Joe Rogan Experience #1832 - Charlie Walker

1. 0:00 – 1:34

   Curiosity-driven travel and why hardship creates connection

   1. JRJoe Rogan0:00

      (drumbeats) Joe Rogan Podcast, check it out.

   2. CWCharlie Walker0:04

      The Joe Rogan Experience.

   3. JRJoe Rogan0:06

      Train by day, Joe Rogan Podcast by night. All day. (instrumental music plays) And we're up. All right, Charlie. First of all, thanks for being here.

   4. CWCharlie Walker0:16

      My pleasure. Thanks for having me.

   5. JRJoe Rogan0:17

      Very nice to meet you. Why do you do the things that you do?

   6. CWCharlie Walker0:22

      First question is the hardest one.

   7. JRJoe Rogan0:23

      (laughs)

   8. CWCharlie Walker0:25

      Um, I, I guess over the years have formed a whole bunch of different answers to that, some of them flippant and sarcastic. Uh, without rambling on for ages and ages, I suppose it comes down to, I'm just really curious. I want to get to these places, see, you know, people living lives differently to mine. I grew up in a tiny little village where, you know, it was nice, but nothing happened.

   9. JRJoe Rogan0:44

      Where'd you grow up?

   10. CWCharlie Walker0:45

       Uh, just close to Salisbury in the southwest of England. Uh, about 10 miles from Stonehenge down there.

   11. JRJoe Rogan0:51

       Oh, wow.

   12. CWCharlie Walker0:52

       Um, and yeah, I suppose I, I started traveling when I was about 18. Took a year out between school and, uh, and university and just got more and more curious and slowly realized that I enjoyed traveling more if I was getting to places by, I suppose, physically difficult means.

   13. JRJoe Rogan1:08

       Mm.

   14. CWCharlie Walker1:09

       Um, um, and that particularly helps, I suppose, if you turn up in some remote community in a ... not that I've been doing this, but in a helicopter or 4x4, or whatever, there's instantly a, a distance, a sort of divide. You know, you're ... I spend most of my time, uh, traveling in the developing world, where that's just building a barrier. Whereas if you turn up on foot or in a little kayak or on a horse or whatever, then I think people kind of take to that a little bit more.

2. 1:34 – 3:50

   First “real” challenge: Beijing to Mongolia by bike (with a snapped quad and broken wrist)

   1. JRJoe Rogan1:34

      What was your first trip that you did like this?

   2. CWCharlie Walker1:38

      Uh, besides backpacking around Africa, uh, the first time I did anything sort of particularly physically challenging was I flew to Beijing and I had a flight out of, uh, Mongolia. And kind of quite last minute I thought, "Oh, well, you know, it's, there's 1000 miles between the two, I'll take a bike, a bicycle."

   3. JRJoe Rogan1:59

      (laughs)

   4. CWCharlie Walker1:59

      Um, didn't get off to the best start. I, uh, I went to a friend's 21st birthday party about 10 days before leaving and, um, I don't really remember the party, but when I wake up in the morning, one of my quadriceps had snapped.

   5. JRJoe Rogan2:11

      (gasps)

   6. CWCharlie Walker2:11

      Not torn, but snapped. The, the doctor said that the two ends would kind of flap around like fishtails and eventually graft onto the rest. I don't know how scientific that that was. Uh, and then on my first night in Beijing, I fell over and broke my wrist a bit drunk. So-

   7. JRJoe Rogan2:23

      Oh, Jesus.

   8. CWCharlie Walker2:24

      ... two, two weeks later when I sort of cut my cast off and sort of, you know, strapped my knee up a bit and pedaled out, I wasn't in the best shape. And, and frankly, the following two-

   9. JRJoe Rogan2:32

      So you just went with a torn calf, quadriceps muscle, fucked up wrist-

   10. CWCharlie Walker2:38

       Yes.

   11. JRJoe Rogan2:38

       ... just went anyway?

   12. CWCharlie Walker2:40

       Yeah, I mean, I started slow. I'm not a ... Like, I'm not a sportsman. You know, I'm not an athlete. I've always just liked to ... I've never really particularly trained for anything. I tend to try and keep fit, but that's, that's, that's kind of it. Um, so I've, I've always sort of thought, start slow and build up. And the, the two ... It only took two weeks to, to cross up to the, to Ulaanbaatar, the capital of Mongolia. And once I crossed the border into Mongolia, there was just no road. It was, you know, it's just desert and there's kind of tire tracks all over the place and you've just got to, you know, take a northeast bearing and sort of stick with it. Um, and frankly, those two weeks were kind of shitty. Like, I didn't (laughs) particularly enjoy them. Um, but yeah, I mean, you're, you're probably aware of the concept of type two fun. You know, you've done something and once you've ... It's, it's crap-

   13. JRJoe Rogan3:23

       Yes.

   14. CWCharlie Walker3:23

       ... but then once you've finished, you start to rose tint it.

   15. JRJoe Rogan3:25

       Right. Yeah.

   16. CWCharlie Walker3:26

       And before I'd even left Mongolia, I was already thinking, "Yeah, there, this, there could be something in this." And, and I saw the potential of bicycle travel. You know, you, you, you can travel a fair distance, you know. If you want, you can go 100 miles a day, you can go 60 miles very comfortably and still have a lot of the day there. You can travel very cheaply, you can travel for ages, and you get to see all those places in between that you wouldn't really go near if you're, you know, on a bus or a train or a car or whatever it is.

3. 3:50 – 5:55

   Food, resupply, and Charlie’s anti-granular planning style

   1. JRJoe Rogan3:50

      Did you have any idea of like where food would be, how you would get through these areas? Like, did you understand like what towns were available?

   2. CWCharlie Walker4:01

      I knew ... I mean, I had a ... for, for that first ride, I had a map and I knew, uh, that besides, uh, kind- I guess a 250 mile gap in the Gobi, uh, that there'd be, you know, enough towns to, to get, get resupplies.

   3. JRJoe Rogan4:15

      So you just had to go 250 miles through the Gobi desert-

   4. CWCharlie Walker4:18

      But you can carry-

   5. JRJoe Rogan4:19

      ... on a bike with a torn quad and a fucked up wrist.

   6. CWCharlie Walker4:22

      Yeah. Yeah, in short. But you can carry quite a lot on a bike, you know.

   7. JRJoe Rogan4:26

      Yeah.

   8. CWCharlie Walker4:26

      You can carry, if necessary, and in, you know, later, you know, in later years, you can carry, you know, two, three, four weeks of food pretty easily. It's not going to be very exciting. It's going to be just a lot of rice and noodles and stuff like that-

   9. JRJoe Rogan4:37

      Mm-hmm.

   10. CWCharlie Walker4:37

       But, uh, you can, you can sort of stack it up.

   11. JRJoe Rogan4:39

       Did you plan ahead for that? Did you, do you understand what your requirements were gonna be? Did you like, did you sit down and write it all out? "I'm gonna be there for X amount of hours. I'm gonna need Y amount of calories."

   12. CWCharlie Walker4:52

       No, I've, I've never been good at planning. Uh-

   13. JRJoe Rogan4:55

       (laughs)

   14. CWCharlie Walker4:55

       Well, no, that's, that's not true. That's not fair. I've never loved getting granular with planning. Um, I, you know, when I'm planning food for, uh ... You know, earlier this year, I had to plan food for about a month. And I kind of looked, "That's about a breakfast," and just times that a bunch of times.

