 Good evening everyone. Thank you for joining us this evening. We are going to make a start. And I'm delighted to have everyone with us this evening. And I'm particularly delighted to welcome Fiona. Hi Fiona. Hi. Sunny Lake District. Yeah. Amazing at the moment. Sounds ideal. And. Few sort of housekeeping things first. We want this evening to be as interactive as possible. So if you've got any questions along the way for Fiona, then please do use the Q&A. If you're on zoom or if you're watching live on Facebook, then do pop your comments below and we'll try and get through as many as possible in the time. Thank you. I'm delighted to welcome Fiona. And I remember it was about three years ago. You know, when you was setting off on this 800 mile trip. And I remember, I remember hearing the new news thinking, thinking, wow, you know, I've done some paddle boarding, but I remember thinking that sounds like a lot of time on a, on a paddle board. I mean, your, your story, because I've, I've been reading your book as well. And actually this evening, we've got a couple of Fiona's books to give away. So at the end, we'll give you an opportunity to win a couple of books, but the book is, is fantastic and well worth a read. So, but Fiona, Fiona is here to talk about this trip. 800 miles from land's end to John O'Groats. And she did, like I say, set off three years ago. And at the time she didn't have much funding, didn't even have a support boat, I think. No, not the beginning. But it didn't deter her. And I think it's a fantastic story and overcoming many of the obstacles that sometimes we put in our way and overcoming many of the excuses that we put in our way. So I will hand over to Fiona and I'll manage the questions and come back shortly. Thank you, Fiona. Thank you. Hi, everyone. It's really nice to be here. And yeah, it's Mark. So I'm going to chat to you about my panel morning adventure. And I guess it all. Fiona, sorry, sorry to interrupt. We're getting a few people saying that your mic's quite low. I don't know if apologies for interrupting. How's that? Can people hear me better now? Much better. Thank you. So, yeah, so as I say, my, my first adventure lands on a great by bike and I set out. And so this is the route that I took on my first adventure. And as you might notice, it gets a little bit straight towards the top, particularly near the Cairngorms. I cycled 800 miles, just 200 or so left to go. And I got caught up by a storm. It was October. Been raining all day. I was absolutely frozen to the core. And I was really worried that I was on the verge of failure. So I had to bail. I had to get a lift to a train station and then get the train up to a hostel where I was planning on staying. And then from there get a few more trains than just cycle the last 20 miles. So really this first massive adventure I'd gone out done on my own and I'd failed. But to me, I really hadn't failed. Like I just cycled 800 miles when all I'd ever done in one go before was 80. And I just loved that process of, as I say, my own being incredibly self-reliant. If stuff goes wrong, I've got to fix it, like the point in the storm where I had to bail. And I really liked that process. So despite the fact that I failed, I wanted to go back and do it again. I want to explore different parts of our country and to do it in a different way. So I decided walking's pretty easy, right? Probably do that. Just keep putting one foot in front of the other and I'll get there in the end. This time I wanted to end with ice cream and beaches. So I went north to south from Jonogroats down to Land's End. And probably of all of the adventures that I've done so far, this walking one was actually the most difficult, I think mentally and physically. So I didn't realize quite how slow walking was weirdly to begin with. So it's an incredibly monotonous pace, obviously, when you think about it. But also I got really injured. So I got about 500 miles in. I got to the Lake District and it was at that point that I got acute tendonitis. So for anyone that's had tendonitis, you'll know it's incredibly painful. And I couldn't even move my foot even slightly without crying and agony. So that was that to contend with. I stayed on the trail or at a friend of a friend's house nearby and rested up on crutches for a week. And then I kept going. And then I got trenched foot because it was so wet. But I managed to get to the end. And there was absolutely no way having failed on that first one that I wasn't going to make it on this second one. And I was so glad that I did, despite the fact that it was hard. And, you know, my body was slightly broken at the end. I absolutely loved it again. So after that, I figured I should probably go back and cycle it again just so that I can say that I've done it. So I did the whole route again. Second time round it was slightly longer. It was about 1200 miles over four weeks. So I kind of, I'd done those two adventures successfully. And I kind of looked at these two maps and thought, you know, there's something missing from here. So I did what any normal person would do. And I decided that I would turn it into a length of red triathlon. And I nearly drowned when I was a child. So there was absolutely no way that I was going to swim it. That just wasn't even an option. But after a bit of Googling, I realized that no one had ever attempted to paddleboard it before. So I decided this is what I was going to do. I went south to north. So going with the prevailing wind. And yeah, it was an incredible adventure. And I managed to rack up a couple of world firsts along the way. So I was the first woman to stand up paddleboard across the Irish sea. I was the