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Rosie Swale Pope
71 Plays4 years ago
74 year old legendary global adventurer and author, Rosie Swale Pope (MBE) is running solo from the UK to Kathmandu to raise money to support PHASE Worldwide and their charity work in Nepal.
In 2003, Rosie began a five-year run-around-the-world, travelling 20,000 miles to raise awareness for the early diagnosis of cancer, and to raise funds for an orphanage in Kitezh, Russia. Rosie is the only person in the world to have completed this solo challenge unsupported, carrying all her belongings in her cart behind her.
Rosie starts her latest adventure on June 25th.
You can follow Rosie on:
You can sponsor Rosie here
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Transcript
Introducing Rosie Swale Pope and Her Mission
00:00:00
Speaker
Welcome to episode 39 of the UK Sports Shop Podcast. In today's episode, I speak with 74-year-old legendary global adventurer and author Rosie Swale Pope.
00:00:14
Speaker
Rosie is running solo from the UK to Kathmandu starting on the 25th of June to raise money to support FaZe Worldwide and the charity work they do in Nepal. For those of you who don't know who Rosie is, she is famous for a, in 2003, beginning a five-year run around the world where she travelled 20,000 miles to raise awareness.
00:00:38
Speaker
for the early diagnosis of cancer and it also raised funds for an orphanage in Russia. Rosie is the only person in the world who completed this solo challenge completely unsupported. She carried all her belongings with her in her cart behind her. I really enjoyed speaking with Rosie. Her enthusiasm is infectious.
00:01:00
Speaker
I hope you enjoy listening to this as much as I did recording with Rosie. Have a great week and see you on the next episode.
Rosie's Journey into Running and Adventures
00:01:09
Speaker
Welcome, Rosie. How are you today? I am very well indeed. Thank you, Joe. A big privilege to be on for FaZe Worldwide. I'm very excited to talk to you.
00:01:20
Speaker
Yes, I'm very excited to speak with you as well. Would you like to, I've done an introduction there like I do on our podcast, but would you like to give us an introduction to yourself, to our listeners? Well, I am just a very ordinary runner. And I always used to think that was just a slow runner, not very good. But I have discovered that all of us can find a way through in running. And just this week, I went to see the very finest
00:01:48
Speaker
I've shopped in the town I'm in and I got the lead shoes chosen to be by a man as a 2.19 marathoner and now I can run up the hill faster. I'm pulling quite a big weight about my buggy. I ran up one of the steepest hills in the area to get here and only stopped twice and it's notorious. Having the right kids, I realised everyone's special
00:02:10
Speaker
even the people. So what I'm going to do, tell you briefly, I used to be a sailing person, so I'm used to self-sufficiency. So I've actually really attracted, when I started running at nearly 50, to passage making. So after a couple of other things, I think my second, third ever race, from the old late friendly 10K, was the marathon desalves, because I love deserts.
00:02:35
Speaker
And so I managed, it was a magical thing. I didn't do very, very fast, but I completed it. And I was so excited. And there I learned how you can carry food because as you know, I'm better than me. They're very strict. They do spot checks. You can't carry somebody else's food or anything.
00:02:52
Speaker
I was so excited. But then after I trained by running everywhere, once I got off the trains, well, I don't mean off the transport, let's say from Wales to London, I would run everywhere. And I remember putting
00:03:07
Speaker
I used to do potatoes to teach me to carry weight. I had a backpack of course then and then I would plant them if they got too heavy so there's still window boxes in Bond Street with potato plants in them probably and then it was so exciting but once I'd done the race, which is a wonderful race and very well organized, I had thought well I've got the backpack and actually had to run the last
00:03:32
Speaker
One of the days of the race, I had to run barefoot, which is very bad, because I had to wrap my scarves around my feet because something happened to my shoes, the long story. But afterwards, I thought I had got a backpack, and at surreal times, I ran from a rocking charity that looks after the working animals, and blisters were tended by a vet.
00:03:50
Speaker
And then, so a few weeks later, or whenever it was, I can't remember the exact date, I had this desire to run across Romania, because I wanted to see the country.
Spontaneous Adventures and Challenges
00:03:59
Speaker
And I thought, well, I've got the kit. I don't know what will happen. And I stood on the Hungarian border, because I'd fly out of Hungary, I was going to run from Romania. So long ago, now it's back in 1997. Am I just boring too?
00:04:12
Speaker
Do you want to hear this? This is brilliant. I didn't know what would happen. There was my running shorts, and then there's a policeman at the border, or wherever it was, and he thought he was going to shoot me because he put his hand in his holster, but he only got a white handkerchief to wave me on my way. I then discovered there's thousands. I'm only one of millions of people doing things like this. But I was so excited because it's grand to have a finish line. But it's also grand to have
00:04:40
Speaker
an unknown finish line every day. But the in-between was amazing. I had some rules which I learned, which are still with me, right at the beginning. I never trespassed. I never asked for anything except water. I only bought my food after I'm a healthy creature, where there's people with things to eat. And I managed to carry it in those days with a backpack and a bivouac. Every night I slept
00:05:02
Speaker
I learnt immediately to sleep in unexpected places. If you slept by a river, for instance, there'd be a thousand lovely gypsies talking to you all night long. So if you slept in a funny patch of bushes near a sort of rusting pylon, you were as safe as houses could make a little nest.
00:05:19
Speaker
And it was his sleeping bag and all. And I had many lessons. I did very many mistakes with my feet and everything. And, you know, and I didn't know very much. I mean, I knew, I didn't know, I learnt all the time. Every village I got some ramp, there's always a really beautiful, authoritative girl in a bar or in a cafe, and they'd sign my logbook.
00:05:40
Speaker
And I wrote about it for Runners World actually at the time. It was only the second story I wrote for them that I wrote then, their wonderful magazine. And so I did it, and it was featured in the magazine. I was so proud. It took me 29 days, and I saw things I would never see if I was poor or rich. It is a special sort of wealth running from place to place, every long distance around the nose. And I was still slow, and my shoes weren't quite right, and everything hurt, but I thought,
00:06:09
Speaker
Way to go is a must and you can think back on it whenever life's boring, you're perhaps not feeling too good. You can store it in your backpack and still carry more things and memories that weigh anything after it became weight conscious fanatic after running long distance the first two times.
00:06:25
Speaker
Wow, what an intro. I first came across you when I bought your book, just a little run around the world. It must have been, I was trying to think when it was, because we spoke a couple of times.
Inspiration from Personal Loss
00:06:41
Speaker
2009. I think I bought it about 2012, I read it. And there were three things that really I could remember even now when we first connected. One was
00:06:53
Speaker
One was that you were followed by wolves. One was there was a picture of you stood by a sign. I think you were going into Siberia and it was saying it's not recommended travel past here. And the other was your buggy. There were the three things that I could vividly remember. Very trying to remember all that. You're amazing because you speak to so many famous people. But I'll tell you how it evolved.
00:07:18
Speaker
A couple of years, I was really happy, you know, and Clive was going to retire a bit, not totally. He wanted to do video making. When I did the marathon the first time, he was, yeah.
00:07:30
Speaker
commission, maybe, I think he paid 50 quid or something, and he was going to film it, it was going to be the local news, it was way to go, we're going to travel the world together, not as a runner, but he could be filming and making his passion, which he always had, but he was always very hardworking most of his life and couldn't do it. And then, then I did shortly after I did a marathon in Saab in 2002. He came home and
00:07:54
Speaker
he said something was up because he never went to the doctor. He hadn't been sick, even with a cold for all his life, really, you know, except for diphtheria, where he's a kid, where he's abroad or something, not diphtheria, swine fever, sorry. That's not even this serious. He was very strong, well, he wasn't a runner, but man, he could run faster than me without even any training. And then he went to the doctor and he said he had a little pain in his groin.
