered him unable ever to run competitively again. He was plagued by nightmares. Like many returned servicemen, he used alcohol to stave off the memories. He eventually found solace in Christianity and was able to forgive the men who tortured him.

Zamperini returned to Japan five years after his release, facing his former guards. He shook hands with most, some he embraced. Watanabe was absent, so Zamperini penned a letter to him, forgiving him instead.

Watanabe was later listed as number 23 on a list of Japan’s most wanted war criminals, but he was never executed.

Zamperini’s story has been chronicled in Laura Hillenbrand’s book, Unbroken: A World War II Story of Survival, Resilience, and Redemption. It has been a bestseller since its publication in 2010. In 2014, Angelina Jolie directed a film version, called Unbroken.

Although he died shortly before Jolie’s film hit theaters, Zamperini viewed it from his hospital bed before passing away in 2013 at the age of 97.

Before his untimely death last week in a Greenland crevasse, Dixie Dansercoer's career in the Arctic and Antarctic spanned more than 20 years. It included nine pioneering expeditions and many others in his role as a polar guide. The 58-year-old explorer and athlete excelled at most of his pursuits, including ultra-marathons, high-altitude mountain biking, kite-skiing, and windsurfing.

Then there were his many exceptional polar journeys.

In 2014, Dansercoer and Canadian Eric McNair-Landry snow-kited around the outer edge of the Greenland ice sheet. Covering 4,045km, they became the first to fully circumnavigate one of only two ice sheets in the world. They also set a distance kiting record.

Treacherous weather forced them to spend much of the first three weeks inside the tent, as fierce storms raged outside.

“Our total distance was 200km out of the target 4,000, so not doing well at all," Dansercoer said of this period. "But suddenly we picked up the good winds and covered up to 300km in a day.”

In the end, the pair took just 55 days to finish.

Earlier, in 2007, Dansercoer and fellow Belgian Alain Hubert manhauled and kite-skied more than 2,000km across the Arctic Ocean in 99 days. Others had crossed the Arctic Ocean before, but theirs was the first from Siberia to Greenland.

As on most of his expeditions, Dansercoer worked to collect field data on climate change. Every 50km, they measured the thickness of snow that covered the sea ice for the European Space Agency. Dansercoer and Hubert took 106 days to cross arguably the most difficult surface on the planet, the semi-frozen Arctic Ocean.

Some of Dansercoer's most exceptional projects included 3,924km and 69 days across Antarctica, a 5,000km in a partial circumnavigation of the Antarctic ice sheet, and a 60-day re-creation of de Gerlache's first overwintering Antarctic expedition.

These three videos give a sense of how strongly Dansercoer felt that tug to the polar regions.

Some athletes, such as Davide Magnini, used the pandemic as a creative platform. During the long void in competitive events, the sensational Italian mountain runner has tried to beat the fastest known times for the three iconic Italian courses: Ortles, Stelvio Pass, and Presanella.

He missed the Stelvio Pass record by a heartbreaking 1 minute 18 seconds. The agony was written all over his face when he realized that he had fallen just short.

Then a resurgence of confidence when he beat the Presanella record with a time of 2 hours 39 minutes 7 seconds. Now, in part three, he’s up against Marco De Gasperi’s 2015 Ortles record of 2 hours, 36 minutes, and 49 seconds.

De Gasperi is an Italian mountain running icon whom Magnini has long looked up to. He’s won six individual gold medals at the World Championships. But De Gasperi recognized his young rival's exceptional ability and encouraged him to beat his time.

Magnini is a total gun. Just 23 years old, he followed his father for many years on ski touring trips before trying out ski mountaineering, downhill, and ski jumping. Eventually, he realized that ski mountaineering is where his natural ability (and joy) lay.

Since then, he’s since dabbled in the mountains on skis and on foot. In 2019, he made podium finishes in four events, including winning the Mont Blanc Marathon and the Dolomyths Run.

He’s fast at whatever he puts his mind to. In 2014, at just 16 years old, he was picked up by the Salomon Academy. “He will be an outdoor icon in the future, not just a running icon,” they predicted.

Let’s put this all into context: We’ve long known that a runner's performance peaks with age, contrary to sports like soccer or swimming, for example. But in 2017, a Washington Post article backed that up with a new study. In it, 16 years of data on American-based runners showed that performance peaks between 35 and 50 years of age.

