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Wander the World: Extreme open swimmer Ryan Stramrood on his many adventures · Wander the World with Pippa Hudson

0:00
Speaker 1: Time for us to wander the world, and in our travels.
0:02
Speaker 1: Today we're speaking to someone who truly has wandered the world,
0:05
Speaker 1: usually into very far flung corners of the world that
0:08
Speaker 1: have one thing in common, not so many fellow tourists,
0:11
Speaker 1: and a whole lot of very cold water. Ryan Stranrood
0:15
Speaker 1: is an extreme open water and ice swimmer, a multiple
0:18
Speaker 1: Guinness World Record holder, and an inspirational speaker. We've had
0:21
Speaker 1: him on the show many times before talking about individual swimmers,
0:24
Speaker 1: but today I just want to pick his brain about
0:26
Speaker 1: some of the most memorable places his sport has taken
0:29
Speaker 1: him too, everywhere from Alaska to South America to the
0:33
Speaker 1: furthest reaches of Russia and destinations that did their best
0:37
Speaker 1: to kill him in the mix as well. Ryan, I'm
0:39
Speaker 1: really looking forward to this conversation. It's great to have
0:41
Speaker 1: you in studio again.
0:42
Speaker 2: Thanks for having me back the pleasure.
0:44
Speaker 3: Such a cool topic.
0:45
Speaker 1: Before we get traveling, let's just remind listeners about you know,
0:49
Speaker 1: it's one thing to talk about where you go, but
0:51
Speaker 1: why you go and why you do this? What was
0:53
Speaker 1: it that first got you plunging into freezing cold water.
0:56
Speaker 3: It's been such a journey Pepper. You know, just the
0:59
Speaker 3: cold waters around Cape Town is where I started it,
1:01
Speaker 3: you know, just getting off the couch, just at the
1:04
Speaker 3: age of thirty, being a couch potato and starting to
1:07
Speaker 3: figure out that actually I enjoy the swimming thing and
1:09
Speaker 3: the element of cold really challenges me. And that took
1:13
Speaker 3: me on this journey. You meet a bunch of like
1:15
Speaker 3: minded mates and all of a sudden, opportunity you do
1:18
Speaker 3: something that that kind of pings on the world's radar,
1:21
Speaker 3: and all of a sudden you invited to all kinds
1:22
Speaker 3: of places to push further boundaries. And that's where the
1:25
Speaker 3: journey's been, and.
1:26
Speaker 2: It's a journey that continues to this day.
1:28
Speaker 1: I mean, we last heard you chatting to John Matham
1:30
Speaker 1: a couple of weeks ago about the latest swimmer around
1:32
Speaker 1: Saint Elina Island.
1:34
Speaker 2: Are you already planning the next big one?
1:36
Speaker 3: Oh? You know, it's in the back of my head.
1:39
Speaker 3: But no, I have to officially say no, I cannot
1:42
Speaker 3: because soon as I start planning it, it just becomes
1:44
Speaker 3: obsessive and I keep going. So Santa Elena is still
1:48
Speaker 3: very fresh. That was forty eight kilometers of solo swimming,
1:50
Speaker 3: and it it was quite quite hard and draining on
1:54
Speaker 3: the body and the bank account as well.
1:56
Speaker 2: Yeah, okay, fair enough.
1:58
Speaker 1: And just by the way, we're going to be talking
1:59
Speaker 1: about sint Alena from the maritime perspective with Brian Incan
2:02
Speaker 1: later on today. Just fortuitously, he wrote in to say,
2:05
Speaker 1: I want to talk about the ships that traveled between
2:08
Speaker 1: Cape Town and Jamestown, So that'll be on the menu
2:11
Speaker 1: again at quarter to three this afternoon for those who
2:13
Speaker 1: are interested. But I mean Cintelena relatively mild compared to
2:19
Speaker 1: some of the extreme environments that you have swum in.
2:21
Speaker 1: I mean, looking at the list of destinations that you've
2:24
Speaker 1: picked out as among the most memorable, it's everywhere from
2:27
Speaker 1: the very far northern tip of Russia to the very
2:30
Speaker 1: southern reaches of South America, places where there is it
2:33
Speaker 1: would appear at first more ice than water to swim in.
2:36
Speaker 2: Ryan, I mean, do you is the.