00:08:18
Speaker
And I thought, well, hey, do men get cystitis? I was joking. And then the doctor said, well, it's prostate cancer, but the good news is, it's a great cancer. If you catch it early, I expect you to live to be 82 or 92 and catch me a big fat fish and start running and you'll be fine. You'll be 100 and run over by a bus. But the trouble was,
00:08:41
Speaker
However, the very good NHS, even then, they're absolutely stunning. But the tests showed it had spread to the bone. And in those days, 2000 to 2003, these years where there was no way out, you could control it. And it was awful. And then the worst thing was to control it for two years, he fought it like everybody does. There's no brave and there's no family who isn't brave. That's why my book is called just a little run around the world, because a real journey is life.
00:09:08
Speaker
And then, so after that, he started having, I mean, I could nurse him at home and he died at home and I can do everything for a cancer patient. I learned by some wonderful nurses in the hospital he was in for a bit. Anyway, he was all right. And then he wasn't all right. You know, we're in bed, he was put, I know I'm a big fat lump, but he was pulling the bed clothes and his arm broke.
00:09:28
Speaker
you know, and was it spread to his bones worse, and then his hip broke, and this wonderful, tough man, and turned into a shadow like everybody does when they've turned. And then the week before, you know, he died, he came home and they that doctors were wonderful, because they had a wheelchair and a hoist, all that he wouldn't need really. And then he died at home looking at his favorite little bird table being fed outside in the same bed with me beside him more or less. So after that,
00:09:56
Speaker
I felt he'd gone on a journey and I had to. So I thought, I didn't know what to do. And then I had learned really from the marathons, in the 10 case, that in running, you don't have to use your own strength. Because you can borrow strength, of all the people saying you can do it. And all the people, let's say among the marathon, which I'd done a couple of times by then, cheering you on. So I thought, so I used my family's strength. I didn't know what to do. But I became aware that you fight darkness with the light.
00:10:25
Speaker
You don't want to be, you don't look for your running shoes under the bed without a torch, do you, or a flat battery. So you've got to bring light, gloom, and gloom, and just don't go. So basically, one day, a long time after that, my family were amazing. Eve, my daughter, and Jimmy, my son, and all my family, and everyone in Tenby, we lived, they were brilliant. And I looked at the map of the world, and I can't talk too much about this because I never run out of time, but I thought,
00:10:54
Speaker
Yes, I can do it. It's not one step, it's the beginning of a thousand miles, it's the eighth of a step. Stephen Seton, the then editor of Runnerswell, he was a superbly kind. He paid me for stories and I didn't yet write to give me some money and everyone was amazing because I decided
00:11:14
Speaker
I am going to do some running. And I knew that if I did the London Marathon, I might make more money. But then, of course, many people do great stuff there, and they run better than me. It's like finding another way through. Still, I thought, I can run around the world. And it will be a package torn foot. I had no particular money. Runner's World supported me generously, not with money, but with a loan sapped phone at one point. I went to my articles and gave them enough to start.
00:11:42
Speaker
So after that, I rented my house, and on my 57th birthday, I stood on the flagstone of my house. And just my son, about five people saw me off, and my brother drew the outline of my foot on the flagstone. And it wasn't going to be the sort of run where you go home for Christmas. There's no money. I had rented house savings,
00:12:05
Speaker
And it's a great kit, which I still believe in. I'm a huge backpacker. It was nearly killing me. And I just turned off, and I didn't see that for a step again for 20,000 miles. So to cut a lot of photos short, I was nearly dying of pain by the time I got to... Sorry, I ran the carriage, and I did the talks on the way to try to build up the coffers, which I really need to do now too, very badly.
00:12:28
Speaker
things changed. And then I took the ferry to Holland, and then I ran across Holland, and Germany, and Poland, and Lithuania, and Latvia, and Riga to Moscow. And then I was really looking at the ground a lot bent over by about 22 kilos. And my gosh, I was trying to visualize my dream was to be a lightweight runner. So I felt given by chance a
00:12:50
Speaker
that baby jogger from Mabukkah, Moscow. So that was great. And that went 2,000 miles over the Ural Mountains. I'd start in October, so I had the easier winter, already lots of adventures on it, meeting people all by myself, self-supporting. I had a small, what didn't have to be sleeping out, but I didn't have a big budget. I had a small emergency fund that I could stay in a place, occasionally, if I needed to, or to charge things. I didn't have any iPhones. It was just before the era of all that.
00:13:19
Speaker
I'm capsule. So anyway, I ran over the euros with a Columbine, the baby jogger. And then I ran to ask, and people said, how'd you get here? I said, I ran his head. No, no, you're gonna run. But I mean, how did you get there? I said, I ran. It was easy. And then the director thought they wouldn't recognize me because I wasn't very well known. And as I pulled the buggy, that's a baby jogger all the way around. But meanwhile run this world that sponsored me Hercules, designed by Steve Holland, who does great stuff around fines.
00:13:46
Speaker
He ended up meals before, but he involved it. Before I got Hercules, I had to run the marathon with a baby jogger, Columbine, and I think I collected five kids on board on the way, and I just made it time, five hours. It was wildly exciting. Hercules was high on top. It wasn't the thing he could live in. He had a tent. Mercifully, it was good because when he got cold, I wouldn't have been able to pack it with enough clothes. Anyway, my idea was just to eat when I had a buckwheat.
00:14:15
Speaker
Tell us about Hercules. Again, I have a lovely picture of Steve Holland's wife, Alex, pulling it with the two kids who are now grown up, one married and one at university in it as kids. And it was the first thing it wanted to design, especially for me, it was made out of iron, because we figured if it crashed, which it did actually when I got run over by a bus once, it could be in Russia, you know, because basically,
00:14:43
Speaker
you know, it can weld iron easily, more easily than aluminium. So I understand. So basically, I had Hercules. Hercules was very overlaid, because I had just so everyone knows, in case anyone hasn't seen your book, Hercules is your
00:14:59
Speaker
basically your home that you call around the world with you. Yeah, no, I have to quickly put in an explanation. If that's okay. First of all, there was me with a backpack disaster. Then it was me with a with a little baby jogger Columbine. It was very fragile.
00:15:15
Speaker
And then there was Hercules in Omsk, but Hercules was completed the whole of Russia. And I just had a little bivouac with three things all the way through Russia, because that's all I had. And then towards the end of Russia, I got a tent because I had too many clothes. It was minus 40, minus 30.
