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Pete Casey was chest-deep in floodwater, five days without food, in the middle of the Amazon at dusk. His guide said: "This is a beautiful place to die, and the day you die is the best day of your life." No higher ground in sight, no GPS signal, no way out. This is the story of the first ever sea-to-source ascent of the Amazon River.

No military training, no wealthy sponsors, no support team. Pete sold his home, scraped together £110,000 in equity, and walked into the Amazon alone. What followed was six and a half years, over 7,000 kilometres, swimming every river crossing against the current, trekking through flooded rainforest, and navigating remote indigenous communities that had never seen a Westerner pass through on foot.

From near-death in flood season to coca plantations in the Andes, this is the full arc of one of the most extraordinary human-powered expeditions ever completed.

What You'll Learn:
• Why Pete ascended the Amazon sea-to-source — and why almost nobody does it that way
• The method he built for swimming river crossings with a packraft and local guides
• How 23 days in flooded forest without food nearly killed him
• What encounters with remote indigenous communities actually look like
• The brutal reality of coming home to nothing after six and a half years

Pete's presentation at the explorers club in NYC.

🌐 ascentoftheamazon.com

📸 Instagram: @p.c.casey
🌿 Junglekeepers (pay it forward): junglekeepers.com

00:00 Cold open — chest-deep in floodwater
01:18 Who is Pete Casey and what is the Ascent of the Amazon?
03:21 Growing up with no money in Sussex — how adventure didn't come naturally
05:19 First trip to South America — joining Ed Stafford's Amazon walk
07:50 Photography dreams and why building became his career
11:32 How Pete decided to ascend the Amazon sea-to-source
17:23 Selling his home — the point of no return
21:17 Route planning on Google Earth and arriving alone
26:26 Why Pete swam every river crossing — method and fear
29:27 The Pororoca tidal bore and using the Amazon tide to gain ground
34:00 First Una tribe encounters — being surrounded
47:11 23 days in flooded forest, no food, chest-deep in water
51:50 Recovery in Manaus and planning the next leg
55:28 How kit evolved over 6.5 years — Wellington boots vs jungle boots
1:00:40 What Pete ate in the jungle — farinha and sardines
1:05:00 Walking alone through cocaine plantations in the Andes
1:13:40 The Explorers Club, coming home, and the food bank
1:23:34 Pay it forward: Junglekeepers

For full show notes and links, visit: adventurediaries.com/podcast

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Beki Henderson is a BAFTA-nominated adventure filmmaker and expedition safety specialist with years of experience leading camera teams into some of the world's most remote and demanding environments. She's worked alongside Steve Backshall, Ben Fogle, Levison Wood, Aldo Kane, and most recently Will Smith on the landmark Pole to Pole series — premiering at the Natural History Museum in London.

In this episode, Chris sits down with Beki to dig into the Green Abyss — her personal expedition into Gabon's Waka National Park in 2024, launched in the wake of the country's military coup. The plan was to pack-raft the undocumented Akoi River for a month, reaching remote communities to understand the human cost of conservation policy. What followed was a masterclass in expedition reality — strainers, flash flood risk, a support team walking in entirely the wrong direction, and a village that no longer existed.

Beki also reflects on building a career in adventure television from scratch, why qualifications mean nothing without field experience, and what it really means to take risk seriously — not the dramatic kind, but the deep, lasting uncertainty that keeps you up at night two metres above a rising river in the middle of a Gabonese gorge.

Chapters:
00:00 — Risk Isn't Dramatic: What Expedition Danger Really Looks Like
01:25 — Introduction & Welcome to Adventure Diaries
03:12 — Growing Up in North Yorkshire With No Adventurous Instincts
06:53 — Building a Career in Adventure Filmmaking From Scratch
10:00 — Wilderness First Responder: Why Qualifications Mean Nothing Without Experience
12:17 — First Break Into Adventure Television: Steve Backshall & Expedition Series
14:07 — The Green Abyss: Pack Rafting Gabon's Undocumented Akoi River
16:29 — Building a Team in the Field & Getting Government Permission Post-Coup
22:29 — Strainers, Portaging & Why the River Always Wins
26:43 — Trapped in a Gorge: The Flash Flood Decision That Changed Everything
33:37 — The GPS Disaster: When the Support Team Walked the Wrong Way
38:10 — Ingondé Doesn't Exist: Conservation, Gold Panning & The Human Cost
44:24 — Recording Undocumented Species & Reflections on the Green Abyss

Pay It Forward: Beki shines a light on the Black Mambas — an all-female anti-poaching unit in South Africa working to protect wildlife and educate communities before poaching ever starts. Find them at blackmambas.org.

