Here is the full transcript of Ironwoman Bonnie Hancock’s talk titled “My Epic Journey Becoming The Fastest Person To Paddle Around Australia” at TED 2024 conference.
Listen to the audio version here:
TRANSCRIPT:
Let me take you back to a day in my life, July 2021. I was sitting with my laptop on my lap, slightly sweating, awaiting a call that could change my life. You see, a year ago I read a book about a woman who paddled around Australia, beating the men before her to become the fastest ever to do so. I’m sure most people would read that book and think, “Wow,” and forget about the idea, but I cannot get it out of my mind.
I’m a surf lifesaver and an ex-professional Ironwoman, and I want to beat that record. I want to become the fastest person to paddle around Australia. But to do so, I’ll need to paddle 80 to 100 kilometers a day and cover every meter of coastline in less than ten and a half months. A ski is basically a kayak, but built to withstand wind and swells and everything thrown up by the ocean.
It’s six meters long, just 45 centimeters across at its widest point, and made of carbon fiber, it weighs eight kilograms. Oh, I’ll also need a support catamaran and a jet ski and a skipper and crew crazy enough to come with me for the journey. It’s going to cost a really significant amount of money too. And my husband and I have sold our cars, but our sacrifice is just a drop in the ocean of funds needed.
This call today is my opportunity to land a sponsorship deal which will enable me to start the paddle. And 15 minutes after the start of that call, I received the life-changing “yes” I’ve been seeking.
Which gives me six months to plan the journey. To figure out what direction I’m going to paddle in — clockwise — how to stay safe, and how to film the journey.
The Great Australian Bight
Flash forward, February 2022. I am 500 kilometers out to sea and facing the crossing of the Great Australian Bight, that untamable stretch of water at the bottom of Australia. If successful, I will be the first person to cross directly across the Bight, as opposed to those prior to me who would hug the coastline. But I figure that to break a world record, I need to be prepared to go where no one has before.
I had a little scare earlier today, though. I fell out of my ski and I couldn’t get back in. I was 100 kilometers into paddling. For the fifth time, I tried to haul myself up into my ski. As I did so, I slid into the icy water, the shock of it sending a chill up my spine like I touched an electric fence.
Out here it’s freezing, and hypothermia is a real risk. I’ve lost eight kilograms in the last two weeks from seasickness. My support boat’s having trouble slowing down. They’re sailing away from me in the 25-knot wind gusts.
They’re not turning around. One more time, I try to haul myself up into my ski and fail again, in waters known for killer whales and great white sharks. I start to sink into a sense of self-pity and feel terribly scared. But as I do so, I look up at the night sky, and I feel like a dot in the grand scheme of creation.
I also have a realization. Out here, staying still is the worst thing I can do. If I can’t get into my ski, I need to keep moving forward. I need to swim. So slowly but surely, I move my arms as my legs start to follow, and I inch my way towards the support boat.
They’re finally coming back to me now. I forgot to mention, it’s nighttime. They’re 50 meters away, and I can hear them calling out, seeing if I’m OK. By the time I’m pulled aboard, I’ve been submerged in the Bight for ten minutes.
I’m so cold, I can’t speak. The bulging discs in my back are on fire, and it feels like my back is breaking in two. My lips are cracked and bleeding from dehydration. But the worst thing is, I need to get back in these waters and paddle for 16 hours again tomorrow as I’m just halfway across the Bight.
I made it across the Bight. And on the April 23, 2022, it’s my birthday, I’m 32 years old, and I’m two months ahead of the world record. I saw 25 turtles on my paddle yesterday.
Experiences on the Journey
But such experiences have become the norm. I’ve been surrounded by dolphins in the middle of the ocean, had seals play beside me, seen flying fish scoot 50 meters across the water in front of me. I’ve seen Indigenous carvings over tens of thousands of years old. I’ve also had sharks show a little too much interest in my ski for my liking.
At the moment, I’ve got a fishing boat supporting me, and since the start of the trip I’ve had a mix of fishing boat, catamaran and jet ski. I’ve also got a crew of amazing young men who champion me every day. They’re excellent listeners, they’re feminists, but I’m missing having a female around when I have my period.
I’m not quite ready to trouble the guys about menstrual cramps just yet. I’m also addicted to lolly snakes, which are known as gummy worms in other parts of the world, I found out recently. It’s not my fault I’m addicted to them though. The skipper of my crew, who looks like Crocodile Dundee in his Akubra hat, fed them to me on day one and now I’m obsessed, I’m eating around a packet a day.
I do eat other things though. Cut up wraps, fresh apple, Jatz crackers, they’re among my favorites. As a dietician, which is my day job, I had the perfect plan for nutrition, and that all went out the window on day one when the craving started.
Crocodiles and Sea Snakes
I’m in Broome in Western Australia. This is where they say the crocodiles start and continue right across the top of the country. May 2022. Yesterday, my crew saw a crocodile ten meters from my ski, watching, waiting. They were quick to call me into the boat and pull me aboard.
But this record means I need to paddle every meter of coastline. That means today, I had to get back in the water where they saw that crocodile yesterday. It doesn’t help that the water is brown and the hundreds of logs feel like crocodile heads waiting to pounce. Crocodiles are predators.
They’re patient, they’ll stalk as long as needed. There’s also hundreds of sea snakes out here that nobody told me about. Yellow with black markings. They’re thick as pythons, and they coil up at me as I pass. At night, I try not to hit them with my paddle.
So in waters known for crocodiles and sea snakes, as I climb down into my ski, I tell my crew to talk to me. Childhood stories, jokes, riddles. Just keep talking to distract me from what lies beneath. When I was an Ironwoman, I thought that vulnerability was weakness.
Be stoic, I thought. Game face always at the ready. But out here, in these waters, no game face will help. Telling my crew I’m scared enables me to get through the day, and we talk and joke and laugh our way through the most dangerous waters in the world.
On August 28, 2022, I set foot on the shores of the Gold Coast for the first time in eight months as a world record holder. I paddled around Australia in 254 days, beating the previous record by over two and a half months. But while crossing the tape was very exciting, it wasn’t the most valuable thing I took from this record.
You see, remember that time I told you about in the middle of the Bight when I looked up at the night sky? It was the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen. And in that moment, I had another realization. Instead of feeling scared, I felt lucky. Instead of that sense of self-pity, I felt grateful.
Grateful and lucky to experience a perspective seen by so few humans ever before. And that gratitude carried me 12,700 kilometers around the country. Mother Nature taught me resilience. To keep pushing as a storm is only ever fleeting. She taught me to step back and look around, as beauty can be found in the darkest of places.
And though the sand and salt has been washed from my body and someone someday will break my world record, I know they will, the memories I have from this paddle will stay with me forever. And I know that all I ever need to do is take a step back and look around and remember, how lucky am I? How lucky are we to be part of this amazing, crazy, unpredictable journey of life? Even if we are just a drop in the ocean. Thank you.