first person to stand up paddleboard the length of Britain lands on the grotes on inflatable boards. And having completed all three, I was then the first woman to do a length of Britain triathlon. And I, despite how difficult that each of them were in different ways, I absolutely loved them. But one thing that really came out of particularly the paddleboarding one for me was that adventures really are not about this. They're not about getting a picture in front of a signpost at the end. That's not what drove me to do them. I think for me, it's very much a case of getting simply to the start line. And that can often be hard enough in itself, yet alone having to worry about the rest of it. So I kind of wanted to share with you tonight, my kind of top four takeaways from adventure, particularly the paddleboarding one, which I hope will help inspire your own adventures to get out on the water or however you want to adventure. So the first one has to be embrace the fear. As I've mentioned, I need to drown as a child. And as a result, I'm scared of the sea. So being out there, being on the water and just having nothing at all around you is just terrifying for me. I was so scared on a lot of the days when I was out there. And it was a real challenge. Particularly the very first few days, I really had no idea what I was doing. I didn't train for any of my adventures, I should say. I really just got to the start line and go, right, I'm going to let my body adapt to this and just see how it goes. So I'm not one for going for time. So I don't try and beat any kind of time record. I just go at my own pace, have fun along the way and yeah, enjoying challenging myself. So the paddleboarding one, there's an obvious fear there, which was really, really difficult as I said at the beginning and it did to a degree get a little bit better as it went on. We kind of managed the days that we were going out at sea and making sure that the conditions were something that I felt comfortable with. But even though I was really, really scared, when we had days like this, I really wasn't scared. Like how can you be scared of that? It's just magical. So this is paddling across to Lundy Island. So the island's about 10 miles offshore off the coast of Cornwall and Devon. And yeah, glassy waters, how could I be scared? It was just wonderful. But it wasn't my own, it wasn't only my fear that I had to deal with along the way. There was also other people's fears that I had to deal with as well. So on the day that I was paddleboarding across the Irish Sea or just before I was about to paddle, one of my sponsors, their PR lady rang me up and she said, Fiona, did you know there's something like 10 species of shark and 30 species of whale in the Irish Sea? And I was like, why are you telling me this now? I was just really kind of trying to make me more scared, I think, or just kind of, it just really played on my mind. But actually the only thing that greeted me from the depths were dolphins. And I really didn't need to kind of take on other people's fears as well as my own. And paddleboarding alongside dolphins was just incredible. They were so friendly, like it never felt that they were going to come and try and knock me off my board or kind of anything like that. I just felt this kind of overwhelming calm when they were around and they would come right up to my board, like sometimes just sort of two feet away and kind of get a really good look at me through the water and I really wonder what they made of me, that would have been so interesting to know. But yeah, I mean, I would never have had those experiences and we had dolphins maybe four or five times the length of Britain and it was always just as magical each time they came and to think that I wouldn't have been able to do that if I hadn't have ignored the fear. And that has to be my number one takeaway really. Second one is learning on the job. So as I said, I've not trained from any of my adventures and generally I try to take like quite a kind of stepped back approach in terms of I don't want to be an expert at this thing. I just want to know enough that keep me and my crew safe if I have a crew and to get to the end and enjoy it along the way. So I learned an incredible amount through paddleboarding the length of Britain. So before I set off, I think I'd maybe paddled on the sea three times. So not much at all. I paddled a little bit more on lakes and rivers. But before I started planning, I really didn't know anything about the sea. I didn't really understand how to figure out tie times. I didn't know anything like that. So it was brilliant to learn about all this stuff. And this is a screenshot from an app that I use. It's called Windy. And there's an app for your phone as well as a desktop version. And Windy is brilliant. It gives you all the kind of information that you'd need to go paddling, whether inland or on the coast as well. So things that I would look at each morning or on the trip. This would be the first app that I look at. And I'd be thinking about things like wind direction. So I'd want it to be pushing me north. Wind speed, preferably blue. So less than 10 miles an hour. And then also things like swell height. So I'm about five foot five. And this is from an actual day of the trip. And as you can see there, the highest swell height is 9.6 feet. And there was absolutely no way that I was going to be paddling that day. But I also got to learn, as I say, about things like tides and times and wanting to, whether I had different points on the route, whether I'd be going from low tides to high, or maybe at different points in the tide, was really interesting to kind of learn about