Ep 605 - Arctic Cannibalism (feat. Buddy Levy)

>> All right, we're live. We're live. Body, lady, thank you for coming. It's leavey or levee. It's leavey, lady, hell yeah, I got it right.

Thank you for coming. Hey, my pleasure. >> My pleasure. >> I've been using your books to fuel the Patriot on. And, well, thank you for that.

>> I appreciate it, man. >> Dude, it's been, I mean, I guess we do have a symbiosis going here, but it's really, dude, they're...

First of all, I thought, you know, I've read the books,

and I'm like, man, this is story and really is a good writer. I would like read. I'm like, it's kind of really kind of, really turn a good sentence. And then I learned, you studied as a creative writer. >> Yeah, that's true.

I actually published my first story when I was 14 years old. And it was a bird hunting story about me, you know, killing a chuck or a part of it, which no one knows about. But, you know, once I saw my by-line for the first time, I was like, you know, because I grew up in this shadow

of earnest, Hemingway and Catchamite Hone, I was like, I just like tell stories, you know? And it was, so I, I wasn't ever good at anything else ended up being an English major. So I just followed that path, you know, from the time I was thinking.

“>> That's what I really liked the books.”

And I was talking to you before I came in here. I was like, how did I, I don't know how I heard about the book. I was like, maybe it was from someone I follow. I might have just been like a random search. I genuinely don't remember.

I do think it's from the Josh Reed's books thing, but I forget. Um, that was conceded or, but that was the thing. I was reading it and I'm like, man, this, this history book is like, it's just focused on the narrative itself rather than just like, it's just, I get drowned in facts reading history where I'm like,

to just tell me the story, tell me the story and then what you do is, which is nice as you give the occasional historical zinger where it's like, actually this thing was that and it's like, okay, it's kind of cool to know. >> Yeah, I got to say it was, I got to, I got to tip the hat first, foremost, it was the books are great.

>> Well, and I've really enjoyed listening to you guys. Um, make things like human ritual sacrifice and smallpox funny. You know, that's, you know, because when I'm writing it, I'm thinking, you know, this isn't really comedy, but you guys crush it. >> There is something very funny about, you know,

when we're talking obviously about the Aztec, the conceded or thing,

but there is something just that thought was funny about never meeting a certain type

of people before, because the way they like brought them into their temples, is like, you know, this is cool, check this out. And it would just be like a dead dog with his skull crushed in and like a dead kid they're eating and you be like, what the fuck, what is this? And they're like, wait, you don't think this is cool, like we think this is cool.

“And they're like, no, no, that's the worst thing you can do.”

Like, no, there's like the coolest thing you can do. And then the civilisation is clashed. So it is funny to be like, yeah, I want to show you something very important to me. We were eating teenagers and you're like, no, yeah. Yeah, and when I write these books to it, it's always like people are like, you know,

why do you focus so much on this darkness, all this stuff, you know? And I'm like, well, I just, I like to see, as you say, you know, different cultures coming together and also what happens to people when they're on the edge of survival. Like how are they going to contend with this new world or this new place? And it really intrigues me to see what, you know, to what degree people.

Especially back then, you know, like, we're able to figure it out and just, and move on, you know? Yeah, it's pretty, it is pretty wild because it's like, especially the food thing and all that like in conquistador and all those books, like, these guys are going these missions and like, yeah, you only have so much food and they run out.

Now it's like, we got to drum up food in a place we've never been to.

Right. So that, I kind of, yeah, just like you have to every time you want to eat, you have to read basically a village or just be like, trying to be cool. Right. Yeah, that's the thing. Or, or have slaves. Yeah, very helpful. That also blew my mind in terms of the, uh, Kees, you know, hey, Nate, don't fucking laugh. We're talking about a different time period

and they were handy. You can't deny having 2000 slaves would be handy to get food, Nate. We're talking history, right? I don't agree with it personally, but, well, I needed food. And I, Ted, either zero or 2000, I thought if I can get food, whatever. And by the way, I used to share the code. You know, when I was writing it, I would be like, they had 2000 quarters and quarters and women who were making just what he is. And my friend, this

writer French, he goes, yeah, those are called sex slaves. And I'm like, well, they were like bearers and ported, she's like, those were slaves. They took them. She's right. That was the, the sheer volume. This is what shocked me, because it would be like, you know, I,

“I think Cortez landed with what like 600 guys and like 2000 slave was that true? Well,”

he didn't come with very many slaves. He, he, he, he did bring one that had smallpox, which was useful for them. Yeah. Yeah, but yeah, but some reason I thought Cortez had, I'll, he started out with a lot. Maybe I'm thinking of someone else. Yeah, well, what he ended up doing Cortez ended up like recruiting that these, uh, ancillary villagers,

guys to go get this major leader, um, who you call, mucked it, you're a muck, right? Or

“muck, muck, you're the, but I could have sworn Cortez rolled up, they had, they had their”

quarters. Yeah, but they got those from, uh, the villages that they sub, assume, yeah, yeah, first

guy, right. So he didn't roll, it was then, I'm thinking of the Pizarro's in, yeah, yeah. That guy set out the party with like 2,000 slaves. Yeah, but, you know, it any rate, like they couldn't have done it alone, and even then they were often outnumbered significantly, you know, but they just, um, figured out ways to manipulate terrorize. Yeah, well, there was that story from the, I'm going to actually talk about this later today, but there was a story

from the, um, Gonzalo's last stand, or, it means like fighting that Spanish Civil War. He's fighting another Spaniard, and it was actually, Gonzalo's slave who ran out and chopped the guys head off. Nice. I just heard it around town, like, you know, we got it and he had to be like, bro, why

“you don't do that to a fellow Spaniard? The hell you doing? He was dancing in the end zone on the”

guy, he was, but yeah, it's just very, yeah, it was like the war was to stop slavery in South America and the dude's slave cut the guys head off. He was trying to stop slavery. Yeah, it was pretty famous like now I fuck that dude for a moment. Gonzalo's anyway, but yeah, it was definitely a complicated time for sure, complicated time. But that is, it is so brutal, because you're trying, you are trying to get the story, but you have had like an every turn, it is completely, like you were saying,

you're rolling around with, you know, quote unquote, a three women who make tortillas for six hundred guys. They're obviously sex slaves. The guys, some of the fucking guys were probably sex slaves. You know what I mean? It's got to be somewhat prison rules. It gets lonely out of the jail. But yeah, I just got to say the, the books are, they're nice, because it is just, it's the story. It's like the thing that happened based on all the historical record, which

how, how like, is that boring researching that? Like, how, how do you get through that? Because that's, I feel like I would kind of go crazy. That's a great question. No, you know, when I love the research part of it, and it's like two components to it for me, there's the actual sitting there and reading everything that's ever been written or to the extent that I can, everything that's ever been written about the particular subject, so that then I know the story and then I start writing,

but then I also, you know, I always go to the place that I'm going to write about to do an expedition

of my own, so I can make it as real and seem like, even though I'm casting myself back maybe 500 years, to try to be on the ground in the environment that I'm writing about so that I can feel the sense of the place and the sea, the floor and fauna, and we can maybe talk about some of those expeditions that I've done, but, you know, it's, for me, it's fun to immerse in that, it's kind of like doing like a mini a master's degree or a PhD for every book, you know,

and it actually leaves a frickin' mark, you know, I mean, I'm on my tenth book and every time, it's a huge divot out of my brain, you know, because I log in for, you know, maybe six or eight months of just reading and then I'll go on my expedition where I'm gonna go and then I sit my

ass down and spend maybe six months to a year, depending just writing the book and so, but I always

find the reading part, the research part really inspiring because, you know, I'm going back to these original texts and they've got, you know, journals and diaries and in the case of the Spaniards, you know, they had these scribes that were there just to record the events and then, so you, you get these first and letters that they're writing back home and so you really get transported to