Now let’s readdress that Magnini is just 23 years old and trying to beat the record of one of the world’s greatest mountain running icons.

Ortles is the highest mountain in the South Tyrol of Italy, near the Swiss and Austrian borders. At 3,905m, it towers above all other Tyrolean peaks in the region and earns its nickname, King Ortles. Its North Face is considered to be the largest ice face in the eastern Alps. It typically takes climbers one to two days to ascend.

Josef Pichler first climbed Ortles in 1804, via its difficult northwest flank. Today, the ascent ranks as one of the most remarkable successes in alpinism in the opening of the eastern Alps.

The quick-footed Magnini is tackling a combination of scree and snow. The first sections are very runnable as he passes two refuges, Tabareta and Pajer. Then the terrain becomes a lot more technical as the mountaineering begins. The film shows him scrambling swiftly past climbers with ropes and helmets.

When he reaches the summit, Magnini is 10 minutes ahead of De Gasperi’s record. He knows now that he can't afford to lose focus on the downhill. That can easily undo his solid uphill success.

But after 2 hours, 18 minutes, and 15 seconds, Magnini becomes the Ortles route's new record holder. “Well, I’m really angry (just kidding)," De Gasperi says with a beaming smile. He knows that someone beating his record will serve as inspiration for more runners in the future, and that’s a good thing for the mountain running community.

As for Magnini, “I feel really alive when I do this kind of thing,” he says, rather lightheartedly, of something as brilliant as running mountains.

Those quirky Kiwis are at their goofy antics again. This time, one man has suffered blisters, a sore gut, a bleeding nose, and jelly legs while running 100km in a pair of gumboots.

George Black, a 24-year-old real estate agent, left from rural North Canterbury, on the central part of the South Island of New Zealand. He ran through Hawarden’s Peaks, Amberley, Rangiora, and eventually finished in Christchurch’s Hagley Park, 100km north. A symphony of supporters greeted him. He says he undertook his peculiar quest to raise proceeds for farms that had suffered from recent flooding.

Earlier this month, the Canterbury region suffered extensive damage when floods ravaged the area in record rainfall. Many farmers had only just rebuilt after Cyclone Debbie.

Wearing a pair of size 8 Red Band gumboots, Black left at 4 am, long before sunrise, and ran in his clodhoppers for 12 hours. His feet were “destroyed”, he admitted afterward, with cuts, scrapes, and plenty of blisters. “I’m absolutely buggered, and so are my feet,” he said.

Black used to run 10km along backroads near his family farm. Last March, he increased his distance dramatically, running 75km from the farm to Christchurch. But that was in sneakers.

Once he’d run 75km, he felt confident about adding another 25km. “I thought I would put on some gumboots to make it harder,” he said.

“I’m just running 100km in gumboots, and it’s not going to solve the world’s problems,” said Black before his wacky run.

His supportive Mum drove alongside him for much of the journey, providing regular sock changes and water breaks.

A 28-year-old woman had to be rescued less than five kilometres after beginning her walk around the UK.

The unnamed Coventry woman set off from Minehead, Somerset and ran into trouble when rising tides trapped her below steep cliffs.

She had planned to walk the 1,014km South West Coast Path, but deviated off-trail to the beach below. By the time she realized her error, the rising tide had trapped her and she had to call for help.

A lifeboat drew close to shore, and rescuer Karla Thresher swam to meet her. She explained to the trekker that the only way off was to swim to the boat. The woman swapped her huge backpack for a lifejacket and swam to the boat. Thresher followed, grappling with the sizeable pack.

Uninjured and undeterred, the woman was supposedly going to begin her trek again the following day.

Recreational walker numbers have spiked in the UK in recent years, and so have rescues. "Lots of people have just read books about coastal walking and think: 'Oh, I'll give that a go'," said Thresher. She adds that rescues are particularly common along this section of coastline.

Depending on the route, a walk around Britain covers 4,300km to over 10,000km. The exact number of people who have walked the entire distance is unknown, but one website suggests that 53 have completed the route in one go.

Louise Arner Boyd became an unexpected candidate for arctic exploration during an era when women’s roles in the United States were changing but still rooted in tradition. Using her inheritance, she funded critical expeditions for the U.S. government and became the first woman to fly over the North Pole. She challenged the narrative in which women figured mainly in the romantic escapades of men.