   15. JRJoe Rogan5:10

       Mm-hmm.

   16. CWCharlie Walker5:10

       "That's about a lunch." And then just pack an extra, you know, 10%, 20% and should be all right. Um, which is, which is perhaps a slightly sort of scattergun, irresponsible approach, but I've, I've slowly got a bit better at knowing what's, what's needed. And I mean, I've never got into, um, calories and, and counting the numbers of it.

   17. JRJoe Rogan5:28

       Mm-hmm.

   18. CWCharlie Walker5:29

       Um, I, I totally see the value in that and a lot of people who do similar sorts of things do. Um, but I've, I've generally thought, you know, I don't need to work out that I've got precisely enough protein for any given day or, or, or fat or carbohydrate, whatever it is, 'cause usually these aren't hugely long endeavors. You know, a few months you can go with a slightly imbalanced diet, maybe take some multivitamins.

   19. JRJoe Rogan5:48

       I would imagine that you're burning a lot of calories, though, riding that bike through the desert for 250 miles.

4. 5:55 – 7:45

   A drunken vow turns into a four-year loop: UK to UK via the farthest points of three continents

   1. CWCharlie Walker5:55

      Yeah. Um, I mean, I, I look back at that trip there and I think that was quite straightforward really. And I do think that I'm not one of these people who says, "Hey, anybody can do anything." But I don't think that-... particular ride across, you know, across to, to Mongolia was especially difficult. Um, but it was, it was, for me, it was, uh, revelatory 'cause I just got this idea of what bike travel could be. And it was, it was only a couple of weeks, less, probably 10 days after I finished that I got a bit drunk and made a, on, on a Genghis Khan bukka, and made quite a rash decision to cycle for what ended up being about four years. Um-

   2. JRJoe Rogan6:29

      Genghis Khan booker? What are you saying?

   3. CWCharlie Walker6:31

      Vodka.

   4. JRJoe Rogan6:31

      Oh, Genghis Khan vodka.

   5. CWCharlie Walker6:33

      Sorry, yeah.

   6. JRJoe Rogan6:33

      Okay, no worries.

   7. CWCharlie Walker6:34

      I've got a plummy accent.

   8. JRJoe Rogan6:35

      No worries.

   9. CWCharlie Walker6:36

      Um, yeah, and I made this decision to cycle, uh, from the UK back to the UK via the furthest away point in each of Europe, Asia, and Africa, uh, and that ended up taking about four years.

   10. JRJoe Rogan6:47

       (Exhales) So, you do this first trip and you decide after it's completed that, you know, you get this i- interesting feeling, you know, it was fun, it was exciting, it was adventurous, and that this is something you're gonna do often. Are you writing about these things? Are you making videos? Like, what are you, what are you doing once you're done?

   11. CWCharlie Walker7:08

       Um, I, I write basically. Um, I'm, I'm not a, you know, a videographer. I take photos. Uh, I didn't for, for the four-year trip that followed. I didn't have social media at that time, um, so I, I very much focused on writing. And every day, at the end of the day, doesn't matter how sort of sweaty and uncomfortable I might be in a tent or cold or whatever, I will write down what happened that day and just, just get it all down and later you can then kind of, you know, get yourself back into that frame of my mi- frame of mind.

   12. JRJoe Rogan7:35

       Mm-hmm.

   13. CWCharlie Walker7:35

       And all these other details will suddenly start springing back in. It's, you know, it's quite a helpful sort of, uh, key to unlocking other memories. Um, yeah, but, uh, writing is my main focus.

5. 7:45 – 10:48

   Living cheaply on the road and turning the trip into books

   1. JRJoe Rogan7:45

      How do you fund these trips?

   2. CWCharlie Walker7:47

      Uh, initially I was saving, scrimping and saving, and, um, that first long journey I lived for four and a half years, as it turned out, uh, on about 12,000 pounds, which back then would've been I guess $16,000. Um, and so-

   3. JRJoe Rogan8:02

      For four years?

   4. CWCharlie Walker8:02

      Yeah, yeah. So I, I lived in a tent. I ate very cheaply. Occasionally I'd get a night in a hostel or something. Um, you can live for a r- really small amount of money if you're just out in the world. Um, more recently, I, I get sponsorship or grants that sort of, you know, help and cover expenses. But I've always done things in quite a lo-fi way. I've never done hugely complicated or expensive journeys. I've always quite enjoyed the, uh, I guess the accessibility of doing stuff that anyone logistically probably could do if they, if they put a bit of thought to it.

   5. JRJoe Rogan8:31

      The four-year one, like, how does one go about deciding that you're gonna do something that's gonna take four years out of your life? Like, did you recognize that it was gonna take that long? Like, what did-

   6. CWCharlie Walker8:42

      I reckoned it would take about that, a- and rashly is the answer. I kind of, you know, I came up with the idea before I really gave it a lot of thought. And the first thing I did is told a bunch of people, you know, family included, "Hey, I'm gonna, in a year's time, I'm gonna head off on a bike for about four years." And once I told a bunch of people, then it became almost a certainty to me because, you know, I think I would've been embarrassed to then back down.

   7. JRJoe Rogan9:04

      Mm-hmm.

   8. CWCharlie Walker9:04

      Um, and so I guess, I mean, I've always found that quite handy with any, with any project, you know, just let people know, set yourself a start date, and then the wheels are already in motion, uh, and out of sort of shame or embarrassment, you'll probably end up going through with it.

   9. JRJoe Rogan9:16

      (Exhales) That's, uh, I can't think that anybody would fault you for quitting. (laughs) I mean, I don't think anybody would say, "Oh, Charlie, you only did three years."

   10. CWCharlie Walker9:26

       I came close a bunch of times.

   11. JRJoe Rogan9:27

       Did you?

   12. CWCharlie Walker9:28

       But, you know, by the time I got three years, you know, then it's like, "Well, I might as well, might as well finish it off."

   13. JRJoe Rogan9:32

       And when you get to the end of that, are you gonna... did you write a book? Did you, did you-

   14. CWCharlie Walker9:36

       Oh, I have something for you.

   15. JRJoe Rogan9:36

       Oh, there you go.

   16. CWCharlie Walker9:38

       (laughs) Before I forget. Actually, I've got something else as well. Um, bear with me. Let's see, what have we got here? These are, I believe for you, Joe.

   17. JRJoe Rogan9:49

       Oh, thank you.

   18. CWCharlie Walker9:50

       Um, those two books are about that four-year bike ride.

   19. JRJoe Rogan9:52

       There you go.

   20. CWCharlie Walker9:53

       Um, and I've got a couple for Jaime. I'll put them there.

   21. JRJoe Rogan9:55

       And now once you do this, so you get back and I, I would imagine, like, writing down everything at the end of the day I'm sure helps, but it's gotta be difficult to sort of capture the s- the nuances of each ex- I mean, uh, you, if you're riding for four years-

   22. CWCharlie Walker10:16

       Mm-hmm.