“these places into the minds of the people who were there and then, of course, you have to balance”

out to what extent like they're lying or patting the story for different political reasons and so you're doing a bunch of sifting and deciding on which you believe and, you know, history to me is pretty dynamic and malleable. It's not like this set thing depends on, you know, they say history was written by the victors. Yeah, but I love it. I love that part. This episode is brought to you by prize picks. How have I been feeling about sports lately? Oh boy, college basketball. Yeah, yeah,

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you play your first $5 lineup. That's code drenched to get $50 lineups after you play your first $5 lineup, prize picks. It's good to be right. So yes, and then in terms of the expeditions, is that like, I get it. You do it for, do like, get a sense of the place. But like, is that also just to kind of get your own adventure thing going where you're like, you know, because that's kind of because you've you've done now. You've done the Amazon.

Yeah. Did you climb the hills and everything? Well, I liked over the endies. Seconds. So I started in, I tried to, for, for a river of darkness and conquistor, I tried to follow the root of the conquistadors as precisely as possible. You know, using maps now, in modern day context, it's a little different because, you know, there's more people there now. But, you know, for the Amazon, yeah, I started in Keto, did some, went on, partly on horseback,

partly on a bus, and then I tracked down to the headwaters of the Koka River and then went for like three weeks in a dugout canoe with two guides and just me and two other people and floated down the river in a dugout canoe, sleeping in the rainforest in hammocks. It was, it was one of the coolest adventures. Yeah. I wanted to ask you about that. What was it? I do want to go there one time. What was it like being there and, you know, oh my god. It's quite remarkable. I mean, to put it

in context, I spent like, I think two to three weeks, including the Andy's part. And by the time I finished, which was in a Keto's Peru, that's just where the Marathon meets the Amazon. So there's 20, I went 400 miles and there's 2,300 miles more to go to the Atlantic, you know. And that, you know, to give

context, I had to look this up. That is like driving from New York City all the way to basically,

I think like, I don't know. It's so far so far. And, you know, but it's cool because once you get out there, it's still, I mean, I floated through this Yassunian National Park and there's so, you know, it's like one of the most biodeversed places in the world. And then you're just like, you get into this river river where, you know, you float for hours and everything starts to look the same because, you know, you're shrouded on each side by these giant sea bateries. And, you know,

“you have to wear like knee-high rubber boots because there's ant colonies. I mean, there's so many”

critters that can, you know, mess you up, vampire bats and that did you see any vampire bats? I did. And I thought, you know, the thing is, I don't know if you remember in River of Darkness for the vampire bats are pretty intense. They come onto it night and, and they have these like canine in size or teeth and they, so they pierce the skin and then they have this anticoagulant enzyme in their saliva. So it is lick at the wound all night. Yeah, you just keep bleeding. But I was,

I was cheating a little because I had a, I had a hammock that had mosquito netting. So, you know, the other, my guides were just like sleeping in hammocks just out there. But, you know, there's so many, there's like spiders the size of your fist and what was the craziest things you saw in terms of animals? Oh my God. Well, so I, this is kind of bizarre. You know, I wanted to, when, when, when you're in the, when in Rome, I guess, I went, when in the Amazon, I decided to,

to go on an ayahuasca trip. Well, okay. So, I didn't decide to do it. How did you do it?

“Classically, did you have it boofed? I remember that, remember they said they're like,”

siphoned it up their butts back and I did not go for the animal style. But that's what I sick they did that though. I know, well, I mean, it gets there. It's, it's main lining. I know, Oscar. Yeah. I know, this guy, my guide, was asian gung, cool dude, man. He, he was like, I'm going to go get the bark and you want to try it, wasca. And I was like, sure, you know, he was just your river. He was my guide. He knew all the birds and, and he was like, you know,

when you're here, you know, if you guys, whoever wants to try it, you know, and there were only these three people. And the two guys. And so I said, yeah, I'll give it a shot. I mean, I grew up dablin' a little in there in some of these hallucinogens. And so, so I had read about and I thought,

like, I was hoping for this amazing spiritual journey into supposedly if it really takes right,

through the Sunni National Park, I had seen a pink dolphin, which is a freshwater dolphin. They're

like a little forefoot long, really cute. So, I, I'm, the ayahuasca is coming on. And I'm having these hallucinations that I keep seeing this pink dolphin. And I'm like, wait a minute. So, my wife's spirit animal is a dolphin. And I'm like, I was expecting like a sea wolf, you know, these giant animals with like web paws or a frickin' crack in or something. And I, I get a pink dolphin and for my spirit animal. Yeah. My forefoot is terrible. You know, I mean, it was not, it wasn't when

“I had hoped for. You didn't drink it off. You should have drank it, but give me four more cups.”

Like, ma'am. Oh, there you. So, yeah, how was that? Was it like, did you have a super strong dose? Or did you feel like it was like a mild dose? I wish I had wished for, I was wishing for more. Yeah. Well, just to transform that dolphin into something shoes for, you know, like, a thing. Kill. Yeah. But I am also red. I'm glad actually that it didn't take fully because I've seen some stuff and heard that, you know, people come out of that changed. Yeah. Yeah.

It's like, I, what from what I've heard, I've never done it, but I've heard like the full dose is like

you're puking. Yeah. I felt, I just hurled a little. Okay, certainly on. Yeah. But what I want to do is not to be a champion of the whole studio. The master of the club, Laptop, the soft, handy, the internet. So, master, I'm really sorry. I'm sorry. You can say that you can be the back. Yeah, you're my manager now, right? But you don't understand.

“Exactly. The job is worth the advantage. Make the whole thing just like this. And when you then”

work, you're going to have a look at the chain. That's right. Save like this. Like this. Hold it, then. Go back. Now, you're going to try to get out of here. You know, the other thing we did, which was kind of insane. I mean, really, because that, you know, I was like, they took us out. We were on this one big lake. That was like off. I mean, the whole thing is so massive that it was actually part of the river, but it was slow moving and it seemed likely. And he's like, you want to go

catch my guy said, you want to go catch piranhas. And I'm like, sure, I'm a no-man angler. Yeah, you know, from fishing. And I go, what do you use? And he's like hot dogs. And so we go out there. We got a little stick. And we're dangling for pirana. Right. And then he said afterwards, he's like, you want to go swimming. And I'm like, well, they're carnivores, man. Like what we're going to, so we swam with in the same vicinity of these piranhas. You know, and it was like, you're just

sketched a bit. Because yeah, like alone, they're not, they're like, I mean, they're jaws are serious, but they're not big. But you get a couple hundred piranhas in your bleeding. And then, you know, you're, it's just like the movies. Yeah, they can, they can launch you pretty quickly. But they

jumped in first and showed me and I was like, okay, I'm not going to whip out here, you know,