When World War I ended, women -- who had previously been destined to raise children and run the family home - had an opportunity to shift the stereotypes of their duties. Women were beginning to question what “suitable” career choices were. Most still found their voices in the shadows of their husbands.

For Boyd, the expectations were clear. She was born into a family of privilege. Her father had made a fortune in California’s gold rush. Boyd was raised to be a socialite, expected to meet community charity obligations and attend social events, then get married. But even as a child, she preferred running around with her two brothers, camping, and horseback riding.

Beginning with minor excursions, Boyd quenched her travel thirst during a period spent nursing in Europe during the 1918-19 Spanish flu pandemic. Once, she took a train to Buffalo, New York, bought a car, and drove across modest road systems of the United States on her own. It was an almost unheard-of adventure for women of that era. Still, Boyd yearned for even greater adventures.

A family crisis

Her destiny took an unforeseen trajectory when both her brothers died of rheumatic fever in quick succession. Boyd inherited the burden of caring for her heartbroken and ill parents, who traveled around America and Europe, mostly for medical purposes. They both died when she was 33, and she became the heir to her family’s $3 million fortune, the equivalent of $40 million today. Her wealth was significant but not boundless.

At first, she dutifully kept up the family's reputation in California high society, serving as a gracious hostess and generous benefactor. Meanwhile, she chafed for a more adventurous lifestyle, as she had as a child.

She soon returned to Europe on leisure trips. When she saw snow for the first time on a 1924 cruise in Norway, she was smitten.

She was set to return to Norway on Hobby, a supply ship previously owned by Roald Amundsen that she’d purchased when the shocking news broke that Amundsen had disappeared. He'd been searching by plane for the missing Italian explorer Umberto Nobile.

Searching for Amundsen

Wasting no time, Boyd funded a volunteer search mission with her ship. She scoured the Arctic Ocean but turned up nothing. Nobile eventually turned up, but Amundsen had vanished. Nevertheless, Boyd’s efforts earned her Norway’s Chevalier Cross of the Order of Saint Olav. She was just the third woman to receive the accolade. When she heard that the king himself would present the honor, she reportedly hurried to Paris to buy a gown because she had only arctic clothing.

Boyd and her unconventional adventures had begun to generate newspaper attention. Her interests were astounding for a woman of that era, but reporters sought to superimpose more feminine pursuits onto her story. For Boyd, this was a continuous source of frustration.

Over the next few years, Boyd’s expeditions shifted to focus mainly on polar science. In 1931, she began a series of annual scientific expeditions to the Arctic, especially Greenland's remote northeast coast.

Documenting the Arctic

She'd learned photography during her earlier recreational trips. Now she used it to document uncharted areas of Greenland. With an aerial mapping camera, she recorded glacial landscapes, sea ice, and land formations. These later contributed to new, detailed maps. She also surveyed ocean depths and collected plants for botanical study. Later, Boyd discovered an underwater mountain ridge in northeast Norway, between Jan Mayen and Bear Islands.

In 1934, she took a three-month journey across Poland to photograph the customs, politics, dress, and culture of Eastern Europe. The American Geographical Society printed 300 of her photos. Afterward, she was asked to represent several learned societies at international conferences in Europe.

Her intimate knowledge of the Arctic, and particularly her expertise on the fiords and glaciers of eastern Greenland, proved useful when World War II broke out. In 1941, the U.S. government's National Bureau of Standards sent her to the Arctic to study the effects of polar magnetic fields on radio communications. The mission was so secret that even her ship's crew was not informed of it. A woman, it was thought, would surely not have the academic prowess for projects beyond mere photography. Boyd even funded the whole project herself.

She was now the Bureau of Standards' leading expert consultant. She also worked on secret assignments for the U.S. Army.

By the time the war ended, Boyd had amassed an extensive list of honors. She was the second woman to receive the Cullum Medal of the American Geographical Society. In 1960, she became the first woman elected to its board. She received honorary law degrees from the University of California, Berkeley and from Mills College. She became an honorary member of the California Academy of Science.

The North Pole

Now in her late 60s, Boyd funded one final arctic expedition that became one of her hallmarks.

In 1955, at the age of 68, she charted a DC-4 airplane and flew over the North Pole. The flight took 16 hours. She was the first woman to fly over the Pole.

