Expedition 1000 Update: Kayaking Journey to Helsinki Done!

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The last time we checked in on British adventurer Dave Cornthwaite, he was just setting off on the latest leg of his Expedition 1000 project. This time out, he was attempting to travel a thousand miles from Oslo, Norway to Helsinki, Finland in a pedal-powered Kayak from Hobie. Yesterday, Dave wrapped up that adventure by arriving at his destination after 48 days out on the water, and covering 1000.5 miles (1610 km).

Dave’s course took him out of Oslo south via the Oslo Fjord and along the Swedish Bohuslan Coastline to Gothenburg. From there he began paddling east, fighting the current of the Gota Alv River for a couple of days, before crossing Vanern, the largest lake in Sweden. Passing through the Gota Canal, he eventually arrived in Stockholm for a brief time, before making an open water crossing to Aland. The final stage of the trip saw our intrepid adventurer island hopping along the Finnish archipelago, before wrapping up his journey yesterday with his arrival in Helsinki.

The tale of the tape on this adventure is an impressive one. Over the course of his travels, Dave crossed through three countries (Norway, Sweden, and Finland). His total time out on the water was 303 hours and 35 minutes, traveling at an average speed of about 3.5 miles per hour. It took him approximately 1,093,900 pushes of the pedal to cover the 1000 mile distance. He also camped on 24 individual islands along the way.

This was the 11th leg of Expedition 1000, in which Dave is attempting to complete 25 individual journeys of 1000 miles or more, without the use of motorized transportation. Previous expeditions have taken him down the Mississippi River on a stand-up paddleboard, through the Atacama Desert on a wind-powered bike, and across Australia on a skateboard. Dave still has 14 more journeys to complete before the project is finished, and as always, it’ll be interesting to see what he comes up with next.

The video below will give you a taste of what this adventure was like for Dave. Throughout the expedition he posted these excellent clips of his travels, and they really do give you a sense of what it was like to make this journey from Oslo to Helsinki.

Congrats to Dave on another leg of Expedition 1000 in the books. Well done my friend.

Kraig Becker