Call to Adventure: Figure out where your own edge is — and go there. Adventure doesn't have to cost money or require extreme skill. Start with what takes you outside your comfort zone.

Follow Beki Henderson:
Instagram: @bekihenderson
Website: beckihenderson.com

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What happens when you walk for days through some of the most remote jungle on Earth — and stumble across a cave covered floor to ceiling in ancient drawings that no outsider has ever documented? In this Season 5 episode, Chris sits down with Joe Trevorrow, former Royal Navy sailor turned expedition guide with The Wild Tales — an indigenous-led adventure company operating deep in Guyana's interior — to unpack three extraordinary expeditions into barely explored territory.

Alongside the on-the-ground stories (rapids, sand flies, night terrors in hammocks, and jaguar tracks beside your sleeping spot), Joe shares how The Wild Tales partners with indigenous communities — the Wai Wai, Patamona, and others — to create sustainable tourism that preserves ancient sites and dying traditions. We discuss the complex tribal history of Guyana's nine indigenous nations, how a Tomb Raider game sparked a life-changing decision, and what the jungle teaches you when you stop fighting it.

Chapters:

• 00:00 A Hidden Cave in Guyana's Jungle
• 01:07 Meet Joe Trevorrow: Royal Navy to Rainforest
• 05:30 Joining the Navy and Travelling the World at 20
• 07:56 How a Tomb Raider Game Led to Guyana Expeditions
• 11:33 How Indigenous-Led Expedition Tourism Works
• 16:45 The River of Death: Paddling the Cassai Chi
• 20:09 Undocumented Petroglyphs Along the Riverbank
• 24:18 Welcome to Masakenari: The Most Remote Village
• 29:30 Tourism as a Lifeline: Keeping Traditions Alive
• 32:40 Don't Fight the Jungle: Lessons the Hard Way
• 35:21 Sitting Under the Milky Way on the River of Death
• 38:10 Night Terrors: The Scariest Night in the Jungle
• 40:12 Makarapan Mountain: 3.5 Billion Years Old
• 46:00 The Mystery Pots Nobody Can Explain
• 55:12 The Cave Expedition: 45km Through Patamona Territory
• 01:03:21 Ancient Drawings That Left Everyone Speechless
• 01:12:00 Conservation: Keeping Sites Secret vs Raising Awareness
• 01:17:49 Future Expeditions and What's Next for The Wild Tales
• 01:23:17 Pay It Forward and Call to Adventure

What You'll Learn

• What the "River of Death" actually means — and the disease theory behind its name
• How indigenous-led expedition tourism works (and why it matters)
• Why two enormous pots were found near the summit of a 3.5 billion year old mountain — and nobody can explain how they got there
• What it feels like to walk into an ancient cave and see drawings no outsider has recorded
• The leadership lesson Joe learned — and why "Navy mode" doesn't work in the jungle
• What The Wild Tales has planned for 2026–2027

Connect with Joe & The Wild Tales

• Joe Trevorrow Instagram
• The Wild Tales: https://www.thewildtales.com
• Anders Anderson episode (S3): Adventure Diaries back cata

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Chris sits down with Brazilian conservation biologist Letícia Benavalli to talk about her work protecting jaguars in the Cerrado — one of the world's most biodiverse yet overlooked biomes. From growing up in São Paulo to founding the Pro Onça Institute, Letícia shares how a childhood fascination with nature led her to track some of the rarest cats on the planet, including melanistic (black) jaguars. She also opens up about the importance of community-led conservation, empowering women and young people in rural Brazil, and her ambition to create wildlife corridors connecting isolated jaguar populations across biomes.

Chapters

00:00 Tracking Melanistic Jaguars
04:43 From City Life to Conservation Biologist
07:10 The Cerrado: Saving Brazil's Biodiverse Savanna
14:47 Learnings from Oxford University & African Wild
22:53 Rare Black Jaguar Encounter in the Wild
27:07 Survival Story: Lost Alone in the Brazilian Jungle
36:38 Jaguar Hunting Threats & Landowner Conflicts
40:58 Pro Onça Institute: Conservation & Community Empowerment
47:02 Women Leadership in Ecotourism
1:00 Urban Jaguars in Brasília National Park
1:06 Rolex Explorers Club Grant & Future Goals
1:14 Call to Adventure: Climbing Brazil's Serra do Cipó

Guest Bio

Letícia Benavalli is a conservation biologist and founder of the Onça Institute (Instituto Onça), an NGO dedicated to jaguar conservation in Brazil's Cerrado and Atlantic Forest. She has worked across multiple Brazilian biomes — including the Pantanal, Caatinga, and Amazon — studying large carnivores and developing community-based conservation programmes. Letícia is a Rolex/Explorers Club grant recipient and a member of the IUCN's Wildlife Conservation and Protected Areas group. She presented her research at the Explorers Club in New York and is preparing a PhD focused on jaguar density, diet, and the genetics of melanistic jaguars in the Cerrado.