2:38
Speaker 1: Ability to go and see places like that that very
2:40
Speaker 1: few people get to ever part of the attraction of
2:44
Speaker 1: what you do, or sort of a side effect that
2:45
Speaker 1: happens to be quite.
2:46
Speaker 2: A nice one.
2:46
Speaker 3: Well, it started as a side effect, and then it's
2:49
Speaker 3: become one of the best, the most privileged things that
2:52
Speaker 3: I think I've ever been been able to boast about,
2:55
Speaker 3: you know, and I'm always there, never as a tourist,
2:57
Speaker 3: always there as a swimmer trying to take on some
3:00
Speaker 3: thing really difficult, and I'm nervous, and quite often, you know,
3:04
Speaker 3: you're always well for me, not quite often, always on
3:06
Speaker 3: a shoestring budget, and you end up staying with locals
3:09
Speaker 3: and with families, so you're not in hotels, you're not
3:11
Speaker 3: doing the touristy things. So I'm in, in fact, a
3:14
Speaker 3: lot of the places I've been there on hotels. They
3:15
Speaker 3: probably don't even know what a hotel is. So yeah,
3:19
Speaker 3: I'm just blessed to have seen some of this world's
3:21
Speaker 3: craziest places. I've experienced it in a very different way to.
3:24
Speaker 1: Most, so, I mean it's very hard to even know
3:26
Speaker 1: where to start. And looking at the map, i mean,
3:29
Speaker 1: let's start with the Americas. As I said, you've traveled
3:32
Speaker 1: right the way from Alaska and the North down to
3:34
Speaker 1: the southernmost reaches of Chile. What was the most remote
3:37
Speaker 1: spot you would say that you went to.
3:39
Speaker 3: Most remote was definitely the Diremede Islands. Yeah, and that's
3:43
Speaker 3: a fascinating story, and I've actually been there twice, believe
3:47
Speaker 3: it or not. And I've got a wonderful little accolade
3:49
Speaker 3: that I love sharing is that I turned forty years
3:51
Speaker 3: old twice. I went once with a whole group, international
3:55
Speaker 3: group who were trying to be the first in the
3:57
Speaker 3: world to relay from mainland Russia all the way across
4:01
Speaker 3: to mainland Alaska in the Bearing Sea. And it's really
4:04
Speaker 3: wild and difficult and right in the middle of that
4:07
Speaker 3: Bearing Sea or these two little clumps of rock really
4:09
Speaker 3: one's called Big Diomede, which its real name is Ratmanova,
4:12
Speaker 3: which is a Russian island, and right three point eight
4:15
Speaker 3: kilometers away from that is an American island called Little Diomede.
4:19
Speaker 3: And I decided I want to try and solo swim
4:23
Speaker 3: be the first solo man to swim from Russia to America.
4:28
Speaker 3: And that year it turned out to be a complete journey,
4:30
Speaker 3: and obviously through that you end up spending some time
4:33
Speaker 3: on the island and it's fascinating.
4:35
Speaker 1: But the two birthday has been because you crossed the
4:37
Speaker 1: international dateline.
4:39
Speaker 3: Yes, yeah, it's with a relay attempt. And we were
4:41
Speaker 3: on a big ship and we were in Russian waters.
4:45
Speaker 3: And I turned forty years old on that ship. I'd
4:49
Speaker 3: love to if we have time, I'd tell that story.
4:51
Speaker 3: And then we went across into America. I've got to
4:54
Speaker 3: get this right. It was a few years ago and
4:57
Speaker 3: the weather turned bad and we ran out of being
5:00
Speaker 3: on a Russian ship. We weren't allowed in the American waters,
5:03
Speaker 3: so we had to go back into Russian water, which
5:05
Speaker 3: was literally a few kilometers on the other side of
5:07
Speaker 3: this imaginary line. And I turned thirty nine again, so
5:11
Speaker 3: because it's a day, it's a day late, or that,
5:14
Speaker 3: you know, I might have which way around it was
5:17
Speaker 3: very wrong. But then then the time caught up again
5:19
Speaker 3: and I turned forty again, so I had two forty.
5:21
Speaker 2: So in I love that.
5:22
Speaker 1: So these islands are three point eight kilometers apart, but
5:25
Speaker 1: nearly a full day or twenty.