   23. JRJoe Rogan10:16

       ... I would imagine there's a lot of very notable experiences you're having during this time. Like, how are you remembering all these and documenting them and-

   24. CWCharlie Walker10:25

       I mean, it, it, like, photos help as well. You know, over the course of four years, I probably had something like 15,000 photographs and that, that helps, you know, furnish a picture. But, um, I mean, it's really just what I said, about, what, 1,600 days I kept a journal every single day. Sometimes they're very brief, you know, just-

   25. JRJoe Rogan10:40

       And you're just writing it down, hand to paper?

   26. CWCharlie Walker10:42

       Just... Yeah, in, in a bunch of, you know, tatty old notebooks that I've got-

   27. JRJoe Rogan10:45

       Mm-hmm.

   28. CWCharlie Walker10:45

       ... kind of, you know, falling apart on a shelf somewhere.

6. 10:48 – 11:46

   The route across Europe and Asia—and how geopolitics can rewrite plans

   1. JRJoe Rogan10:48

      And what was the path?

   2. CWCharlie Walker10:49

      Um, so I started, uh, near Salisbury where I grew up, um, headed across the channel up Western Europe through Scandinavia to Nordkapp, which is the, the northernmost point of Europe. It's up in the Norwegian Arctic. Um, that's quite a dramatic place. The, the sort of monument at Nordkapp is at the top of a, um, 300-meter-high or 300-yard-high cliff. You go and look over the railing and you've got the Arctic Ocean sort of crashing against it, the North Pole's-

   3. JRJoe Rogan11:13

      Oh.

   4. CWCharlie Walker11:13

      ... another 1,200 miles on. Um, then I took a sort of very long wiggly path across Eurasia to Singapore, which took, you know, nine, ten months or so.

   5. JRJoe Rogan11:23

      Jesus Christ. (laughs)

   6. CWCharlie Walker11:25

      (laughs) But I didn't know what route I was gonna be taking for that. Um, you know, I, I, I didn't... A- again, I didn't l- allow myself to get too bogged down with details. And also over the course of nearly half a decade, so much changes, you know, the-

   7. JRJoe Rogan11:36

      Yeah.

   8. CWCharlie Walker11:36

      ... the Arab Spring happened after I started, so-

   9. JRJoe Rogan11:38

      Oh, wow.

   10. CWCharlie Walker11:39

       ... the Middle East, you know, changed. The geography and the geopolitics of the Middle East totally changed after I started, before I got back around to that part of the world.

7. 11:46 – 14:24

   Bikes as “Trigger’s broom”: theft, Frankenstein rebuilds, and constant repairs

   1. JRJoe Rogan11:46

      Mm, is this your bike?

   2. CWCharlie Walker11:48

      Uh, that is the second of two bikes. Yeah, that one I-

   3. JRJoe Rogan11:52

      Did one of them break?

   4. CWCharlie Walker11:53

      So the, the, the other one, the one I started with, I got off of eBay for 100 pounds secondhand, so-

   5. JRJoe Rogan11:58

      (laughs)

   6. CWCharlie Walker11:58

      ... not, not a great bike, you know, basic. Um, and that one got me all the way about 34,000 miles to Cape Town. Uh, and then that bike was sadly stolen, just, I was locked up on... it was locked up on the street.

   7. JRJoe Rogan12:11

      Oh, Jesus.

   8. CWCharlie Walker12:11

      Uh, and coincidentally that afternoon I, I'd been invited on a radio show to talk about my trip and the, the DJ-... asked me about his bike, you know. And Capetonians, uh, you know, they're into cycling, mountain biking, and I think he was expecting some specs or, you know, what, you know, what I was riding. And all I could really say is, "Actually, it got stolen this morning." And he... I'm about to murder an accent and, you know, you'll get angry emails, but, uh, he said, (in a British accent) "Oh, no, that's absolutely terrible. Like, let's get this boyki a bicycle. We can get him back home." And he, uh-

   9. JRJoe Rogan12:37

      That's not bad.

   10. CWCharlie Walker12:37

       ... said, "Any of you, any of you listeners out there, you've got a bicycle, you send us a message, we'll get it to this boy." Um, and about six or seven bikes were sort of presented to me the next day.

   11. JRJoe Rogan12:46

       Hmm.

   12. CWCharlie Walker12:46

       Well, I had to go around the city and collect them all up, but a couple were kids' bikes, one was an antique, one had been found in a canal-

   13. JRJoe Rogan12:53

       (laughs)

   14. CWCharlie Walker12:53

       ... um, the frame of which I ended up using. So I took them all apart and I made-

   15. JRJoe Rogan12:55

       Oh.

   16. CWCharlie Walker12:55

       ... I made one bike from all the different parts. And I, I just, wha- the, the bottom bracket, the kind of part between the, the pedals in those, that sort of hub, that was the only part I got from a shop. And the rest, uh, was just these, these decimated bikes, kind of, you know, bastardized into this, this one Frankenstein frame.

   17. JRJoe Rogan13:12

       Well, that's a cool story.

   18. CWCharlie Walker13:13

       Yeah.

   19. JRJoe Rogan13:13

       And so then this bike, you rode for the remainder of the journey.

   20. CWCharlie Walker13:17

       Yeah, that got me 10,000 miles in one year back home.

   21. JRJoe Rogan13:20

       Damn.

   22. CWCharlie Walker13:20

       (laughs) And then it was stolen a few weeks later-

   23. JRJoe Rogan13:22

       How wi-

   24. CWCharlie Walker13:22

       ... in London.

   25. JRJoe Rogan13:22

       Was it really?

   26. CWCharlie Walker13:23

       Yeah.

   27. JRJoe Rogan13:23

       Oh, wow.

   28. CWCharlie Walker13:23

       It was basically unrideable by that point. Is that... I can't tell which one- Yeah, that's the first- ... that is. ... one. That's up in Tibet. Okay.

   29. JRJoe Rogan13:28

       How long do bike tires last?

   30. CWCharlie Walker13:31

       I-
8. 14:24 – 16:31

   Languages, charades, and writing vocabulary on his knuckles

   1. JRJoe Rogan14:24

      Wow. And when you're traveling through, through all these places, what kind of language barriers are there? Do you... I mean, do you understand other languages besides English?

   2. CWCharlie Walker14:35

      I'm not a natural linguist. Um, I, I can get by in French, and that was handy in sort of Central and West Africa. Um, I picked up and sort of worked quite hard at, at Russian. I've got some Russian, um, which in the, the -stan, the Central Asia, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, et cetera, that was handy.

   3. JRJoe Rogan14:53

      When you say picked up, did you pick up on the fly, or did you prepare?

   4. CWCharlie Walker14:56

      I, uh, probably a few months before I got to that part of the world, I picked up some, um, uh, like audio lessons.

   5. JRJoe Rogan15:02

      Mm-hmm.

   6. CWCharlie Walker15:03

      Uh, and just sort of listened to them while I was, while I was on, on the road. Um, and then I got quite good at just sort of, I guess, charades. You know, even, even if a, a... Like China was always linguistically the hardest place.

   7. JRJoe Rogan15:14

      Mm-hmm.