Key Topics Discussed

1. Growing up in São Paulo & finding conservation — How a city kid from Latin America's largest metropolis ended up dedicating her life to wildlife, sparked by a childhood visit to the zoo and a love of nature documentaries.
2. The Cerrado: Brazil's forgotten biome — Why this vast savanna is critically important for biodiversity but receives far less attention and protection than the Amazon or Pantanal.
3. Black jaguars and the Onça Institute — Letícia's face-to-face encounter with a wild melanistic jaguar, the rare genetics behind black colouration, and the founding mission of her NGO to connect isolated jaguar populations.
4. Community-led conservation & empowering women — Why conservation cannot succeed without involving local and rural communities, particularly women and young people, and how traditional knowledge strengthens scientific work.
5. The Rolex/Explorers Club grant & global ambitions — Winning the gra

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Ricardo Kaljouw is a Dutch adventurer and mountaineer from Flushing (Vlissingen) in Zeeland, Netherlands — a province that sits below sea level, making his obsession with the world's highest volcanoes all the more fitting. By day he works in military shipbuilding, constructing frigates for governments around the world. By adventure, he has just become the first person from the Benelux to complete the Volcanic 7 Summits — a challenge so rare that only around 68 people in the world have ever achieved it.

Chapters

• 00:00 – Introduction: A Dangerous Encounter
• 01:28 – Welcome to The Adventure Diaries
• 01:50 – Meet Ricardo Kaljouw: Volcanic Seven Summits
• 04:35 – Growing Up Below Sea Level
• 06:39 – Navy Life: Battling Pirates in Somalia
• 09:13 – Inspiration: Climbing Kilimanjaro
• 12:16 – Inside the Crater: Virunga's Lava Lake
• 17:19 – Mount Damavand: Winter Climbing in Iran
• 23:41 – Mountaineering Lessons: Snow Blindness
• 28:04 – Papua New Guinea: Jungle Trekking Challenges
• 31:49 – Close Call: Mistaken for a Witch
• 33:07 – Survival Story: Stranded on Ojos del Salado
• 41:00 – Romance on the Peak: Pico de Orizaba
• 42:33 – Antarctica: The Ultimate Expedition
• 45:40 – Landing on the Frozen Continent
• 1:00:25 – Summiting Mount Sidley: A Historic Feat
• 1:13:26 – What's Next: The Volcanic Grand Slam
• 1:17:16 – Book Launch: A Million Steps on Lava

Key Topics Covered

• Growing up in the flattest country on earth and joining a walking club as a kid
• Serving in the Royal Dutch Navy, including an anti-piracy mission in the Gulf of Aden in 2010
• How a safari to Kenya and a first glimpse of Kilimanjaro sparked a lifelong obsession
• The Virunga documentary that sent him to the Democratic Republic of Congo — and sleeping on the rim of Nyiragongo, home to the world's largest lava lake
• Climbing Damavand (Iran) in winter and going snow blind on the descent
• Surviving near-starvation and a machete encounter in the jungles of Papua New Guinea
• Getting stranded alone at 6,600m on Ojos del Salado (Chile/Argentina) in whiteout conditions
• Mount Elbrus (Russia, 2017) — his first experience on glaciers, roped teams and crampons
• Carrying his proposal ring to the summit of Pico de Orizaba (Mexico) and the Aztec legend behind it
• The full Antarctica chapter — flying to Union Glacier, a 1,000km internal flight to Mount Sidley, two weeks in a 10-metre safe zone, a guide evacuated with pulmonary oedema, and a last-gasp summit window in minus 42°C
• Reflecting on what it means to finish a multi-year, multi-continent challenge

Lessons from the Mountains

• You're only at 70% when you think you're at 100% — but know where the real limit is
• The descent is where most accidents happen; the summit is only halfway
• Always use your equipme

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What does it actually feel like to sleep alone in a West African rainforest — the noise, the insects, the pitch-dark uncertainty? In this Season 5 opener, Chris sits down with Jude Kriwald, adventure filmmaker and cyclist, to unpack Alone Across Gola — Jude’s solo ride across West Africa, including a remote jungle crossing in Liberia/Sierra Leone’s Gola region.

