Determination and Resilience with Laura Bingham

How long did that voyage take you?

Just short of two months. We were stuck on the Azores for about a week and a bit because the winds weren’t right to set sail, which is amazing because we were there during this festival. Every Sunday in June or July they have this festival where they feed everyone in the streets. So one family was elected the previous year to buy a cow and use that cow to feed everyone in that town. They also hand out free milk and free bread. There’s this whole tradition is the kings and crowns and the legend or whatever it is is that they bury the crown, and the crown would only show itself to the best king. So one king decided to put on a festival-type thing to feed his people to show him how generous he was. Then the next Sunday is another family and they try and prove how generous they are.

That doesn't sound like the worst place to get stuck! You also attempted to cross the entire continent of South America completely human-powered and with no money in 2016 which is an absolutely incredible feat! It was great to hear you were raising money and awareness for Operation South America, a charity that looks after homeless or abused girls and young women in Paraguay. Could you tell us a little bit more about this adventure? 

Yes, so the only reason that I decided to cycle was that it was quicker than walking. I realised that I could walk up the hills and then speed down. I also realised that every Tom Dick and Harry has cycled South America so I was looking for a way to make it different and to make it more individual. So as I was scrolling on the internet, I found this organisation called Operation South America, they're a Christian group and they're such lovely people. I thought that their intentions and their message were so lovely so I got really friendly with them and I just felt really passionately about all the stories that they told me. For example, there was one set of girls that came to them and they didn't know that they were supposed to eat every day, they thought that they were just supposed to eat every other day because their mother had died when they were young, and their father had to go off to work and he could only come back every other day. The kids were seven and five years old. They didn’t know that you’re supposed to eat three meals a day, they just ate every other day when their father came back from work. They were left for 24 hours at a time. It’s only really when you hear those kinds of stories that you realise how lucky we are because if we can't feed ourselves, we can go to our parents, and then our parents can kind of feed us or give us a bit of money. If our parents aren't in that position, then the government can give us Universal Credit. And then if the government can't really give us Universal Credit, there are food banks, and there are so many safety nets or layers in the UK that just mean we very rarely go genuinely hungry. And if we do it’s because we've not explored all the options, I guess. But in South America and a lot of other countries, it's not set up that way.

For example, when we were in South America, Ed, my husband, got hit by an articulated lorry. Some people stopped and I was asking them to call an ambulance and they had no idea what I meant, it’s not something they’d typically do. So someone told us there’s a health centre down the road, so we had to shove Ed in the back of a pick-up truck, took him down a really, really bumpy road, bearing in mind he had just been hit by a lorry, he was so pale. We didn’t know the extent of his injuries at this point, he could’ve had spinal damage and there he was in the back of a pick-up truck going over really bumpy roads. We got to the health centre and there was just a number to call, someone turned up 10 minutes later and stabbed him in the bum with a syringe. We had no idea what was inside that syringe. In the UK there are so many procedures when accidents happen, and we’re so used to seeing things sealed and the doctors have our medical records but it was not like that there. I wasn’t supposed to be using any money on that trip, however, the doctor asked for cash before they’d do any sort of procedures so I had to run all over the place to try and find a cash machine. Thankfully everything turned out to be fine but it really does just show how lucky and privileged we are here in the UK.

You faced many obstacles when doing this expedition, such as having to rummage through bins for food and eating leftover scraps from restaurant customers’ plates. This must’ve been so tough. How did you find the motivation to continue?

It sounds kind of petty but I just hate that moment if you’ve stopped doing something and you come back home and people very compassionately go; “oh it’s okay, at least you tried.” And I’m like I don’t want to just try, I want to complete it. I just don’t give up, I don't know whether it's stupidity or just pure perseverance. It just feels like stubbornness, almost. I just can’t take no for an answer, even to the point where just now I went to a furniture store and the guy was like “you’re never going to get all that in your car” and I managed to fit it all in the car and prove him wrong. I just don’t give up on anything. Although in saying that, cheating is one thing I don’t mind doing if it means I’m going to win. For example, in CrossFit, I always do the number of reps that I'm supposed to do even if I have to catch up at the end of the class if I can't keep up. If it’s in terms of a race where I know I’m going to lose, I’m very happy to tie someone’s shoes together!

I also find that if you put yourself in a situation where you physically can't give up, so when you're up a mountain, and there's no one around you, you can't give up. Similar to when I was in the Essequibo river, you can’t really give up if you’re in the middle of a jungle. You just have to try to push yourself to keep going, even if crying every day helps get you through it!

Another one of your incredible endeavours was in 2018 when you successfully lead a world-first expedition to locate the source of the Essequibo River in Guyana, then make a decent by kayak. What were the main objectives of this expedition?

So the cycling expedition was more of a humanitarian charity led to publicise how hard it is for people in South America and about this organisation. I don’t know if you know about my children’s books, they’re called ‘One Girl and Her Bicycle’, they’re all about that cycling expedition. In book three called ‘Lands of Courage’ that has the organisation in there which is really nice and all profits go to them.

The aim of the Essequibo expedition was more personal. It was to highlight deforestation and mining and showcase Guyana, the rich culture and the ecotourism. It was also an arrogant ‘this is what humans are capable of’ to try and find the source and do a world’s first. The river had never been traversed before.

What sort of wildlife Did you see when you were there?

We saw a LOT of Jaguars. When Ed walked the Amazon, he didn’t see any Jaguars, but then in Guyana, it’s one of the only countries where you’re allowed to cull Jaguars because their numbers are so prolific. If the indigenous communities see sort of 5 Jaguars in a week, they’re allowed to start culling a few because they’re just so rife out there. Everyone I spoke to had their dogs stolen by Jaguar. I remember saying to someone “you’re so lucky you don’t have foxes because the foxes always kill my chickens”, and she was like “well we do have Jaguars that steal our dogs!” We had a Jaguar that ran through our camp one night. I didn't wake up. Everyone else woke up and chased it off. I was asleep to the whole thing, which is stupid. And we heard them calling every night. We saw Howler Monkeys, I remember going to the loo and looking up and there's just a monkey staring at me from the top of the tree. It’s like Disney there, there are animals everywhere. There were birds with really beautiful colours. It’s almost Jurassic over there. The jungle is so rich, honestly, if a dinosaur walked out, I wouldn't have been surprised. There was one area with rocks stacked on top of each other and loads of grass growing out the top of it, it looked like one of those tepee things.