By now, she had spent almost all her fortune and was in financial difficulties. She eventually had to sell her family home, before her death in 1972 at the age of 84.

Her legacy continues. She published The Coast of Northeast Greenland, a book about her earlier expeditions. Because of Greenland's strategic importance, the government had asked her to pause publication until the end of World War II.

An uninhabited region in East Greenland -- Louise Boyd Land -- was later named after her. Even today, climate researchers use her glacial photographs to compare how much the Arctic has changed in these warmer times.

Boyd never married or had children. Nor did she singlehandedly change the perspective of what a women’s “suitable” career choice should be. But Boyd did help birth a phenomenon of women in science and showed that women are capable of enduring harsh arctic conditions. Even socialites.

When Thor Heyerdahl died 20 years ago at the age of 87, the famous Norwegian explorer and ethnographer left behind a controversial legacy. He’d spent years attempting to prove his radical views of Polynesian heritage. His claims infuriated academics and have been accepted as without merit. But in the process, he managed to popularize science.

From an early age, Heyerdahl had a keen interest in zoology. As a boy, he charged admission for visitors to view a venomous snake he’d housed in his homemade “museum”. He took a degree in zoology and geography at the University of Oslo, while simultaneously studying Polynesian culture and history, privately.

After university, he earned the opportunity of a lifetime: go to the South Pacific to study local animals and how they had arrived at that far-flung location. He promptly wed his first wife Liv, and the couple traveled to Fatu Hiva in 1937. It was his breakthrough, experiencing as an adventurer the environment he was studying as a scholar.

An experiment in Eden

Fatu Hiva was a sharp learning curve for the newlyweds, who were ill-prepared for the primitive environment they found themselves in. With barely any provisions, they spent a year on the island before returning to Oslo to write about their research in Heyerdahl’s first book, called Hunt for Paradise in Norwegian (1938). Because of World War II, it never appeared in English. Thirty years later, he wrote a popular book, called Fatu Hiva: Back to Nature, that explored that initial experience.

Although his youthful quest for a modern Garden of Eden in the South Seas failed, Heyerdahl returned to civilization with a new theory that contradicted the accepted view of Polynesia’s origins.

Historically (and currently), the prevailing opinion was that Polynesia’s population originated in South East Asia. When Captain Cook stumbled upon civilizations in the South Pacific, he was puzzled by how people had managed to spread so far between the islands.

By today’s standards, that might seem like a strange underestimation of the abilities of prehistoric cultures. But during the late 17th century, arrogant Westerners couldn't comprehend how those early peoples could navigate a domain that is geographically larger than any other nation on earth. And how did they travel those vast expanses in open boats?

His Polynesian theory

Despite evidence documenting an east-west migration from South East Asia to the Polynesian Islands, Heyerdahl spent the rest of his life attempting to prove the opposite. He believed that the pre-European Polynesians may have sailed from South America.

Heyerdahl decided that because South American plants such as the sweet potato were available in Polynesia, it was probable that some Polynesians had originated in South America. His theory was that Polynesia had been discovered by accident when a ship from the Americas drifted off course.

However, because winds and currents in the Pacific generally run from east to west, scholars maintained that it would be impossible for ancient ships to reach Polynesia from South America.

The Kon-Tiki expedition

The most famous of Heyerdahl’s expeditions aimed to prove them wrong.

In 1947, Heyerdahl sailed from Peru to Polynesia on a raft called the Kon-Tiki. He used only technologies and materials available during pre-Columbian times. To help validate his theory that wind and current could have led a boat to the islands, he made the Kon-Tiki un-steerable.

For 101 days, six men and a parrot traveled almost 7,000km across the Pacific. Eventually, they struck a reef at Raroia -- an atoll in French Polynesia –- which abruptly ended the experiment.

The Kon-Tiki expedition proved that South Americans could have drifted to Polynesia, but it did not prove that they had done so.

Upon his return, Heyerdahl wrote The Kon-Tiki Expedition: By Raft Across the South Seas. The book became a bestseller and helped spotlight ethnography in general and his personal theories in particular. Perhaps what made this and his subsequent expeditions so popular was that he seemed to be doing science, yet he was having fun at it -- unlike the staid academics who disparaged him.