that. But I wouldn't have done in any other scenario. And because I'm inexperienced, I also had to get a support boat. So this is my boat. She was called Shogun. She's 32 foot sailing yacht. And I didn't know anything about the sea. I also didn't know anything about boats. So it was fascinating to learn about how boats move in water, how you sail them, how you can use the wind and tide as a break, because obviously boats don't have breaks. All that kind of stuff was absolutely fascinating. And I really loved just kind of being a complete amateur, being completely open and like telling everyone that, I don't know what I'm doing. Please educate me. And just sort of soaking up all that knowledge was great fun. But I also got to learn, obviously, about Britain. So this is probably one of my favorite places on the paddleboarding trip. And this is Lundy Island. So from that photo earlier, I've had a boarded across during the day, stopped paddling once it got dark and then we motored over and anchored off the island. So then come morning we woke up and we just had this kind of deserted feeling island to ourselves. And there was only sort of two other boats anchored off the island. So it was magical to really be there and kind of be quite alone while we were there. And then from my walk, my favorite bit of Britain is here. So this is in the Lake District. This is Oldswater. And I walked along the north edge of Oldswater during my walk. And it's just beautiful kind of part of Britain. And it was really from that, I bought the length of Britain when I got stuck in the Lake District. So I realized just how beautiful it is. And that's kind of what prompted me to move up here last year. And then from my cycling trips. And this is my favorite road to cycle on in Britain. It's the smoothest tarmac you will ever see anywhere in the middle of nowhere. Hardly any cars and with a tailwind and beautiful sunshine. It was just lovely scenery. So I've really enjoyed kind of discovering Britain as I went through the three modes of transport. And so my next one, number three has to be do it your way. I think whatever you're doing, whether that's an adventure, small or large, whether it's work or some kind of fun side project, I always try and find my own take on it, my way of doing it. And those of you that follow me on Instagram might know that that's often cake based. So if you can see in my life jacket here in the pocket, there's quite a few chocolate bars. So that was definitely fueling me along the way, giving me motivation, but also just making it super fun and kind of live for the cake stops. I think earned cake is the best kind of cake and I, and I love striving for that. But I think it's also sometimes it's difficult to kind of maintain your approach and your vision for something. And during the paddle boarding trip, that wasn't something I always managed to do. So I was paddling up past Northern Ireland and back across the Irish sea at this point over to Scotland. So we'd paddle through the nights across the Irish sea and we were back over into Scotland. And so this is just sort of showing you where we were going. So we're on to the left of the Mulligan Tire there, up towards Oberlin and then we're going to cut through Scotland to the Calendonian Canal. And it was around this point that we need to do a crew change on my support boat and refuel. So we were going to go to Crenan Harbour, which you can just see on a sort of bottom right there. There's a little purple boat and I was paddling up through the channel in the middle there. The plan was you can kind of see some islands in the middle of the channel. And there's like a little lighthouse right at the very bottom. So I was going to paddle to the right-hand side of those. My crew were going to go into the harbour, do what they needed to do, and then come back out and meet me. And it was important that I stayed to the right-hand side of that channel, because if you look further up to the left, between the two islands there, you can see Corrie Wacken. And I don't know if anyone has heard of that, but it is the world's third largest well pool. It's on the West Coast of Scotland. And for those of you that don't know, this is what it looks like. So it looks pretty horrendous. There's no way anyone would really want to paddle anywhere near that. It's not a permanent well pool. It only develops certain tide states, but it's the world's third largest, so it's pretty hefty. And I think there was a production company that did an experiment and basically took a life-size adult dummy with a lifejack and a depth gauge. And they threw it into the well pool and they got pulled 262 metres down to the sea floor, dragged along the seabed and then chucked out further down current. So if I'd been pulled into that well pool, it would have been game over. So I wanted to stay well away from that. So that's why I was saying to the right-hand side of that channel. So this is the day itself. So it was not a breath of wind, glassy waters. The skipper that I had with me at the time was a yacht master skipper, so he was very experienced and he had looked at all of the data and he didn't think there'd be much tide. So the plan was that the boat would go and leave me to do this crew change and refuel. The reason being was that one of my sponsors was particularly keen on me going really fast. And as I've said, my goals really are kick stops. It's not about speed. So this is kind of where my attention waned and I kind of felt that maybe I should go fast and maybe this is something that I should do and that's why they left me. And to begin with, I was kind of fine about that because of the conditions and it was lovely