Bear Grylls: 'Now I'm only 90 per cent reckless'
19.05.12
“I’ve met her and she’s a very vivacious person, and I think it’s truly
inspirational that someone as busy and as high-profile can spare the time to
volunteer,” says Grylls.
In truth, she’s more likely to find herself potholing or sea-kayaking than
mastering double overhand knots, such is the gung-ho ethos of modern
scouting.
And indeed, the ethos of Grylls, our Eton-educated, buccaneering national
hero, who broke his back in a free-fall parachute in Zambia in 1996, yet 18
months later become one of the youngest climbers to conquer Mount Everest,
aged 23, a feat that springboarded him to ever greater feats of derring-do.
I have an immense fondness for Grylls, as I was the first journalist ever to
interview him. It was, I recall, like trying to pin down a boundlessly,
exhaustingly, energetic springer spaniel and I was bowled over (almost
literally) by his irrepressible zeal.
Fifteen years on, and a great many record-breaking expeditions later, he is
now a best-selling author and global television star – an estimated 1.2
billion viewers have tuned in to his show Born Survivor, which is screened
on the Discovery Channel as Man vs Wild – he’s written books and survived
the Foreign Legion and quicksand and rapids, pitted himself against the
North Atlantic Arctic Ocean in an open boat and led an expedition through
the Northwest Passage.
Source: Telegraph.co.uk