00:15:34
Speaker
very tricky to stay alive, even then. But once I got, I didn't go across the Bering Strait. There wasn't any, there was a little later, but I couldn't have done it. I had no specialist stuff. I went from Nagadan, and then I took a ferry to the rails on the
00:15:49
Speaker
western point of the American continent, Wales, Alaska, and then Hercules wouldn't take the snow. It didn't suit that snow. It was 100 yards a day with me taking all the kit out and hauling it. But the people, because I'd run from the Bering Strait over the mountains that used to have people, but now nobody goes there because they can go
00:16:11
Speaker
by airplane or by... I had to go in October. Time was important with seasons. I had to leave in October when the ice wasn't very hard in order to get to the Yukon River by the time it froze because the tundra would have been impossible in the summer. So I had to
00:16:26
Speaker
I tried with Hercules, oh man, I took the wheels off, we got stuck all over the place. And when I arrived in Nome, the reason, the lovely love, I was befriended by the lovely assistant, whatever it is, I don't know, the lawyer, I can't remember what they call it, the attorney, yeah. And he said, the musician didn't ask his policeman to stop me for my own good, was that I managed the valley. And
00:16:49
Speaker
the way I was alone for five days of doing that and I ran out of food except for one little lump of walrus blubber Eskimo had given me and I underestimated things completely and I never done it again. I thought 60 miles come on, I can't need three packs of spaghetti but with the blizzard and I was alone, I remember all alone and there was
00:17:09
Speaker
I had by then a garment, but the maps were bad. So there's three mountain valleys, and one would be a dead drop. And the ice was always shifting. So basically, I couldn't trust it. I was going forward on my stomach before taking Hercules. This is before I got to know. So when I got to know, they befriended me a lovely, sweet to me. And they loaned me, got a loan of a, I did a rod, smed. You know, to husk people on it as a thing, which is a great thing. Now it's loaned this and it had a tent on it.
00:17:37
Speaker
So instead of spending three hours trying to crush heavily frozen tents into some sort of manageable shape, and also I was running out of food because again, I couldn't handle it. When it's cold of minus 30 and it was regularly minus 35, 40,
00:17:53
Speaker
You can't really cook outside. In Russia, a disgusting petrol, with all due respect, but here it is so cold. So I went to the Caltex Portage Trail at the Bering Sea coast. It links the thing to the river. And do you know what? It was minus 62 Celsius, hard to stay out of the pipe.
00:18:10
Speaker
But anyway, that's not about this.
Lessons from the World Run
00:18:12
Speaker
I finished a run around the world. I broke my ribs many times. I was swept away by rivers, knocked unconscious, one down one river. There's no time because so much has happened since. You know, Joe, I just can't, can't say it. But I arrived home, I did the second footprint. And then I realized after the last footprint, there's a next footprint for all of us.
00:18:33
Speaker
Wow. I do just want to ask you one, there is one thing I want to ask you about, you run around the world before we talk about your, because you have done so many different adventures.
00:18:44
Speaker
What was it like to be followed by wolves? I woke up. Well, the fact is, you know, something enough, you can go on great training when you're in comfortable surroundings on how to have resistance and bravery. But when you're bloody well got to do it, you know, there's an Icelandic saying not from not there, but later, need makes the naked lady spin. If you've got the handle wolf packs, you can do it. And I knew you don't run from puppies. Even friendly puppies will nip your heels.
00:19:11
Speaker
So he created my tent. It is big, temperables. I was every night camping in the forest in the snow, learning to make tea from tree bark and eating buckwheat for breakfast, lunch and tea. And I heard this sort of noise. Next day, he was looking at me and I was really upset. He was going to kind of chat me up or eat me. But it was very frightening. And if I'd run from him, he might have killed me because wolves are very friendly and everyone loves wolves. But in Siberia, if they're hungry, they will kill you. Not America, you know.
00:19:41
Speaker
They're lovely. And then they followed. I can't tell the whole story because they haven't got time. But eventually the wolf pack followed me for 10 days. And I didn't dance with the wolves and I didn't make pets of them. But I just tried to move along and they followed me as they were seeing me out of their terrain. And what kept me going was the reason. I think there's all sorts of tricks I can tell you.
00:20:02
Speaker
by socks and how I managed the physical things. But you all know that what the main thing that me going I'm I think I know it's a save a lot of runners. I had this powerful reason to do it. Because I felt I was just an ordinary person, a very ordinary runner, but I had experience and practical things. But the thing is, if it saved one life, having seen my husband dye my arms, him go on a journey and then me like many others go on a journey for the sake of people they love for various reasons to lose. I was going to do it. If it took everything I got,
00:20:32
Speaker
Yes. Wow. Well, if anyone hasn't, I would recommend reading just a little run around the world. But I'm still going in there. It's brilliant. I loved it. So yes. So lots of things happen in between. You don't want to.
00:20:47
Speaker
Yes. And the really important is now. If we have time, we'll go backwards. But let me tell you a turning point. When I was, a few years before I'd run across America and blah, blah, blah, and that eventually got the buggies, once the buggies succeeded another, and the one I've got now is the best I've ever had, and it's quite old, and I've just got it back from Turkey.
00:21:08
Speaker
But I digress. So what happened, the next big turning point, among many, there's no time to talk about, is that it's very dangerous ladies doing housework, because I had just finished a project living out on the beach for the homeless and doing something for them. And I thought, we're going to go to the launderette. It was a beautiful 5 o'clock in the morning. The last day of the year, well, it was the 28th of December, 2017, nearly 2018.
00:21:32
Speaker
And I just slipped the smallest puddle you ever saw. There was a bits frozen, crash. And I was looking up at the circle of faces and my hip was broken. I couldn't even, it was hanging off nearly because basically I damaged it a few times, falling on the ice and things. And I couldn't get up. I couldn't get up with anybody help. I could not. It was painless, terrible. This was the 28th of December, 2017.
00:22:00
Speaker
Okay, so it's very with me. At home, really, at Hov, in Hov and near Brighton, where I am now. And it was amazing to me. And I digressed it. And on the way, Ambulance had to come and get me. And I was telling him, I'm going to run around the world again. I'm going to run. And all the morphine was talking, you know. And they were saying, yeah. And it was so great. And then the surgeon took a look at me and he really didn't think much of it. I lived mostly in the seafront doing projects. One of these crazy people, like just going to just wreck my work. But bless him.
00:22:30
Speaker
He didn't replace it, he pinned it because I had good bones from the running, see? And then I was thinking, Chris, it ends the end because I'm 70, or 70, or 71, I can't remember what, but it was that time anyway. And I thought, that's it, when you break your head, then there's curtains. But I had amazing friends. The park run is one of my favourite things.
00:22:51
Speaker
And first of all, my friends wouldn't let me go camping till I could get off the floor by myself. And frankly, I had to stay in a hotel for a few, it was a lovely, lovely place. But the main thing was, my friends said, you've got to get off the floor by yourself. So I was up there with a nightmare, not drinking anything, but in the bar, because you could help me if I couldn't really get up. Once I could get up, my other friend Claire, she took me finding a campsite. And then I stayed, and when I'm in now, I come back to, it's really like a poem in England.
00:23:19
Speaker
And they gave me the biggest tent, just a normal belt, cheap tent, a normal tent, but they put the glorious, you want the radiator in it. They fussed me, they spurred me. That's why I'm starting on this one. They were amazing. And when I still couldn't run, they let me do an ice bucket challenge for the nurses and added extra ice cubes. It was snowing, which was that ridiculous. So they were stunning.
00:23:42
Speaker
And lots has happened since. And then four months later, I managed to hop when I was allowed to fly and took no medicines after I left the hospital. I'm pretty strong inside from all the training running. But four months after, I took a plane when I was allowed to fly off because of the, you know, whatever. But you get sort of...
00:24:03
Speaker
in your air in your blood or something stupid. I can't remember. It's not stupid. But anyway, I went to America, the Texas where that buggy I'm using now was being stored by a lovely, lovely friend of mine. And I pulled it on crutches hopping and thinking, gosh, I reckon everything all the way to Dallas, where I said it home by freighted at home. And it really, and then I hopped the suitcase to the airport again. And then I came home and I was thought that's finished me off, but I got stronger. And
00:24:32
Speaker
Then the week before I'd broken the hip, I was leaning up to the present day, the week before I'd been planning a trip to run to Berlin, because that book you've just mentioned, it was kindly coming out of a very sweet young German publisher that really needed support.
