Antarctica…really!

In March of 2009 I was selected to be a part of Team Inspire for an Expedition to Antarctica. The selection involved a three stage application process that not only changed my life, but also lead to a turbo-charging of my desire to inspire youth to be involved in the work of saving our environment.
Being selected for this opportunity meant I was flown from Denver, Colorado to the southern-most tip of Argentina – Tierra del Fuego. From there, I met with other researchers, students and policy makers from around the world. At the time, we discussed what we expected from the Copenhagen Climate Conference and talked about how our work fit into the realms of being good stewards of the global environment. After two days of preparation, we boarded a ship to cross the Drake Passage to Antarctica.
However, the most rewarding part of the whole experience and the center-piece of the expedition was being lead by polar explorer Robert Swan, OBE (Order of the British Empire). Rob is the first person in the world to have walked to both the North and South Poles! He and his team faced a number of their own challenges and disasters and personal losses in accomplishing these amazing feats. His leadership on the edge training has helped formalize so many of the axioms I’ve lived my life by from trial and error – which I hope to share with you here in the coming months.
Right, so I’ll be posting some videos and photos from that journey and you will have the opportunity to ‘meet’ with some of the researchers I went with. In the next week or two, we’ll be posting ‘schedules’ of speakers that you can sign up to speak to via Skype about their work. These are researchers, graduate students, activists and policy makers from all over the world: Canada, India, Hong Kong, US, New Zealand, China, England and more. If the timing doesn’t work or you don’t have access to Skype, we’ll have a forum where you can post questions for us to ask for you and will record these audio/video conversations for you to check out when ever!