Buy this hat - yes, the very one that sat on my head from Big Ben to Brussels!

I accumulated all kinds of swag and memorabilia while I was in Copenhagen, from the UNEP Climate Express train and various other events. I’m looking to raise a few $$ to replace the last of the items that were stolen during COP15, so we’ve launched a special sale of these once-in-a-lifetime goodies.

Even if you weren’t able to make it to Copenhagen for the climate change conference, here is a way you can buy a little piece of history.

As to what I took away from Copenhagen apart from these trinkets – well, physically, I left with more than I had when I arrived. But emotionally I left with so much more, and that feeling is growing as I see amazing stories arriving daily of companies, countries and individuals taking action at sub-national level. Where our global leaders have failed, we are now succeeding!

On the Atlantic

On Feb 5 I will be in San Francisco for the Ocean Film Festival screening of Rowing The Atlantic, the film by JB Benna of Journeyfilm. It was a finalist in last year’s Banff Mountain Film Festival. The film includes a lot of the footage I shot during the Atlantic Rowing Race – I was director, producer, scriptwriter, cameraman and, errr, star, plus interviews and commentary filmed afterwards in Sausalito.

If you live in the Bay Area, I hope you might be able to come and join us. I will be around for Q&A afterwards.

And there are many more stunning films in the SFOFF lineup – all connected in some way with our incredibly precious oceans. Check out the program for full details.

See you there!

Never buy a coffee from a coffee shop called Insomnia. I mean, really, how much more obvious could it be that it was going to lead to a poor night’s sleep? Sometimes the obvious is so obvious that it gets hidden by its own obviousness.

But insomnia has its compensations. As I lay awake in the wee small hours, I was buzzing with insights as well as caffeine. Some of them even still made sense when I played back my voicenotes this morning. Here is one. Some people, especially around this early part of the New Year, are asking themselves if they are heading in the right direction, if they are on track for the life that they want. Are they living out their life purpose? And how would they know if they are?

Far be it from me to offer advice. I just do what feels right to me. If head and heart agree, then chances are I’m doing the “right” thing. I think that these three are fairly reliable indicators.

1. Does your “purpose” absolutely chime with your personal values, the things that you hold dear?

2. Does it feel like everything that has happened in your life so far has been leading you up to this point? Every skill, experience, and/or attribute that you have acquired – has it all helped to equip you for this project?

3. Does it make you bounce out of bed in the mornings, eager to do what you can to pursue your purpose and move a bit closer to your goal?

If you answer “yes” to all of these, you probably already know that you’ve found your purpose, and you don’t need me to tell you that. If you answer “no” to any of these, would you like to be able to say “yes” instead? If so, then maybe you want to think about asking a few more questions, trying out a few more options.

But no need to stress about it too much – in fact, stressing or striving too hard can complicate matters unnecessarily. Sometimes you just need to get yourself out of the way and allow the answer to come. Relax – there really isn’t any such thing as a “wrong” thing – it’s all a learning experience, even if only to eliminate some options. Thomas Edison once said, “I haven’t failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that don’t work.” So what if you try one “purpose” on for size, only to find it doesn’t fit? No worries. 9,999 more chances to succeed await you!

I’d been thinking about this quite a bit recently, in connection with planetary rights lawyer Polly Higgins’s Emergency Application in the case of People of the Planet vs The Politicians. I have been privileged enough to see some of Polly’s early drafts in connection with the application, which have exercised long-dormant parts of my intellect. Many, many years ago, I allegedly studied for an undergraduate law degree – although as I recall, most of my hours in the law library were spent researching the surprising ability of law books to serve as very adequate pillows after early morning crew outings on the river. But somewhere in between the snoozes a few smidgeons of law must have permeated my skull – possibly by some kind of osmosis as my head lay on the pages of dense legal text. Anyway, I find that I am just about able to follow Polly’s lines of legal argument.

There is a kind of satisfying closure in this discovery – “A-ha. So THAT is why I needed to study law all those years ago. I always wondered, and now it makes sense.” Still trying to figure out the point of my O-level French, but maybe in time all will become clear….!

[Photos: another random life skill picked up along the way - taking pretty pictures. These from the Big Island of Hawaii a couple of days ago.]

Or even Daring Animals, Cute Adventurers… and Me.