I'm going to, yeah, I'd be so, when I, every time I hear about people swimming in the Amazon, I'm like, it's terrifying. Because there's, there's like manatees in there. Yeah, well, the manatee, you know, they're chill. Yeah. I mean, I, I could have seen the manatee as my spirit animal, too. Yes, something. Yeah. Just, the sea cow is what they're called. They're like, going the bottom and graze grass. We're just like sluggish. So anyway, that's awesome. Yeah, it was, it was really

informative. And you know, what I'm usually trying to do when I'm going on these journeys is I bring all the primary texts that I can carry. And so I'm reading about the expedition that I'm writing about and then I'm kind of living my own one and sort of putting it together like what this place would have been like. And the, you know, there are all sorts of things like in the Amazon for instance, the sounds, you know, in the evening, there's like thousands of different insects

and weird like night insects where the freaking, you know, their head pops up and it goes around like with your destined blinking lights and it's just wild, you know. And there's, you know, there's, there's panthers and the thing that's got me a little nervous, I'm not scared of snakes, but, you know, the Amazon has the largest, the anaconda, right? So, you know, even if you're in a four feet up in a tree in a hammock, you're thinking for a 30 foot anaconda,

“it's not a really big reach for them to, you know, yeah, I think it's literally, come, constrict you to death.”

Oh, so like, what do you do? I guess you got a yell and they cut it off and whatever. Yeah, I mean, you know, you don't, you don't really want to be running into an anaconda, but there's a guy named Paul Rosoli who lives in the forest and that dude is badass. And so he, he, like, intentionally goes out and finds them and catches them and wrestles with them and stuff, you know. So, if you know what you're doing, which I didn't, I mean, that was just trusting my guy. Yeah, I mean, what do you, how do you,

what, like, skill, can you have to, like, wrestle? What do you got to know to do? You need, like,

lay on your belly and quicksand, it's better for you. Spread out this. Yeah, I guess, Anaconda,

“I would try to poke its eyes. Yeah, and there's all sorts of poisonous animals, creatures, you know.”

The weirdest thing is that they're these, like, you know, um, well, and also Cayman, you know, which are not as gnarly as like an Australian sawwater crock, but we, we went out, uh, evening, spotlighting for Cayman. They're like an alligator. Yeah. Yeah. And, um, or they are an alligator. They're small, they're, how big are they? Yeah, they can get pretty big, but these, the ones we were messing with, we're just, like, for feet, but even then is dark and you're like, I don't do,

not knowing my normal course of life to be grabbing, uh, alligators, you know, I mess with them. Even though I was born in New Orleans, I should be more, uh, burly about gators. Well, they can, can they jump out of the water? Yeah, they can kind of leap up and say, yeah. Yeah, so, uh, that was, um, and, you know, it's just like the stuff that it's the unknown to me. So you're, you're like, sleeping in this hammock, and then you hear all the stuff like the howler monkeys who

make this really wild, lion-like husky roar sound. Um, and, you know, just being out in that environment is so intoxicating for me. Yeah. I don't know why. So, and you, and you recently,

you went to the Arctic, right? I did. That was surprising. Like, what the hell? I've never,

that's one place. I've never even thought to go. Yeah, I went from the jungle to the Great North, the ice, you know. Yeah. And I've actually now, I'm, I'm my fourth Arctic book. And do you like the Arctic? I really do. I like the, um, I can't, well, you know, there's so, so many elements to it. Like, um, but I was going to say that on my most recent book, I wrote about the first people who tried to fly blimp to the North Pole, like back in the early 1900s.

And when I first read that, I'm like, huh, we're going to, we're going to take a 200 foot balloon inflate it with like 270,000 cubic feet of flammable hydrogen. Stick a freaking, you know, Johnson 40 outboard motor on it. What could possibly go wrong? You know, yeah, blow up. Um, how do they make it? Well, there's some really great stories of, uh, and that's

just my third Arctic book. Um, you know, there, there were crashes on the ice and, and people

having to survive for months on and on floating sea ice big birds. Um, and, you know, Matt, you know, credit, well, this, that book is called "Rumb of Ice and Sky" and it's set off the largest Arctic rescue in history. Um, but the, the, the funny part of, uh, going to those places is, so I went, went to this place called Svalbard, which is 600 miles north of northern Norway. It's still in Norway, but, uh, it's halfway between the northern, the Norwegian north coast and the

north pole. Uh, so it's like, wait, it's the most northern, inhabited place on earth. Um, and, uh, I had, I had, I had met, I had previously met this woman in Greenland, um, and, which just,

“actually, before we owned it and had a golf course there, but, you know, um, what are we going to do?”

It just was 20 years ago. Yeah. Uh, and she got me, um, really turned on to, uh, the Arctic and, uh, Arctic explorers and stuff. Right on. And so I ended up meeting up with Ingrid, my friend, and, and, and went to Svalbard. bizarre thing when I, uh, I, before I left to go to Svalbard, I read this story. I was like, 'cause I wanted to camp, and I wanted to get the feeling of what, you know, at least to a degree of what it was like for these people to sleep in the cold and on the ice.

Um, it turns out that there's only one campground that you can stay in Svalbard and it's, yeah. Like during COVID, a guy, this Dutch man, whose job was to put an electric fence around this campground. Uh, he was there with all, this is like one of the great tragic ironies man. He was there. All the offencing equipment was lying there at the camp site camp area. And, um, the day before he was going to install the fence, he got, um, malted death by a polar bear.

Right. So, in Svalbard, the polar bear is protected. There's signs all over the outskirts of the town that's just have a picture of a polar bear. And then it says, like, beyond this, you know, you're kind of on your own. Yeah. And so, you know, you can imagine the first few night sleeping there, uh, electric fence or no. If you've ever watched videos of polar bears like, they're just upright over that thing or break through it. You know, they're, you know, they're, you know,

“I've been for some reason. I thought there. I just, I think I've only ever seen them in like,”

Coca-Cola commercials. So, I like didn't even knew that. I didn't know they ate people. Although they were poor. Oh, Lord. They were delicious. They are, I mean, I, you know, oh, there you go. There's something every day. I thought they were honestly like chill bears. I swear to God, you said they eat them. I was like, that sounds like polar bears. Yes. So, there were some

fitful nights in the camp site. Wait, so they never finished the electric fence after the guy got

after a few nights, you're like, I mean, you know, you hear the tent flaps rustling and stuff and

“you're like, all sketched out plus at that far north in the summer, which is when I was there,”

the midnight sun is, there's no darkness. So, you know, you're kind of not sleeping anyway. And then,

you, you know, you hear anything. And we're like, what are the people like you live there? I always wonder

those places where like it's, it's light 24 hours a day. Do they get like the total darkness, too? Oh, yeah. I mean, what are the people like there? They like completely weird or like, I feel like you'd be really weird if you like didn't have a nap. They're hardy folk, man. Like, cause six, you know, you know, half the year, it's nearly dark. Yeah. And so, but there's northern lights. There's the Aurora Borealis stuff. So, you know, they cruise around on dog sled and

with snow machines in the winter. And in the summer, it has like, you know, a three-day growing season. And so, yeah, they do some quick harvesting. But, no, it's just so, it's never really that warm. You know, I was there in June and it's snowed. And it's a, it's a harsh, I really, you end up appreciating that kind of people who are carbon out a life there. I mean, small part itself is very organized. It has a lot of tourism, you know, big tourist ships come in. But also, you can go on

guided expeditions and go see kayaking among the icebergs and the glaciers, which I did. And

really, I'm, it's so, so rad. I love that place. Really, yeah. I've never, that's, I gotta,

I gotta think about that. Because every time I hear about like North Pole, all that Arctic exploration,

“I'm like, count me out, man. I don't know why I just, is it just like snow as far as you can see?”