   8. CWCharlie Walker15:14

      But even after I learned how to ask for an egg, you know, in a village shop to some rural area, I still preferred to do it the way I'd done for, (laughs) you know, for weeks up to that point, which was go into a shop and start sort of, you know, flapping, clucking your wings-

   9. JRJoe Rogan15:26

      (laughs)

   10. CWCharlie Walker15:26

       ... and sort of, you know, clucking slightly more and more manically. (clucking) And then (pops lips) putting out-

   11. JRJoe Rogan15:32

       Oh, that's hilarious.

   12. CWCharlie Walker15:32

       ... from behind me an egg and pointing it. And they go, "Oh, the foreigner wants an egg. Yeah, we'll get him some eggs."

   13. JRJoe Rogan15:35

       Oh, that's hilarious.

   14. CWCharlie Walker15:36

       Um, so you k- yeah, you can make a bit of a game of it, um-

   15. JRJoe Rogan15:38

       Yeah.

   16. CWCharlie Walker15:39

       ... and of course, yeah, in lots of parts of the world, there are plenty of people who do speak good English, um, so I, I will say, I wasn't, um, I wasn't washing a great deal (laughs) at this time in my life, you know, living in a tent, getting the odd splash wash in a puddle or a river or whatever. And so my hands, which were on front of me and the bike, uh, sorry, in front of me on the bike's handlebars most of the day, uh, it, when I arrived in a new country, I'd find the first English speaker I could and ask them how to count to 10 in their language, and then I'd write on my knuckles one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, 10 on each hand. And then, you know, on the palm, hot, cold, yes, no, good, bad, up, down, left, right, just a whole bunch of vocabulary. And that, you know, you pick it up pretty quick when it's in front of you for maybe six, eight hours in a day. And when that was done, I'd wash them off and maybe learn some new words and sort of carry on. So even though I was passing through regions and, and didn't have all that long to get to grips with many languages, I, I got a bit of a head start with that.

9. 16:31 – 23:09

   Loneliness, solitude, and sneaking into Tibet

   1. JRJoe Rogan16:31

      Oh, wow. Um, what is it like when you're alone for that long?

   2. CWCharlie Walker16:37

      That's probably the biggest challenge. And I've definitely got better at that over the years. But when I was off on that bike trip, you know, there were, there were times, particularly up in Tibet where that picture was, the, the road I was following in Tibet is the, the, the western sort of approach to Tibet, and on a good day... I was there in winter, which is not ideal, it's, it's cold, but on a good day, there'd be maybe one vehicle going in either direction. But often there'd be several days at a time with no vehicles and, um, there were, you know, no settlements along the way. And later on... So to get into Tibet, I didn't have permission, so I had to sort of (laughs) in, in the night, I cut a hole in the fence of a military base and snuck into, into Tibet. Uh, so beyond that point, I was having to kind of hide.

   3. JRJoe Rogan17:16

      To get into Tibet? So, so it's difficult to get into Tibet?

   4. CWCharlie Walker17:19

      Yeah. So, so the, you know, Tibet used to be a independent country.

   5. JRJoe Rogan17:23

      Right.

   6. CWCharlie Walker17:23

      A lot of protests, most, you know, ethnic Tibetan people don't want to be part of China, but in the '50s, the, the, you know, the, the People's Liberation Army marched in. Uh, and, uh, this was only a couple of years after the, um, the Beijing Olympics, and in the lead up to those, there were, in, in Lhasa, the, the capital, I think it was around three dozen, uh, self-immolations. Y- you're aware of that phrase?

   7. JRJoe Rogan17:46

      Yeah.

   8. CWCharlie Walker17:46

      Yeah. Uh-

   9. JRJoe Rogan17:47

      Horrific.

   10. CWCharlie Walker17:47

       ... usually monks. Yeah, and, you know, for the, for the listeners who might not know, this would be-

   11. JRJoe Rogan17:50

       Well, they probably know from the Rage Against the Machine cover.

   12. CWCharlie Walker17:52

       Yeah, yeah, exactly that.

   13. JRJoe Rogan17:54

       Yeah.

   14. CWCharlie Walker17:54

       So people marching out in, you know, in front of the, the, the soldiers or the police, pouring a tin of, uh, petrol over themselves, or gasoline, lighting themselves on fire, and, and burning to death, you know, i- in protest at what they see as the, the occupation of their, their country. Uh, and of course, the, the Chinese government doesn't want people seeing these sorts of scenes, so they, they, they made the whole area off-limits to foreigners, and basically, well, it still is really. Y- you, you can visit sort of limited little pockets in, in, in Lhasa, the capital, and a couple of other kind of temples and towns nearby.But to do that, you've got to be in a, in a group with a guide and a vehicle and permits and, you know, it's, it's, it's expensive and, and you, you're just not allowed to travel by yourself with a, with a bike. So that was the only way I could get in was to sort of sneak in. But after that point, I was then having to, to hide the whole time, and, and to bring, bring it back to your question, the loneliness there, I really, really struggled. You know, I was, I was up there for about six weeks and, you know, I probably had two conversations in that time. You know, it was, it was really hard. Um, but now I've got a lot better at it, and there's ... Ah, I, I keep meaning to look this up 'cause there was someone, it's one of those people that's always quoted, it'll be Oscar Wilde or Mark Twain, someone like that, once said that, uh, "Loneliness is the paucity of one's own company and, uh, solitude is the richness of it." Uh, and it's-

   15. JRJoe Rogan19:09

       Hmm.

   16. CWCharlie Walker19:09

       ... you know, it's two sides of the same coin. So being by yourself can totally suck, but if you just kind of try and flip the perspective of it, and you know, it's not always possible and it's certainly not easy, you can then sort of, you know, enjoy the pa- the space, the peace, the freedom, um, particularly if you've got a, you know, kind of a busy life when you go back home.

   17. JRJoe Rogan19:24

       It is an interesting thing about human beings that we seem to have a requirement for other people's company.

   18. CWCharlie Walker19:29

       Mm-hmm.

   19. JRJoe Rogan19:30

       I mean, we really do. Like, we do enjoy moments of solitude, you know, like sitting on a dock, you know, looking out at a, at an ocean, just relaxing, maybe having a cup of coffee by yourself. But if that goes on for too long, we have like a, a deep feeling of longing and a, a sorrow comes over us and ...

   20. CWCharlie Walker19:50

       Well, we're pack animals.

   21. JRJoe Rogan19:51

       Yeah.

   22. CWCharlie Walker19:52

       And, and you know, I guess, uh, this is my cod evolutionary (laughs) uh, sort of take on it, but I suppose anyone over the millions of years of, of our evolution who had that instinct to always be there by themselves probably wouldn't have been passing their genes on so much. (laughs)

   23. JRJoe Rogan20:06

       Right.

   24. CWCharlie Walker20:06

       And so they, so you know, probably would have been bred out, you know, we, we've selected for people who live in communities.

   25. JRJoe Rogan20:11

       Yeah, makes sense. It only makes sense, but it's, it's so strange how, uh, intense it is when, when you are alone for long periods of time, and for people that have never experienced that, it's, uh, I mean, what you've done in, in doing that is, uh, is really extraordinary, and I would imagine it gives you some very unique insight into how your own mind works.

   26. CWCharlie Walker20:34

       Yeah. Uh, I think I've always been relatively good in my own company. I've, I, I, I suppose years ago I might have referred to myself as a, as a loner in the, in the sort of positive sense of that word as opposed to I guess it, you know, (laughs) it's probably a bit of an insult as well.

