The PaddleMore Podcast

This week we chatted with Lowri from FlowFree coaching. As a professional kayak coach and freestyle guru, Lowri's passion is playing on the river. She's competed at the top level in freestyle kayaking and has paddled some of the biggest volume rivers in the world, including thousands of laps on her local run, the Dee-bezi. Lowri chatted about her love of making rivers playful and how she really wants to maximise every day on the water. If you're not having enough fun, maybe try getting in touch and ask her to show you how to play!

This week on the podcast, we chatted with Jamie and Kyle, two young, up and coming white water kayakers. The two lads have both had their plans upturned and their lives changed by the pandemic and we chatted about how this has changed their view on paddling both personally and professionally. It was great to chat to some folks who are fresh into the outdoors, and who are super stoked on boating! As usual we cover how they got into the sport, and see just how far they've pushed themselves in the past couple of years. We also talk fears, uncertainty and aspirations. You can find Jamie at @jamandhiscam on Instagram Kyle is @kr.kylerodger on instagram, and https://youtube.com/channel/UCM-j_0k8tvFE18ufycxCCsQ for his youtube channel.

This week we're chatting with Sammy and Daniel, two of Kenya's canoe slalom team. They were recently out in Spain competing in the African qualifiers for Tokyo Olympics and are both keen paddlers of white water and slalom. We chatted Spain, cold water, covid, learning to paddle and their developmental aspirations for the local community.  Growing up on the banks of the river Tana, Sammy and Daniel have spent their lives in and around the water. They want to keep sharing their love of white water and inspire a new generation to take up running rivers and chasing sticks.

For this week, we thought that seeing as lock down in the UK is starting to wind up we thought it might be nice to share with you all some of the providers from around the UK. This is a great list of varied, though mainly Scottish, paddling providers, all of who will offer you a slightly different, but awesome experience. This isn't and extensive list there's loads more out there this is just the folks that got back to us. Take a look at their websites here! Beyond Adventure  CAG Adventures  Granite Adventures  Green Wave Guiding  Kayak Summer Isles  LM Coaching  Outdoor Pursuits Scotland  Outdoor Explore Paddleboard Fife Pinkston Watersports Pure Land Expeditions Sandy Johnston Coaching  Scottish Rock and Water Strathspey SUP  Sandeman Canoe Company

This week we chatted to Daz. In his own humble words, Daz is just a bloke who goes kayaking with his mates. In reality, Daz is a bit more well known than that. He has paddled every river which descends Everest, as well as K2, many of them solo. He spends a load of time paddling enormous solo runs out in Nepal, Bhutan and India, but he's equally happy paddling a local Welsh drainage ditch with his mates while he's in the UK. The Himalayas aren't just a kayaking destination for Daz, they're home. He's been living, working and playing over there for more than 20 years, and his company Pure Land Expeditions is a staple of British Himalayan adventures. If you fancy a trip to one of those incredible countries, follow the link below and find out more. For everything else, well, we'll let Daz explain. http://www.purelandexpeditions.com/ https://www.facebook.com/purelandexpeditions.net https://www.instagram.com/ple_and_me/?hl=en

This week we're chatting with Niamh Shannon about her new product "Pinkston to Pyrenees - A women's only journey to paddle in the sun" Niamh along with her dad, Dougie, are launching Pinkston to Pyrenees, a year long programme taking folks from paddling here in Scotland to paddling in the stunning Spanish Pyrenees. To get in touch with Niamh check her insta @nevshannon or email her on niamhshannon98@hotmail.com

This week we're chatting to Franco Ferrero. Most british boaters will have a book in their house with Franco's name somewhere in it.  Franco is best described as a lifelong paddler, learning while in school and then having an exciting coaching career, before setting up and running Pesda Press while traveling the world on their 32 foot yacht.  Pesda Press is the publishing company for outdoor people, publishing books for the adventurous, with over 70 titles, everything from skills textbooks to guidebooks (including ours!). Take a look at pesdapress.com

Episode 11, Adam Shoalts This week we chatted with modern day adventurer Adam Shoalts. Adam is an explorer in residence for the Royal Canadian Geographical Society, taking on some monstrous canoe adventures and solo missions across Canada. It was awesome to hear all about how Adam became a man of the woods and water, and his life as a backcountry adventurer in a country inhabited by some of the most diverse and life-threatening wildlife around. Adam funds his adventures and, well, life, by writing fantastic books about all his trips. His latest, Beyond the Trees, is a trip report form an epic 4000 kilometre journey through the Canadian Arctic in a canoe, fighting upstream against ferocious rivers and navigating wild lakes and epic portages, all while under siege from barrages of blackflies. His other two books are Alone Against the North, a journey exploring the Hudson Bay lowlands, and A History of Canada in Ten Maps, an adventurous insight into the growth of a sparsely populated country, are well worth a read, too. All three can be found on Amazon. Adam himself can be found at https://adamshoalts.com/, or across Facebook and Instagram. Don't forget you can support the podcast on Patreon.com/PaddleMore 