paddling. As it happens, I got much closer to these islands than I'd planned and initially I thought, oh, that means I'm just paddling really well today. But then I realised that it's actually not. It was because the tide was stronger than we'd planned and not long after this picture was taken, I realised that I was actually now between the lighthouse in the middle of this picture and the islands further along. I was being pulled in the direction of Cori Wacken. So I text my skipper, let him know, please hurry, the tide's really strong. And then I just kind of tried to beat myself on the islands. I tried to paddle across the tide. I just couldn't fight it, it was too strong. So if you can hopefully see in this picture, the water started to get super swally. Every time I board, it would hit these swales of water. I'd just be thrown around. So I had to get really scared. And at this point, my skipper rings me. Now, obviously I'm not where he's expecting me to be. The tide's pulling me in a different direction around these islands. And like, you know, imagine his perspective, there's someone on the water that you are responsible for. There's the potential that they're being pulled towards a deadly well pool. And then I answer the phone in the worst way possible. I am crying my heart out. I'm like, where are you? I'm being pulled towards this well pool. I'm going to die. And so I was a little bit scared and dramatic. But so he was sort of asking me, what can you see? And I was trying to tell him. And then about 30 seconds into his phone call, all the water around me just shifts again. And this time into one big circle. And I knew that other well pools developed a different tide states in this sort of area of water. And I knew that they wouldn't get as big as Coriwacken, but I knew how big they would get. So all I could do was just quickly tell my skip of what I could see, hang up because I can't paddle with one hand. And then just paddle like crazy to get to the edge of this well pool and hope that my crew will come and find me. And about, oh, I don't know. I don't know how long it was. Maybe it was a couple of minutes, maybe it was a little bit longer or maybe it was shorter. It's so hard to tell in the moment. But I managed to get to the edge of this, this swirling mass of water. And then finally I saw my boat on the horizon and it was so long and they scooped me up. And I cried even more. And it just reminded me like, why was I in that situation? I shouldn't have been. Like if I had stuck to my guns, if I'd just been focusing on the cake stops and not been swayed to try and go faster, my support boat would never have left me. So that's why I think you should always do it your way and kind of focus on the cake stops and the things that you are driven to in terms of adventure and try not to get swayed to other things that other people want. So that's number three. Number four. So this one I think is just so true. Life and adventure is all about people. Even on my first kind of couple of adventures to the walking and the cycling when I went solo and self-supported, despite the fact that I was on my own, they are incredibly social ways of travelling. I think being a solo traveller, lots of people feel much more comfortable approaching you and they kind of talk to you a lot more. The amount of support that I had on those adventures was just incredible. Like people came in family from Instagram and bought me cake. You know, people in coffee shops, I just get chatting to them and they're buying me cake. It was brilliant. And then also obviously with the paddleboarding one, it was slightly different. We didn't meet as many people because I was on the sea. But with this one I had crew, which was wonderful and I had not experienced that before. So this is Liam. He was 22 when he joined the adventure and he joined as a photographer. But as I mentioned at the beginning, I started without a skipper, without a support boat and without any money to get a support boat. I just had Liam and I kind of had to keep believing that I could figure out a way to get the rest of the stuff. And it turned out that luckily, Liam is a paddleboarding instructor. He is also a dinghy instructor and like a motor boat instructor as well. So he really understood the sea and boats and kind of like how to read conditions and this kind of thing. So, and even though he had all of that experience, he'd never actually been on a yacht. I think maybe for more than two days before he joined the expedition. So when I couldn't find a skipper, he stepped up and I managed to get someone to come for a day to give him some sort of training. And then he was on his own and he skipped my boat pretty much the length of Britain. Pretty much sort of half of that was solo. So we didn't have a deck hand until I got to Ireland. It was just the two of us on the support boat. And he did an amazing job. You know, he not only skipped the boat, he kept me safe while I was paddling and he managed to photograph and video the expedition as well. So it wasn't just an awesome adventure for me. It was brilliant to be able to give this experience to my crew as well. Next up, so Aileen is on the right here. So she actually joined the expedition in Crinan Harbour. So her first job on the boat was to find me and make sure that I don't go into a whirlpool. And then she stayed with us for like a month right to the very end of the adventure. And she was just a brush of fresh air. You know, she so much energy just, you know, I remember the very first day that she joined after they picked me up out of the water. And the next time I was then back on the sea the next day, you know, after just me