You're like, well, there's a lot of, you know, there's a lot of mountains too. And I'm having grown up in the mountains. I'm drawn to that. So, you know, huge, and it comes from sea level. So, you've got these massive peaks jutting up in fjords. It's kind of like you picture Norway, but farther north, and stays icy and cold and wind swept for more of the year. So, so here's the question, because it's like, if you're on an expedition, would you prefer

dying the death of someone dying in the Amazon or in the Arctic? Yeah, that's a good one. You know, I've, I've read and written about both kinds of death, right? There's something appealing in a way about like, the cold, if you were just going to get hypothermia and freeze the death, that would be okay, because you just sort of like go to sleep and,

“you know, lie there and lie there and lie there and lie there and lie there. Yeah, as they say.”

But, you know, if you go the other route, you know, in the jungle, you get like dengue fever or something. I would not be fun or, you know, you're bitten by some snake that gives you paralysis first. So, yeah, I'm going to take the north, the north, except I will say that when I was in Greenland, we went out on a boat with a, I was actually writing about a blind adventure named Eric Weinmeyer, who's the first blind man to some at Mount Everest

and kayak down the entire length of the Grand Canyon. How did you get that? Well, he had, he had

help. He had a guide. But amazing. I mean, he's a transformative human. Yeah, that's an amazing.

But I was following him in Greenland on this adventure race and where it's like a week of different, really hard sports and part of it included like, boating for like a day or two all around this southern Greenland. And we were following him in this boat and I got to, I get in the boat with a seal fisherman dude or a seal hunter, I guess. And you know, I said, I, when we got in the boat, I said like, we're the life jackets, you know, and he looked at me and he kind of smiled

to Greenlandic in you at dude and he's like, we don't have him and I go, well, why? Because I mean, I'm going to get off and he goes, no, no. If we fall in the water, we don't want it to take that long to die. Because if you're just like floating along, you know, then you take 10 minutes, whereas if you just bob and then say, how cold is this water? Oh, man, because salt water can keep it below free, you know, it's like birds are floating around the top. I mean, it's literally

three minutes without a dry suit you die. You would die. So you're going in this boat, hoping like everything goes, you know, like, right, trust the dude. But yeah, so he was basically to fall in or dead anyway. Right. So it seems like, you know, the size craft you guys on this boat was like a 20 foot outboard. Okay. But we were following the people who were actually kayaking in rubber rafts. You know, so they were more imperiled than we were. Yeah. Some of

they had the lead suits, which I guess they won't even preserve you for not that wild. The good, really good dry suits you'd stay alive for till somebody came and if they came and got it. Yeah.

stories that I'm telling and the people I'm writing about and like they had none of that, you know,

“no Gore text, no dry suits. And they're out there in like native, in the north, you know, like”

the, the, the, the, um, Scandinavians and some of these Northern people's Lord ones who invented like skin, seal skin kayaks, right? So they are expert in paddling these things, you know? What is a seal

skin kayak? So basically, if you see it, you know, the plastic kayaks that you see out on the

earlier, but they build them with like, um, wooden frames and and sometimes bone because in a lot of these places in the far north, there's no trees. Yeah. And then they, uh, they put the outsides are like stretched seal skin or sometimes walrus, um, and so they are really, they're water tight, um, and, you know, they're the ones who invented the whole, the, the older kayaks actually look pretty much, the designs have stayed similar, you know, there's a little cockpit and you're sitting

up. Yeah. You're so low on the water, you know? It's, it's, in any wind and waves and it's just

“terrifying. Like, I don't want to be that crazy.”

Do you like it? Every day, on the other hand, and I, and on the home house. Do you

like when it's on the other hand? And because you like it, you know, we're in the field that you're out for. Because with credit, it's just like that. Or you're going to get credit on your credit on my way home. Also my credit is just online. X, X, L, 220 gram for 0, 3, 0, 9, and 70 ID, but it's for all of it. Well, it's funny to do the guys who explored that place, because like, you know, again,

go back to the Amazon. It's like, okay, check it out. Like, here's like a kind of useful place. It was like, the thing with the north pole, it's like, you get there, like, yeah, it's on a snow.

It's like, okay, it's an open polar sea. Like, there's nothing there.

But what was really intriguing to me on a regular the north pole, but it was that, you know, they didn't know. Like, so the people that I was writing about up until and even including the derigible airship journeys, in like the 1880s, it was just a giant blank white spot on the map. I was about to say, what do they think was up there? Was there any like tails of what they thought might be there? Yeah, and some really confused tails that actually ended up like not helping

people because they, there was this theory that there was a ring of ice around this kind of warm temperate zone. So they thought that it was like open sea there. And so a lot of times when the the brits and some of the other, I mean, the the the the north regions went there or tried to go there. Like, the theory was, okay, we're going to break through this ice barrier and then it's like warm. I don't know why they believe that exactly. Could be,

you ever get into hollow earth theory? Could just, there are people who think at the top of the north pole, like it hollows out. Yeah, kind of going. Yeah, it's true. I'm teleported right to China. See at the bottom. Yeah. Yeah. Where it's also ice in frozen. Yeah, it's going to be found out there was not the fabled oasis in the middle of all the air. Right, and a lot of times the earlier expeditions went with not enough gear and warm clothes because they thought they were going to

end up in these more temperate places. And they should have figured it out by noting what the indigenous people were wearing. Yeah, sure. You know, they're like totally bundled up with

“Rick and Caribou. How how high up to indigenous people go up to, are they all in the north pole?”

Well, nobody lives at the north pole. But they they live, well, saltbirds, the most northern place, but on the northern coast of Greenland, there are still e-top native populations, people who are still carving out a life up there and living a traditional way with, you know, seal hunting and, I mean, there's there, there's like whales in Beluga and, yeah, you know, they're hardy. I would imagine. I think which one we call it, the egg loser. I've read

about, I was in a like a kids museum with my kids. And apparently they like retain heat, like insane, like snow retains heat. Oh, man, unbelievably so. Yeah, one of the things that's in writing about these expeditions, you know, I marvel at the endurance of these, you know, the explorers because, in many, in some cases, they were smart enough to take a long, indigenous guides and hunters. And, you know, they, they would slog for like 12 hours across the

snow and ice, get to the end of the day, build an igloo in like 45 minutes. And then you have, like, a seal blubber lantern at one end, and you're tucked into this igloo. And there's, and these guys are, you know, taking, not only writing down where they've gone, what the coordinates were,

happened, including what the weather was like. But, you know, they're doing that after, after just

tracking for a day or something. And the other thing that most people don't realize is that they're, especially in the north, it's not, not the case in the South Pole. But these, they're giant flows of ice that's breaking up, and they move tremendously. So you could be in your igloo, and all of a sudden, you hear this crashing crack, you know, heaving sounds and, and shattering. And now the ice is breaking up underneath your igloo. And so they like, you kind of need to

“sleep with your boots on. Or your rear muscles. Oh, that's what you're saying. It's just a frozen”

sea. Right. And then, and so we did a little shatter. And then you have to get out of there. And like, regroup somewhere over here. And, you know, you're yelling at each other in the darkness, and it's just as gnarly. Oh, that sounds awful. It really does sound terrible. That's not pitch me on the north pole. What's up with the South Pole? Yeah. Well, the South Pole is different.