5:27
Speaker 3: One hours in time.
5:29
Speaker 2: Yeah, amazing.
5:30
Speaker 1: And I mean that water to do that crossing? What
5:33
Speaker 1: sort of water temperature are we talking?
5:35
Speaker 3: It was meant to be six degrees but it turned
5:38
Speaker 3: out to be three point two degrees, and that is
5:40
Speaker 3: one of the one of the swims. But that I
5:42
Speaker 3: can't claim as having succeeded. Again a massive story. We
5:46
Speaker 3: ran out of We didn't get permission to go swim
5:48
Speaker 3: into the Russian waters, and the Ratmanova Island is actually
5:51
Speaker 3: a military base, and it's quite quite hectic. If you're
5:55
Speaker 3: in a speeder in three degree water and you swim
5:56
Speaker 3: then and then you get arrested, you're not going to
5:58
Speaker 3: last very long. So we lost a lot of our
6:01
Speaker 3: American support crew through the insurance via the insurance permits,
6:06
Speaker 3: et cetera. Yeah, yeah, yeah, So anyway, I ended up
6:09
Speaker 3: swimming three point eight kilometers from Russia into the USA,
6:13
Speaker 3: but I didn't go from the actual island to the
6:15
Speaker 3: other island, which which is would allow me to claim
6:17
Speaker 3: the record. But while still an experience of notes And.
6:20
Speaker 1: I mean when that happens, I mean, as you know,
6:23
Speaker 1: the kind of extreme tasks you undertake, it's a given
6:26
Speaker 1: that you're not always going to succeed.
6:28
Speaker 2: Does that haunt you and bug you?
6:30
Speaker 1: And is the part of your brain going, I've got
6:32
Speaker 1: to go back and finish it one day, or have
6:33
Speaker 1: you reached the point where you were able to go
6:35
Speaker 1: it wasn't my day, I'm going to move on to
6:37
Speaker 1: something else.
6:38
Speaker 3: Yeah, a little bit of both. Actually, it does sit
6:40
Speaker 3: with me. I would still love to go and do that,
6:42
Speaker 3: but you know, just for your listeners. I flew from
6:44
Speaker 3: Cape Town to joe Burg, joe Burg to London, London
6:48
Speaker 3: to New York, New York to Anchorage, Anchorage to Nome
6:52
Speaker 3: to Wales, and then I got on a boat went
6:54
Speaker 3: to the island. So it's not around the corner. It's
6:57
Speaker 3: quite a commute. So I would love to do it.
6:59
Speaker 3: It doesn't haunt me necessarily. It's part of my story,
7:01
Speaker 3: it's part of the growth. Would I like to tick
7:04
Speaker 3: it off?
7:05
Speaker 1: You would watch this space one day to the list
7:08
Speaker 1: of one day now. I mean some of the destinations
7:11
Speaker 1: on your list of famous swims are more recognizable Shwire
7:15
Speaker 1: in particular in Argentina. Anybody who's gone on a cruise
7:18
Speaker 1: to the Antarctic knows that that's the traditional jumping off point. You,
7:22
Speaker 1: of course, experienced it from a very different perspective.
7:25
Speaker 2: I did.
7:25
Speaker 3: Yes, I've actually once again. I've been there twice, once
7:27
Speaker 3: when I was going to Antarctica and another time when
7:31
Speaker 3: I was going to try with a group of Mays
7:33
Speaker 3: to try and swim. We're doing a trilogy of swims
7:35
Speaker 3: and we're going to Cape Horn Island, but we also
7:37
Speaker 3: wanted to go and swim the Beagle Channel. Which is
7:41
Speaker 3: on the other side almost facing a Shwire, And that's
7:44
Speaker 3: a little place also on my list called Porto Williams.
7:47
Speaker 3: And Porter Williams and a Shwire compete with each other
7:50
Speaker 3: and both claim to be the southernmost town in the world,
7:53
Speaker 3: so there's a little bit of rivalry. You can literally
7:55
Speaker 3: see the one from the other. We were based in
7:57
Speaker 3: Porter Williams, which I would say is much smaller than
8:03
Speaker 3: but I think that the question is are they really
8:05
Speaker 3: a town. They had one little coffee shop that smelt
8:07
Speaker 3: like petrol the entire time that and we were based
8:10
Speaker 3: there for about a week trying to swim that Beagle Channeld.