paddling for five minutes, she was whooping and cheering me along and I was thinking, oh, I'm going to need this after five hours, not five minutes. But it was just never-ending. She just didn't run out of energy and it was brilliant. It really, really helped boost morale when I needed it. And she was just a brilliant that kind. She was such great support. And then on the left-hand side here is Paula, Paula McGuire, otherwise known as Paula must try harder on Instagram. And she came and joined us for just a little bit of paddle when we were on the Catherine Canal. But I actually heard about Paula when she was doing her own adventure. So the same year in spring 2018, she had set out from, I think she started down in Cornwall. So she tried to swim a lap of Britain before Ross Edgley did, which I think is incredible. It's absolutely amazing. Unfortunately, she's also scared of the sea. And she ended up having panic attacks, which meant that she had to call it a day. But I think, you know, just an incredible achievement to get, as I say, get to the start of that adventure just to have a go and see what you can do. Like I really admire Paula. I think she's amazing. And then we also had another guest join us on the paddle boarding trip. So part of our route took us past Aileen's family home where she grew up. So this is her dad in the canoe there. And he came out, paddled out from their home and brought us cake, which was amazing. So I loved the fact that my adventure was an excuse for him to have an adventure too. So that was super fun. And I really loved having my crew and kind of sharing everything with them, the ups, the downs, and as well as the finish line moment, like they had had incredible adventures as well. And I think I should probably just say that, like Aileen had never been on a boat before she joined. She'd never paddle boarded before. She didn't have a driver's license. So obviously we managed to get her to drive the support boats through parts of Neptune's staircase going into the Caledonia canal, which if you don't know it, it's incredibly tight kind of lock system. And there was three other much more expensive boats of mine in there. So she was under quite a lot of pressure and she did an amazing job. So yeah, just all round it was brilliant to be able to give other people a super fun adventure as well. So that's kind of my talk really. That's sort of what it's all about for me. It's about being an amateur and embracing that, learning on the job, having the cake stops, remembering that's why I'm doing it, ignoring the fear and remembering that I can't do this without people and nor would I want to. Like I think having lots of cool people in your life is really what makes it special. So yeah, I absolutely loved the adventure. And as we've kind of mentioned, I wrote a book about it called Ignore the Fear. Which you can win. There's a couple of signed copies up for grabs at the end of this. So I thought I'd just finish off by giving a little snippet into what I'm up to next. So I've called it couch to ultra marathon and kind of in line with my previous adventures. It's something that I've not really done before. I've never really been a runner. It's kind of almost like a badge of one of that I would have and say, Nope, I'm not a runner. I don't do that. But for some reason I've been like compelled to kind of start to take it up. I think it was when I heard about Jasmine Paris running the spine race and she absolutely smashed not only the race record that year, but the overall Milan women's race record by I think it was 12 hours. Well, she was expressing milk during the race for her daughter. And I was like, well, if she can do that, maybe I can become a runner. So I started training in January and before that I'd only ever run five miles in one go, but I have decided that some point this year I'm going to take on the Pennine way. So it's 260 miles, 10 back to back marathons that I'm going to run in one go. So I probably won't sleep. I'll just keep running through the night until I get to the end. I'm going to do it with with crew. So I have support crew with me and hopefully some support runners. And I'm training at the moment and getting injured as most runners seem to, but hopefully I'll be able to have a super fun adventure and learn lots about myself and Britain along the way. So yeah, that's that's my talk and I hope that's been inspiring. Thank you Fiona. That was fantastic. I particularly love the pictures of paddling with the dolphins and, you know, the whirlpool looked. Yeah, intense. Yeah, yeah, very much so. Wow. We've had a few questions. If that's okay. Sort of take another 10, 15 minutes just to get some of these, these answered some great questions from people. So I'll start with an easier one. Luke, Luke says you, you talk about cake quite a bit and where have you found the very best cake and what cake was it? Oh, that is a hard question. And I mean, in general, my favorite cake is a lemon and blueberry. But where do they find the best cake? I think that's a really, that's a really difficult question. I think for me, I kind of mentioned it in the talk, but like, ernt cake is really what makes it taste good for me. Like I can just go to the, the cupboard and get some cake out, but it just doesn't taste as good as if I have like cycle, 70 miles to get there or paddle boarded across the IOC. I think that's what makes for really good cake. Great. Thank you. Um, you were, obviously you showed the pictures of the, the dolphins and um, you had a crew. Um, but how many, you were spending quite a bit of time on your own, on the board, I guess, just with your own sort of thought, um, how long were