   27. JRJoe Rogan20:49

       Yeah.

   28. CWCharlie Walker20:49

       But I, you know, I do like my own company. I'm, I'm happy in my own company, but I have got, I, I suppose over long periods I, I, I would realize later that I'd sort of essentially de-socialized and, you know, suddenly being back in, in a community or around people where I can have a conversation, it just takes a bit of time to kind of, you know, r- equalize after, after being by yourself for a long time, um, because you've, I mean, you've got no one else to answer to.

   29. JRJoe Rogan21:13

       Yeah.

   30. CWCharlie Walker21:13

       You know, it's, it's, uh, it's, it's total freedom and that can be, uh, an indulgence, a self-indulgence.
10. 23:09 – 30:14

    Congo by bike and dugout canoe: rapids, crocodiles, hippos, malaria, and typhoid

    1. JRJoe Rogan23:09

       You went through the Congo on a bike?

    2. CWCharlie Walker23:12

       Uh, I started on a bike. Uh, I was actually with someone else for this part of, this is the, the bike journey.

    3. JRJoe Rogan23:17

       Mm-hmm.

    4. CWCharlie Walker23:17

       Um, so this was 2014, um, a guy from Scotland who I'd met, he, he was motorbiking down the, uh, the east coast of Africa with a couple of friends and I, and I think about seven times we kept bumping into each other. They, they (laughs) were covering a lot more ground. They were taking a more sort of circuitous route than me. But in Cape Town, him and I spent a bit of time together and he said, "Hey, well, so you know, when you go to Congo, I'll fly up and I'll join you." And so in the capital of Zambia, Lusaka, he, he flew up, he bought a bike for I think about $90, like a sort of three gear, shitty, heavy, s- s- sort of strong bike. Uh, and we, we cycled into Congo, uh, DRC, you know, there's two Congos, the big one, the, the, the fucked up one I guess.

    5. JRJoe Rogan23:58

       Yeah.

    6. CWCharlie Walker23:59

       Um, uh, we cycled across the border in the south in, in the Copperbelt and then followed the border all the way across the south of the country 'til eventually the road we were following just kind of ran out. Um, but there was a river there and we, we'd been aware that this was gonna happen. The Lulu is the name of the river. And so we, uh, we bought a dugout canoe which is, or a pirogue they call it there, which is essentially just a, a tree trunk with the insides scooped out. You know, it's-

    7. JRJoe Rogan24:21

       Mm-hmm.

    8. CWCharlie Walker24:21

       ... your sort of typical I suppose you'd say tribal canoe that you'd s- you'd see right across the world in all sort- you know, in South America or in Sub-Saharan Africa or in, you know, Papua New Guinea, the same sort of thing. And we bought one that was about five and a half meters long I think and...... for the next month, we kind of battled this thing down a river. Um, but as we... So it, it was not a, it was not in great shape. Uh, and we had to get in it, all our gear and two bicycles, and these things sit really low in the water.

    9. JRJoe Rogan24:46

       Hmm.

    10. CWCharlie Walker24:46

        We've got maybe two inches of clearance. You know, if the, w- y- any small rapids, the water's coming in and you're, you're going down. Um, but as we, after we bought it, we pulled it up onto the riverbank and we turned it upside down, and we were patching some little leaks and cracks and trying to kind of brace it. And the whole village just gathered around us in this big, excited, but concerned crowd. And they were tutting and shaking their heads. And a sort of spokesperson essentially stepped forward and said, "Really, I don't think you should go on the river. Um, there are, there are rapids and waterfalls." And we're like, "Yeah, no, it'll be all right." "And there are hippos and crocodiles and, you know, if you guys don't drown, you'll be eaten and you'll be dead in a day either way." Um, and we took it with a pinch of salt, and, and, and that month was probably the most fraught of my life. It, it was, it was ridiculous. Every day we'd be struggling down rapids. The smallest little rapid would be enough to sink us, and the boat wouldn't sink, it would just go, you know, down. It would sit, you know, f- two, three inches under the water. But unless we had them all strapped down, all our bags would start floating off in different directions-

    11. JRJoe Rogan25:43

        Oh, Jesus.

    12. CWCharlie Walker25:43

        ... and we're splashing around in the water trying to gather everything. "Oh, that one's got the money and the cameras. Oh, get that bag, that's got all of our food."

    13. JRJoe Rogan25:48

        Oh, Jesus.

    14. CWCharlie Walker25:49

        "Passports over there." And all the while you're wondering when is a crocodile just gonna come and sort of grab-

    15. JRJoe Rogan25:53

        (sighs) Oh.

    16. CWCharlie Walker25:53

        ... your ankle. Um-

    17. JRJoe Rogan25:53

        Did you see them?

    18. CWCharlie Walker25:55

        We s- we only saw one.

    19. JRJoe Rogan25:56

        Really?

    20. CWCharlie Walker25:57

        Um, they, so they, they, I mean, they're around. Everyone kept saying they're around, lots of people-

    21. JRJoe Rogan26:00

        Yeah.

    22. CWCharlie Walker26:00

        ... we met said they, you know, they, they do see them. I think they've been hunted quite a lot over the years. Uh, and although these are on the, the Congo, so this is a tributary of the Congo River, um, they're, they're Nile crocodiles, that's the species.

    23. JRJoe Rogan26:11

        Yeah.

    24. CWCharlie Walker26:11

        And they, they grow up to, I mean, they get really big.

    25. JRJoe Rogan26:13

        They're 20 feet long.

    26. CWCharlie Walker26:14

        Uh, yeah, yeah. I think that's about the max.

    27. JRJoe Rogan26:16

        Yeah, they're huge.

    28. CWCharlie Walker26:17

        Um, but we-

    29. JRJoe Rogan26:18

        That's a, that's a dangerous animal.

    30. CWCharlie Walker26:19

        Yeah. Well, I mean, it was, it was a, we were in a really remote area. There are no roads, there were just footpaths connecting villages, and no one else was stupid enough to travel up and down the river. You know, people had canoes, pirogues, uh, but they would just use them for fishing, so they would just sit on the water, you know, place some nets, come back out. Um, and we (laughs) , we, one afternoon paddling along, and there was this group of maybe 50 men on the riverbank, all just waving and singing and dancing around, sh- with, shaking machetes above their heads. And so we didn't pull over, you know, we thought, "We'll, we'll pass by." But, uh, a few hundred yards on, there were just two men by the, by the, on, on the bank. And we pulled up to them and said, "You know, what, what's going on up there?" And they said, "Oh, they just killed a crocodile, a big one." And I said, "How big?" And they said, "Five meters." So that's about 15, 16 feet.
11. 30:14 – 42:34

    Mongolia on foot with a pack horse: vodka rituals, wolves, and theft

    1. JRJoe Rogan30:14

       How much crime did you encounter?

    2. CWCharlie Walker30:16

       Not a huge amount. I mean, I, um, I mean, p- like, my, uh, pocket got picked in, in Malaysia, which is one of the safest (laughs) places in the world. Uh, my horse got stolen in Mongolia. That, that happens. Um-

    3. JRJoe Rogan30:32

       You had a horse?

