Talkin’ ‘bout the Bear

My readers have heard me brag about my sons’ exploits many times.  I’ve told you how one of them called me from atop a Colorado mountain one week, then from an airplane preparing to parachute out the next week.  I’ve told you how three of them became the first to ever “hike” the trail to Havasu Falls, Arizona and back in one day.  They did that by running roughly a full marathon through the rocky canyon between dawn and dark.  I’ve told you how they formed a team to run the team marathon at the Bass Pro Shops Outdoor Weekend, and won it multiple years.  They currently hold the overall record for all teams, and they did it as a team of five brothers.  Individually or as part of a relay, they still hold every Malden High School track & field record for distances over ½ mile, plus a few more.  Two of them once had a physical fitness test in high school JROTC and got into a contest to see how many sit-ups they could do.  The major made them stop when they were somewhere around 600 each.  He stopped them because HE was tired of counting.

But, compared to Bear Grylls, my boys are just a bunch of couch potatoes.

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You probably know Edward Michael Grylls by the nickname his sister gave him when he was a day old – Bear, and you may know him as the host of “Man vs Wild,” his first series on American television.  In that show, Bear (and a camera crew to record the event) would be dropped off at some remote location, and Bear had to stay alive long enough to “get rescued.”

Now I’m not in any way trying to minimize my sons’ achievements.  I’m quite proud of them.  But let me tell you some of the incredible things Bear Grylls has done.

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While still in high school, Grylls earned a black belt in Shokobon Karate.  He later travelled to Japan to train as a Karate Grand master.

Bear funded trips around Europe and beyond by selling water filters door to door…while still in his teens.

After high school he went to India, where he hung out with members of the Indian Armed Forces, and considered enlisting there. 

According to Bear, “I spent quite some time in India before I joined the army (in the United Kingdom). I went out there (mountain) climbing, and up in West Bengal and all-around Darjeeling.  I love India.  We were in Calcutta for a while and then we were with the Indian Army as well.  It’s a place I really love, and I’m really looking forward to getting back there for a long time.”

He enjoyed the experiences he had with Indian soldiers so much that he joined the British 21 SAS force (Special Air Service – similar to our special forces) when he got back to England.  He stayed in the SAS for three years.  Then, during an SAS skydive In 1996, his parachute tore at 16,000 feet, causing him to descend rapidly (pretty much “fall”) to the earth, crushing three vertebrae, as well as some ribs and other bones.

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Just eighteen months after incurring multiple fractures in that accident, he became the youngest British man, at 23, to reach the summit of Mount Everest.  While preparing himself for his attempt at Everest, he became the youngest Brit to climb another mountain (Ama Dablam) which Sir Edmund Hillary (the first man to summit Mount Everest) had said was unscalable.

Bear must like that mountain because, another time, he took off in a powered paraglider from 4,400 meters (almost three miles) elevation, a few miles south and flew above Everest, eventually reaching 9,000 meters (almost six miles) up.  He broke the old world record by 3,000 meters (almost two miles).  In the process he experienced temperatures around -60 degrees. 

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He joined Lt Cdr Alan Veal RN (Lieutenant Commander, Royal Navy) for dinner…at almost five miles above the earth, at a dinner table with two chairs on a platform dangling from a balloon.  The table was set with a full meal.

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Yes, it was a stunt, but so was the time he, along with double amputee Al Hodgson and Freddy MacDonald, broke the world record for longest (time, not distance) indoor freefall.  The three men accomplished the feat inside a vertical wind tunnel.

Bear started doing charity work even before he achieved fame.  One of the strangest was when he staged a sponsored naked rowing challenge along the Thames in a homemade bathtub.  He did it to raise money for a friend who had lost a leg in a climbing accident.

In the same year he led a circumnavigation of the UK on jet-skis in aid of the RNLI (Royal National Lifeboat Institution).

He got together with a group of friends in 2003, then embarked on an unassisted crossing of the North Atlantic Ocean. Travelling in an eleven-meter open rigid inflatable longboat, the team encountered force-eight gales while negotiating a course through icebergs on their journey from Halifax, Nova Scotia to John O’Groats, Scotland.

Bear, with a team of four, travelled to the south pole in an attempt to climb one of the world’s most remote unconquered peaks.  The trip was organized to raise money for the Global Angels (an organization dedicated to bringing clean water, education, and healthcare to poor communities around the world).  During the journey, the group utilized biofuels in order to raise public awareness of the potential of the alternative fuels.

Unfortunately, Bear didn’t complete the trip because he suffered a broken shoulder while using a jet-ski and had to be evacuated.

With the Global Angels again in mind, in 2010 he led a team of five in an attempt to pilot an ice-breaking rigid inflatable boat through the Northwest Passage.  This perilous waterway is 2,500 miles long and was partially frozen at the time.  Besides the Global Angels, the team wanted to raise public awareness of global warming.

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Bear joined the Cub Scouts at six years of age, and has stayed with them.  In 2009, at age 35, he was appointed Chief Scout by the Scouts Association (like our boy scouts, but covering the United Kingdom and its territories), becoming the youngest man ever to hold that post, a position which he still holds

In association with the Discovery Channel, Grylls created a video game (Man Vs Wild: The Game) for XBOX, PS3, and Wii consoles.

He has written, at last count, 11 books, in a range of genres including biography, self-help, fitness and children’s adventure fiction.

He has starred in, and/or created, multiple TV shows.  Currently, he hosts “Bear Grylls: The Island,” and “Running Wild with Bear Grylls.”

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Warning: If you have a weak stomach, you should skip the next four paragraphs.

He has urinated on his own t-shirt and wrapped it around his head to help him stay cool while surviving in the desert.

Grylls once use a bloated sheep carcass to help him stay afloat.  Another time he gutted a dead camel and climbed inside the body cavity, where he then spent the night.

Bear has eaten some of the most exotic, and some would argue, most disgusting, things while serving in the SAS and while filming his series.  The list includes raw frozen yak eyeballs, raw moose heart, a giant live spider, maggots, raw goat testicles, a live snake, and other bugs, including some whose insides closely resembled pulsating yellow pus.  He drank yak blood; reindeer blood; the liquid out of a camel’s intestine; and liquid squeezed out of fresh elephant poop.  As if you could ever forget, he has also drunk his own urine out of a fresh snake skin.

Yes…his own urine…out of a fresh snake skin.

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After all the adventures he’s had so far, Bear’s medical record reads like a shopping list of pain.  His injuries include crushed shoulders; a sliced finger; a chipped shin bone; a broken elbow; a dislocated hip; smashed knee cartilage; and various bites from snakes, bats, scorpions, and many, many bugs, including over 4,000 mosquito bites.

The payoff has been the good he’s done for others and lots of fun, fame, and fortune.  Maybe the fun wasn’t what many of us would call it, but the fortune is real and universally understood.  When I checked, Bear’s net worth was over $8,000,000.

Yeah.

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Bear’s theory on life is pretty well summed up by something he said in an interview ten years ago.  He opined, “Life is precious and it’s important to live it boldly.  There is no point in being too scared to do what you want.”

In many ways, that’s the same thing my sons and I believe…well, minus most of the gross things Bear has eaten and drunk.  Oh, and we’d like to forgo the peeing on a t-shirt and wrapping it around our heads…and floating on a rotten sheep carcass.  Yeah, we’d like to avoid all that.

If we pass on those things, do we still get the fortune?

I didn’t think so.

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