you on the board for on your own each day? Was it, did it vary? I mean, so we typically do, um, it's not in the beginning, we just do one tide a day. So that would be six hours of paddling. Um, I'd usually break halfway through. So I have three hours and then jump on the support boat for a cup of tea and then jump back on the board and go back to where I'd last paddled from. Um, but yeah, sort of three hours at a time. Um, we did have radios. So if I wanted to, to shout at Liam and ask for a cup of tea or something, or just ask what he's up to. Um, and then we could also just kind of talk. Sometimes the boat was kind of close and we could, we could talk about that. But usually yeah, on my own sort of thinking about that life and about the, all the wildlife underneath me and hoping that I wouldn't fall in. Yeah. Well, I was going to say, did you get lonely? But it sounds like, um, yeah, it was probably quite, when the weather was good, it was probably quite a nice experience to be on your own and kind of, I mean, it was days. It was on the nice days. It was amazing, but there was definitely points because it's such a different adventure. I think kind of I mentioned that, you know, when I was doing the walk and the, and the cycling, like I'd meet lots of people along the way. And I really liked that mix of meeting lots of people, but then also having kind of saw it two times as well. And I think for this adventure, that kind of was slightly different and a little bit. Um, I feel like a little bit missed out on meeting people along the way. Um, so it was slightly more lonely than, than the other adventure, but I do like being on my own and kind of getting my head down and getting into a rhythm. So it's kind of a mix. Great. Rachel asks, where do you find the motivation to start such big adventures? Um, I think it just kind of, I think particularly with the paddle boarding one, like it was just such a ridiculous idea. Like who am I? I'm a complete novice. I don't have any of the money or boat or crew that I need at the very beginning. It was just kind of, yeah, it's just so ridiculous that I was just kind of weirdly compelled to do it. And it was just something that, you know, inside me was just saying, I have to do this. Um, and I've done other adventures since like I tried to cycle across Europe the year after in 2019. And I quit halfway through because I just, my heart wasn't in it. And I think, um, yeah, if you're going to take on something that's really big and super challenging and time consuming potentially, then it kind of has to really, really speak to you. And I think that you kind of know when you know, you know, so. Brilliant. I really love your, um, your, your principle of, um, just it's okay if you're rubbish, just and you talked about it in the, um, you know, being an absolute beginner was almost an excuse to ask lots of questions and, um, you know, just accept that, you know, everyone has to start somewhere that's a really nice, nice way of, um, approaching things. Um, Josh, Josh asks how long did it take to go across the open ocean sections? Yeah. So, um, so there was the section from, uh, Cornwall to Lundy Island. So that was about 10 miles. And that would have been maybe like three hours, I think. I can't remember exactly. Um, and then from Lundy Island on to, um, South of Wales was sort of, uh, maybe more like 10 hours. Um, and then the crossing over the Irish sea was, I think it was 12 hours paddling. Um, so, and particularly going, doing those crossings and then more crossing ties rather than going with or against one. Um, so that meant that I could be on the, on the water for longer. Great. Thank you. Um, the question here from, uh, Jose about how do you fund your trips? And I know in the book, you talk about a lack of funds on day one. So that's quite a good question. Yeah. I mean, they've all been self-funded. I've never had unfortunately a big company give me lots of money, which would have been lovely. Um, and I know that I'm incredibly lucky that I've been able to, to self-fund them. I mean, the paddle boarding trip was, was quite expensive purely because I needed to support boat really and crew, but they're the first two adventures. Um, they were, um, well, the walking one was, um, two months and the other ones a month. Um, but you know, if you, if you go cheaply, um, you can do them for, for not that much money at all. Really. And you, I think how, how hungry is something put something out that said, you say, um, I think it's 20 pounds a week for a year. You get a thousand pounds. And you know, you can go on a pretty good adventure for a grand, um, for a month. So that, you know, there's lots of ways of funding adventures. Yeah. Thank you. Um, Rihanna asks how do you deal with, uh, this is a good question. How do you, how do you deal with other people doubting you, um, doubting that you can achieve these challenges? Cause I know again, it's in the book and you talk about that. Yeah, definitely. I think it's really interesting. Um, to some degree, I kind of, I quite like it when people go, I can't do that. I'll show you. Like sometimes it's quite motivational. Um, but obviously it's also like, it's super tricky right at the very beginning. I went out with Liam. He took me, um, we went down to the coast and we just kind of did like a little photo session. Um, so it was one of the three times that I paddled on the sea before I left. And I was so scared and like, I tried to launch my board off the beach and I got completely wiped out by a wave and he was kind of looking at me like, how on earth are you going to paddle board the length of Britain? You can't even get off the beach. And I was