Grand Adventures. Alastair Humphreys

Чтение книги онлайн.

СКАЧАТЬ like to think of myself as first a person and second a girl. Maybe it’s because I’m young and grew up in a family that never treated my sisters and me any differently to my brother. But I struggle to understand why women shouldn’t go on as many adventures as men.

      Some of the most inspiring people I spoke to were elderly. Granted, their physical fitness may be beyond the norm for ‘old-age pensioners’, but their enthusiasm and spirit are inspirational for anyone who fears that their adventuring years may be behind them:

      KU KING

      EXPLORING THE PLANET WITH A PROGRESSIVELY SMALL BACKPACK

      One of the things that we have noticed in many years of travel is the increasing number of older independent travellers on the road. Travel is no longer the domain of gap-year students. There are people of all ages out there creating their own unique adventures all around the planet. Nowadays, the economic situation means that redundancy (often with an attractive financial package) is an option for many. Instead of investing in a new kitchen or adding a conservatory, some people are grabbing life by the throat and booking year-long round-the-world tickets. When you are in your twenties, the years stretch ahead of you like a blank canvas. You have all the time in the world. When you hit your forties, and more so your fifties, you become aware that time is limited. We still have an abundance of travel dreams to realise, and we are determined to make them come true before arthritis sets in!

      ROSIE SWALE-POPE

      RAN ROUND THE WORLD IN HER SIXTIES

      Age is one of the worst things. Most of my friends now are younger than my daughter. But as people get older they need to ask themselves ‘who am I?’ and ‘what do I want?’ Life is not a rehearsal! People just give up. There are so many real barriers in life that we should stop making false ones. Don’t make yourself get stuck. It’s a well-off people’s problem: poor people in the world just get on with life when they are older. We give up. Of course, people are different biologically and there’s a reality to ageing. When Paula Radcliffe is old she won’t be able to run as fast, but she can do something different and amazing instead. I’m 68, but I’m overjoyed to be the age I am, to be who I am. You can be 21 and 68. I haven’t grown up yet!’

      SVEN YRVIND

      75-YEAR-OLD SAILOR, ONCE SAILED ROUND CAPE HORN IN A 20-FOOT BOAT

      When I was young I worked 8am to 10pm on my projects. But I’m getting older now, so I am slower. But that’s OK: I am enjoying building the boat. It’s interesting. I’m more knowledgeable now, more patient as well. The mind wanders. I try new things [design details for the boat]. They often don’t succeed. I try again, I try something else.

      At the opposite end of the spectrum, young people often worry that they are too inexperienced to set out on a big journey. Everyone needs to begin somewhere, though, and these adventurers demonstrate that age is no barrier to accomplishing extraordinary feats:

      TEGAN PHILLIPS

      CARTOONIST AND CYCLIST

      I am 21. I think my age actually worked to my advantage because, for me anyway, one of the biggest parts of adventuring is unlearning a lot of things that you didn’t even realise you had been taught. A lot of the time I would think things like, ‘Oh no, I can’t wash my hair in a restaurant bathroom, it just isn’t done’. And then I would think, ‘why the hell not?’ Where did I even get all of these silly ideas from in the first place?

      ANDY WARD

      WALKED ACROSS EUROPE, FROM THE UK TO ISTANBUL

      You’ve got to start somewhere. You don’t need experience. Everyone has walked a certain distance, chatted to random people they meet along the way and set up a tent in the ditch, or asked a farmer to camp in their field. It’s just a case of getting up and getting on with it. I’d been a little worried about getting a job afterwards until I was halfway through my walk and I got two emails from two different investment banks in London. Both asked me to come and work for them. I’ve never applied for a job with a bank before. They had just heard about the walk and the blog, and they got in touch. I spoke to them and said, ‘Why on Earth would you want me? You don’t even know my CV or anything else.’ They said, ‘We’ve got enough Cambridge students. We want interesting people. We want people who can talk to clients and talk about interesting things.’

      SARAH OUTEN

      ROWED THE INDIAN OCEAN

      I guess there’s a bit of naivety that comes in at the age of 21. You think you can take on the world, all of these things. I saw it very simplistically. I can’t think what the right word is, but I looked at other big expeditions and I thought, ‘Well, this isn’t rocket science. It’s just a big project and if I chopped that project down then I can make it happen.’

      JESSICA WATSON

      SAILED SOLO ROUND THE WORLD

      It’s incredible how low our expectations of young people can sometimes be. As I was preparing to sail around the world I constantly came up against people who just assumed that a young girl couldn’t do such a thing. I don’t know why we automatically think something’s not possible rather than looking at how it might be achieved.

      ANDREW FORSTHOEFEL

      WALKED ACROSS THE USA

      I graduated from college with a ton of questions, unsure of what I wanted to do, and figured I’d try to create around myself a situation that would help me engage those questions. I thought I might go abroad for a little bit but then I got fired from a job and didn’t have the money I thought I would have. So I figured I’d just start walking and keep it simple. I wore a sign that said, ‘Walking to Listen’. The idea was to get people curious and hopefully they’d stop and share a story or a piece of advice. And that was pretty much it. I had a few basic rules: walk every mile that was possible to walk. And camp out more often than not because that’s all I could afford.

      © Daniel Munoz/Reuters/Corbis

      BELINDA KIRK

      ROWED AROUND BRITAIN

      I had towed the line, worked hard at school and felt that I had done what I was obliged to do for my parents, friends, society, etc. So, completely against my parents’ wishes, I told them I was going to Africa to study monkeys and have an adventure for a year before getting back on society’s merry-go-round and going to university and all that jazz. It was without doubt the best step I’ve ever taken, bar none.

      Some people say the first step is the hardest. I think it can also be the easiest. Because really it’s a no-brainer if it’s what you want to do more than anything else. I started as part of an organised expedition. I paid to be there – when you have zero experience to offer anyone then I think you should expect to pay to build that experience. I also knew I wanted to be part of some zoological fieldwork and couldn’t have done anything meaningful on my own.

      KELLY DIGGLE

      CYCLED A LAP OF ICELAND

      I panicked at the realisation that, age 22, I was settling down to a life of conformity. It had just become a norm. I turned my back on pouring coffee for a living, sold the car, waved goodbye to my relationship and left Cornwall. I had no idea where I was headed. All I knew was that I had this burning desire to СКАЧАТЬ