8:13
Speaker 3: You get to know a place that's only got one
8:14
Speaker 3: coffee shop quite well in a week. Yeah.
8:16
Speaker 2: And it's people.
8:17
Speaker 1: I mean, you've said that you often stay with locals
8:19
Speaker 1: when you're drink swims like this, right, I mean, what
8:21
Speaker 1: does that add to your experience as a traveler, to
8:24
Speaker 1: be home staying rather than having a hotel.
8:27
Speaker 3: Experience amazing And it's very lucky because you see things
8:30
Speaker 3: you would never see. You learn a little bit of
8:32
Speaker 3: the culture, you eat at the dinner table with them,
8:34
Speaker 3: you learn what real hospitality is. I mean when nobody's
8:38
Speaker 3: coming into their lives and they so often, more often
8:41
Speaker 3: than not, what's laid on for us, it's just incredible.
8:44
Speaker 3: You know, people move out of their bedrooms and room
8:46
Speaker 3: they all sleep on the floor, and you feel guilty
8:49
Speaker 3: sleeping in someone's been Like in a place called Ponterenas,
8:52
Speaker 3: where we based for a week. We're trying to swim
8:53
Speaker 3: the mcgallon Magellan Channel, and yeah, we stayed with a
8:58
Speaker 3: wonderful family looked off us. In fact, they fetched us
9:01
Speaker 3: at the airport and they fetched us in this van
9:05
Speaker 3: and at when we walked to the van, there was
9:08
Speaker 3: this brightly colored cob with our big life sized images
9:12
Speaker 3: of us on the site. Oh my god, which was
9:15
Speaker 3: all in speeders, which was exceptionally embarrassing but absolutely unique
9:20
Speaker 3: as well. They'd gone they were so excited about us
9:22
Speaker 3: coming and us making this attempt on the swim in
9:24
Speaker 3: their little town and stay with them, that they'd gone
9:26
Speaker 3: through all this trouble and branded their van for us.
9:28
Speaker 1: I mean, I was just amazed that they would make
9:30
Speaker 1: the effort to come and get you at the airport,
9:32
Speaker 1: learn to put you on the side of the van.
9:33
Speaker 2: I love that story.
9:35
Speaker 1: We're talking to Ryan strmrout Extreme Swimmer about some of
9:37
Speaker 1: his travels to some of the most far flung corners
9:39
Speaker 1: of the globe with the coldest water and very little
9:42
Speaker 1: in the way of sort of tourist infrastructure, And if
9:45
Speaker 1: you've got questions for him, you're very welcome to ask them.
9:48
Speaker 1: Keith has sent in a question asking how long it
9:51
Speaker 1: normally takes your body to get back to normal temperature
9:53
Speaker 1: after a swim.
9:54
Speaker 3: Yeah, Keith, thanks for the question. That is a little
9:58
Speaker 3: bit hot, long as a piece of string, but depends
9:59
Speaker 3: how cold and how long you've been in the water.
10:01
Speaker 3: But a lot of what I do when it's extremely
10:03
Speaker 3: cold water from zero degree celsius to say, from five
10:07
Speaker 3: down to zero, I won't be in for too long.
10:09
Speaker 3: Thirty two minutes is the longest, and it was an
10:12
Speaker 3: Antarctica and it took probably you don't know, your core
10:15
Speaker 3: temperature takes a lot longer, but you probably stop shivering
10:20
Speaker 3: in that within forty five minutes to an hour. I'm
10:22
Speaker 3: a big shiverer. You know. Everyone thinks, because I've been
10:25
Speaker 3: doing these icy cold swims for the last twenty years
10:28
Speaker 3: that I don't feel the cold, but you know, I
10:30
Speaker 3: come out the way I did a swim this weekend,
10:32
Speaker 3: and I stand there shivering on sudden looks like, but
10:34
Speaker 3: I thought you were the guy doesn't shiver. I always
10:36
Speaker 3: have to tell him, no, I hate the cold just
10:37
Speaker 3: as much as anyone else. But it's been such a
10:40
Speaker 3: fascinating classroom for me.
10:41
Speaker 2: Yeah.
10:41
Speaker 1: Yeah, learning to master that, I'm sure a mental challenge.