    4. CWCharlie Walker30:32

       Yeah. They're not, they're not expensive. Uh-

    5. JRJoe Rogan30:34

       How much is a horse?

    6. CWCharlie Walker30:35

       I bought a horse for about 120 pounds, so I guess-

    7. JRJoe Rogan30:37

       Really?

    8. CWCharlie Walker30:38

       ... 150 bucks or so.

    9. JRJoe Rogan30:39

       You could get a-

    10. CWCharlie Walker30:39

        Uh-

    11. JRJoe Rogan30:39

        ... horse for 150 bucks?

    12. CWCharlie Walker30:41

        It, it depends how many... Eh, every few years Mongolia has, um, they, they call it a, uh-... uh, snow or ice event. Uh, so essentially the, the, you know, Mongolia winter is really cold. You know, it gets down to about -40 Fahrenheit or Celsius. Um, and if, uh, if it snows and then thaws and then freezes, you get this crust of ice-

    13. JRJoe Rogan31:03

        Mm-hmm.

    14. CWCharlie Walker31:04

        ... over the ground. The, the horses, which are kind of left to their own devices over winter, they're, they're kind of semi-feral, it's called, you know, they're, they're kind of half wild. Um, they, they, they can't break through that crust of ice as they would with snow, with their hooves to get to the grass. Uh, so come spring, actually last time I was in Mongolia, the, the whole countryside was just littered with corpses of sheep and horses and-

    15. JRJoe Rogan31:23

        Wow.

    16. CWCharlie Walker31:23

        ... and goats. So if they've had a bad winter before, sometimes they lose up to about a third of their kind of national livestock. And horses cost quite a lot, but it wasn't too bad when I was there. Um, the, the horse I would sort of, at night... So I spent about two months hiking across Mongolia with this horse. I tried to ride it, but it was so small, the tiny little pony. I, I'd gone to quite a lot of effort to find a horse that was, you know, up to the challenge. And I went out into this sort of village outside the capital city, asked around and, and y- you can't do anything there without having to drink copious amounts of vodka. So it's a real pain in the ass, to be honest.

    17. JRJoe Rogan31:54

        You have to?

    18. CWCharlie Walker31:55

        Uh, yeah, I mean, that's just the way everything is done. Um, and-

    19. JRJoe Rogan31:58

        How so?

    20. CWCharlie Walker31:59

        "Well, hey, you wanna come and look at a horse? Great. Well, let's first, um, let's first, you know, let's first drink some vodka and, um, we'll pour a little offering to the gods and we'll flick a little bit into the sky as an offering to the sky god. And, you know, it'd be rude to refuse 'cause, you know, it's, it's an offering."

    21. JRJoe Rogan32:11

        Right.

    22. CWCharlie Walker32:12

        And then, I mean, to be fair, I was in my mid-20s, so I was, you know, I was quite happy (laughs) just to drink the stuff. Um, but, uh, you know, this kind of quite unpleasant paint-stripping vodka and just bottles and bottles and bottles. So I spent this long day going from person to person to person out, you know, in the sticks, um, you know, driving across, you know, grasslands, you know, off-road. And finally, we met these people who had a, this guy had a horse to sell and he said, "Yeah, here's the horse. Do you want to check it out?" And I was like, "All right." I didn't, I, I had never ridden a horse before. I didn't know what I was looking for.

    23. JRJoe Rogan32:39

        (laughs)

    24. CWCharlie Walker32:39

        But I thought, "I'll check out the hooves." I was about to try and check the back hooves and they're like, "No, no, no, don't do that. You'll, you'll get your face kicked off."

    25. JRJoe Rogan32:45

        Yeah, Jesus Christ.

    26. CWCharlie Walker32:45

        But I checked the front hooves, I checked his teeth, you know. Um, she, it was a, a, a female horse, didn't look too old. Um, you know, decent, strong, you know, coat was in good condition. I thought, "Yeah, this is fine." And we agreed a price and, um, about two days later I had to go back to the capital to get my stuff, buy a saddle. About two days later I came back, met the guy, and he presented me with this horse and it's like, "Well, that's a different color and it's got testicles." Um, so that's a, that's a different horse altogether, but, you know, there wasn't really much I could do ab- do about it. Um, so this horse didn't really take to being ridden. Um, I don't think... It was too small. I don't think he could really cope with me and my not very heavy bags. Um-

    27. JRJoe Rogan33:20

        So you just used it sort of as a pack horse?

    28. CWCharlie Walker33:22

        Pack horse, yeah.

    29. JRJoe Rogan33:23

        Yeah.

    30. CWCharlie Walker33:23

        Uh, so we, we walked, and at night I would make a fire. You'd hear wolves howling, um, you know, often. I'd make a fire and sort of tether the horse 10 yards away and that's kind of the first line of defense. (laughs)
12. 42:34 – 48:03

    Coming home: surreal reunions, health fallout, and building a travel-writing career

    1. JRJoe Rogan42:34

       Spares. So when you get done with this trip-

    2. CWCharlie Walker42:38

       Mm-hmm.

    3. JRJoe Rogan42:38

       I mean, this is a four-year trip. What do you do? Do you have a home at this point in time, or did you not have an apartment anymore?

    4. CWCharlie Walker42:45

       No, I, I, um, I, I hadn't, I had nowhere to... I mean, I went back to my parents' place for a few weeks, and I had no- I had 30 pounds to my name when I came back, you know.

    5. JRJoe Rogan42:53

       What is the first day back like? Like, when you, when you show up at your parents' house, what is that like?

    6. CWCharlie Walker42:58

       Weird. There was a, um, about two months before I finished, I think I was still somewhere in southern Morocco or Mauritania, my dad said via email, you know, "Let's have a party when you get back. Let's have a sort of a homecoming." And so we arranged, we picked a time and a date and arranged a place in London, um, a street where friends of mine, we could come and gather, and we had a little sort of welcome home party. So I was told, yeah, at se- at the stroke of 7:00 you gotta be here on this street. Um, and I, you know, turned up and there were, you know, I don't know, 120, 150 people, some of whom I hadn't seen for, for years and years and years, and it was totally surreal.

    7. JRJoe Rogan43:34

       Wow.

    8. CWCharlie Walker43:34

       I was still quite... The six months following, um, this was about six months on from when I was ill in Congo, my health hadn't been good throughout that. So I'd been on my ride up through France, for instance, winter was coming and I was getting these incredible, like, stomach cramps every now and then. And I'd have to... I remember one particular day when I basically just kind of veered off the road in a village and fell into someone's woodshed, and then about 10 minutes later I kind of came round and there was just this elderly French couple standing over me not wondering what to do with me. So I, I wasn't particularly well. But I turned up at this, this homecoming party, you know, with a beard down to my tits and, you know, hair down to my shoulders. I looked a right state, to be honest. Um, and it was strange how quickly I felt kind of normal back among people again, initially at least. It was over the coming days that, you know, the kind of the weird, you know, itch of wanting to move came back and...

    9. JRJoe Rogan44:22

       So you got, like, wanderlust almost immediately afterwards?

    10. CWCharlie Walker44:25

        In, yeah, in the- in the- so I guess a couple of weeks on, you know, the novelty...

    11. JRJoe Rogan44:28

        Wow.