Here’s a teaser for the Banff Film Festival, featuring some gorgeous and jaw-dropping shots from around the world, and some strange woman crawling over the cabin roof while her rowboat tips around in 20 foot waves.

This is a brief clip from the film of Rowing The Atlantic, made by Journeyfilm, which was a finalist in the 2009 Banff  Mountain Film Festival. The whole festival now goes on tour around the world. Literally. Even the South Pole. But not, unfortunately, Kiribati.

In keeping with this blog’s theme of mountains and adventure generally, if you’re pining for some intrepid outdoor action pending my departure in April, here are some resources:

The Adventure Blog – an excellent roundup of the latest news from the world of adventure. I receive it by email (simply subscribe at the website), and it’s just about the only newsletter I actually read on a regular basis rather than deleting unread.

The Atlantic Rowing Race – started late this year, apparently due to everybody’s marine flares (which have to be shipped separately for safety reasons) going astray. Solo rower Charlie Pitcher is going great guns in his radical boat – he did 66 miles the other day, to my immense envy, and is leading the race as I write.

Or if it’s epic feats of endurance that float your boat (!), check out Journeyfilm’s DVD of Ultramarathon Man Dean Karnazes running 50 marathons in 50 states in 50 days. And he has a very cute website too. I met Dean in San Francisco once, in a coffee shop. He’d run there, of course.

If you’re more into the gizmology and engineering side of oceans, you’ll enjoy The Adventures of Greg. He’s preparing to be the first person to travel from Canada to Hawaii by human power, in a (very claustrophobic-looking) pedal-powered boat. He’s got some other amazingly ambitious plans as well, and blogs regularly about the progress of building his incredible machines.

Oh, and he designed my “Savage” logo too, as a favour for me contributing a few tidbits of advice about ocean crossings. And his brother made the stickers for my boat. He’s a good guy! Award yourself extra bonus points if you can pronounce his last name correctly.

So I hope that all this energy and adrenaline will keep you amused and entertained over the winter (or summer, for my readers down under).

Enjoy!

And Steve, I hope this keeps you happy!

For those yearning for a change of scenery – either literally, if you’re sick of the sight of snow – or figuratively – if you’re tired of hearing about environmental issues… here is some light relief. A few days ago I arrived on the Big Island of Hawaii, where I am staying at a friend’s glorious ranch halfway up a mountain, with spectacular views of the distant ocean. Without wanting to make you too jealous (well, okay, just a little bit) here are some photos of a few plants from the garden.

You may notice that these piccies are a major step up from my usual dodgy old iPhone photos. This is thanks to Joan in Atlanta, who has arranged to loan me an Olympus EP-1. My little photo retrospective of 2009, mostly photographed by me, but with the final few slides by my talented photographer friend Jules, had borne silent witness to the shortcomings of an iPhone camera. The contrast between his shots and mine was too stark to be ignored. Having been a pro photographer for a few years (2000 to 2003 approx) I was embarrassed by the inferior quality of my pictures. Joan came to the rescue, on the strict proviso that this camera does NOT go to sea.

I’m quite impressed with the EP-1. Intuitive and easy to use, with most of the capabilities of an SLR but a lot smaller, it saves the extra weight and bulk by not having a viewfinder other than the LCD screen. I also love the optional square format. I used to have a pre-digital medium format camera – showing my age, here. Mine was a Mamiya 645, but now I can pretend I have a top-of-the-range Hasselblad, as used on the Apollo space missions.

Today it has been great fun strolling around the ranch, looking out for things to photograph, as a kind of meditation on nature and a therapeutic contrast to the ongoing fallout from the Copenhagen theft (still no replacement driver’s licence, so I can’t drive, credit card and SIM card also still in transit, and this morning the USB ports on my brand new laptop went belly-up – sigh! This too will pass….).

While we’re on the tech stuff, a couple of other recommendations for the geekily-minded iPhone and/or Mac user.

Favourite new apps:

- Things, for managing To Do lists on iPhone and Mac. Dead simple to use. Does all it needs to do, and nothing more. Has been used frequently recently when brain starts buzzing during jetlag-affected nights. Sync brain to iPhone, sync iPhone to Mac. Wake up in morning (or whenever) to well-organized To Do list. Easy!

