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The Three Lakes Expedition

Photo Credit: Roxanna Barry

Recently we supported Bex Band and Emma Rosen on their first expedition together across three lakes in the Lake District. We caught up with Bex on their return and got the low down on how the expedition came about and how it went.


Let’s set the scene – where did you and Emma both meet? 

We both met on the side of a mountain in India – Stop Kangri to be precise! We were both doing expeditions to summit the mountain (Emma’s was successful…mine wasn’t) and we had a 1 day period where we crossed paths at a hotel. We instantly clicked over our love of writing and adventure. As soon as we were both back home we met up for a coffee. Shortly after that we actually ran a writers retreat together and since then have been saying we both wanted to do an adventure together. 


Whose idea was it to do the Three lakes? 

Over a cocktail in South Bank, we committed to doing an expedition together in 2022. We wanted it to be about a week in length – having a 2 year old makes it hard going away for long periods of time and Emma has been very busy with work. For this reason and because of our recent commitment to reducing our impact on the environment, we also settled on doing something close to home. The other requirement was that it was something that we hadn’t done before and would push us out of our comfort zones. From this, we settled on doing a water-based adventure. 

After a few weeks of going back and forth with ideas, we eventually settled on packrafting and hiking between the longest (Windermere), highest (Red Tarn) and deepest (Wastewater) lakes in England. It felt like a real adventure as no-one has done this before and neither of us had ever used a packraft!


Was it the biggest challenge you have done to date?

My biggest challenge to date was hiking the length of Israel – a 1000km trail. It was my first experience of doing something so adventurous. I was unfit and had barely any hiking or camping experience. It was an adventure that changed my life forever. Off the back of that hike, I launched Love Her Wild (now one of the biggest women’s adventure communities in the world), have gone on to do many more adventures and even wrote a book about my experience called Three Stripes South. 

Emma is about to head into her biggest challenge yet, hiking Everest Base Camp and Island Peak in Nepal (at time of writing). Good luck Emma!


What have been the highs and lows of the expedition?

Like any good expedition, there were plenty of both. The lows were the tough distances carrying such heavy packs that contained all our rafting, hiking and camping gear. The blisters on the hands from miles of paddling. The getting lost in bogs and losing steam. The highs though made it all worth it….like crossing Windermere lake and reaching the summit of Helvellyn. As well as quieter shared moments like watching a beautiful sunset from our wild camping spot on the first night. 


Have you learnt something about yourself? 

I’ve learnt that I massively underestimate myself….I think we both do! The whole journey to the Lake District we were both saying how nervous we felt and how we were sure we wouldn’t be able to cover the long distances. We had already started considering ‘plan B’s’ and how we might make it easier. We didn’t need to though. It was tough, but we took it slow and steady and both made it to the end, making all 3 crossings successfully. 

I’ll start believing in myself a bit more going forward!


Where do you go from here? 

Emma obviously has another big adventure on the horizons. I’ll need to wait a little while until my next big challenge though. Juggling adventure-life with being a mum is something I’m still adjusting to. While I do sometimes miss having lots of big expeditions in my life, I know it won’t be forever and instead I focus on small challenges that I can manage alongside raising an infant – such as trying my local bouldering centre for the first time or taking my little one wild camping. At some point I’ll feel ready for something a bit bigger…..I’m just not sure when that will feel right or what that will be. But that’s all part of the fun! 

Find out more about Bex at https://www.theordinaryadventurer.com/ and Emma at https://www.25before25.co.uk/ 

 

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