The Art of Adventure

Pen Hadow appears by arrangement with DBA Speakers www.dbaspeakers.com
In 2003, Pen Hadow became the first person to trek solo and without resupply from Canada to the North Geographic Pole - 770 kilometres across shifting sea ice, open water, and temperatures of minus 40. It is a feat that has never been repeated, and almost certainly never will be.
But this is not the story of a single expedition. It is the story of a promise made to a dying father and fifteen years of refusing to give up.
Pen joins Hugh to tell the full story: from a childhood toughened by the nanny who once looked after Captain Scott's son, to the moment he fell through the ice without his immersion suit just days from the Pole. He describes the paralysing effect of cold on decision-making, the protocols for surviving a polar bear encounter while swimming between ice floes, and why the hardest challenge of all was not physical - but managing the wild swings of emotion that come with being completely alone.
He also explains what his years on the Arctic ice revealed about the disappearing sea ice, a discovery that has defined the second half of his life, and one he now shares with audiences around the world.
Pen Hadow's book Solo is out now.

In 1845, Sir John Franklin sailed from England with 129 men and two of the Royal Navy's finest ships, HMS Erebus and HMS Terror, to chart the last unmapped stretch of the Northwest Passage. They were expected back within three years. They were never seen again.
What followed became one of the greatest mysteries in the history of exploration. Scattered bones on a frozen island. Inuit testimony of starvation and cannibalism. A hastily scrawled note in the margins of an Admiralty form. And a Victorian public that refused to believe its heroes could have met such an end.
Russell Potter, one of the world's foremost Franklin scholars, joins Hugh to unpick nearly 180 years of searching, speculation, and discovery. He explains what we actually know, what we can only guess at, and why the mystery endures. Both ships have now been found, one remarkably preserved beneath the Arctic waters, but what lies within them has yet to be fully explored.
From the fatal decision to abandon ship, to the race between Lady Franklin and the press, to the amateur sleuths and satellite hunters still searching today - this is a story that refuses to give up its secrets. We ask why the Franklin Expedition continues to grip us, what it reveals about the nature of obsession, and whether the answer might still be out there, waiting to be found.
Russell Potter's book Finding Franklin: The Untold Story of a 165-Year Search is out now.

In 1869, John Wesley Powell set off down the Colorado River with nine men, four wooden boats, and no idea what lay ahead. The Grand Canyon, 300 miles of unmapped canyon, unknown rapids, and sheer rock walls, was the last blank space on the map of the continental United States.
Author John F Ross joins Hugh to tell the full story: how a one-armed Civil War veteran turned geologist became the first person to navigate the entire length of the Grand Canyon, racing against starvation through 360 rapids in boats that were entirely wrong for the job.
From losing a third of their food supply on the very first day, to the desertion of three desperate men - it is a thrilling snapshot into a moment in time. We ask what Powell's extraordinary journey revealed about the American West, about leadership under impossible pressure, and about what it means to push into territory where no map can help you.
John F Ross’ book The Promise of the Grand Canyon is out now.
The Art of Adventure is brought to you by Arthur Beale, outfitters to sailors, adventurers and explorers for nearly 500 years. Find out more at arthurbeale.co.uk.

Helen Sharman appears by arrangement with DBA Speakers www.dbaspeakers.com
In 1989, Helen Sharman was driving home from work when a radio ad changed her life. Astronaut wanted. No experience necessary. Britain had no space agency, no human spaceflight programme, and no tradition of sending civilians into orbit. Helen was a 26-year-old food technologist from Sheffield with a chemistry degree and no military background. She applied anyway.
Eighteen months later, she was sitting on top of a Soviet rocket - and on 18 May 1991, she became the first British person in space.
Helen joins Hugh to tell the full story: the 13,000 applicants, the gruelling selection process, and the live television broadcast that revealed her as one of the two finalists. She describes life at Star City on the cusp of the Cold War's end, the manual docking crisis 200 kilometres from Mir when the navigation system failed and the crew had to act alone, and those evening hours when five people gathered around a porthole and simply looked at the earth. She also reflects on what it actually takes to go somewhere extraordinary — and why the qualities that got her there might be less unusual than we think.
The Art of Adventure is brought to you by Arthur Beale, outfitters to sailors, adventurers and explorers for nearly 500 years. Find out more at arthurbeale.co.uk.

In 1838, Henriette d'Angeville became the first woman to climb Mont Blanc unaided - in a 12-kilogram wool dress, a matching bonnet, and hobnail boots, with 18 bottles of wine and a carrier pigeon tucked into her pack. Her name was largely forgotten until adventurer and filmmaker Lise Wortley decided to find out exactly what that climb felt like by doing it herself, in the same outfit, from the same church in Chamonix, via the original route.
Lise joins Hugh to talk about her project Woman With Altitude, which researches and retraces the overlooked journeys of history's women adventurers - wearing exactly what they wore, right down to the corsets. She recounts the 2024 attempt that ended in a storm (four climbers died the following day), the return in 2025, and what it actually feels like to jump crevasses in a floor-length dress while looking into the darkness below. But this episode is about more than one extraordinary climb.
Find out more about Lise on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/woman_with_altitude/?hl=en
Or her website: https://www.womanwithaltitude.com/
The Art of Adventure is brought to you by Arthur Beale, outfitters to sailors, adventurers and explorers for nearly 500 years. Find out more at arthurbeale.co.uk.