We've stumbled on to an accidental trend... Every 5 episodes you'll get to hear from us, you'll have the chance to ask us questions and hear our options on everything paddle related, but seen as we only realised this this week you'll just have to hear our opinions! Don't forget to support the podcast on Patreon.com/PaddleMore  BUY OUR BOOK 

We have a book out!  It's that simple really. It'll be in shops from the 12th of March but is available for preorder now from pesdapress.com

This week we're chatting to sea kayak guide and sea life expert Bree.   Bree bases her self out of Telegraph Cove on Vancouver Island, British Columbia where she runs guided tours around the island with the focus of viewing the amazing marine wildlife which surrounds the islands off the west coast of Canada.  Check out the following companies which we mentioned during the episode,  Canadian Skyline Adventures for walking trips in Jasper National Park, https://www.canadianskylineadventures.com/ Laughing Lichen Wild Crafted Herbs and Tea, for some fantastic natural produce from the Northwest Territories, https://laughinglichen.ca/  For all your online business needs check out Katie Broadhurst Online Business Management, https://katiebroadhurst.com/ And finally if you like the sound of a guided trip with Bree from Telegraph Cove, check out North Island Kayak, https://kayakbc.ca/

This week on the podcast we're chatting to adventurer Huw. Although he spends most of his time on a mountain bike, the last few years Huw has been expanding his adventures using a Packraft and have been to some really awesome places with it. To see more of Huw's adventures you can find him on Social Media @topofests or at topofests.com. You can also find his partner Annie @a_girl_outside.  Also take a look at @Backcountry.scot for more information on Packraft courses and equipment or at https://backcountry.scot/

This week we chat to Anup Gurung, one of Nepal's top kayakers and environmental activists about Mission East to West their expedition in 2018/19 aiming to paddle all the major rivers of Nepal. You can find out more about Anup one his YouTube channel just search ANUP GURUNG, or via @anup_ice_pal on social media 

This week we chatted to sea kayak guide and expeditioner Will Copestake. Not only does will run a successful sea kayak business, kayaksummerisles.com  he also spends most winters in Patagonia working as a guide and discovering the fantastic area around the Rio Serrano. Find out more about Will at willcopestakemedia.com  We've joined Patreon! Support The PaddleMore Podcast here patreon.com/PaddleMore

We don't have a guest this week! Instead, this is the first of our PaddleMore chats, where Moose and Grant talk about something paddling related, or answer a question from you. We get asked regularly how to plan trips, either big trips near home or international trips to paddle abroad. Having both paddled in a number of countries, we delve into the challenges surrounding big trips and foreign paddling, and tell a story from the time we paddled in Spain.  There's also a new segment, some rapid fire questions, where you get to find out all about Moose, so listen out for those! If you haven't seen Moose's famous swim you can watch it here on YouTube 

This week we talked to coffee, beer and food lover  Amber "big deal" Maslen.   Amber who has been a K1 slalom athlete on the GBR World Cup team for 2018/19 is based in Highland Perthshire has been paddling slalom for the last 13 years. In that time she's taken podium places across the world including Sweden, New Zealand, Slovakia and Poland. We chatted about female participation in paddlesports, what it takes to stay motivated as a paddlesports athlete during a global pandemic and the importance of inspiring the next generation.    Find out more about 286° West on Facebook, Instagram search @286_west and at www.west286.squarespace.com To see what Amber is up to follow her on Facebook and Instagram via @ambermaslen or at www.ambermaslen.com

This week we talk to white water kayaker and raft guide Glenn about his time working for Savage Wilderness on the Tana river, in Kenya. This relatively unnkown river is a white water paradise, and every year the Tana River Festival takes place, with races and events up and down the river.  Since Covid hit, Glenn and Savage Wilderness have been working closely with the local community to build water confidence and understanding among locals who live and work near the water.  Along with help from Immersion Research, Savage Wilderness has set up a kayak school for local youth. This is a school which extends far beyond the water, as Glenn will tell you, and is becoming an integral part of the community. Immersion Research have set up a fundraiser to help pay the staff who work on this school, and anything you can give them would make a huge difference to getting more young people kayaking.   https://www.gofundme.com/f/youth-development-program-by-savage-wilderness Keep up to date with the Tana River by following Glenn, and get in touch with us if you want to know more about visiting the Tana. Glenn: https://www.facebook.com/glenn.richards.121 https://www.instagram.com/glenn.richards.121/ Also keep watching more of the community work that Savage Wilderness are up to at the moment: https://www.facebook.com/SavageWildernessKenya https://www.instagram.com/savagewilderness/ And don't forget to add the Tana River Festival to your "must visit" list of festivals: https://www.facebook.com/tanariverfest https://www.instagram.com/tanariverfest/

This week we chatted with canoeist, expeditioner, bush craft king and advocate for getting young people into the wilderness, Kenny Noble from Avon Outdoors, who chatted with us about his wilderness trip to the Canadian Yukon with a group of young people.

Introducing us, the podcast and our first time together.   *May contain some naughty words... but Denise approved!