Resilience in the Face of Physical Challenges
00:24:48
Speaker
So I thought I'll run there for fun. And so I hadn't been able to because of the broken hip. So I thought, yes.
00:24:53
Speaker
So I think it was in, I broke the hip in December 2017. As far as I remember, it was in June. I went off June or July. I can't remember, but that in the summer sometime, I ran from Brighton
00:25:08
Speaker
to Hove, and then to all the way, not was it North France, Belgium, Germany to Berlin, and I thought I'm getting stronger. And then I went home to a speech for this wonderful charity phase worldwide. You see, Clive had had a dream. The first dream he had after after marathon this album was we were going to, I was going to, we're going to go to
00:25:30
Speaker
Nepal and helped the people there. He didn't want to come along just like a spare watch of his rosy rungs and I'm support. No, we will. He's a practical guy, very good at electrics and everything at help. And then when he got sick, he said, I'm going anyway, but he didn't. So I thought,
00:25:47
Speaker
a way to go. And the lovely Jonathan who's listening now, he said, and also there's arguments who really said it, because the lady was staying with, I went up to Cumbria to do a conference with FaZe Worldwide to give a very bad talk, but that won't stop like now. And bless them. They said, would you run to Paul for us? Would you run to Paul for FaZe Worldwide? Practical help achieving self-involve.
00:26:11
Speaker
And I thought, yes, because previously I've been planning. Yeah, I've had an interesting life. You know, I sailed around Cape Horn and I rode down Chile and horseback. My previous idea had been, let's go to the country's worth of memories. Like my poor mum died when I was two. I had a hard childhood. But after I was brought up by the Postman in Davos, and that's another story when I did this for South Pine Marathon and met her when she was nearly 100 again. And my grandmother was the one, the first person that said,
00:26:35
Speaker
It isn't good looks or natural gifts, lucky few child wanting to do things. And I wasn't a delightful creature. I was an ugly, gawky, worst runner in school. I was so embarrassed and upset that eventually encouragement, if love is the best short word in the dictionary, encouragement is the best long word. Because I'd met the Tenby turkeys when I was nearly 15. That's why all that I've described has happened. They said,
00:26:57
Speaker
They said, they didn't say, you know, you're not doing so bad. They said, if you can run a marathon, you can't be Ted B. Turkey unless you can run a marathon. And all these lycra clad supermen, young men with great speed, they slowed down. And, you know, that's the real magic is real magic is encouragement and love. It's not really rabbits out of hats and things, although they're fun. So anyway, after that, I thought, yes, I've got Kathmandu when you're 72 or whatever, 73 or whatever it was. That's amazing.
00:27:26
Speaker
But I wasn't going to come back. I started from England when I was in America, blah, blah, various different journeys. So I was going to continue from Nepal because reality and running are very, and dreams and goals are the same, aren't they? I was very fit by now, except that they are still a bit healing.
00:27:46
Speaker
Basically, I haven't got as much time ahead of me as I have behind me. Basically, you have to choose what to do. As a runner, all runners know how to change pace and adapt to the situation, don't they? The pace and the effort I'm going to keep going from, and I'm going to go all the way, a long way around.
00:28:02
Speaker
All my journeys are a long way round because I have reasons. I have to go to Vienna, blah, blah, blah. So anyway, I set off and I ran through approximately 3,000 miles and through exactly 12 countries from England. So you set off from where to where? Give us that again.
00:28:18
Speaker
I apologize, this is not very good. No, it's great. You are so infectious. Well, I have to say, what happened was, because time is precious, I didn't go back to England and start again. Very important, this is really the crux of what I'm talking, really the best thing in the whole world, what's happening now. I decided that I would run the Kathmandu from Berlin,
00:28:40
Speaker
and raised for phase worldwide. We've got the link here. I know you're going to give it out and everything, but it was just very important. And it didn't do very well. But I did my best. And I continue from Berlin, very low profile through Czech Republic, Austria, Slovakia, all through Hungary, all through Serbia. By then I knew how to do it. I learned a lot, you know, and had very hardcore equipment, good equipment. And eventually, after many, many countries, I arrived in Turkey and there
00:29:09
Speaker
apps and a big long story there why I got such a reception later but anyway when I eventually got to Galata Bridge I had loads of publicity for the first time made a few thousand pounds at long last for that very needy charity where even a pound buys a bag of sweet potatoes and helps these proud people grow their own stuff.
00:29:25
Speaker
So I went across Galata Bridge and now this news and many other things and eight million hits or many millions, amazing. But that was great. And they closed the Bosphorus Bridge, especially for me. The municipality out of Istanbul are amazing. The police were very kind. Everyone was amazing. And then I was on my way in Zafrebola when COVID struck and I was stopped because I was only 62. In fact, I'm very, very much older.
00:29:49
Speaker
And the funny thing is then magic, like the magic happened today, I have to digress. The Hilton saved me. They owned the day at stake was going to stay for two nights because I was dreaming of crispy sheets and charging my phones after being in the mountains. The lovely man Ahmed.
00:30:06
Speaker
He, I think it was the manager, a highly thought of manager, but neither did a few people, staff, no kitchen, no takusi, no nothing, but when lockdown happened, somehow they brought a gigantic exercise machine that wouldn't even fit the lift up to my room. They said, when you can keep going,
00:30:24
Speaker
I was on my track. My idea for Safran Bola had been to finish my run through Turkey and then go to Georgia as a baijan across the Caspian Sea by ferry, then Tukmenistan, etc, etc, to Kathmandu. And there was a hope because it was in March when I stopped. Because I was over 65, you're banned to leave the house.
00:30:44
Speaker
And so I did stop. And that was it. And then because COVID continued for everybody, we find a different way around in a million different paths, haven't we? Many people, I had to come home eventually, but my beloved cart was left there. And it'd been every year. And then I
00:31:02
Speaker
In between lockdowns here, I got my heavier card. Inspired by my grandson Michael Stanway, I decided I'd never done it to run from Land's End to John the Groats, again, with divinations to the middle of the sea, Sarah Williams and different people. And after that, I
00:31:19
Speaker
I did that and it took a long time because I kept stopping and doing things. Sorry, sorry to stop you. So you've got to Turkey, you had to stop because of COVID. So you've then, so you've already ran thousands of miles. Yes. And then you've come back to the UK and in your downtime you've decided to do, was it jog or all the jog? Let me, I'll just try this, but this is a very important, I haven't got it very good, but I want to just tell you what happened when I got back to that caravan site, South Dunway Caravan Camping,
00:31:48
Speaker
was my lovely, wonderful grandson who is 18. He keeps getting older and taller than me. He came to cycle to see me and he was going to cycle to Scotland and he and I thought, oh wait, I can't go to Turkey, but I can do something. It was wonderful. Occasionally we were permitted to do it. I thought, I can do something. I'm meant to do this. And I thought it'd be, I'd never done it. And also after the round the world run, I'd arrived back in Scotland.
00:32:11
Speaker
poignant memories. So I thought, yes, I must keep strong. And this rather heavier one, it'll be fine. And it's a big story itself. But that became an important run, because it ages. And I met several lockdown at the head of tier one, but the people coping, like the lady suffering from depression, who was so depressed, and her husband says, why did you do a bit of baking? You love it. She's now making cheeseboard. She bought me a cheeseboard at midnight. I was still doing the same thing.