10:45
Speaker 3: Much humans haven't evolved well to handle the cold, but
10:48
Speaker 3: we've evolved very well to avoid it. So you you
10:50
Speaker 3: know the things that happen in your head and your
10:52
Speaker 3: body when you expose yourself to temperatures that are going
10:55
Speaker 3: to kill you. Eventually, all these subconscious defense mechanisms come
10:59
Speaker 3: bounding to the foe, and when you repeat it enough,
11:02
Speaker 3: you begin to understand it, and you begin to understand, however, Zealous,
11:05
Speaker 3: this wonderful protection defense mechanism that you've got is, And
11:09
Speaker 3: once you understand it, you start to see where else
11:12
Speaker 3: you apply it, not just in the cold water, but
11:14
Speaker 3: in all aspects of life and interest. It's become a
11:16
Speaker 3: great classroom for me. That's what I preached around the
11:18
Speaker 3: world at the moment.
11:19
Speaker 1: Yeah, Ryan, I mean, you talked about your body's defense
11:22
Speaker 1: mechanisms to stop something that could kill it. Some of
11:25
Speaker 1: your swimmers have come close. They've done their very best
11:28
Speaker 1: to try and kill you, and one in particular of
11:30
Speaker 1: Northern Ireland, I gather it came very close. Indeed, won't
11:33
Speaker 1: you share that story with us?
11:35
Speaker 3: Yeah, I was trying. There's a very well known channel
11:37
Speaker 3: called the North Channel, so it's a few notches up
11:40
Speaker 3: from the English Channel. The water is a lot colder,
11:44
Speaker 3: and I was very it was very much my time
11:46
Speaker 3: to swim it. I was ready for it. I'd done
11:48
Speaker 3: the training, everything was right, and off I went. And
11:51
Speaker 3: I didn't get a very nice day, but I can't
11:53
Speaker 3: blame that. That was my decision to go. I was
11:56
Speaker 3: advised not to, but I went anyway, and about six
11:59
Speaker 3: hours into the and it was about eleven and a
12:01
Speaker 3: half to twelve and a half degree celsius, which when
12:04
Speaker 3: you're just in a speedo goggles and cap for you listens,
12:06
Speaker 3: there's no wetsuits or anything like that involved, that sucks
12:10
Speaker 3: the life out of you quite quickly. And everything went
12:13
Speaker 3: perfectly well for me up till about five and a
12:15
Speaker 3: half hours, and all of a sudden the wheels fell off.
12:17
Speaker 3: And what turned out, is to cut the long story short,
12:19
Speaker 3: is I had contracted something called SIPE, which I'd never
12:22
Speaker 3: heard of at the time, and that is swimming induced
12:24
Speaker 3: pulmri edema. Good Heaven and a combination no one really knows,
12:28
Speaker 3: but a combination of the freezing water and a lack
12:30
Speaker 3: of sleep and maybe some medication I took for pain,
12:34
Speaker 3: aches and pains and lots of other things, and ingesting
12:37
Speaker 3: a lot of salt water as well upset a chemical
12:40
Speaker 3: balance inside me, and my lungs were filling up with
12:43
Speaker 3: water and the problem so you're slowly drowning, but you
12:46
Speaker 3: don't really know it. And I'm so trained to know
12:49
Speaker 3: that I'm going to feel terrible, and I'm so conditioned
12:52
Speaker 3: to push past what I need to and to not
12:54
Speaker 3: be soft and to understand it. But this was just
12:58
Speaker 3: next level. And of course lack of oxygen to my
13:00
Speaker 3: brain made my thought process even slower and worse, and
13:04
Speaker 3: all of a sudden I kind of blacked out in
13:06
Speaker 3: a film. The next thing, I was in the boat.
13:08
Speaker 3: That's the last next thing I remember, So yeah, that
13:10
Speaker 3: was And then two nights in a far northern Irish
13:14
Speaker 3: hospital was not fun. Having my lungs drained.
13:18
Speaker 1: I mean, thank heavens, that is why there is a
13:20
Speaker 1: support boat with you on all of these swims.
13:22
Speaker 2: But I mean, what a story. We've got a caller.
13:25
Speaker 1: On the line who wants to say something to you
13:27
Speaker 1: because I believe he's had the experience of swimming with Ryan.
