Dave Cornthwaite
Amongst other things he has paddleboarded the length of the Mississippi, skateboarded across Australia, swum 1001 miles, written three books, stayed awake for 72 hours in a row without turning crazy, and for years has tried in vain to get Nutella to sponsor his adventures. But will he give up? Never!
Here’s my talk from TEDxYouth@Bath a few weeks ago. Spot the nervous moments!
Three months ago I was nearing the end of my Mississippi Summer. I left Tennessee with my brother paddling alongside and we were greeted in Helena-West by John Ruskey, the founder of the Quapaw Canoe Club and a man whose name had been mentioned all the way down the river.
John is one of the most remarkable men I’ve ever met. A true modern day bohemian, he couples modern technology with a love of nature, wildlife, literature, poetry, art, human development and, importantly, the river. My brother Andy and I spent a day at the Quapaw base in Clarksdale, Mississippi and then moved on down the Mississippi River alongside John and his band of Mighty Quapaws, all local lads who were all capable paddlers, guides and apprentices under John’s guidance.
The Quapaws are conducting a year-long clean-up programme, prompted by the devastating floods of early 2011 that swept junk and trash into the river system. The video above offers just a glimpse of what the Quapaws get up to, and the impact of plastic pollution on the environment.
> Visit the Mighty Quapaw’s Website
> Read this article by John Ruskey
> Another article & video about our stay in Clarksdale by the Delta Bohemian
This photo, taken by Evan Walton just south of Quincy, Illionois, has reached the final round of SUP Connect’s SUP Photo of the Year Competition.
If you like the photo and can spare 5 seconds it would be great to immortalise this Summer’s Mississippi River Expedition with a winning photo!
> To vote click here and ‘Like’ and Comment on the photo - much obliged!
One month ago today I woke up at 6am in Venice, Louisiana. The night before I’d arrived after dark having paddled a few metres short of 60 miles in 15 hours. Tired but exhilarated, it felt like I’d passed an exam. For 82 days the Mississippi River had grown, pulling me with it, and suddenly I was there, less than 30 miles and one day’s paddle from the Gulf of Mexico.
It’s a large chunk of a year to spend on the move; living out of dry bags, camping on sandbars, learning every day how to negotiate fast-flowing water and sharing an industrial navigation channel with barges and ships that always threatened to draw me under their bow.
And then, all of a sudden I was there. Paddling into the Gulf, jumping on a boat and zooming back upstream, crawling into bed, up early to catch a flight, two days later landing back in Heathrow to a greeting from my Mum and a homemade sign. Boom, I was home. It was done.
Thankful for the September sun I spread sodden camping gear out in the garden, and then set to work. Writing, planning, lecturing. Past expeditions have ended without a plan and time passed without reason, what a waste! This time the only downside has been a lack of chance to digest exactly what has happened this Summer. I look at the pictures and it feels like someone else’s expedition, who is that man standing on that board?
One month on it still hasn’t sunk in. Several of my toes are still numb, the joints in my fingers still ache, I still miss attaching my hammock - my bed - to trees just metres from my river. I may have reached the sea but the journey isn’t quite over yet.
Yet again, my life has changed and I’m not sure how to keep up. It’ll be a few more weeks before I’m ready to announce a new expedition but in the meantime I’ll get back to work and trying to make sense of it all.
950 still images from a world record-breaking descent down the Mississippi River on a Stand Up Paddleboard. This was my Summer!
> For more, visit www.davecornthwaite.com
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