It's more of a land mass that has frozen sea, too. But what I've always found funny is that,

you know, because not a lot of people know about the Arctic and the Antarctic. So they'll, I'll tell them, I'm writing about the Arctic, and they say the only thing they know is Shackleton, which is one of the most famous explorers, right? And they're like, oh, so like Shackleton, right? And I said, well, yeah, it's like Shackleton, except on his journey, everyone lived. And I only write about story for half of the people died. At least. And Shackleton was Antarctic. Yeah.

“Yeah. You still got an amazing story. Personally, if I was talking to Arctic and someone came”

at me with Antarctic, I would probably even respond. I'd be like, okay, dude. I know what you mean. But I haven't been there. That's the one and then on my bucket list of, uh, I've been on every continent except Antarctica. And so that's, that's next. So in North Pole, at like the North Pole, is that like a military base or like, what is there? No, there's just a, it's just a spot on the map. What still? Um, so what they, what they did discover was that

there had been a theory that there was a, another continental land mass there. So, you know, maybe we, maybe there is, um, reserves of something oil, maybe we could, you know, and there, it was contested by a number of countries. So what they did figure out in the book that I wrote "Rumble of Ice and Sky," they fly over it in a blimp and are able to take pictures and, and confirm that there's no land mass there that is just a giant expansive of moving ice.

Okay. And then I'm trying to like picture it. So if you fly to the North Pole and then it's keep going straight. Well, these guys ended up in, what is it? They, they crash landed in Taylor, Alaska. Well, it depends on what direction they go. But like, with the cool thing is, once you go, once you pass an North Pole, every direction leads south, you know, it's like no matter if you turn around or, which in one case they did, they turned around and then went back to

this fall bar, that didn't work, they crashed. But yeah, it's, um, yeah, these stories I love because, you know, once they're out there, then something usually invariably terrible happens. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, it's really, it is, I do like that when you're reading all the sun that's like they're about to die. They're like literally on the verge of death the entire time. Right. How are we not going to die? Yeah. Yeah. I was, I was bugging out on the poison,

it's a different thing, but the poison arrows in the river darkness was like, I couldn't stop thinking about them. Just one little scratch from a poison arrow, and it's just like a 24 hour shivering horrible death. And your arm turns black and falls off. Yeah. And it's like, yeah, don't, you know, duck and stay under those manatee shields, you know, dude, that shit sucks. Guys, this episode is brought to you by on it. Ever feel like your brain is on, but nobody's home.

Spend 10 to 15 seconds sharing a quick, relatable and funny story from your own life, but at time, how about this guys? I'll be honest. I do dumb stuff all the time. This is for Alphabran by the way. I, they sent it to me, so I've been taking it. I fucking like it. I swear to God, I figured I would like, let me just try it out. Let me see. Let me see what it's all about. I like it, dude. It feels

“like it's a nice, it's caffeine free. First of all, that's why I never took it, because I'm like,”

I don't need any God darn caffeine. But yeah, I don't know. I think I, I looked it up. I, I don't, I don't know if this is like you can say what it does, but it apparently just like boosts your dopamine or like pushes dopamine into your brain. Give it a try. Give it a try. I like it. And yeah, it gets, it gets

me charged, man. I take it. It's a very, and here's the thing, too. I'm very, I'm very prone to just

taking stuff. I mean, like, oh, I think it's working. But I gave it to my brother. I, I guinea pig, my brother Swim, who's no stranger to chemicals and chemical compounds, who has a harder your

moving and grooving. So, hey, look, we did it with that science right there. Did a fucking study

“on myself and my brother and Spud and we were all like to end this shit fucking rips. So get it yourself.”

Try it out. Try it out, right? Alphabran is a daily supplement with science back ingredients, like L. Theonine, design a support memory and focus, so you can lock in tune out distractions and stay sharp. Visit on it.com and shop Alphabran to unlock your next level. That's oh, N-N-I-T.com. And yeah, I literally take it every day now. I like it. Go ahead, Sean. You have to plug a show. Yeah, thank you. Coast. Yeah. Hello. It's what we do it for. Hello, everybody. This is Sean.

I just wanted to let you know one last time that I'll be in Salt Lake City this weekend, Friday and Saturday with Nate Marshall, March 27th and 28th, tickets are at SeanGuardDini.com. Please come. There are plenty of tickets available to these shows. So many tickets. And we'll be at the Houston Riot Fest the week after that, April 3rd and 4. And then an actress is after that at the Creek and the Cave. So please come.

Tickets at SeanGuardDini.com or Lamaria Lee.com. And she's ShaneMgillis.com too. It's a lot of the link. Thank you, guys. Thank you, man. Of course, guys. Oh, man. This leg of the tour is winding down on April 10th. I'll be in St. Paul, Minnesota. The Fitzgerald theater. Paul. It's all good. But you guys need. I was just my red light. Was that what you were reading it? Oh, you're fine. Ain't no big thing. Just getting the audio

out to the people. Sorry. Also, 4, 11. The next day after I leave Minnesota, I'm going to Des Moines, Iowa, a white Sherman place or whatever. I'll be there. 4, 11. So Iowa, Minnesota. I have shows there. Let's go. It's finishes out strong, guys. What do you say? And then also, mother fucking Phoenix man, celebrity theater. Guys, come on. It's in the round. It's a cool place. Don't embarrass me. Oh, yeah. Guard eating will be there. Fucking, it's going to be a blast.

And by the way, I come alive in the round. If I'm being honest, I've done the round with Shane. I love it. So please, guys, please, please, please. Otherwise, I'll literally, I'll just pay to get feet seat fillers and all. I don't fucking care. I'm going to have a good show in the round one where the other guy and I'll pay them the laugh at me, too. That's 4, 17. Guys, 4, 18. I'll be in Tucson, Arizona. And let's get it going. Also, I'll be in Toronto. We have two shows in Toronto. Both of them are

one of them is definitely sold out. The second one is dang near sold out. So my dad is third. I don't

“know. Riviera, theater, Chicago. Let's go get that. I think that's going to sell out guys. That's in April.”

There's been a rumor about adding a possible, if that sells out in 11 o'clock show at Xenis. We'll see. We'll see. I don't know. I don't know. We'll see. We'll see. We'll see. We'll see. It's going to see. Oh, nice. Oh, yeah. But yeah, guys, go to mapacuskir.com. That took way too long. Just six shows left before I chill for the summer. Thank you. Thank you. Jeremy, the beat. The Amazonians. Oh, this is quite. Oh, so yeah. The LA. Okay. Bring up the fabled Amazon woman. Oh, the women.

Well, I thought because everybody who lives there is considered an Amazonian now. But true. There's different tribes. So yeah, the Amazon women, that's an interesting and perplexing myth and story. I didn't meet any. I was looking for them. The Warriors. The Amazon women warriors. Yeah. But they had the breasts in the jungle. Whereas the Greek, the Greek, but that's where the term comes from. They're Greek women who would, would they like strap their breasts down?