- iStayFit for the iPhone, for managing workouts and monitoring weight. I’m having a much-needed post-Christmas detox, and this has really helped keep me motivated. Cute little demos for each exercise. And as I have my iPhone with me in the gym anyway, so I can listen to inspirational podcasts, it’s ideal!

- Nearest Tube for the iPhone, for finding your nearest tube station in London. Admittedly of limited use in Hawaii (!) but I’m just loving the new “Augmented Reality” concept generally. The way of the future, methinks. I could try to describe it, but I think you have to try it to really get it. Or try watching the video.

- 1Password for iPhone and Mac, for managing website logins and recording details of credit cards, drivers licence, etc. Allows you to log in to websites with just one click – ID and password are automatically entered. Can also be used to generate highly secure passwords.

- TextExpander for iPhone and Mac, for those commonly used words, phrases and paragraphs – or even a whole page. e.g. I’ve set mine up so that SF automatically expands to San Francisco, with a satisfying little popping noise.

- Tetris for iPhone, a dangerous waste of time, but great fun. I originally only bought it as a tribute to my Hawaii host, who owns the worldwide rights to the game, but it is amazing how satisfying it can be to plop small geometric objects into an interlocking pattern…

- Distant Shore, gorgeous graphics and very therapeutic for the jetlagged insomniac. You walk along a virtual beach, with gentle surf sounds to soothe you, beachcombing for seashells. Gather 5 shells and you get to write a message in a (virtual) bottle and throw it into the (virtual) sea. And occasionally you receive a message, at random, from another Distant Shore player. While I would be the last person in the world to endorse throwing anything at all into the sea, I deem this acceptable.

- Green Calculator. Okay, sorry, I almost made it to the end of the blog without mentioning matters green. But I just can’t help myself. This is a cute calculator, with some good tips on reducing your environmental impact, but like any other calculator I’ve seen it doesn’t factor in what you buy and what you eat, which for many people will boost their footprint substantially. I suspect that our world is now so incredibly complex, with foods and goods whizzing every which way across the planet, these calculations are simply incalculable, but if anybody knows otherwise….?

I hope you enjoy these apps as much as I do – and remember, you can always choose to uninstall Tetris. “Yeah, man, I can give it up any time I want….”!

Thanks for all the positive comments about my pictorial retrospective on 2009. Now that I’ve looked at the past – I’m now looking to the future. If you want to find out if I’m coming to a city near you in the next few months, read on.

Changing the world, one plastic bag at a time. Holland & Barrett healthfood store in London bans the bag

My overriding goal for this year is to figure out how I can be of most use. No unkind comments about removing myself from the gene pool, thank you very much! I hope there are actions of a more positive kind that I can take. In Copenhagen, I had hoped to spread some inspiration, and maybe even show some moral leadership on the virtues of leading a less materialistic, more experiential, life.

Yick, yick, yick – you’re probably making gagging noises at this point. Maybe this all sounds very holier-than-thou, in which case please excuse me. But really, what else do I have to offer? I’m not a scientist, politician, or experienced activist. So as far as I could see, my most convincing contribution was to BE the change I wanted to see in the world, by showing that the pursuit of excessive amounts of “stuff” – with all the collateral damage to the environment – is not necessary to have a happy, fulfilling life.

Do I feel like I made a difference in Copenhagen? Yes, I do, but to a very limited extent.

Do I feel my strategy was on the right lines? For a while I doubted this, and wondered if I should get more involved in political activism. But I don’t have the appetite or the inclination for it. I think I was on the right lines, and should stick with the same strategy, but crank up the energy, the urgency, and the outreach by several notches, and build on the new relationships and alliances I forged in Copenhagen to take the strategy to a new level.

So how does this overall strategy look in terms of what I do and where I go? Well, unfortunately it looks like a certain amount of air travel is going to be involved yet again, but less than last year. Although my travels are offset, I completely acknowledge that it is better not to incur the carbon debt in the first place. No doubt some will argue that I only travel as much as I choose to, but my experience has been that having meetings and giving presentations in person is enormously more impactful than through electronic means. So I could sit at home (if I had one) and do all my work over the internet, but that doesn’t seem the right course for me at this stage in my life. I will just ensure that I make every journey pay its way in terms of people met and messages delivered – to the max.

