A 16-foot canoe loaded with food, 500 miles of wilderness ahead of us, camping on islands under the stars: paddling down the Yukon River remains one of my favourite adventures.

The river Kaveri is one of the 5 great holy rivers of India, revered by pilgrims for centuries. From its source amongst the coffee and cardamon plantations in the cool hills of the Western Ghats, the river flows 500 miles across southern India towards the hot plains of Tamil Nadu and the Bay of Bengal.

In 2012 Alastair rowed across the Atlantic Ocean.

I spent six weeks in the Canadian Arctic on an Ice Base on the frozen Arctic Ocean at 78 degrees north (at the spot often referred to in polar races as ‘The North Pole’, though in fact it was the 1996 location of the magnetic North Pole).