They don't own it. Yeah. Time downs. They can shoot the arrow. But what I loved about that story and the Black Sea is that they, and this persists too in the Amazon basin is that they would take men mate with them. Yeah. And then like tell them to fuck off. And then they just have the women on the island that were like, we're using you as, you know, you're just procreators. Fantasy. Yeah, collective male fantasy. Get out of here. We're done with you. Go do shit. The

jungle with your friends. I've no use for you right now. Go on it. Well, that was the question. That was kind of what I was thinking about just yesterday. I was reading it. And so you have the, you know, because the conquisitors had the fabled myth of El Dorado, the king, the kingdom of gold, and all this stuff. And that was kind of the myth. That was like a myth that was driving

“them. But like why would, I think you might have just answered the question. But why would”

these Amazonian people all make up a myth of like powerful female warriors? Right. I mean,

there's the sexual thing of them like abducting you from your village and taking you to have sex with you, whatever, drop you back off. But it's like, it is just a weird collective myth that have all these people in the jungle form of like powerful women warriors. Yes, actually back then. And now, yeah, I get it. My people would do that. But like back then in the fucking 1500s,

since it has persisted for hundreds of years, I mean, I love the fact that this is where mythology

“becomes, you kind of wonder. Like is there a kernel of truth to this? Because, you know,”

with modern technology, wouldn't we have found them? But I have to say, in the Amazon, I mean, when I came, when I did my journey and came out and landed in Eqito's Peru, there, there was an article in the paper, or, you know, online. And it had images of, you may have seen them, like their uncontacted tribes still. And they're like painted orange. And, you know, helicopters are whatever small planes are flying over to check them out. And they're just standing

there with spears going, you know, land. Please, you know, you know, that goes maybe seal. But, you know, they, I mean, they would do all right with their guns. Yeah, they probably would. But for me, the point was like, well, okay, if there are, if there remain uncontacted tribes, even in, you know, I was down there in 2008, they're still today, are uncontacted tribes. Yeah. And so it's so vast. And of course, you know, it's being imperiled by logging and farming

and all this stuff. But there's still, it's so vast that there's, if there are pockets of people that have lived the same way for thousands of years. And, and then there's myths about these

particular female tribes that are warriors and don't want to be mess with. To me, there's a,

I have to believe that it's possible. Yeah. Well, the guy in the book saw them. He thought them. So it was like they were, they were, they were, they were like lighter-skinned, tall women that had a bunch of like short guys. They were Boston around. Yeah, I love it. And if you, if you, if you put out, you're, they're fucking killing you. Yeah. That holds, that still holds this day. Yeah. Heidi, I tell you about you better keep fighting him. Yeah, I might have an Amazonian in my house.

That's the last Amazonian. If I didn't, you think I'd be sure to off the floor. Don't back down. No, that, yeah, it was, and it's just such a funny thing, because you hear, you know, they're like, while they're floating around the river, it's like, there's these tales of Amazon women warriors and you're like, you know, how you're like, okay, it's just like a fable. Then they actually battle them and you're like, what the fuck was that all about? I mean, kill me couple. Yeah, yeah, they killed

of almost all of them. Now, shocking, it didn't take one of them prisoner. I know, we still, you know, because if you look back to what Cortez did, and you know, there's also there's albinoes that come into camp one time. Yeah, that was weird one too. Tall albinoes. Tall albinoes.

“You know, they may have been pituitary giants or something. What is it pituitary? What is it?”

Well, like, you grow really fast and you're usually they're marked by having a really big, actually I played rugby for seven years. One of our, one of our best players in the scrum almost a pituitary giant. So he was like, huge, like Andre the Giant. - Yes, okay, yeah. - Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

- The fans just produced the hat on your rugby team. - I would imagine, yeah, John. - I mean, that was the other medieval battle and everything that's fucking awesome. - And he had it, you're like, oh, he talked like that.

(laughing) - I'm pissed if he didn't, honestly. If I did giant with a soft voice, I'd be like, spul-shit. - Howdy.

(laughing) - But Cortez had the wherewithal to snag some of these, you know, specimens and take them home to England or harm me to Spain and he would be like, "I wanna show the king what is here."

And so there were dwarfs and albino's, and some of them, he absconded with, put him on a ship and send him with the royal fifth of gold that they were required to send back. - And he was like crazy.

- Check him out, like this place is rad, you know. - It's crazy to just send enough. - It's just a bunch of treasure then, like essentially like an old friend show. (laughing)

- He was like, he was like, you open a chest and like dude, midges pop out and you're like, "Whoa, that hell's this." - But in fairness to Oriana, he didn't have, like, you know, he was just trying not to die and get down the river.

So he didn't have the capacity to put him in the boat. He was trying to feed his own men. - Yeah, true. - Cortez was like, okay, we're gonna put these guys on ships and send him back and show what I'm thinking.

“- The worst story of all, I think, from River of Darkness”

is when they landed into that village. And it was just women there. And they took over the village and just all just slept with these ladies. - Right.

- And obviously, let's be, let's be frank about it. - And then the guys, then all their husbands came home from a trip to just see these like,

people they've never seen before, all with their wives

and their huts and it was just like, dude, that's the most insane thing you could possibly imagine. - Everyone goes out to work, you come home, and everyone's wife is now being detained by like a strange being used to it.

- I mean, I'm home to this.

(laughing) - You know? (laughing) - You know, you've really been having turtles all day. (laughing)

- And I was like, it's so funny. - I was Chuck, I was Chuckling too. You guys were talking about how they named everything, you know. - And then one place, you read it in the park three or whatever, and it's like, it was like,

place of the burn people. And I was thinking, we should have been called the place where we burned people, you know. (laughing) They didn't want to name it when it really was.

(laughing) - Yeah, also lovely, they called it. We had like that, it Gonzalo Bizarre had a bad march, and it was named the worst march ever through the jungle. - Literally, that was a literal term.

- Yeah. The worst march ever through the jungle. (laughing) - There have been a lot of bad ones. - Yeah, this one, worst, worst ever.

- Well, it is pretty bad when he gets back, and he's like literally in, you know, skins. - Yeah. - Bare foot, you know, the fact that any of those days. - The worst is them, I didn't know you could do this,

but the horse you cut it open, drink the blood as needed, and then you pack it full of mud. It's just like a walking, just like a food truck, you just kind of walk and you would cut slickers, cook a sliver of it, eat it,

and let it keep walking as you're eating, and it was like, oh, yeah, that was grim. I was listening to it a little bit on the plane, and I'm like, "God, I forgot about that." You know, it's just what people will do.

And, you know, I have to say, there wasn't much cannibalism in the conquistatory tales, but if you really, if you like cannibalism, as you get to them, (laughing) as you get to the Arctic stuff,

a lot of cannibalism. - Yeah, that was the, that's the funny thing too, 'cause I, you know, and ever I'm like, I'll like organize notes for things, and I'll use like, you know, grock or cloth,

and they're always like, by the way,

they didn't sustain themselves on cannibalism, it was for ceremonies, it's like, okay dude, they're just like eating, like, don't like, nice it up, like it was church, that's okay. But so that Arctic was like, they needed to munch guys,

that was like, sustained, that was like sustaining. - Yeah, and you know, you're talking about a different, like, the idea was that the explorers coming from Europe and North America were like, you know,

“was taboo in different cultures, it's less, less so, you know?”

- Yeah. - And it does beg the question, I've been asked that at book reading, it's like, would you eat human flesh? - It's always one guy at a book reading. - Yeah, it's like, did you ever read a person?

(laughing) - This is really what we would read a person. - Do you think if I died, you're fake? (laughing) - I'm gonna, I mean, what do you say to that?