    12. CWCharlie Walker44:28

        ... of having a comfy bed each night wore off pretty quick, and I needed to find a job to, you know, to earn some money, so I picked up the first job I could find. Um, and, you know, it was not the sort of job that I think I, you know, I was gonna do long term, but it was, it was just enough to get me back on my feet.

    13. JRJoe Rogan44:44

        What did you do?

    14. CWCharlie Walker44:44

        Uh, I sold luxury tours to China for a travel company.

    15. JRJoe Rogan44:49

        (laughs)

    16. CWCharlie Walker44:50

        And so I talked to clients saying-

    17. JRJoe Rogan44:52

        How ironic.

    18. CWCharlie Walker44:52

        Well, exactly. You know, I talked to clients saying, "Oh, you know, you gotta go to this place. It's great." And they say, "What was your experience like there?" And I say, "Well, the ground is good and firm. You can put a tent wherever you want, but, you know, the, the, the, the height will probably be comfortable. You'll be fine."

    19. JRJoe Rogan45:03

        (laughs)

    20. CWCharlie Walker45:03

        Um, yeah, it was, it was- that was, uh, not necessarily the, the best fit for me as a job. But soon after that, I started planning the next trip and started writing these books and, and sort of since then I've kind of turned that into a career.

    21. JRJoe Rogan45:16

        So, immediately you sort of understood when you returned, like, this is not a one-off, this is something you're just gonna continue to do?

    22. CWCharlie Walker45:23

        Yeah. Yeah. Um, well, people started asking me to give presentations about the trip I'd been on, you know, sort of photo slideshows, I guess, and I started doing more and more of those at, you know, to village halls and clubs and festivals and schools and businesses, and that slowly became, like, about half of my living. And I realized, oh, I could do this for a job, you know. This could be, this could be a living, um, and enable me to carry on, you know, taking on challenges. So since then, there's, you know, there's- there's always something in the pipeline, do some sort of journey, come back, relate the story, write about it, repeat.

    23. JRJoe Rogan45:55

        Now, when you start up again, are you... is there any hesitation about, like, the length of the trip? Like, that four-year thing, even though I'm sure it must have been a fascinating and wonderful experience, there, there had to be a little bit of a hesitation of committing to that much of your life-

    24. CWCharlie Walker46:16

        Mm-hmm.

    25. JRJoe Rogan46:17

        ... again.

    26. CWCharlie Walker46:17

        I, well, I mean, the longest I've done since then is eight months. So-

    27. JRJoe Rogan46:20

        Mm-hmm.

    28. CWCharlie Walker46:20

        ... you know-

    29. JRJoe Rogan46:21

        Yeah.

    30. CWCharlie Walker46:21

        ... it's, it's, it's a lot different, and the last couple have been sort of two or three months. Um-
13. 48:03 – 59:27

    Skepticism, gurus, mediums, and afterlife uncertainty

    1. JRJoe Rogan48:03

       But isn't... aren't those lessons only learned through the experiences? I mean, I would imagine...

    2. CWCharlie Walker48:09

       They're definitely best learned through experiences.

    3. JRJoe Rogan48:11

       Yeah.

    4. CWCharlie Walker48:11

       But I think you can, in the same way that, um... I mean, one of the biggest genres of literature is self-help, right?

    5. JRJoe Rogan48:17

       Mm-hmm.

    6. CWCharlie Walker48:18

       And that's just reading about it. That's-

    7. JRJoe Rogan48:19

       I think most of that is nonsense, though.

    8. CWCharlie Walker48:22

       (laughs)

    9. JRJoe Rogan48:22

       I, I think in, uh, like, literally, when I look at, like, self-help books and self-help people and mentors and stuff, there's a large percentage, more than half, that's nonsense.

    10. CWCharlie Walker48:33

        At the risk of insulting a few people I know, I totally agree with you. (laughs)

    11. JRJoe Rogan48:36

        Yeah.

    12. CWCharlie Walker48:37

        Um, but then again, I haven't read, you know, I haven't read those books, and also I-

    13. JRJoe Rogan48:40

        I haven't read all of them.

    14. CWCharlie Walker48:41

        No. (laughs)

    15. JRJoe Rogan48:42

        Clearly.

    16. CWCharlie Walker48:42

        Just, just a few.

    17. JRJoe Rogan48:42

        But I've read enough bullshit where I'm like, "God."

    18. CWCharlie Walker48:45

        Yeah. Well, there, uh, there's a, there's a huge tendency out there for people to kind of take on the persona of a guru, essentially.

    19. JRJoe Rogan48:52

        Yes.

    20. CWCharlie Walker48:52

        You know, and there's so many charlatans out there. There are so many... You know, it's like with a lot of, um, esoteric pursuits and alternative things.

    21. JRJoe Rogan49:00

        Mm-hmm.

    22. CWCharlie Walker49:00

        You know, there's, there's, there's things that are rooted in, in fact or that are kind of, you know, veering that way, and there are things that are... I mean, like, uh, mediums, for instance.

    23. JRJoe Rogan49:09

        Yes.

    24. CWCharlie Walker49:09

        I mean, I, I've got-... I, I don't mind saying it, I don't care how many people are listening, I've got no time for that because as far as I'm concerned, they're either, I think the two ways they describe it are they're either open eye, which means they know they're conning everyone, or they're shut eye, which means that they, you know, they genuinely believe what they're doing. And, and, you know, that's, that's a different thing. I'm kind of fine with that. It's just I don't think they're right. (laughs)

    25. JRJoe Rogan49:30

        Yeah, I have a friend who went to a medium, and it's kind of a hilarious story 'cause he goes, "They're, he, he knew everything about my grandmother, knew everything about this." I go, "Don't you know everything about your grandmother?"

    26. CWCharlie Walker49:40

        (laughs)

    27. JRJoe Rogan49:40

        What the fuck is the point of someone telling you-

    28. CWCharlie Walker49:42

        Yeah.

    29. JRJoe Rogan49:42

        ... some things you already know?

    30. CWCharlie Walker49:43

        Yeah, that are on our Facebook page.
14. 59:27 – 1:07:57

    Yakutia expedition meets the Ukraine invasion: propaganda, policing, deportation, and prison

    1. JRJoe Rogan59:27

       Well, speaking of horribly wrong, let's talk about your most recent one because, uh, this is what led you here and this is, this is a wild experience that you just returned from and, um, just so- tell people what you've done.

    2. CWCharlie Walker59:42

       Sure. Uh, so I, I've been planning for almost a year to go to a region of Siberia called Yakutia which is, I mean, it's the largest administrative area in the world. Um, so it's one region of Russia. It's almost the same size as India. I think it's about 96% the size of India, uh, but only 1 million people. So it, it's massive and empty and it's far north. Uh, about half of it is north of the Arctic Circle. And there's, there's one large city, but outside that, there are scattered, some remote and very remote communities, um, and they're, for the most part, um, they're, there are plenty of sort of, you know, crumbling, near abandoned industrial towns from the Soviet era as well. But there are, there are lots of scattered small villages of indigenous Siberian peoples, particularly the Sakha who are the, the largest, uh, ethnicity in, in the region. Um, and then there are smaller peoples like the Eveny, the Evenki, who traditionally herded reindeer. There's all sorts of people scattered across this massive area. And I wanted to, to head out there. It's- it's the, it's also the coldest inhabited place on Earth. Um, so, uh, the, the record recorded low, and Jamie might be able to confirm this, but a place called Verkhoyansk. I can't remember the exact temperature, and it's in Celsius only, but about -67.3, something like that.

