Want to see a movie about my Pacific row? Footage of leaping dolphins and swooping seabirds, incredible sunrises and sunsets, storms and scary waves - and no doubt a lot of soul-baring moments to camera? Well, hopefully it will come to pass - if we can get a few $$$ together.
Earlier this week I met again with filmmaker Bill Chayes of Chayes Productions. We have agreed to form a partnership to produce a series of three documentary films about my adventures. Each program will document one of the legs of my trip; California to Hawaii, Hawaii to Tuvalu, Tuvalu to Australia. It will be a non-profit project with these objectives:
- To inspire others to take that leap of faith to set their own goals to reflect their own personality and to begin to take steps to achieve those goals. We will tie my story to those of three "parallel lives" - three people on dry land who are facing their own personal challenges, such as coming to terms with illness or disability, or launching a business, or becoming a parent. I will be in contact with them from the ocean, and will get inspiration from their lives, as hopefully they might get inspiration from mine. We hope to show how we all look for role models to help us overcome obstacles and rise to higher levels of achievement.
-To present the message that the future of the oceans will have a huge impact on the future of humanity. As oceans rise, or lose their capacity to absorb CO2, our cities, health and wellbeing will be affected in ways we can only begin to imagine. Through sending back eyewitness reports as I row across the world's oceans, and taking part in beach clean-ups in each of the staging posts along my route, I hope to create a 'ripple effect' of general awareness leading to responsible ocean stewardship, showing what people can do to help preserve this wild, wondrous, and vitally important environment.
The documentary will be targeted at the educational market, using the connections I have already established with schools that use my ocean adventures to illustrate lessons in geography, science and exercise. Teachers also (scarily!) like to use me as a role model, particularly for the female students.
As well as the education market, we intend that the film will also be screened at film festivals worldwide, and that ultimately there should be a theatre release, capitalizing on the current popularity of adventure films (Into The Wild, Touching The Void etc) and environmental themes (An Inconvenient Truth, The Future of Food, Sharkwater, etc).
Look to this website and blog in the near future for updates about the film project, including fundraising events - featuring me and my boat.
In the meantime, if you want more information and/or want to help us out with a donation specifically for these films - or if you know somebody else who may be keen to participate in this exciting project - please contact Bill Chayes at billchayes@gotsky.com.
[photo: on camera last year, during the Pacific preparations. The camerawoman here is Bebe Flynn.]
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Today when I got home from a therapeutic stroll in rain-sodden Wunderlich Park, I found a large parcel waiting for me at the guest cottage that I currently call home - a 9-tray Excalibur dehydrator. This is my intended solution to the unavailability of healthy and wholesome expedition meals - I plan to make my own.
Since my New Year retreat I've been a bit of a health food nut, and have been unable to find any expedition meals that live up to my high new standards of nutrition. If you don't want to eat additives, trans fats, wheat, white rice, dairy or non-organic meat, that doesn't leave many options. And a rower cannot survive on beansprouts alone.
It may take some experimentation to figure out what works and what doesn't - I need to come up with some recipes that are tasty, nutritious, dehydrate well and will last for several months if packaged in vacuum packs. This is quite a tall order, considering that I have only a few months left, and my time is already heavily scheduled.
But where there's a will there's a way. And fortunately there will be a mother as well. Mum, once again, is coming to the rescue. When I was preparing for the Atlantic she came to stay with me for a month to help with everything from sewing to packaging food to boatbuilding. This time around she will be joining me in San Francisco in May to help with final preparations for my May/June launch (precise date and location to be determined by the weather). She might have hoped that by now she'd be through with cooking for her offspring, but no such luck...
P.S. Voiceover artist for speaker showreel now found. So no need for further action from previous blog, but thanks for the suggestions.
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I need a British voiceover artist for my speaker showreel (see earlier blog).
I am looking for a youngish male voice, neutral accent, not too posh. Ideally the speaker should have access to equipment for recording an MP3 file of the voiceover. Any potential candidates should please contact me via the Contact form on this website.
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Today I received this helpful advice from Steve Moore of the Royal Navy. He works at the Institute of Naval Medicine in Gosport, where I go for regular physiological testing.
From Annex C of Chapter 3 from MoD's Joint Service Publication 539 entitled "Climatic Injuries in the Armed Forces - Prevention & Treatment"...
"52. Anecdotal experience suggests that patients may improve if, once their acute injury has fully resolved (by 3 months after injury at the latest), they rewarm their feet each evening using a foot spa. The aim is to immerse the hands and/or feet in water maintained as close to 40?C as possible for 20-30 minutes, following which feet should be placed in insulative but slightly loose bed-socks. Patients should perform this when they are able to relax, and additional vasodilation may be aided by no more than 50 ml of their favourite spirits, such as whisky, consumed at the start of rewarming."
Footbaths and tots of whisky - sounds like my kind of a cure!
It would be especially welcome as I am now back in Woodside, and my spirits are suffering from the wet and squelchy winter weather. After spending much of the last two months in pristine snowy wilderness, it seemed strange as I drove south to return to weather that would seem more at home in Britain than in California - pouring rain and dank chilliness. Yesterday in the gym I overheard some people complaining how cold it was. "You should try Northern Minnesota," I thought...
Or how about Antarctica? I spent yesterday working with an editor to create a showreel to show future clients how I perform as a motivational speaker. I was introduced to Minette by Alison Levine, who has been writing a highly entertaining blog from the bottom of the world.
"There is a saying that no one who goes to the Pole comes back unchanged. I truly believe this. I can already see some changes in myself. I went out for dinner last night and when the waiter put bread and butter on the table in front of me, I ate the butter straight up -with a spoon. Instead of drinking Evian at home I now prefer to melt ice from my freezer in order to get my water. I don't plan to wash my hair anytime soon. I can wait 43 days again. Maybe 44 just to see if I can break my record. I plan to wear a ski mask during the day - all the time now, and not just when I am robbing banks. And of course I plan to lobby the Miss Universe pageant officials in order to convince them to allow the first contestant from Antarctica to compete."
Click here for more...
[photo: Alison Levine - although in the future I hope I might have a similar photo!]
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