Connect with Jude

• Book Jude For Your Next Event: https://JudeKriwald.com/Speaking
• Follow On Insta: https://www.instagram.com/judekriwald
• Need Mentoring? AdventureMentor.org

Alongside the on-the-ground stories (heat, hydration, kit failures, and a few genuinely sketchy moments), Jude shares a thoughtful take on neurodivergence (autism + ADHD), why “analogue adventures” matter, and how we can build a life that’s more honest to who we are.

What You’ll Learn

• What jungle nights are really like — and why the soundscape is unforgettable
• How Jude manages risk when travelling solo (and what satellite SOS can’t solve)
• Why ADHD/autism traits can be powerful outdoors: hyperfocus, pattern-spotting, rapid problem-solving
• The “stepping stone” approach to confidence and route planning
• Why rest days aren’t optional on long bike trips

Chapters:

• 00:00 Exploring the Unknown: A Journey into the African Rainforest
• 01:45 The Call of Adventure: Jude's Formative Years
• 06:49 The First Big Expedition: Cycling to India
• 11:58 Navigating Life's Gaps: The Lost Decade
• 17:34 Harnessing Neurodivergence: ADHD and Autism as Superpowers
• 22:45 Adventure Mentoring: Leveling the Playing Field
• 28:26 West Africa: A New Frontier for Exploration
• 29:44 Exploring the Unknown: Journey to West Africa
• 31:19 First Night in the Jungle: A Personal Experience
• 34:59 Planning and Preparation: The Adventurer's Mindset
• 36:30 Camping and Rest: Balancing Adventure and Recovery
• 38:05 The Trusty Bike: A Companion on the Journey
• 41:29 Hydration and Health: Navigating the Jungle's Challenges
• 43:46 Self-Reliance and Communication: The Importance of Preparedness
• 47:16 Cultural Interactions: Bridging the Gap
• 51:19 Understanding Poverty: A Lesson in Empathy
• 54:29 The Gola Rainforest: An Adventurer's Discovery
• 57:25 Navigating the Unknown: The Adventure of Exploration
• 58:37 The Art of Filmmaking: A Journey into Storytelling
• 01:02:54 Reflections on Courage: The Impact of Adventure
• 01:05:31 Creating a Platform: The Power of Sharing Stories
• 01:08:14 Paying It Forward: Supporting Future Adventurers
• 01:12:25 Embracing Analog Adventures: A Call to Disconnect

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Listen Now: AdventureDiaries.com/Story

Reaching the North Pole wasn’t just about distance—it was about whose work could survive the ice. For over 20 years, Matthew Henson led expeditions where others failed, mastering indigenous travel and keeping teams alive through the harshest conditions on Earth. Yet when history was written, his role was reduced to the margins.

This is the story of how polar exploration actually functioned, and why recognition followed authority rather than effort.

Listen to the full immersive story of Matthew Henson in our premiere episode of the Adventure Diaries Exploration series.

👉 Listen now: AdventureDiaries.com/Story

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Support the Show: Join the new Patreon for exclusive after-shows, extended newsrooms, immersive short stories and meetups at adventurediaries.com/go

In this highlight reel from the Adventure Diaries Podcast, Chris W. revisits his conversation with explorer Katharina Kneip. Katharina shares the harrowing story of hitchhiking on a French sailboat to cross from Iceland to Newfoundland, battling 50-knot winds and ice in one of the most remote regions on Earth. She also discusses life under the eternal sun of Svalbard, camping near existing settlements to stay safe from polar bears, and offers a grounding "Call to Adventure" that encourages everyone to find exploration simply by walking out their front door.

FULL Episode With Katharina

Timestamped Chapters

00:00 - The Danger of Sailing: Hitchhiking from Iceland to Newfoundland
05:14 - Svalbard's Eternal Sun and Polar Bear Safety
07:01 - Comparing the Rough Beauty of Iceland vs. Svalbard
08:29 - Call to Adventure: The Simple Power of Walking
10:51 - Season 5 Launch Updates & Patreon Support

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The Adventure Diaries Podcast also covers a broad spectrum OF topics withIN the fields of Adventure, Exploration, Micro-adventure, Survival, Mental Resilience, Conservation, Scotland, Hiking, Solo Travel, Cycling, Nature, Storytelling, Mountaineering