My new book - How to Get to the North Pole: and Other Iconic Adventures - is now on sale. You can buy it from me, on Amazon or in your local book shop. If you are so desperate to get your hands on a copy that you can't read any more then just click here to buy it now. But for those who recognise that good things come to those who wait, below is a little more information about the book, what's in it and wher ...

Just a quick note to let you know that, due to "health reasons", I won't be planning any more projects for a while. That includes finishing our cycle from the Scilly to Shetland Isles and swimming the Thames. Hopefully I'll be back soon. The blog will continue as normal. In other more exciting news: The Book Sales of the book seem to be coming along alright. Thanks to everyone who's bought a copy so far. It ...

Expeditions to the North and South Poles have a lot in common and it can be easy to assume that they are both pretty much the same - cold and white. However, they are very different in a number of ways. Below are some of them. [divide] [box type="note" bg="#ebebeb" color="#111" font="arial" fontsize="13" border="#a6a6a6" head="How To Get To The South Pole" headbg="#21417b" headcolor="#fff"]This is an edited ...

Whenever I told people that a recent client of mine, Sarah Outen, had rowed a boat from Australia to Mauritius, the most common source of beffudlement was where you sleep on an ocean rowing boat. This was usually followed by some curiosity about how such a tiny boat would survive out at sea. Below are some answers to those questions. [divide] [box type="note" bg="#ebebeb" color="#111" font="arial" fontsize= ...

Recent years have seen a spate of young sailors taking to the waves in an attempt to become the youngest person to complete a solo and unsupported circumnavigation. There are debates about which journeys were made entirely unsupported and those which were non-stop but below are some of the sailors included in the lists: [divide] [box type="note" bg="#ebebeb" color="#111" font="arial" fontsize="13" border="# ...

I like to think that there are three options for hauling large volumes of supplies across a deserts: cars, camels and carts. The former two methods are utilised frequently but examples of the latter, carts, are fewer and further between. Below are a few notable carts that have been used to cross deserts and there's a series of videos at the bottom too. [divide] [box type="note" bg="#ebebeb" color="#111"  fo ...

Walking and climbing on high mountains brings additional risks from the lack of oxygen in the air. Below I have given a very brief description of Altitude Mountain Sickness (AMS) and some basic advice for acclimatisation. [divide] [box type="note" bg="#ebebeb" color="#111" font="arial" fontsize="13" border="#a6a6a6" head="How To Climb An Unclimbed Mountain" headbg="#21417b" headcolor="#fff"]This is an edite ...

The first record of someone pedalling around the world is Englishman Thomas Stevens' 13,000 mile journey by Penny Farthing in 1884 carrying little more than a spare shirt, a change of socks and a pistol. Much has changed since then – in particular there is less need for firearm – but the essence remains much the same: you can go a long way with a bicycle and a sense of adventure. Skipping forward a hundred ...

While researching my book, I contacted lots of different explorers and adventurers and asked them to contribute a top tip in their given field. It was impossible to include all of them in the book however so I will publish some of the extra ones on this website. These ten tips come from Charlie Paton of Extreme Outdoor Adventures. Charlie is an ex-Royal Marine and ex-biathlete who was part of the first Brit ...

The North Pole does not lie on a land mass but in the middle of the Arctic Ocean. For the most part, it is frozen over and hence, at the right time of year, it is possible to travel there on foot, ski, dog sled or similar. The question of its location is slightly more complicated than you might assume as there are a total of four different North Poles. Their varying locations and the different means by whic ...

I didn't write the entire contents of my book all on my own. I had help. Here are the great people who assisted me with the chapter on How To Cross A Desert: Charles Foster Charles Foster is a traveller, author, barrister, and a Fellow of Green Templeton College, University of Oxford. Much of his life is spent in deserts. His desert experience includes expeditions in the Sahara, the Sinai and the Danakil De ...

It may be surprising to learn that desert travellers often live for many weeks and months at a time, working hard in hot conditions with only a few litres of water each day. Conventional wisdom may dictate drinking many times more (up to ten litres in some instances) for that level of exertion in those temperatures but evidence from desert expeditions indicates that, if properly managed, you can safely oper ...