The Adventure

The world has seven main continents; Europe, Africa, Asia North & South America and Australia and Antarctica.

There are seven great oceans The Arctic, North and South Atlantic, Indian, North & South Pacific and Antarctica.

There are many major rivers such as the Amazon, Nile, Yangtze, Congo, Niger, Mekong and many more.

What’s my plan well I don’t have definite plan as such it’s about going with the flow but I have 10 years maybe longer depending upon my health and finances. But I’d love to try and visit all the main world continents by 3 modes of travel the ocean passages will be by sailing boat. The interior exploration by bike and river expeditions in my two man kayak. My sailing boat will be my base and once I go off exploring it will be mainly wild camping on my touring bike and military style folding kayak.

This adventure has happened more by chance than design? The sailing of the world was my dream but the cycling and kayaking was really an after thought. Would be silly not to explore the interiors of some of these great continents on my travels.

I bought a Koga touring bike, again more by accident than design. It’s superb bike and has high quality aluminium bike frame and the gearing is high spec reliable German engineered Rohloff Speedhub.

I came across the Koga bike a few years ago when went to see and hear a talk by the round the world cyclist Mark Beaumont. It’s high bred road touring bike designed to take panniers at the back and front so you can be completely self contained with your own food, water and camping gear.

The kayak I bought last year knowing it was a high quality Nautiraid military styles beech framed folding kayak. The two man kayak will allow me to carry plenty of expedition equipment for my river kayaking journey’s.

I don’t want to race around the globe in my sailing boat but do it at leisurely pace meeting people places and absorbing their cultures, wildlife and scenery. How far Iwill I get in 10 years who knows?

I plan to leave this spring and head south from North Wales call into NW Spain then into the Mediterranean. But my first major continent will be Africa. Sailing, biking and kayaking along the way. I’ll develop my operating procedures as progress on my explorations.

I recently watch a Dutch long distance cyclist on his YouTube channel who produced wonderful films on his American west coast tour. I liked his easy going style and dialogue and the use of drone with produced superb aerial photography it made me think wow it’s amazing the quality of some ordinary folks filming. The sound score was also superb. I noticed he had a note book with details of his daily activities.

We live in an amazing technological age but I’m great one for keeping things simple. I’ve been brushing up my ocean navigational skills using the old fashion method of navigating by compass mileage run and dead reckoning and the use of a sextant for celestial navigation fixes. It’s quite involved process as compared to using a GPS. But I thought it would be a nice thing to do each day. See how accurate I can get using a sexton and my watch for a celestial fix’s as compared to using an electronic GPS.

I’m under no illusion its one big challenge I’m undertaking at my age (70). It’s as if all my previous life experiences have brought me to this juncture in my life. It’s important that I do this in harmonious way, meaning I’ll be using the wind to propel me along on my sailing boat. On land and rivers it will be by my own physical muscle power. Hopefully all this physical activity will keep me fit and healthy over the next 10 years. When I get to 80 if I’m still fit and heathy and able enough and still enjoying myself I’ll just keep on going. But that’s long way off yet. So I’ll take a day a month and a year at a time.

I will blog and make films of what I see and feel about each county I visit and try and describe the topography, the people, the culture and the wildlife I meet and experience. How do I feel about this challenge, excited. For a long while I have felt as if there’s bigger force pushing me to do this. I feel calm about this undertaking it’s as if it’s was all meant to be.