like, no, no, seriously, like, believe me, I can do this. I know I can. And there was a point, I think where he was almost going to pull out. And if I hadn't had Liam, I wouldn't have been able to make it. Um, so it's kind of a balance between, you know, being able to convince people that I can do this. And then sometimes being like, you know what, you can think that I can't do it if you want to, but I know that I can. And I think that's, that's enough motivation. Do you, do you look back now and think if you knew what you know now about that trip, because you kind of started again, talk about the book. You start off with a kind of, um, knowing very little, but you've just got this kind of, um, determination. But if you knew what you knew now, would you still do it? Still have done it? Um, I don't think there's anything that happens that would have, would have meant that I wouldn't want to have done it. Um, I think very much my approach, um, is not to super over plan everything. Like I had a rough idea of, um, where I was going and maybe sort of, maybe how long it would take me to get there, but because I was an experienced, I didn't know. And I quite like that not knowing like, I think that's, I knew everything if I was like a super experienced pad of order, and I planned it to the end's degree. For me, that would take a lot of the adventure away from it. So I quite like not knowing what's going to come. That's great. Um, Matt asks, Oh, when you were talking about your, the bike ride, he asks, um, what was the name of the smooth road that you, you showed the picture of? Um, I don't know the name of the actual road, but it's between leg and tongue. So right in the middle of the Highlands in Scotland. Brilliant. Thank you. Um, and Rachel asks, I'm a runner and trying to get fitted to run for longer. Do you have any advice or tips on how to look after yourself that you can so that you can run more in terms of avoiding fatigue? Um, great. I mean, that's an interesting question because obviously I'm doing the run at the moment, like trading for it, but I keep getting injured and so I, I don't know what the answer is right now. Um, in terms of fatigue, I, I would, I mean, I'm not an expert, but I would guess that just means general fitness. So maybe doing other things like swimming or running or cycling or even paddle boarding could, could help build general fitness. Um, without the impact of running. Okay. Uh, Robert asks, would, uh, great talk. Thank you. Thank you. Well done. Would you do anything differently with the paddle board trip with hindsight? Uh, and do you still paddle now or did you have your fill over those 800 miles? I mean, I guess the only thing that I might do differently is that I wouldn't have tried to go a little bit faster when I was doing that crew change and refuel. And then I would have kept the boat with me. Um, but otherwise like I loved all of it, like even the bits where I was crying, like it was still fun and I, and I really enjoyed the ups and downs. Um, and I do still paddle. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I think I've made the only paddle on the sea once since I was very nervous. Um, but yeah, I live in the lake district. So I love going on sort of wind and mirror and, and all the lakes around here is lovely. Matt asks, what was your usual paddle board outfit? I mean, I guess this is a wider question on maybe gear that you had. You talked about radios and things like that, but also claving. Did you, because I know a lot of people paddle board in sort of dry suits, but you didn't look like you had one of those on. But, um, so what did you wear and use? Yeah. So I guess, um, yeah, the options are like a full dry suit. Um, kind of like semi dry or a wet suit. Um, and I chose a wet suit. Um, only because like I was such an amateur that I figured, um, you know, I could just wear the bottom half. I wanted to, but it still kept me warm because it was surprised even on. So that's actually the day I started. Um, which I think was the 20th of April. Um, in 2018 was the hottest April day in 70 years on record. Um, so, uh, even then it was still quite cold out. So, um, it was, um, it was, um, it was, um, um, even then it was still quite cold out at sea. So having the warmth of the wetsuit. Um, but then being able to, you know, unzip it and take the top down. If I got a bit hot worked for me that I just had that sort of flexibility. Um, and then once I got up into Scotland and I was in the Caledonia canal, like I was down to sort of board shorts and a bikini at one point it was so hot. So it kind of varied. Um, but yeah, predominantly wetsuit. Brilliant. Thank you. Um, just looking at, um, I don't know. So it doesn't give their name, but they said, um, they had a near drowning incident as a child. So I want to know what is your best tip to ignore the fear in the water. I'm a canoe kayak, um, paddler, but struggle with ocean paddling and winter training. Um, I mean, I think for me it was a combination of having the support boat. So I knew that there was someone on hand that could help if I didn't feel safe. You know, I could just immediately go and get off the water, which isn't always obviously possible to have your own support boat, but, um, knowing exit points and emergency exit points can help because you really know what your options are. If things don't feel comfortable, even if it's not necessarily a dangerous situation, you just don't feel like you're managing your fear or whatever. You can just get off the water. Um, and then I think, um, just kind of choosing conditions that, you know, feel right for you. Um, some of the conditions that I refuse to go out in an experienced pad