The Outdoors Station

Andy and I undertake, once again with recorders in hand, the 2015 TGO Challenge. A 200 mile backpacking event walking from the west coast to the east coast of Scotland organised by The Great Outdoors magazine. Limited to 300 participants, this event is unique, as it isn’t a race or competition, but purely exhists to promote fellowship amongst backpackers who come to join us from all over the world. In this episode you’ll hear Andy arrive at Shiel Bridge where he meets up with Challenge friends new and old, for a wild night before setting out on Friday 8th of May. Rose and I set off the same day from Glenelg. As you’ll hear we are all thrilled and in some way, confused to be enjoying fine weather to equal our high spirits. It isn’t often the TGOC starts this way. This is the first day of the 2015 TGO Challenge.

In 2 days time we will be starting the TGO Challenge 2015 200 mile walk across Scotland and I wanted to update people as to the delay in the release of recent podcasts. We have now had illness, injury and the backpackinglight outdoor show in the last few weeks. We will be recording the walk this year, so stay tuned for some epic stories!

“I got to Notre Dame cathedral in Paris late yesterday evening. A totally arbitrary finish point. But not as corny, nor quite as far, as the Eiffel Tower. The last day was a 14 hour non-stop forty mile hike. There was frost, wind, sun, rain. My ankle, though complaining, held out. Some eejit tried to mug me on the quais in the last mile to Notre Dame and was most surprised by my spirited response. And having missed the night bus back to London I slept in a patch of brambles in the Bois de Boulogne. And got on the bus to London this morning. I think, all in all, it was a joyful month of walking, but to be honest, at the moment, it feels like it never happened. But then it's a funny old world out there.” Is the final paragraph on Jasper's website The Slow Adventure which draws Jasper’s mini adventure to a close. In this second podcast you’ll hear all about it and other unwritten challenges.

"When I set off to walk from Munich to Paris in early November 2014 one of the aspects of a long winter trip where I would be sleeping out in a hammock under a tarpaulin for more than a month were the long hours of darkness. I was apprehensive that spending more than 14 hours a day in darkness would be oppressive, or boring, or genuinely take me off into corners - dark corners - of my mind that I'd rather not visit or revisit" Is the opening paragraph from Jasper's website relating to this recent slow Winter adventure in Germany and France. This is part one of an interview looking at the various aspects of such a long walk through the landscape.

On 5th August 2014, Ash Dykes age 23, from Wales U.K, became the first known person to complete a solo & unsupported walk across Mongolia, the second largest landlocked country in the world. He pulled all of his provisions on a wheeled cart weighing 120kg, from West to East, covering 1,500 miles in just 78 days, knocking a staggering 22 days off his predicted time. The threat from Wolves, snakes, guard dogs, dehydration, sandstorms and snow blizzards, are only a few of the many dangers he faced whilst traversing the Altai Mountains, Gobi Desert & Mongolian Steppe. I caught up with him on the first night of his UK theatre tour to hear more about his unique journey.

To make this experience different the two ladies in my life joined me as I headed into wet Wales (once again) to Llantony Abbey. Rose and Pip our Springer Spaniel 18 month old dog. It was the Pip's first time wild camping and we hoped she would enjoy it. Camping in the snow and sub zero temperatures was the only concern as we didn't want to put her off future adventures. We survived and here's the podcast to tell the tale. Includes a review of the Aarn Featherlite Freedom Pack.

The Wild Camp series continues and in this episode I’m going back in time, yes even before Goretex and Dyneema. I’m going back on this particular walk some 4500 years! Taking inspiration from a listener who wrote early on in this series and suggested I should combine the walk with some history I visit the Neolithic area of Avebury a World Heritage Site some 14 times the size of Stonehenge, but considerably less well known. We take in West Kennet Barrow, Silbury Hill, Avebury Stones and the Avenue and combine it with a walk along the ancient drovers route The Ridgeway, for a wild camp one frosty cold night. Come and join me and see how I get on using a quilt in a bivvy bag, under a tarp, under a night sky full of stars.

The first podcast of 2015 and we are now into our 10th year of producing quality content for the outdoors enthusiast. However we are in a dilemma of where to go next. What do our listeners want to hear or see and how do we get there? This podcast is part of our SWOT analysis and we are seeking your help to put us on the right track. It is easy for us to assume we know the answer, but without a survey where you tell us your thoughts it is easy to be very, very wrong. Please take part in the survey, your views are vital to what happens next. http://www.theoutdoorsstation.co.uk/2015/01/listener-and-viewer-survey-the-outdoors-station/

And so our Christmas meal in a wet, windy Wales continues as Andy Howell and I continue to enjoy our 3 course Christmas meal, cooked from ‘fresh’. Your join us in part 2 on the Digestif course, with some of Rose’s Sloe Gin and white chocolate as we continue the banter relating to the outdoors and Social Media. The night was very, very windy and wet so the rain was driven hard against the side of the WickiUp3. So much so that the water went ‘up’ through the air vents and dripped inside in small amounts onto the sleeping area. It wasn’t the end of the world, but my sleeping quilt was a bit damp in the morning. Thankfully as it was only for one night, it was no big issue.

It finally happened, 3 years after our first epic 3 course Christmas meal in a storm, in a tent, in Wales my memory faded and I suggested we try and do the same thing again. A Masterchef inspired 3 course Christmas meal in another tent, in another storm but still in Wales. This is part one of a two parter as Andy Howell joins me on my Wild Camp series as we leave late in the day to get going, get misplaced in darkness and then set up camp before starting to cook and eat our seasonal extravaganza.