00:32:38
Speaker
very good in COVID, because I was still self isolating, cooking my own food, not very rarely staying in hotels. And you know, I could if I wanted to, but mostly I was 90% of the time I was just sleeping in the fields, my technique would be like in the way to Turkey, that I would run as well as I could all day and do things. But then I find a field in the night because I was tired, therefore I didn't have the energy to talk or to get out of any difficult if they were aware of the situations as they went.
00:33:06
Speaker
So I would sleep and be wakened by bunches of stray dogs all the way through that terrain. And it all joined me for breakfast, and very friendly. And then I would have my tail up in the morning after several cups of delicious coffee, because I'm a decadent woman, you know, I don't believe in austerity. And then I would run with my happy and fresh to the village and have tea with everybody, because I could do it then. Yeah, that's, it's a question of finding the way to do it. Because if I'd gone in the evening, it would have been difficult. And
00:33:33
Speaker
This changed later because when I became a little bit unknown, it was a bridge. They used to think it was dangerous for me, but it was really dangerous what they were suggesting. They had to sleep in a town car park, you know, a hotel. But never mind. So I did that. And then I came back and did the same to John O'Groats. I went to see many people on the way. I had to do the assignments, but I met the most extraordinary people. To start with, I met people, one man just out from jail after Freer's arm robbery, who was absolutely delightful.
00:34:03
Speaker
look into the future just being in the hostel.
Stories from the Road and Meeting Diverse People
00:34:05
Speaker
And he's now had a job at one of the supermarkets in the back, you know, loading things that all made. And there was these great people. I met somebody, a grand man in Bristol, but I also met the guys, a guy who tried to make his way in the world and making dog toys, you know, after being homeless. And then I suddenly became who I was more than that. I got the call of the North. I thought I thought it was just an exercise run. I thought, Oh, I love the North.
00:34:30
Speaker
It's a good place. It seems hard, but I know the snow. And by the time I'd gone to John the Greats on Christmas Day the day before total Scottish was stripped locked out, I'm going to get a ferry straight to Norway and up to Lapland.
00:34:45
Speaker
But it's not like that. And that buggy, the one that I had there would have been totally, it's very good for what it is, but it's too heavy for taking top of the skis and actually not quite a strong obstruction because it's not meant for it. So I came back and it was hard enough to get back the chief constable of John O'Grath's little bet. Casey Hunter gave special permission for me to run some of the way home because the warders were clothed and then a very kind truck of friends, friends of friends of friends and good, like my good friend Nick Crag, he got a friend of his.
00:35:14
Speaker
A lot of the way I had to travel separately was very difficult. This summer in January, I can't remember the dates. Anyway, I thought, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. And then I thought, it's better than if it hadn't gone wrong. For me, not for millions of people, sadly, but for me, because I can start away from England. It isn't let's recover or reset it.
00:35:32
Speaker
start again. So roses round the Kathmandu reborn with a proper send off. And by the way, I'm the oldest one by many, many years, but I never entered to have gone from lands entered down the groves at all, even not pulling something but I never entered but this time I will have fun. Because after all, it's great fun when you get older, it's a great chance to do things in a special way because why not? And anyway, so that's what I'm doing now. I'm getting ready. When do you start? When do you start? I
00:35:59
Speaker
I've learned one thing, Joe, 25th of June. I've learned that a few are determined enough to weigh parts for you as much as it can. And it happens in a big way and a little way. So I suddenly, I don't care what, I know I can run, I've got two COVID jabs, I went, the doctor will write it all out, get all the precautions I can.
00:36:19
Speaker
to be allowed to go, but I can run the Harridge. So I'm leaving at midday on the 25th of June from South Dunway that nursed me so beautifully, it was so good to me. And all the people of Hassex, I'm celebrating. Hassex, my village, and Brighton and Hovind, the whole of England, were such special people I met on the way to John the Groats. And in Scotland, oh man,
00:36:39
Speaker
up in Betty Hill. Where do you meet those people? Are they when you're running or is it when you stop in the evening and they see the buggy or where do you mostly get to meet these people? Let me tell you about today. This has happened since the beginning, multiplied when I'm not running longer.
00:36:59
Speaker
I had a very busy day yesterday. I pay for everything. I never ask for a discount. I never do anything because you choose the people you need and then they become mates. I have many people I love on my cart. I don't say, please could you do it free, could I have a discount? I don't do that. I already had a great success at the run shop here at Bletchington Road because
00:37:22
Speaker
yes, they'll just let you measure your feet and see the size as it really runs, and that's the best shoes I've ever worn. But I did all that, but this morning, it's been a right hustle to fit it all in. So yesterday, I was doing the logos, and we got it in the evening. Then I went to see my son, then I parked in a road in Hove, and it was fairly boring, but I noticed about 10 o'clock, that's the way to be, you know, quite quiet in a certain place near a bin, there was a little bit of
00:37:50
Speaker
roadwork, so it was a bit confusing as to what I was, but I wasn't hiding. But it just is kind of come invisible by the way you think. And then after that, at midnight, because it was really dull, then I ran to the seafront. And I slept with the sound of the waves until about three. And normally I'd be doing my mathematical training. So I like to do extra things and I'm able to exercise the brain.
00:38:11
Speaker
And if I have any. But anyway, most of the time I had this feeling, my gut feeling that all runners have was becoming stronger and stronger because I used to be listening to it. And I knew I had to leave. So instead of leaving the buggy in Hove,
00:38:26
Speaker
I ran all the way to Brighton, not very far, but I didn't bother washing, didn't bother cooking, as you can probably see. I had to get to here. But on the way, what did I meet? First of all, I met a lovely man who had come down to London and hoped to do the London Marathon.
00:38:42
Speaker
Then I met a man lying on the bench, a nice young man, and he really looked very obviously homeless. And I said, Oh, I said, Well, I've got, I've got about 10 classes, half a half each, you know, have some breakfast with a lovely time, I bought him a little breakfast, I didn't, I just gave him the money. And then I carried on. And then, oh, man, so next, I mean, everywhere people, I met another guy, I
00:39:06
Speaker
something on the way it evolved, this idea, I have to have a good wife, what am I going to do? I was going to go back to my son Jim's, but I thought I can't go back before like this. So I remembered Hilton and Safran Bolo that looked after me for two months. And I was on the front there with uncoamed hair, just like I am now.
00:39:24
Speaker
and I went in there and the charming manager here. I'm not paid by the health and I'm not sponsored by them. I just want to tell you there's something special because they'll do things when you need, not for money. Basically, he let me have the spring for an hour and a half free. I've got their elite Wi-Fi,
00:39:42
Speaker
I rushed off to Apple to get and again the top best man came and he knew this machine he helped me and then I went to Costa's where they were so kind and I plugged a few things in and then I kind of went back and forth then I had to come back here and I thought oh my gosh the buggy anyway I arrived in this room seven minutes before you called me and then Jonathan was standing by and we've done it in the address we've got this far so this is so special
00:40:07
Speaker
I've learned, just like I'm going to lead marathon, or which I never will be, that you can win at the last minute. If you keep your nerve and keep going, keep thinking agile, I thought, I can do this. I can't do that. We're there. And that's happened several times to me recently. I've learned so much from running. So we've spoke a couple of times leading up to this, haven't we? I am
00:40:30
Speaker
completely in awe of your mindset. Because you said to me on the phone last week, you said I'm 74 and now I've got all these wonderful adventures ahead of me.