13:30
Speaker 1: Jeff is on the line from Parl Good afternoon.
13:32
Speaker 4: Jeff, Hey, Ryan host Man. We met on the weekend
13:37
Speaker 4: and I introduced myself to you. Yes, I remember to
13:39
Speaker 4: give it the fast paces for this year. Man, I
13:42
Speaker 4: just want to say thank you. You were absolutely inspirational
13:45
Speaker 4: in getting me off my couch ran into the water
13:51
Speaker 4: and we both know why. And all I'm saying is
13:55
Speaker 4: thank you very much. And you are on the inspiration.
13:58
Speaker 4: I've read your book and I want to get more
14:01
Speaker 4: people to say, hey, listen swimming and see it's amazing
14:03
Speaker 4: for so many reasons. And I just need to say
14:08
Speaker 4: thank you because you have physically changed.
14:10
Speaker 2: My life, my mental well being.
14:13
Speaker 4: You know what water does for us. And yeah, and
14:17
Speaker 4: next year I'm going to give you a better run
14:19
Speaker 4: for your money.
14:20
Speaker 3: I love that, Jeff, thanks so much for taking the
14:22
Speaker 3: time to call it. That makes me feel good.
14:24
Speaker 1: Amazing, cool, Jeff, Thank you so much. I mean, drop
14:27
Speaker 1: the mic and leave the studio, right. I mean, that's
14:29
Speaker 1: why you do what you do, right, it is.
14:31
Speaker 3: And I appreciate jeff school very much. But I'm so
14:34
Speaker 3: blessed to be able to encourage a lot of people
14:36
Speaker 3: and help a lot of people, not just in swimming
14:38
Speaker 3: as well, you know, just with how they think and
14:40
Speaker 3: how they.
14:41
Speaker 1: Perform, because I mean that is the message of your
14:43
Speaker 1: inspirational speaking is taking the lessons you've learned from your
14:46
Speaker 1: sport and applying them to the rest of life.
14:48
Speaker 3: Correct joint parallel to high higher performance sport and high
14:52
Speaker 3: performance business and all that you know for the sales pitch,
14:55
Speaker 3: but you know, it extends a lot further than that.
14:58
Speaker 3: You know, what you learn, what I've learned in the
15:00
Speaker 3: I don't try to get people into the cold necessarily,
15:02
Speaker 3: but I take the lessons that I've learned and have
15:04
Speaker 3: pushed and what I've managed to achieve, and I draw
15:08
Speaker 3: beautiful parallels and it's thankfully helped a lot of people.
15:11
Speaker 2: That's great, Jeff, so appreciate that call. Thank you.
15:14
Speaker 1: We've also received a voice note that's coming on seven
15:16
Speaker 1: two five six seven one five six seven.
15:19
Speaker 2: Can we take a listen to that?
15:21
Speaker 3: Join it from one to ask Ryan a question, and
15:26
Speaker 3: it's just interesting, you know, I.
15:27
Speaker 2: Mean flats everywhere, goes everywhere.
15:29
Speaker 3: I've just been there for twenty years. How does he
15:31
Speaker 3: fund it? How do you fund it?
15:33
Speaker 4: Ryan?
15:34
Speaker 3: How do you fund this whole lifestyle? Yeah, a million
15:38
Speaker 3: dollar question, the question, you know part and I say,
15:41
Speaker 3: that's very sincerely. A large part of every challenge I've
15:44
Speaker 3: done is being able to fund it. And you know
15:48
Speaker 3: I've recently you mentioned, I've just been to Santa Leanna
15:51
Speaker 3: Island and once again I actually don't have the money
15:53
Speaker 3: for it. I have the credit for it. And I
15:57
Speaker 3: sat there with my partner Leeder Ekka, and I've said, no,
16:00
Speaker 3: I'm not going to do it. It would be too irresponsible,
16:03
Speaker 3: and then reminded myself that every single swim I've ever
16:07
Speaker 3: done has been an irresponsible financial decision. But look where
16:10
Speaker 3: it's got me, and look what it's taught me, and
16:12
Speaker 3: look the growth I have had. So that doesn't answer
16:15
Speaker 3: John's question, but it's all I'd say, ninety five percent
16:19
Speaker 3: self funded, and that is I save for it, and
16:22
Speaker 3: I have to work extremely hard, and I have to
16:25
Speaker 3: do it on a shoestring budget and make a plan.