So… here is my approximate itinerary, still extremely subject to change:

Seagulls standing on the frozen boating lake in Regents Park. And yes, global warming IS a reality - but it's about average temperatures, not individual instances of hot or cold weather.

Jan 11 San Francisco

Jan 11-Feb 3 Hawaii – working on book and fundraising

Feb 3-5 Vail, Colorado – Vail Symposium

Feb 5-10 San Francisco Ocean Film Festival – film of “Rowing The Atlantic” being screened (finalist in Banff Film Festival)

Feb 10-28 Hood River, Oregon – working on book (Feb 22-26 Ocean Sciences Meeting in Portland)

Mar 1-18 Kiribati – as guest of President of Kiribati – TBC

Mar 18-23 Seattle – to speak at National Geographic Live! presentation series

Mar 24-Apr 2 TBC

Apr 3-10 TED Galapagos – I am speaking at this prestigious event. One-off ocean-themed TED in honour of Sylvia Earle

Apr 10-15 Kiribati – to prepare for launch

April 15 to late July or early August – Pacific III: final stage to Australia (fingers crossed!)

Until October or November – in Australia and/or Southeast Asia

December – Mexico City for COP16

So – another quiet, boring year – NOT! Of course you can follow it all here on the blog. I’m excited about the next 12 months, and I hope you’ll be interested enough to follow along through the power of the internet – most of the enjoyment with none of the carbon emissions!

A slideshow of 2009 – the highs, the lows, and most of all the friends, family, supporters, teammates who helped to make it such an incredibly special year. Thank you to you all! And many of you will find yourselves starring below…. apologies that I couldn’t include everyone, but please know that I have valued and appreciated the part you have played in my life over the last 12 months.

Wishing you all the very best for 2010 – may all your dreams come true!

I am happy, warm, well-fed and online. And I hope you are too.

Romy's farmhouse outside Carno, Wales

I am sitting in the study of an old stone farmhouse in Wales, looking out at blue skies and a snow-covered hillside. Yesterday I drove here (thank you Alun, who lent me his family’s aged BMW for the journey) from the flat in London where I had been staying for a few days of self-imposed retreat to reflect on 2009, and plan for 2010. Thanks to the kind woman who found my journal dumped near her house in Copenhagen and returned it to me, I was able to read back over my thoughts and dreams of the last 12 months, and look at what worked and what left room for improvement. Themes and patterns emerged. I was able to put things in perspective.

And now I’ve started to figure out how to build on the progress I made in 2009, and to synthesise my direction for next year. Lots of influences are playing into my plans – my experiences on the ocean and in Kiribati, the Climate Ride, publication of my book, the walk from Big Ben to Brussels, and of course the COP15 conference in Copenhagen. Books I’ve read and conversations I’ve had have also been highly formative. I am gleaning jewels of wisdom and pearls of insight from all kinds of sources. Assimilating, thinking, and listening to my heart.

It has been a blessing in disguise to be mostly offline. Undistracted by the thousands of emails awaiting attention, I was able to take quiet time out between Christmas and New Year to breathe and be. A very special time.

So the timing of the delivery of my lovely new MacBook Pro was just perfect. It arrived yesterday, just before I left for Wales. Now that I’ve got my head and heart sorted, it’s time for the hands to get busy again to start making it all happen.

This feels like a more than usually significant New Year. Tonight it is a full moon – a blue moon, in fact, the second full moon within one calendar month. And 2009 was a mega-year for me. 2010 promises to be even more so. I’m eager to see where it will take me – and in fact, the world. 12 months from now, how will the world have changed? Because, for sure, it will have.

Raising our glasses to wish you all the best for 2010 (that's me on the left)

Before we leave 2009, I would like to say a huge thank you to everybody for making 2009 so special. Those who supported me with their comments while I was on the Pacific. Those who contributed to the walk from Big Ben to Brussels – the supporters and the wonderful women of Team BB2B. Those who chipped in and helped me replace the cherished possessions stolen in Copenhagen. Those who bought my book and wrote to tell me how it had touched their lives. You have constantly impressed me, entertained me, informed me, and encouraged me.

Thank you so much. I love you all, and wish you health, wealth (in the spiritual sense) and happiness in 2010.