Easter Island

After Kon-Tiki, Heyerdahl organized another adventure to Easter Island in 1955. He wanted to prove that Easter Island’s people had also migrated from South America. Instead, Heyerdahl returned with even more opposing views.

Heyerdahl believed that between 1722 when Admiral Roggeveen discovered Easter Island, and 1774 when Captain Cook visited, significant contact between South American and Polynesia had occurred.

He brought thousands of artifacts back to Norway, including human remains, sculptures, and ancient weapons to prove his claim.

He then published two large archaeological reports, plus the usual popular book, called Aku-Aku, that made his case to a wider audience. Some years later, he stubbornly wrote another book called Easter Island: The Mystery Solved. In it, Heyerdahl claimed that the Hanau Eepe of South America first settled Easter Island.

As the years passed, Heyerdahl’s views expanded to include the radical possibility of cultural contact between early peoples of Africa and the Americas. He believed that certain cultural similarities, such as the shared importance of pyramid building in ancient Egyptian and Mexican civilizations, suggested a link.

In 1969, Heyerdahl embarked on an expedition to prove that Egyptian civilization may have also influenced pre-Columbian Western cultures. He left Morocco on a boat named the Ra, constructed in Egypt from Ethiopian papyrus reed. But the Ra began taking on water 950km from its destination, because of design flaws.

The Ra expeditions

Undeterred, Heyerdahl gave it another shot. This time his boat Ra II was built in Bolivia. In 1970, his multinational crew of seven set sail, arriving 57 days later in Barbados as intended. To Heyerdahl, it was another win.

Seven years later, he was at it again. This time, he navigated down the Tigris River on a reed raft. He set off from Iraq, across the Arabian Sea, onward to the Persian Gulf, and finally to the Red Sea. The expedition was to establish the possibility of contact between the people of Mesopotamia (Pakistan), the Indus Valley (Western India), and Egypt.

The voyage was on track for another success. But four months and 6,400km into their voyage, the crew set their raft alight in protest of the wars raging through the Middle East.

Heyerdahl later led further expeditions to Easter Island, the Maldives, and an archaeological project in Peru.

His life’s work was entirely devoted to gathering proof of his wayward theories. While elements of his expeditions had been successful, his theories were never credited. Researchers maintained that his successful voyages owed to luck and the use of additional modern resources and that ultimately his claims proved nothing.

One of the main criticisms of Heyerdahl’s theories was that the Galapagos Islands (so much easier to reach by raft than Polynesia) had no known signs of South American settlement. Heyerdahl rebutted those claims when he found four early South American settlements, including artifacts, during a visit to the Galapagos Islands.

Unwavering commitment to flawed theories

Heyerdahl's commitment never wavered. Not only had he successfully sailed vast oceans in open boats, drifting with the winds, currents, and tides. He had also found South American history on Galapagos islands.

Scientists eventually had the final glory when DNA advances made it increasingly easy to discredit Heyerdahl's opinion. In the late 1990s, genetic testing concluded that Polynesian DNA is more similar to people from South East Asia than to people from South America.

Some studies have detected traces of South American ancestry among Polynesian cultures, but they have always been counter-proved by greater evidence of Asian origin.

Anthropologist Wade Davis went a step further by publicly criticizing Heyerdahl's theory in his 2009 book, The Wayfinders. Davis claimed that Heyerdahl "ignored the overwhelming body of linguistic, ethnographic, and ethnobotanical evidence, augmented today by genetic and archaeological data, indicating that he was patently wrong”.

For Heyerdahl, it was less important to be right or wrong, than it was to draw attention to ancient history and anthropology. He proved that even though the origin of Polynesian ancestry might not be exactly as he believes, it is certainly possible to cross large oceans in ancient boats.

An Academy Award

Documentaries have followed his numerous books, including a 1951 documentary about his Kon-Tiki expedition, which received an Academy Award. The Kon-Tiki Museum in Oslo displays items used in his expeditions, including the original Kon-Tiki and Ra II rafts. In 2000, The Thor Heyerdahl Institute was established to promulgate Heyerdahl’s ideas even after his death.

When Heyerdahl received news of his ill health, he didn’t fight his impending death. He chose to refrain from medication or food, allowing his brain tumor to overcome him naturally in 2002. He was surrounded by his closest family members.

Heyerdahl may have been proven wrong on his key theories, but he left one unanswered question: Did Pacific Islanders and Native Americans ever have contact?