Yep, you read that right. We caught up with Cumbrian Rosie Watson, 900km into her epic trip across the globe, finding better ways of dealing with the climate crisis in the process.

Originally from Ennerdale, one of the most beautiful places in England and the area that gave birth to Ascendancy Apparel, Rosie spent a lot of time outdoors as a child, and got into orienteering & running at around the age of 12.

She switched to fell running at about 18, and started wanting to run for longer, using it as a form of travel, as well as for racing ‘the fell running & racing community in the Lake District is incredible and very unique’.

Rosie found inspiration in a variety of books, about people doing very long human-powered adventures. These included books written by Alistair Humphreys, and Rosie Swale-Pope's 'Just a little run around the world' to name a couple.

‘I wanted to do something similar, but running and off-road, and on as many beautiful trails as possible, and also combining doing something useful to tackle the climate crisis - sustainability was the area I had trained and worked in’.

Kate Rawles was another big inspiration having done several epic 'adventures with a purpose'.

‘Her advice was "you need to tackle sustainability a way that makes you feel alive". Working in an office wasn't doing that, no matter how interesting it was - I wanted to be outside! So this idea was born!
Often things to do with the climate crisis are communicated through numbers, figures, descriptions of projects etc, which isn't exactly easy to connect to on a personal level. However this connection and emotional engagement is exactly what we need to create real change. It's all very well knowing that x & y has this impact, but if you don't really feel and connect to it, it doesn't have an impact (take the example of the recent surge in the mainstream awareness about plastic, after David Attemborough highlighted it with moving images and TV!). I'm hoping to communicate the ways we can change society for the better, in both quality of living for everyone, and the planet, in a way which shows the human, personal stories which people can relate and connect to. I'm hoping this will also have a 'double win' of showing the good in people across nations and cultures - something we desperately need at the moment given certain global moves towards right-wing politics, and dehumanising and 'othering' of people from certain cultures and in certain situations (e.g. refugees, migrants etc). And of course, I'm hoping for the triple win of helping empower women to take on more solo adventures’!

Rosie was able to run with a buggy in the Netherlands as the terrain was so flat.

So how do you plan something this big?..

Although Rosie doesn’t have an exact schedule or route, she hopes to complete the trip in six months to two years.

Understandably her priority is to be very careful about looking after her body - running, especially with a rucksack, is much more stressful for the body than cycling, for example, and as a result Rosie will need to be careful, given the longevity needed to complete this challenge.

On a super tight budget, and unsupported trip, she won’t be able to pay for a physio/sports massage person to come along and hold her together!

To fund the trip Rosie is using both her own savings, and a Go Fund Me page - ‘people have been so generous and supportive!’, She’s also receive some financial support from Small World Consulting, where she used to work!

‘I also have support in terms of some kit, free coaching, and advice from these companies, which I'm really grateful for! But basically I'm trying not to spend more than 50 pounds per week. Doing this is part of the adventure itself’!

Rosies planning was mostly focused getting everything ready so she could just get out of the door, creating a very rough route to aim for, getting the website sorted and spreading the news a bit.

‘In terms of route, visits etc, the details of this are only really organised a couple weeks in advance, maximum! That's been one of the main challenges so far - balancing my time and energy between running, researching, contacting people in the route coming up, writing blogs etc... there is quite a lot of ongoing admin! In terms of the route, I generally find already existing long distance hiking trails, then try and patch them together as much as possible, and just use Google maps for the bits in between. So keeping my phone charged for all of these things is an ongoing battle, which is why Powertraveller have been such an essential sponsor’!

So how’s it going so far?..

‘It's gone really well so far, and I've absolutely loved it too (even the weather has been great!). I've done 900km so far, so that's about 20km per day on average. That's felt pretty manageable, and I deliberately want to stay within my limits for the first few months. I'm not in a rush, and the main goal is to not get injured and to be able to keep going’.

Any highlights so far?..
’I’ll probably always remember the first week - I was SO excited to be finally moving and 'doing it', and arriving at the ferry in Newcastle was an amazing feeling - to actually be leaving the UK, having ran there from home, entering the 'unknown'! Being taken in by some lovely students at Wageningen in the Netherlands was another highlight, and they made me pancakes on my birthday, then Gloriya ran with me for the day (see blog here)! Meeting Martin Frick at the UN in Bonn (Germany) was great too, and so was the RheinBurgenWeg trail to Mainz - so beautiful. Visiting Hambacher Forest wasn't a highlight as it was so shocking to see, but it had the most impact on me so far and I'm really, really glad I went (see Blog here)’.

What would you say to anyone else thinking of doing something similar?

‘Ever since leaving I keep thinking 'what took me so long?!'. So many people want to, or think of doing something like this. That's no good - you need to make yourself get on and do it, or you won't. I took Alistair Humphrey's advice! Step 1 - set a leaving date & time period, and guard it like you would guard a child from monsters (this isn't his wording, but you get the idea). Ignore all other opportunities - especially career related, as they all seem great, so are super tempting, but there will always be new ones. You can do this even before you know what the adventure will be, but it's the hardest part! Step 2 - save up as much money as you can between now and that date. Step 3 - make the adventure you want to do fit that budget and timescale. Use the gear you have already, and buy other bits second hand. If you're not running with it on your back, you don't need to go super light. If you are, you don't need much gear anyway! Then go! Don't wait until you feel 'ready' - if it's a challenging adventure, you won't (I definitely didn't, and the week before leaving I cried quite a lot). You won't regret it, whereas it's more than likely you WILL regret not going. It's easy to tell yourself you will do it one day, but maybe you won't - I'm sure there are a lot of people who at one point thought they'd do something like this, but never did. Don't let this be you! Whatever budget or timescale or other challenges you have, you can still find an adventure. And finally, please make it sustainable while you're at it. Carbon-intensive adventuring isn't worth the impact on the planet, and you don't need to fly to the other side of the world to have a good time (e.g. Mike Elm just got the train from Edinburgh to China, and had much more fun than you would flying there)’.