- Do you think someone asked you that? - I say, would you? - I mean, it depends on how, if it was your, if I can homie, you know, like, - Yeah, sure.

- How well do you know 'em? - True, you know. - Is it a guy or a girl? - Right, I wouldn't eat a guy personally. - Yeah, I would, I would, I would, personally.

(laughing)

- Oh man, I was a powerful warrior, I would eat a powerful warrior.

- Yeah, I mean, I think at a certain point, I would. - You know. - Yeah, obviously, if you get hungry enough, yeah, for sure.

- You know, you're delirious with hunger and it's like a meat. - Yeah. - If you ever vegan, I would say no. - I have a cupboard full of like cereal and all this stuff

and I'll be not hungry and I don't want to eat the cereal and I'll eat the cereal. If I was starving to death, I would totally eat a person. - Yeah. - Well, like, no, not even not a question.

- Yeah. - Sorry, sorry. - Sorry, sorry. - But so man, let me eat everyone here.

“I think you guys are great, but if I get hungry”

- But so it gets kind of grim. - Oh, try. - It gets kind of grim because then it becomes a question of okay, if there are already dead. - Yeah.

- Like, let's say they starve to death. - And then they're alive. - And there, which happens in a couple of my books where, you know, they're dead already, they starve. So that ain't, you're looking around.

Okay, I don't want, you know, we've already gone out hunting and we haven't found anything and there's a guy starving to get us. Are we gonna, are we gonna do it? And versus, you're gonna, you know, kill someone

to eat them, which is a different thing for me. - Well, this went dark. - No, no, I hear what you're saying 'cause if someone starts to death and you gotta split up your friend

with all your other friends that eat them, but it's like they isn't a lot of meat on them. - Right. - Next person starts lagging, like we need to eat this guy now and get a better meal out of it.

- Yeah, and then in some cases, what happens is like they start looking around, this happens and in that book, actually, or in labyrinth advice. So, one guy, you know, everybody else is like emaciated sort of walkin' dead situation on the ice

and then you've got like one guy who's like 200 pounds

“that looks like he's just come from CrossFit, you know?”

And they're like, 'cause up with him. Like, why is he so, you know, burly?

to the title crack where they've been throwing the dead people

and like beat him at night, you know? - Beat him at the title crack. - He's just jacked and ribbed. - And that guy, it doesn't go well for him. - So, he was kind of gave himself away

about being like, man, I'm just different. I'm just building different, it's crazy, it's genetics. - So, he was just sneaking off a night time and just frying up the guys and... - Yes, and then, but the commander,

this was an army expedition. And the commander figures it out, a dolphin's grelating, he's like, I don't know, I hate you guys. - Yeah, that's the way I'm gonna have her. - So he ends up going, okay, he catches him, stealing food.

And then he says, okay, we're gonna take three guys out there and Henry, that's his name, Henry's got to go because he's eating what little food we have left. And so, they do it thing where he was - Oh, he was much in the food reserves.

- After and end that end the people. - Yeah. - And so, then he's like, we, you know, well, I'll buy if Henry keeps eating everything. So, they have an execution and they just like go out there

and, you know, I gotta say that's not very fat positive of them. (audience laughs)

“- And I don't think that's what he was hungry.”

- Yeah, yeah, and Henry was body-shaming people too. You know, that's fair. Damn, so he was, so they executed him, but, you know, they wanted to not know who did it. So, they really put like blanks into the guns

and then a live round in the other one. - And all fired, they all fired on him and... - Dang. - Then they had to report it to the, if they, you know, they didn't, some survived, so then they had to like,

write a report of like, yeah, we took out Henry. - Made a kill him. Sorry. - That's what you get, man. He can be doing that on the expedition?

- No. - It's a bad form. - Bad team player. - It's a terrible team. - That's a terrible team player.

- Things all about himself. - There's no I in team, it'd be great. (audience laughs) - Dang, that's awesome.

“- So, what is like, so out of all the expeditions you've done,”

what are they, you've done, the Amazon, Artic, Phil, I will also, I went to Borneo. This was, I think I mentioned you, I had followed these crazy multi-sport adventure racers around the world for about seven years,

and this was run by Mark Bernett, the guy who created Survivor of the Apprentice. And so I was doing some research, and I was a journalist then, writing about these sports.

And one of the ones I went to was in Borneo, which is northern Malaysia, islands. And that was super intense because, and it was actually during this race where Mark Bernett found the island

that was the first survivor island where the first competition happened, however many like 112 seasons of Survivor, - Yeah, yeah, yeah, whatever it's been.

And so, this was really incredible.

We were following these racers around, and we were in Boats motorboats, but we would sleep on islands, right? And I had heard, my friend is trying to freak me out, he's like, "Yeah, well, Borneo, that's where the headhunters are, right?"

So I thought like, "Yeah, really?" And he was like, "Well, they're south. They're south, and where you're gonna be." And I'm like, "Oh, good." And he said, "But, Borneo has some of the most toxic snakes

in the world, and also, so at one point, I'm on this island, and we were like waiting to go to the next island, and we camped out there, right?" This couldn't have a hammock there because of no trees.

And so, I had heard about this C-Crate K-R-A-I-T,

“which is like one of the most toxic snakes in the world, right?”

And if it bites you, I think you have like hours to live. So we're like, "Get to this island. It was beautiful. We're all setting up camp in this one guy.

We had this McGyver dude named Britto. He's British and his nickname was Britto, which isn't that clever, but that's what we called him. But Britto turns out was really scared of snakes, right?

So we had seen in a couple of their water snakes. So it's freaky 'cause we had to anchor out like a shallow. We anchored like 200 or 300 yards from the island, and then you couldn't get into shore 'cause it would break, you know?

Yeah, yeah. Talk up the boat. So we're like carrying all our crap through the water, seeing occasional slithers going, "Goddamn." And so when we got to shore, Britto was like,

"I'm fucking so scared of snakes." And I'm like, "Okay, well, you know, just stay away from them." But we ended up like in the middle of the night. So I set up my tent.

And in the middle of the night, I feel some like next to me, and the dude is sponing me, you know? And listen, I'm okay with sponing, you know? But the guy, I'm like, "Prin, what the fuck are you doing?"

He's like, "I can't take it, I can't be out there." And then I showed him, I go, "Well, it's not gonna help you "that much in here. "My tent had like a little hole in the corner."

And I'm like, "The secret is gonna come, right?"

And I'm like, "They're, they're, they're water snakes." Yeah, they're water snakes, but they can come on laying at their amphibious. Oh, it's not, but it's also like,

“don't be next to me, he's like, we're gonna, you know?”

Right, she was like, "I'm afraid it snakes too, "brow back up, man. "Get off of the guy, I know." I can butt to you. Get your snake away from me."

But, but, and then I went to the next day, I go, I think you made it all up and they closed you, honestly. You probably did, you told me, buddy. Yeah, so the next day I went out and took a leak. And I'm like, I see the movement in the scrub, you know,

and I'm like, "What the, is that?" And it was like, it turns out, it was a monitor lizard, which are next to the Komodo Dragon,

the second largest reptile in the world.

I mean, there's like, from me to these guys, you know? And it's like a Shetland Pony elongated size lizard, you know, and you're like, and they're kind of gnarly too. I mean, you know, if you don't spook them or something, you're good, but like, it all just makes you nervous.

