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| Me up the mast, fixing the rigging during the latest offshore sailing trip (Tasman Sea). Photo cred: David Hows |
This winter and spring (and summer during the evenings), I have been very busy working on a book. So busy that there has not been any sailing since the Tasman Sea, and I had to turn down some mountaineering projects. Yesterday, the manuscript was submitted, which means I finally have some
time over!
The book is about survival, more specifically prepping. I wrote
it together with Lars Wilderäng, and it will be available as a physical
book already in September – in Swedish only, at this
stage. We look at prepping in a wider sense – it’s so much more than just stashing
canned food! The book introduces a much broader perspective, touches on a lot
of psychological aspects, and inspires to a certain mindset that will help you
not only in a crisis, but in all aspects of life.
The same mindset can be applied in extreme adventures. Shelter,
water and fire are covered, in case you would find yourself in trouble in the wilderness, for example. But
more importantly: what do you do in order to overcome difficulties and continue
on? How do you prepare yourself to become a survivor?
This, and much more, is covered in the book. Look for the
title “Är du förberedd?” and get your copy in September!
While we’re speaking of books, I also want to tell about a
book I have helped researching, by guiding the writer Anna Fock into a fall-out zone inRussian Ural Mountains. The nuclear catastrophe of Mayak is a 6 on the 7-level INES
scale (International Nuclear Event Scale). It is only surpassed by Chernobyl
and Fukushima. But nobody seems to know about it. It’s no wonder – the Soviet
government had covered up the fact as soon as it happened, including not evacuating
people from the area.
One day I will write more about the trip. It was a once-in-a-lifetime
experience – armed with Geiger meters and iodine tablets, we rode around in the
middle of the Zone, interviewed survivors, photographed nuclear victim
cemeteries. There are no tourists there. The locals are careful about what they
talk about. But as an adventure magnet, I could open a few doors – and the
research material came in as a flood wave.
The result is published in the late summer. It’s a novel,
written as a fictional story of a local boy, with tons of facts from the area. The
title is “Väderfenomen” – weather phenomena. That’s what the officials called
the cloud from the nuclear waste explosion, as it appeared glowing over a large
area. It’s just a weather phenomenon, nothing to see here, the birds falling from the sky is just a coincidence. Get the book! Read it!
In just ten days from now, I'll be off to an offshore yacht race. It will serve as a great training opportunity for the coming Rolex Sydney to Hobart Yacht Race in December, where I will be competing again. I will be on the same yacht as the last time, but this time you will find me at the wheel!
And the biggest thing this year, and possibly ever: I'm getting married. This also requires some work and preparations which are taking a lot of time. But it's OK. It's amazing.
I'll be back with reports after the summer!