00:40:42
Speaker
Like I was talking to my dad last night, he's 72, and I can't imagine him ever picking the phone up to me and just going, Joe, I'm running off to Kathmandu. What's your enthusiasm? It is, it's your mindset. Even for learning how to do this podcast, you've been so enthused with it and the way you describe the people at the Hilton then, it's infectious. But what's still driving you to, because these challenges you do, they're not,
00:41:11
Speaker
I mean, they're so mentally and physically demanding. What's still driving you to do that now? Well, it's very interesting because I do pull the pod because it's so helpful. It teaches you agility to start with because you can't just run on a path and you can't just go on the road, you just keep thinking about it. But I do, look, I ran all the way around the world and most of my life I was
00:41:33
Speaker
fueled by passion and maybe sorrow and devastation because my husband was, hey, we used to dress each other in tinsel at Christmas. It was hip and me and, you know, it was just, we were totally a love story. And, and that was sorrow that drove me, but happiness is a bit of pathway. I don't do it to prove I'm a grand rate runner or anything. I only would say I'm the oldest, it was useful for FaZe World, why don't forget to put the link in. But
00:42:00
Speaker
I've got happier. Also my mind, I've realized that the big deal is in the head, really older. And I know that my best times now, your best time because you're a very fit man would have been perhaps when you're younger, because you've gone incredibly fast, like nearly all runners, because I was incredibly useless. My knees used to go out and I've got a wonderful, a wonderful guy called Sam up in Derbyshire. He
00:42:26
Speaker
a friend brought me a session with him. And now he's got his logo up. He said I've got potential. He said if he had me for six weeks, I could run till I'm 92. I love it. And also I'm taking more care. I used to assume I was strong. I was to be falsely proud. Yeah, you sailed across the Atlantic. Surely you can do that. But now I know you can't. It's just specific for a person like me to have the right shoes, the right food, and to kind of look off my mind. That's mean a little bit of
00:42:51
Speaker
little exercises, a little, very haphazard, but not sort of sanctimonious meditation, like practicing, and I can come backwards from 20 sort of lampposts and that sort of thing. I've become a lot stronger and more determined since Turkey, because Turkey, I love Turkey deeply, but it was a very hard last week, I had to stand up to a rather important
00:43:13
Speaker
The police were wonderful to me, but it wasn't his fault that I had to stand up to prevent him destroying my cart. And so, you know, I had a hard last week, and I'm going back to the 2023 marathon with the runners there. There's 80,000 of them running for charity on the marathon. Very, very helpful.
00:43:33
Speaker
Is that Istanbul? Yeah, Adam Adam. They're called Adam Adam. I don't even know. They're great buddies. I've got some extraordinary Turkish friends. And I'm having a little Turkish flag with me, because they were in tears when I had to leave. I was hoping just on track with one is on my back. It was in the best reserved place in the Hilton car park in Saffron Polo. And they were like running on minimal wage, you know, it's devastatingly hard.
00:43:57
Speaker
So I did it. So my plan right now, a legitimate plan is working like a fury, because although I'm spending more money than I have, which is why I want to do a few podcasts, I know me podcasts, little zoom talks, you know, I've already done this with the Orion runners who were the first, and I had to learn how to do both Microsoft and Keynote and insert films and
00:44:17
Speaker
my videos and slides and it all worked out just so it was wonderful. I'm available from inside my podcast at least while I'm in England for everything from five or upwards is perfectly acceptable. I don't do things for any particular amount of money. I don't care that I do would use a little more but I don't care so I learn things
00:44:34
Speaker
And now I'm specific, I respect my mind. If I had, I didn't have it for you, which is why this podcast is not doing very well, but normally I'd stop and have a cup of tea and I would relax, maybe listen to one bit of music. And then I'd get masses more energy. That's my trick now. But this morning was a little bit wild and woolly, but still, you know, I had a nice drink of some green stuff that I slugged down my throat on the way here. You've still got plenty of energy, Rosie.
00:45:02
Speaker
more energy than before, because I never looked after myself before. And I never had any training. Now I'm trying to improve my very, very strong legs. But my knees need more muscle. I had a bruise ligament for the smallest snow in Scotland. And I'm very bendy. I can touch my hands on the floor. I'm very stiff at the back. So this wonderful Sam
00:45:22
Speaker
I don't know the name of his business, but he's great. And so is a lady called Nathalie, who's just, she's, she's got, she's a marvelous, I haven't been to her, but I've got lots of people looking after me now because I'm a lead. You see, when I'm young, I'm not important, but now I'm Nathalie football. I can get, I'm on your podcast to start with, which is a huge honor for a silly runner like me. So you can, I'm really, really excited about being older because she, if you,
00:45:46
Speaker
It gives you huge chances, all runners know that, because you can get best of age category and we will be proud. But with me, even wider than I mentioned, everyone does what I say. I mean, the curry, I'm not promoting particularly, the curry is the apple store, the man on the beach wanted me to look after the cart for me, but I didn't think it would work really if too many people jumped on it, because it offered people. And then the wonderful hotel here that immediately understood and given me the best conference hall,
00:46:16
Speaker
It used to work in big ways, now it's working in little ways and it's just so exciting. I think the next 10 years, my plan is to run to Kathmandu and then to go to the high Kashmir, maybe running or maybe not because
00:46:31
Speaker
There's a school there where a wonderful man has recently died. She's set up at Sheffield College for Girls. And after that, my plan had been to come home with Ice Chicken, and I'll freight her home because she's my baby. I'll do something. I'll keep hold of her. And then I'm going to do many, many park runs everywhere.
00:46:48
Speaker
I'm going to run marathons in places like Antarctica, but I'm not going to, at least until I'm 90, I'm not going to do any more round-the-world runs because I love my family. My daughter's amazing, and my son is stunning, and he's been helping me so much. And my grandchildren, now I'm a person that they've used to them, and I wasn't very good at them, you know. I was away a lot when they were young to bless them, and I've never had the handle of really using
00:47:12
Speaker
cooking well in the house and doing things I can cook, of course, then school runs, I haven't done it. I mean, I can drive, and I can do anything I want. The funny thing is, Joe, because everybody can do anything if they set their mind to it, you've got to choose what is the most valuable thing to do for you might be cooking. For me, it's, I've learned a little bit, I'm not as good as many people. But most of all is the will and the passion. The best thing is you shouldn't do anything unless, except with passion. And if you do something that isn't with passion,
00:47:41
Speaker
You've got to keep thinking of a way around it to do something else or to change it. Sometimes you can change things a little way because I run for love and happiness. And as you say, my buggy's just got a sort of a thing that looks partly like a heart and partly like a sort of, you know, bubble.
00:47:57
Speaker
And I'm going to put people, I'm going to tell you what I'm going to do. I have a few stickers from people, but I'm also going to have, I've got a huge blackboard on top. Children are going to go on it. But I can say, when I come to Brighton in two weeks, I'm going to come to say goodbye.
00:48:13
Speaker
I thank you Brighton. And when I'm in the middle of Norway, I can do that. So it's much better than too many stickers because people can't understand. So it's a universal thing because I ask who's the special people I've met. It's everybody. I've freaked into some of the worst dangerous areas in America and the best. I've slept in Manhattan and the Bronx and in Gary, Indiana, where's the world now? Because people are people and I know how to handle people who are fragile. I'm not trained. I'm not a psychologist. My daughter is. She's brilliant. Me, I just,
00:48:42
Speaker
I just don't show fear, because that's insulting. And you don't act rude. The latest, it was a lovely story. When I was in Inverness, stuck outside the cycle shop, everything was closed. I was just on the pavement in the snow, lots of lovely people came to befriend lots of gorgeous people. But this time, I was two o'clock, I think I may have mentioned two o'clock in the snow. And there was voices behind me loud and drunk. Oh,
00:49:05
Speaker
Oh, there's a coffin. There's a coffin and they were laughing. And I knew, my God, I'd have to come out and show myself or they might jump on it, which wouldn't be very good for it. This was just to let your listeners know that there are two job pods. There's Ice Chick, which is the first one, but the oldest prototype is infinitely valuable. Precious gift.