You know, we went to a dinosaur. A measure of the size of a Shetland Pony, that's a dyno. Yeah, and you're out there in its Jurassic Park situation. And you know, it's just trying to make a living. That's fucking terrible.

“And then how did you just on that island for a day?”

Yeah, and then we went off to the next, I mean, it was like a 10 or 12 day long race. And we also had to crawl through, they had this really cool section of the race where they had to, they're these bat caves that are really famous

and they're huge. You go through these, like, you crawl through these tunnels to get inside the big cavern and they're massive. And then there's these bat caves that actually are the, the local population, they harvest these birds.

They're like, kind of like a swallow. They're called swifts. They harvest, there's a, they go up on these like vine ladders to harvest the eggs from these swift birds. It's like a medicinal effort to use the act situation.

What? Yeah, every single place has their, like, I swear, like, this is like the tree bark, liquor, or whatever. Every single civilization has their own, like,

bone or medicine. You gotta have it. You do. Hey, I turned 40 this year. I mean, you got, I'm gonna think of it, bro.

I'm like, it's finally come for me.

But so yeah, you're crawling, it was kind of nasty. I'm not against bats or anything. But like, when you, I mean, you guys, I know I have a converse, yeah, yeah. You got bats.

“But you have to crawl through tunnels of bat guano,”

like, you know, centuries of bats shitting there to get into the cavern place. And then as part of the race, the racers had to go through there and then climb up this huge, like, a scarpement

and then like, repel down the other side, right? So, you know, you're just coming out of there going, did I pick the wrong gig? Like, I'm covered in batshit, you know, which, oh, it's not good.

No, can you guess, it's like, it's like, I know birch it, you can get really sick of it. Yeah, you back on, oh, you don't want to eat it. True. Fair enough.

No, it has, you can get sick. Well, because the birch hit, what happens is it dries and then you hit something and it goes up in the air and then as soon as you breathe at in it, you got that, like, when it gets wet,

that's when it kind of messes you up. Like, like, whatever, I think moisture activates. Yeah, it's good, it's been, I was working my dad where I were doing the thing with pigeon shit. He might've been making this all up.

And he was just like, moisture activates the germs and birch hit. It's like, that's on you too, virus. You don't be snorting that. That's pretty cool though.

So what do you, um, what do you have? Like, cooking up, what's your, what's your next? Well, I'm doing a, I'm doing a fourth Arctic book 'cause I am the master of the art. You are the master of the art, is it turns out?

And so I'm claiming an art, I'm gonna go to the anarch. Yeah, I'll beat you to it. Well, my editor, I'm actually, this is avoidance behavior right here 'cause I am working on a new book and it's about,

so you may have heard of John Franklin who, this Franklin expedition that went off in the two boats, ships got stuck in the ice

and then he never came home.

He had 120, if you guys heard about the terror, it's an AMC show called the terror that was a huge deal, but anyway, these two ships got stuck in the ice and then nobody came home and so his wife, Lady Jane Franklin sent, for like 20 years,

sent expeditions to go try to find them and then let have those people died. But those two ships were recently found in like 2017 and 2014 because of Inuit oral history, they said we saw, you know,

they're answers are said, we saw these boats where they went down and they ended up using some mercifuls to go find both those ships and it helps solve the problem or the questions about what happened

and in fact cannibalism occurred. Of course, 129 men perished, but that's not what it looks about. (laughing) - Yeah, sure, yeah. - My books about the first Franklin expedition

in a way, is about the first Franklin expedition

in like 5,000 miles on foot and canus,

“with DNA, yellow knife, indigenous people.”

It was during the time of the Hudson Bay Company in the Northwest for traders, right?

And so it's 1819 and it's just this incredible ordeal

where they're trying to figure out where the Northwest passage is. In fact, almost all this stuff was related to finding the Northwest passage and these are many of the Arctic tales

and it's just an incredible ordeal. - What's the Northwest passage? - They were trying to find a C route, instead of having to go all the way around to Asia, you could go quicker from your circuit through the circuit

as all these islands north of Canada, but it's really hard to navigate and half the time it's frozen and not navigable. And so it took centuries to figure out that it's not practical and it's kinda many people.

I mean, with global warming, it's becoming open longer, if you believe in global warming. But it's still not, it's too circuitous to get through quickly and it doesn't really solve the problem. But it took a long time and many lives

to come to this realization. - It sucks. A lot of those guys do have noticed when they, whenever someone has a successful voyage

and they try to do the second one,

it never works out. Besides, I feel like Christopher Columbus is the only guy who kind of like, I don't even know what happened to him ultimately. He gets, yeah, like where the journey is improved.

- Yeah, he just kind of is, I don't know if this is true. I was talking to somebody months ago about Christopher Columbus, who was a history teacher. And he was saying that Christopher Columbus, when he first got to, what was it like,

his spagnola or whatever, they were the people there. After the name of them, they were like, you know, your famous, it was like the super docile. Well, apparently he would just like hop on their back and make them piggyback him around the island,

which is so disrespectful. He was like, I'm tired and just piggybacked. What is the name of this carryover? - You look fit. (laughing)

- That's disrespectful.

- I thought that was crazy.

I mean, there's obviously all of them did a lot of terrible things, but that would just, (laughing) if a grown man was like, all right, come on. Let me hop up.

If they hop on you real quick, I would be like, it's fucking bullshit. - Yeah, but he made it. He was the only guy, I feel like he did, I'm sure there are others, but he had like multiple

successful expeditions, right? - Yes, he was an influence. - Yeah, but you're right, they tend to end poorly. I mean, even in the case of Oriana and River of Darkness, like he thought like what he learned going down the river

would have helped, and then the return voyage was disastrous. - Right. - Well, plus you can't figure out where you're going, you know, like because of the mouth is so wide. One of the staggering facts that I wrote it,

I'm gonna have to confirm this after we are done here if it's actually true, that there's an island at the mouth that's the size of Switzerland. - Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. - That's the same.

- What do you look at that up?

“- I think I think that it'll probably quote me.”

- No, I think that's the case. - Yeah, and it's, so imagine Oriana arriving back there with his child bride, you know, and he didn't bring a child bride in return, boosters is crazy.

- And then like we're going back up, and we're gonna mostly visit the places that were nice to us. (laughing) - Yeah, Marahoe Island.

- Yeah, that's insane. - And I forgot about that, and then he survives it, and then brings a child bride, honeymoon's. - The child bride. - The great honeymoon.

- So you're crazy. - Crazy. - He's diced in front of her. - Brazil is a nice this time of year. (laughing)

- Yeah, I do like learning about those little like, those weird like waterways, like the Boca de Serpiante and the Boca de Dragón, where they got to like navigate these weird rocky channels with like wetlands, through, what was that, like the Trinidadian coast

- Yeah, mangrove swamps and everything. - Fucked sucks. - Yeah, I mean, that would suck so, especially just to learn where you're at, and I go where the place where it ends

called the "Nouth of the Dragon," I'd like, fuck. (laughing) Fuck. (laughing) I wonder why they call it that.

(laughing) Well, buddy, this was great. Thank you so much. Is there anything else? You have or anything you'd like people to know

or any of that stuff, talking business? - No, man, just, I really appreciate being here for customer. - It's been a blast and I'm gonna keep writing these things until I'm weak and infirm and need to feed on friend. - There you go. (laughing)

- Well, thank you so much, my pleasure, man. - See you, buddy. - Take care.

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