of water would have probably been absolutely fine, but, um, making sure that it was, it was made me feel okay. It was, it was more important than what other people think is, is kind of generally acceptable. So I think knowing what you feel comfortable in is, is really important. Brilliant. Thank you. The, Jenny, Jenny asks what, what training did you do beforehand for arms and legs strengthening? Um, she says, sorry, you might have mentioned it at the start, but she missed the first 10 minutes. Okay. Um, so I did no training. I, I had only pad on the sea three times before I left. Um, both because I, I didn't want to scare myself out of going. Um, and also just cause, you know, I had lots of organizing to do and, and I kind of like the, just finding out how, how I go along the way. Um, the only kind of issue that I had, I guess that I might have benefited from doing some training from, um, as I got tendonitis in my left wrist at one point, um, I kind of went to go through a paddle stroke and felt it ping, which is not good. Um, so then I had two weeks off the water, luckily for bad weather anyway, but then when I got back on the water, then I could manage the pain and kind of it was, it was all right from there. Um, which, but interestingly that, I think that maybe was less so to do. Well, partly training, partly also because going up the west coast of like Cornwall, um, the wind was always coming from my left. So I had to always paddle because I wasn't that good, I guess on the one side to kind of counter the winds. And I think that kind of put extra pressure on my, on my wrist. Interestingly. Um, question here about how did you decide on which type of, um, standard paddle board to use. And, um, so what, what size of board did you use? Was it? Um, so I had a, a 12, six and a 13, two. So I started off, um, on the shorter one, which was ever so slightly wider. So it was more stable on the water while I was sort of finding my feet as it were. And then once I just crossed over the Irish sea, um, and I was feeling more confident than I swapped onto the slightly quicker board. Um, okay. Great. Thank you. And I think we just got a couple more questions. Yeah. Um, we kind of covered this, but Jennifer, you did have sponsors, but, um, did, did they cover all the costs? I think I, I know we answered that one. They covered none of the costs. So I just had kit sponsors. So I mean, even just that was, you know, incredibly welcome and definitely helped. Um, yeah. So they kind of provided the boards and clothing. Um, and then sort of other bits of kit. Um, that I needed, but no, no cash whatsoever. Unfortunately. Um, would you, would you do a, would you do an adventure on a, I know you've, you've got loads of other things planned, but would you do a similar adventure like this again on a paddle board or, or is it kind of done and you've spent eight and, you know, 81 days on a board. And you kind of, it's one of those. Um, I would quite like to do another paddle board adventure. Um, maybe somewhere that is slightly more sheltered than the British coastline. So maybe something in the Mediterranean would be quite nice. Uh, so it's warmer, clear seas. Um, I think that would be really interesting. Great. Um, I'm, we'll finish with this one because Jenny asks, Liam sounded like a rock as a real superstar. What qualities of his character did you most embrace and welcome throughout? Oh, um, he had a real kind of ability to just get stuck in. Like even if, like I'd never asked him to do anything and he, I just turned around and he'd be like helping in some way. Like, I think that was, you know, just invaluable to be able to have someone that just, just get stuck in. Cause that's kind of what you need. Um, but it was, it was also kind of, um, really open to the fact that we have no idea, like how this is going to work. We don't know how long it's going to take and that kind of person that's adaptable and you can kind of get along with and makes the most of it. I think is super valuable in any team as well as a, you know, an adventure team. Yeah. Sounds great. Spend 80 because he was there for the whole trip. Was he 80? He had a family holiday booked. I think in Spain. So you had a week off halfway through, but other than that, he was there the whole way. Brilliant. That's quite something to suddenly pick from obscurity to kind of spend that much time with someone. Yeah. Um, yeah. Thank you very much. I'm sorry to people who've put the questions in that we've not had enough time to answer those, but I really appreciate you, um, chatting this evening. And, um, thanks for sharing your presentation. Fantastic pictures there. Um, just we talked about winning, uh, a copy of the owner's book. So I'm just going to add a little link to how you can, um, enter to win. I've got two copies to give away. Sign copies. So, um, you've got till Sunday to enter that. So please go ahead and do that. And, um, yeah, I think, um, paddleboarding certainly taken off in terms of popularity. And, um, which is great with, we're stocking paddleboards for the first time this, this summer as well. So I think everywhere you'll be looking when you go to the beaches and the lakes now will be full of paddleboarders. Yeah, definitely. It's great. It's a great way to get on the water, isn't it? It is. Yeah. Very much. So thank you very much for your time. Yeah. I really appreciate that. Great talk. And, um, yeah, we'll, uh, we've got some more talks coming up next week on navigation and, um, and the week after as well. So if anyone's interested in those, please check out the website and, um, hope to see you all for those talks as well. Thank you very much. Good night. Bye. Bye.