00:49:25
Speaker
from Mike Denoma and Steve Holland, the designer and the person that commissioned it for a race in the Arctic. And then this slick chick that looks posh, but she was my office, only Steve Holland will build me something for an office because I don't like being, I don't really like being in a house anymore. But she wasn't meant to go a long way. So anyway, I was in slick chick, having none other. And then
00:49:46
Speaker
These guys, oh, there's a coffin. So I stuck my head out. Oh, there's a person in the coffin. Man, it was two in the morning. I said, hello, guys, how are you? Oh, they had their phones out. I didn't even make anything transparent. They were filming me. Oh, oh, my hand is yellow. So then I said, I'm getting home now and having a family.
00:50:04
Speaker
Oh, yeah, we'll go now. And so I saw them weaving down the road, talking about the person in the coffin. And then I just went back to sleep. So you made myself a cup of tea in the morning. And and all my many friends that made Instantly Inverness, it's a fast track way to have amazing adventures and make friends that you've only met for an hour, but you feel you've known them for 10 years. And I really want to say all the people in Doneggros, I want the right job. But
00:50:28
Speaker
Just like self-supporting is not just about eating your own grits and running alone. It's about, I've still got to do the website. I've still got to build the back door. I've still got to do this. I've still got to do that. And then I've got to minimize everything which I'm doing every day. So that's me. And the future, all I can say is I'm very, very blessed. There's people that do marathons, exceptional things that are severely in trouble and they fight against the odds and they've all inspired me.
00:50:57
Speaker
You know, people like Chris Moon who I was lucky enough to meet and I did marathon assault one year when I did it. These are many others, but just because you haven't got anything wrong with you isn't a reason for thinking you might get something and sitting back. The only way you get
00:51:13
Speaker
If you're healthy, the crazier you should get. And you have to make decisions. My hair is a mess. So I just use very good shampoo. No longer do I bother with colorism. I don't put any condition on it. And I don't protect myself, but I don't have makeup. Sometimes I don't have a mirror, like a blind person wouldn't. So I have to somehow dress the teeth. And I've got a fantastic dental hygienist, because I like my teeth, because I've got so much to smile about.
00:51:39
Speaker
And thanks to, you'll see in the book, I mean, they're still going. Thanks to this lovely lady, I only saw her yesterday, and she gave me a beautiful toothbrush, electric one, the one of her own. People are just amazing everywhere.
00:51:55
Speaker
How can people follow along?
Future Plans and Community Support
00:51:59
Speaker
First of all, I'm running for phase worldwide, but for the first time ever, really for the first time ever, I think, I can't remember quite, but most major, I've got a just giving page.
00:52:13
Speaker
and you can look up www.justgiving.com slash fundraising slash Rosie Swale Pope and also I'm also put the thing is I rarely do fundraise I did for the prostate cancer people I made her
00:52:29
Speaker
that's £200,000, but other people did. I don't like asking for money, but these people are amazing. So many, it's so lovely because they give us so much because these guys don't get to stress, they cope in the hardest place that the people in the most isolated region of Nepal, they've got to start strong appeal, one of their special appeals as well as other things. Like if they just
00:52:51
Speaker
support the women, particularly the women, the families to grow vegetables, to get trained as midwives, they can look after themselves. I can't look after myself very well in the wilderness, neither can they. So I'm inspired. And I'm also doing it for Clive, because he wasn't the man that would have liked to be remembered for some cancer. He'd be happy that I go to Nepal after all. So he's, you know, so good.
00:53:16
Speaker
Great. And you're on Twitter, aren't you? No, you're on Twitter. I'm also on Twitter, and I'm also on Facebook, and I'm also on Instagram, and I'm also on Wikipedia. I'm all over the jolly place. But I think of this run, but that's not in the sort of just giving thing, is Rosie's run to Kathmandu Reborn. Because like many people, we've been, I met people who had lost powerful jobs, like, you know, event directors and millions of clients gone. So then they start,
00:53:45
Speaker
running a dead dream of a cafe. Everyone finds their way through. But I believe it's an exciting opportunity, it's a dynamic, because obviously, if you've got, let's say you're stuck somewhere on the road, you will have to take a way around it. On the way around it, you may discover something you'd never, never see otherwise. Certainly, my run to Nepal was a fine kind of idea and was very exciting. But now, I'm going back to Russia, I'm going back to the Arctic, I'm going to the wonderful, wonderful company PhD,
00:54:15
Speaker
gave me clothes. I made a little jacket for Clive when he had bone cancer weighing only 200 grams. I'd do anything for them. I'd give them my life. But without being asked, they got, they sponsored me again. But I didn't have any way to take pictures. I don't have a camera. So the wonderful local wedding photographer Barry Page, he's sporting, he spent three and a half hours up in the south down to hardly need the clothing. Modeling this amazing padded gear.
00:54:39
Speaker
it's wonderful down state-of-the-art expensive down close where there's no one doing wedding dresses people like that through your mind and I wasn't gonna pay him I didn't say would you do it for free I said what's the price and he gave me a price I said yes it's important but in the end he said it's so much fun it would take a penny for it and they were a gift to the people you know everyone's got their favorites but these people sew their stuff handmade in England
00:55:04
Speaker
in Staley Bridge, drinking that tea in a sagging sofa, lovely ladies with used to work, whatever the industries were for sewing, and Peter Hutchinson passed away from prostate cancer two years and years ago, it was very poignant.
00:55:19
Speaker
But you do things for a reason, but most of all, you do them for joy. Every day is an adventure. You've got to make plans, but then along the way, things change. You might be doing all the training for a marathon, but in the end, you know you just can't pass this and you can't pass that. You meet some kids and you shake their hands. It's just a big marathon.
00:55:41
Speaker
Your personality rubs off on people, so I'm not surprised that people love to support you like they do. Please support me for Facebook, if you feel you can. Don't worry if you can, a smile will do, but be aware that even a pound or so is a huge help to the people out there, and they don't take any money, they have nothing. I have no expenses whatsoever from the charity. I have a very small job as a patron of a wonderful little company called
00:56:11
Speaker
Nicholas Associates group, but I'm just because I'm the sort of what else ran ambassador. And I'm so grateful. I have no other money except my pension. And if I if I do a few talks, and I'm going to write a book again, because everyone wanted me to publish a lot of the book, but it didn't get me don't write books for money, you could wash dishes, cannot lose the money, or do any old thing, or do wonderful talks. I've done some very highly paid talks to as well as ones for one pound, you know, go by price. But anyway, but you can't write books
00:56:41
Speaker
when you're my age, because I'm 74, going to be 75. And how if I say I get a million dollars, well, you know, 10,000 pounds from from a company to say, I'm passionate about a certain brand of orange aid, even if I it's perfectly harmless, and very understandable for elite runners, because they need a lot of money. But my freedom by being self supported, the most important freedom is I save a lot. And I need to say what I think,
00:57:08
Speaker
So, because I'm going to Lapland, I am writing another book, I haven't run the new proposal or got any deal, but I'm going to do it because you need to say what you think. How are the kids going to believe? If you take exercise and go running, if you believe in yourself, it may not always work, but it always works better than if you don't. You can't tell those people, yes, you'll make it. No, but you will certainly can stand tall, because you've given your best shot. And I meet people around every corner who bring tears to my eyes. And
00:57:37
Speaker
I believe feelings are important. You know, the really strong people are not the tough people, they're the ones who are hard and tough inside. And I'm really trying to get fit inside my mind as well as outside my body these days. And I've taken me a long time. I'm so happy that slowly I'm getting there.