    3. JRJoe Rogan1:01:00

       Whoa.

    4. CWCharlie Walker1:01:00

       Um, and that's inhabited. People live there. And so every winter it's super cold and people survive in that. And they used to survive, m- many of them, in a sort of nomadic sense, living in, in sort of skin tents. Um, reindeer, you know, hide teepees, essentially. Um, so I wanted to get out there, experience some elements, not in the total depths of winter, but in sort of February, March, April, um, of that extreme cold.

    5. JRJoe Rogan1:01:24

       Is in February the total depths of winter?

    6. CWCharlie Walker1:01:26

       Um, I think January's their coldest time.

    7. JRJoe Rogan1:01:30

       What is February?

    8. CWCharlie Walker1:01:31

       Well, I mean, I was prepared for -50 Celsius, which is sort of minus-... I guess it's about -60 Fahrenheit. They hit the same at -40. - 40, yeah. But because the- Yeah, and then it branches off. ... each degree is different, it gets- Yeah. ... confusing straight away. Um, so I wanted to get out there, experience this cold, and, and just meet some of these people scattered around and just kind of see, you know, see what their lives are like and also see if they're changing with the, you know, if their lives, their sort of traditional ways of life are being threatened by the, the climate changing. You know, in, in, um, summer, last summer, when, you might remember there was, it was, uh, I mean, it was all over the news for a while, perhaps less so in America, 'cause you guys got your own wildfires here, but, um, an island in Greece, Evia, was, was on fire, like the whole island essentially, really bad wildfires. But at the same time, an area the size of Belgium, in Yakutia, was burning. Uh, all co- all collectively, all the different wildfires at the same time. Um, so they, you know, they have crazy bad wildfires out there. Uh, also just close to Verkhoyansk, that town with the record cold, they had a, a record arctic high of, um, 39 point something degrees Celsius. Again, I, that's about 100 and- Yeah, that's hot. That's about the same as it is here today, I think. Yeah. Um, and- All the way up there. Yeah, uh, in the Arctic Circle. Um, so- That's insane. Yeah, I just wanted to go and check it out and see what it was like, so I, you know, planned to hike, um, a few hundred miles along frozen rivers, which in winter, for about three months, get sort of plowed and turned into ice roads. Um, zimnik, or zimniki, as they call them there. A bit like your sort of ice road truckers, I guess- Yeah. ... I don't know. But it's on the river. The river's frozen perhaps two meters thick, uh, and towards the top on the frozen sea ice. Uh, and to hike up to this town called Tiksi up on the north coast, um, it's a port town. Um, but I arrived, I flew in on the 21st of February and the world changed a lot in the, in the sort of three or four days after that. Um, day after I arrived, uh, Russian forces marched across the border where they'd been massing, you know, up to, I think, about 140,000 troops by the time I flew out. And when I flew out, you know, with hindsight, it all seems kinda stupid to have gone, maybe foolhardy. But at the time, basically the entire world, except for presumably Putin, the US intelligence, and UK intelligence, which both seemed to think something's gonna happen, but all the world's media, all commentators, all pundits were saying, "No, this is just a bluff. You know, this is just Putin trying to, you know, scare NATO into concessions, you know, to get more promises that NATO won't spread it, you know, that Ukraine won't join NATO," whatever else. Um, but they marched, they marched across the border, um, and two days later, they formally in- formally (laughs) , a formal invasion, they, uh, they, they, you know, launched their full scale nationwide invasion, marched into Kiev, bombed everything. Um, and I was so far away from all this, you know, the, um, Batagay, the small town where I started hiking up in the Arctic, um, that is geographically the same distance from Vancouver as it is from Kiev. You know, so it's just really, really far away. I was closer to the North Pole, I was east of Pyongyang, I was on the same time zone as Central Australia, just really, really far away. And I kind of thought about it and I thought, well, A, I'm here, and it's gonna be interesting, you know, I'm possibly one of, if not the last tourists in Russia, certainly out in the east. Um, and I've got this almost unique but accidental opportunity to see this country and the lives of normal people, ordinary citizens, as what seems to be a horrific, you know, potentially the brink, the precipice of World War III starts to unfold. And so I thought, right, well I'm gonna, I'm gonna carry on with this trek, but I'll just try and keep across, you know, information. Um, uh, but as soon as I got to Batagay, I, it's a short flight from the capital of the region up to Batagay on an old Antonov twin prop sort of Soviet plane. And from there onwards, my, you know, I couldn't get any phone signal, I basically, the only real information I could get was local state media. I passed a village perhaps once a week. Um, and you turn on the, I mean, the most, the most insane thing was turning on the, and y- I mean, you'll be aware of this, I'm sure, but you turn on the local news out there and they're talking about Ukraine on their news segments and every second or third sentence will have the word fascism or Nazism and they were slowly just drip feeding... Well, drip feeding's the wrong word. They were just gushing this false information out into their public space and loads of people believed everything they heard, totally believed everything. You know, the, I remember while I was still in the capital, just the day after I arrived, the, the, you know, the troops had gone into the Donbas, this disputed territory in the east that they're sort of annexing, and that evening, I was in some guy's, uh, sort of cabin just outside town. I, you know, we'd met and went for drinks with some other people and he said, "Hey, let's go back to ours for some drinks." Uh, and this guy, I'll call him Anatol, I don't wanna say his name, but, um, he (laughs) he started dicing up some horse ribs to cook us some, some sort of, you know, peppering them and everything. And he asked me what I thought about Ukraine. This is really early days, um, and I said, "Well, you know, I don't..." I had to be careful with what I was saying, "I don't know that much about it. But it, you know, it seems like this is gonna get really serious." And I'm also aware that when I turn on my phone and look at the news apps, the information I get from the BBC or The Guardian or whatever else is totally different from what I see here. And of course, I knew all this, but I was sort of couching it in terms that gave him the chance to kind of, you know, I was, I wasn't, I didn't want- Right. ... to preach. Yeah. Um, and he said, "Yeah, well, you know, it's great because, um, you know, Vladimir Putin is, is making Russia great again, and this is, this is Russian land and it, it belongs to Russia, and, um, those Ukrainians are all Nazis anyway. Um, and, you know, we're gonna, uh, they're, they're performing genocide on Russian peoples." And the thing I found cr- like, craziest about all this, not just the fact that he was so precisely parroting Putin's propaganda, you know, which I had assumed beforehand people would be taking with a pinch of salt. But the fact that, I mean, this guy was Sakha. He's not a Slav, he's not a White Russian. This guy is from a people who about 400 years ago were-... brutally, aggressively colonized by a sort of militaristic, expansionist, Czarist Russia, who spread into the area and, and, you know, and just took over. And I just thought somehow, with hindsight naively, that these people that were from a, you know, sort of ethnically different background heritage might not be quite so sold on the cause of Russian nationalism, which is essentially what Putin used to sell the invasion in the first place.

Episode duration: 2:56:29