16:29
Speaker 3: It's part of it, really is part of the challenge.
16:30
Speaker 3: In fact, that's something that Lewis Pugh taught me back
16:32
Speaker 3: in the day. That is very much part of your
16:35
Speaker 3: challenges is funding it and getting there. And it's exceptionally
16:38
Speaker 3: easy to say no, exception easy to say I can't
16:42
Speaker 3: afford it, and maybe that's sometimes a responsible thing to do.
16:45
Speaker 3: If I'd said no all the times I should have
16:46
Speaker 3: said no, my life would look very different and definitely
16:50
Speaker 3: not nearly as rich Cay.
16:52
Speaker 1: So the final question to circle back to the travel
16:54
Speaker 1: aspect of your story, Ryan, is there one destination that
16:57
Speaker 1: that sort of has a special warm spot in your
16:59
Speaker 1: heart a partner not for the warmth of the water,
17:03
Speaker 1: but a part of the pun but just as a
17:05
Speaker 1: destination that you walked away from thinking, Wow, I'm so
17:09
Speaker 1: glad I got to see this part of the world.
17:11
Speaker 4: Yes.
17:12
Speaker 3: Firstly, the Yokutsian region in Russia was most certainly the
17:16
Speaker 3: most unique. I wish I could spend more time there.
17:19
Speaker 3: We were off to do the bearing Reland. We flew
17:21
Speaker 3: from Moscow in a big plane that with a whole
17:24
Speaker 3: bunch of people. The plane. I don't know how the
17:26
Speaker 3: thing got in the air, but we had to stop
17:28
Speaker 3: over somewhere in the middle of like central Russia, and
17:31
Speaker 3: we attended a charm in I hope I'm pronouncing that
17:34
Speaker 3: writer ceremony, and it was just fascinating. And the other one,
17:38
Speaker 3: which is my personal is Gnome in Alaska. Now, I'm
17:42
Speaker 3: a big watcher of a show called gold Rush, Yeah,
17:45
Speaker 3: and gold Divers and all these things, and I've done
17:47
Speaker 3: it long before I was ever thinking I did get
17:50
Speaker 3: to know. I didn't even know the place really existed,
17:52
Speaker 3: you know, it looks like fairy tales. And then all
17:54
Speaker 3: of a sudden I found myself in Nome in a pub,
17:57
Speaker 3: sitting with the Palmernkis and all the characters off the
18:00
Speaker 3: show I'd be watching for years and having a fine
18:04
Speaker 3: time with them. And Gnome is just such a unique
18:07
Speaker 3: you know. I certainly don't recommend it as a destination
18:11
Speaker 3: to put on your list, but for me it had
18:13
Speaker 3: special meaning and love. I've now been there twice, and
18:15
Speaker 3: you know, always being attached to some crazy, hectic challenge,
18:19
Speaker 3: you know, I suppose it gives it a little more mystery.
18:21
Speaker 3: Plus the TV show and me being in an episode
18:25
Speaker 3: almost in my own way, like.
18:26
Speaker 1: Waking up in the middle of an episode of rivals
18:28
Speaker 1: in the British countryside and.
18:30
Speaker 2: Wondering, oh you got there quite in the same skill right.
18:33
Speaker 1: It's been wonderful chatting to you and catching up, and
18:35
Speaker 1: thanks for both the travel aspect and this more philosophical
18:39
Speaker 1: life skills aspect of the conversation. I think you could
18:42
Speaker 1: hear from the nature of the messages that it really
18:44
Speaker 1: does impact people hearing these stories, so thanks for sharing
18:47
Speaker 1: them with us. And I know there is some saving
18:49
Speaker 1: to be done until the next big adventure, but when
18:51
Speaker 1: you're ready to take it on, let us know where
18:52
Speaker 1: you're heading and we'll gladly follow you vicariously.
18:56
Speaker 3: Thank you so much. Thanks for the interest, but I
18:59
Speaker 3: really appreciate it, and I will certainly let you know
19:01
Speaker 3: what's next, because there always is something.
19:03
Speaker 2: He's always going to be a next, He's never going
19:04
Speaker 2: to stop. Ryan strom Rude, thanks for joining us.