00:57:54
Speaker
Well, Rosie, it's been absolutely lovely speaking to you. I, for one, can't wait to follow along from the 25th. Really looking forward to it. I wish you the very, very best on your upcoming adventure. That's so nice to meet you. Yeah. I do, Mike, and then how I'll fit it all in. There's a very nice young filmmaker coming, making a film of me this Saturday. So this afternoon, after I say goodbye to my
00:58:17
Speaker
to run shop and to my son, I'm going to run over the over the ditching beacon again, because I've got to be there tomorrow because on Saturday morning, a young professional filmmaker that works long hours in a low pay but he's very, his dream was to, to make a
00:58:32
Speaker
four minute film, which takes a day or two days, because apparently, my runs helped his mum when she had anxiety. So he's waiting for free. I'm not being paid for it. But I've got to be there on the dot at nine in the morning. He's only got a day and we're going to be up to the beacons and he's going to, he's got all these, oh, he's very exciting. One of the people he's recruited to do it for free is
00:58:54
Speaker
actually, the son of the one of the finest filmmakers in the world, I must be very good at documentaries. But years ago, I did a film in in in my country in Central America. And that guy is now elderly, I think, but his son is doing I couldn't believe it was the same name. So it's going to be an adventure, but I've got to stay strong. So after I've left you,
00:59:16
Speaker
down time. So what I'm going to do is run my buggy, thank the Hilton hugely, and look up my pictures of I was on the Hilton website worldwide, because they were I was doing exercises like running up Everest up the stairs there and I shut up. But basically, then I'm going to have them run to
00:59:33
Speaker
run the ho from here just a few miles and then I'm going to see my son. I'm going to try to, if they're there, have a quick call in to run because they run and Ruben and Kurt, Kurt's the dad, Ruben's the son. I want them to look up my son. He's not my son. He's not around yet, but he's got the bills and he's got one or two sports, old sports injuries. And I feel I'm no expert, but if you've got shoes that are really good, that's a hell of a first step.
01:00:00
Speaker
You know, they'd be more comfy walking around and the same, I can't afford much for that. You know, my son and daughter have got birthdays on the same day, one, two years after that, you know, was born on the sailing boat.
01:00:13
Speaker
40-something years ago. Amazing. I can't believe it's the same me, but it is the same me. And I've had, you know, all the stuff I sell around people, and I was, yeah, but what I'm buying from now is the state of the art run socks their birthday, because I haven't got any money. These are the best socks I've ever worn. That's what they, and then when I'm in a little rental fair, I'm going to buy another pair for myself and get somebody to bring them out if I can. And I go to buy a pair for Jimmy and Eve, because, and maybe my grandson and daughter, when I can, because they,
01:00:42
Speaker
He didn't even touch me. I had my feet. What happened was I went to a lovely little cafe. I thought better go and use the bathroom. You probably have to run on this thing. I called in the day before just asking if I could come. He watched me walk across the road without the buggy. He had a pair of shoes in his hand, one of those guys. He said, well,
01:01:03
Speaker
try these, and they're the best shoes I've ever had on my feet. There's nothing in the wind. You almost think there's nothing for sale, and nothing saying about Gates and all that analysis, but they're hugely respected by the very top runners in Brighton area. But they put it on, and they said, we've got these socks, and they're dancing around with joy. And then I didn't even ask the price, and I didn't ask for anything, but I just got them.
01:01:25
Speaker
And I think they gave me a little discount, but they do that to everybody about 10% or whatever. Maybe even more. And I also want a friend called Kurt, who was also training for athletes. And he may have had a word with, I don't know, but then I wanted some off-road shoes with my off-road shoes are far too heavy. They're right, someone says, and they're critical. So, oh, yes, these won't be quite so comfy. It proves the beautiful lightweight off-road shoes. I think they're
01:01:46
Speaker
they're pelican, you know, and then I have all my feet, and I have the new tires on the thing, new tools, inners, slime, liners, I can do with nothing. But when you've got everything rabbit, and I'm spending the money now, because if I have to get it on the way, I'll probably be more expensive, and it won't be as good see. So I've already got the wheels on the way down. And I've been working, I
01:02:12
Speaker
I think I told you, when it arrived in the airport in Derbyshire, I walked and ran back and tried to do little jobs on the way like that. So anyway. Yeah. Rosie, thank you ever so much.
01:02:23
Speaker
Well, thank you very much, Joey. It's been delightful. And let's say a big cheer for FaZe Worldwide. Poor Jonathan. He works so hard. He's brilliant. And he's got a young, he's a baby or a young toddler, a young wife, you know, and he's one of the very few people employed with FaZe Worldwide in this country. And I couldn't have done it without him because he's got that way of thinking like you have.
01:02:46
Speaker
We'll, I'll include on the link to the podcast, all of your Twitter and Instagram and a link to you just giving page as well. Any pictures at all. You probably can find any pictures you see on any of these social medias if you want and you can grab them. And if you need anything more, ask me.
01:03:03
Speaker
And I'm so honored to be interviewed by you. I'd rather ask about you than me anyway. But I used to think I'm not special, but I've realized everyone's special. Everyone's precious because everyone's only got themselves. So, you know, if I want to have a life, I've only got me
01:03:18
Speaker
have to be your own. You really have to try to treat yourself a bit specially when you can, so that you can do it. My buggy wears socks on stones. I can pull it up 32 steps, well, 22 I didn't think. I can make it do difficult things, run up the steepest hills, but if I've got to run it on pebbles on the beach, the stony beach, I've got cheap charity shop sort of
01:03:41
Speaker
soft things like socks or a bit of a vest or something. I know it's silly, but it's bearing the wheels. My horse gets treated before a race. I'm not a race horse, not an analogy, but they have bandages in their legs and their tails and everything. Because one day they may have to pull the stops out and people are the same. So that's why I tell you all you runners who are listening to this wonderful podcast, just be
01:04:04
Speaker
pressure yourself, because honestly, nothing else works. Otherwise, it's no use being brave, but something could have been avoided. By the way, when I after broke my hip, the surgeon, several weeks later, he was very offensive, absolutely, I'm his favorite person now, because they did a scan, and it couldn't even work it down.
01:04:21
Speaker
And he was beaming. And he's a little, I have to say, it's called Princess Royal Hospital in Haywood's Heath. And he's Benedict, Benedict Rogers, but I used to call him Roger Moore. And I thought about that by mistake. But he's just lovely. I have to just tell you, when I broke my hip,
01:04:40
Speaker
those who went on drugs or, you know, big medicine. It was New Year's Eve I had in hospital. I was only there one night and that was maybe two nights. And they brought all the people, just a smattering of wine, just a little dribble. And wasn't that a wonderful thing? All those nurses worked so hard. And they weren't just being nice. They were taking blood and they were dealing with people who couldn't understand what was going on.
01:05:03
Speaker
arranging operations. And you know, anyway, I digress. Other people are special. Ranis is the metaphor for the fact that everyone's special. Goodbye. Sorry to go more. What a lovely way to finish. Thank you, Rosie.