One Step Beyond

In this second half of our interview with Erin Blankenship , a former professional football player in leagues around the world and the co-founder of Equal Playing Field , we talk more about the initiative’s all-female, full-size pitch, full length football match on top of Mount Kilimanjaro (the highest ever played). We then learn about the challenges and triumphs of its second record-breaking game...

Ever considered arranging an official 90-minute football/soccer match, on a full-size pitch, at 18,746ft/5714 meters above sea level, in the oxygen-starved atmosphere on top of Mt Kilimanjaro ? Erin Blankenship did; in 2017, she helped co-ordinate a World Record for the highest altitude match ever played, one in which every participant, from 22 different countries, was female.   Erin was born...

Mike Peters is the rare rock star to have an MBE after his name - awarded not for his musical successes with Welsh rock band The Alarm , considerable though they have been, but for his charity work with the Love Hope Strength foundation. That story starts In 1995 when, on the eve of an American tour, Peters was informed that he had Non Hodgkin's Lymphona , or cancer of the blood cells; deciding to...

For this episode, we revisit India in the form of another short story I wrote about our travels backpacking round the world, with then wife and then 11-year old son, in 2016, for almost the whole year. It’s set in the hills of Karnataka , and it's called You Do Not Need A Guide . This story has been on my mind to read for you for a while now, but I’ve been pushed to move it up the timeline because...

One Step Beyond is one year old, and to celebrate, we revisit some of our best episodes and catch up with the guests, each of whom was invited to answer four questions about how they coped with this past pandemic year and how they are staying optimistic and motivated moving forwards. A dozen of them responded, sending in their recorded replies from five different continents, and over the course of...

Following on from Episode 15.5, and the short story "You Don't Believe In God?" I return to our round the world backpacking trip from 2016 and pick up where that last short story left off... In Morocco, disembarking an all-night bus in Merzouga, on the edge of the Sahara. If you enjoy this story, and especially if you’d care to hear more like it, please do let me know via e-mail at Onestepbeyond@i...

Three years ago, Julie McGuire , a High School English teacher in the South Bronx, came home from work eager to set off on another weekend in the Catskills, only to find her wife waiting to declare the end of their marriage. The sudden announcement threw Julie into a deep depression fueled by days full of self-loathing and nights full of NyQuil; she admits that she lost the will to live. Julie slo...

In 2009, in the first month of his first tour of Afghanistan with the British Army, James Rose had his legs blown off when he stepped on an IED. He barely survived with his life. Yet in 2019, he became the first double, above-the-knee amputee to climb Mount Kilimanjaro unaided. The decade in-between saw James struggle with PTSD, weight gain, alcohol and drug abuse… but also, the unending support o...

I live at the gateway to New York’s Catskill Mountains , which I consider my playground. And I’m not the only one. In what seem to be record numbers right now, people run these mountains, they ski these mountains, they bike some of these mountains, they camp out in these mountains, they forage in these mountains, at times they are allowed to hunt in these mountains, but more than anything, they hi...

Ashley Scott is a teacher in Atlanta, GA, who grew up believing that travel was not for people like himself. In his mid-30s, having still never been outside the USA, he established an educational travel program at his school, and began taking female students of color to countries where they could immerse themselves in local culture while having a safe and non-prejudiced experience. Some 40 countri...

In this second of a two-parter about New Beginnings for the New Year, I talk to David Watts Barton , a writer, traveler, musician, Burner and all-round optimist who upped and left the USA for Berlin in the middle of the 2020 pandemic year. He talks about how and why he made the move, what makes Berlin so special, and about his ongoing writing projects: Music1967.com , and Japan From Anime to Zen....

One Step Beyond launches 2021 with a two parter about two people who refused to let the pandemic of 2020 prevent them making planned life changes. In part 1, Adam Fletcher - yes, he is a relation - talks about his volunteer work with asylum seekers on the Greek island of Samos , and why it has inspired him to hang up his career as a touring musician, including lucrative work in a touring Abba trib...

In May 2016, halfway through my 3-person family's year-long backpacking trip around the world, we met the Norths - Phil, Amanda, Sophie and Nate - in Chiang Mai, Thailand . They had left their former Alaska hometown of Kenai behind for good in the fall of 2013. and would not resettle in the States until 2017. On this episode of One Step Beyond , I catch up with the the Norths - in their new hometo...

Long term international travel has proven nigh impossible in 2020, and will be well into 2021 as well. But what if you live on the road, what if you are already somewhere else on the planet when lockdown happens. Does it all stop? And if it does stop, where do you find yourself and can you survive there? And if it doesn’t stop, what does that mean, and how is it to travel in the age of covid? What...

Regular listeners may know that in what  I sometimes call the ‘default world’ – the one outside this podcast – I am a writer by trade, and my books have included one published memoir with another to come. And those same regular listeners have probably heard me talking, on a few episodes now, about the trip I took in 2016 with my then wife and our younger, then 11-year old son, whereby we went...

On this Episode, I go for a "bush wack'" hike up Rusk Mountain in the Catskills to disengage from the American elections. Guiding me on the climb through the snow is Ken Posner , whose minimalist approach to outdoor activities takes inspiration from the Greek vagabond-philosopher Diogenes . Ken frequently sets off on marathons, hikes, climbs and other adventures without food, water, navigational t...

"If you’re not interested in culture or community, then don’t walk through a country. And if you don’t want to fall in love with humanity, then don’t go to India." (Note: Spotify listeners will notice an out-of-sync narration during parts of this episode. Please listen on another platform if you care and apologies to all listeners for allowing an episode to go out with an editing error!) In 2017,...

Welcome to Episode 13 of One Step Beyond . This time around, we discuss ‘ Still Running: The Art of Meditation in Motion ,’ a new book by Vanessa Zuisei Goddard . I first met Zuisei in 2006, at the Zen Mountain Monastery in Mount Tremper, in the Catskills, where I was taught how to sit zazen - the form of meditation practiced there - by Zuisei herself. But Zuisei is also a runner, and for all that...

Hey you… Welcome to Episode 12 of One Step Beyond, a fortnightly show about positively engaging with the world outside our door, with host Tony Fletcher . In 2016, Jess Gumkowski and her husband BJ – the ‘ YogiTriathletes ’ – sold or gave away almost everything they owned, and packed what was left (primarily their triathlon gear and their dog) into a Honda Fit with no fixed destination. 2016 was a...

Welcome to Episode 11 of One Step Beyond, a show that encourages you to take a step outside your comfort zone and enrich your life. Ten years ago, Bill Hoffman was just another busy, middle aged, married 40-something father carrying an extra 40lbs of weight around his midriff. He hadn’t run since high school, and had barely engaged in any other athletic activity during those 25 years either. Then...

Welcome to Episode 10 of One Step Beyond, a show that encourages you to take a step outside your comfort zone and enrich your life. This episode: IF NOT NOW, WHEN? The title of a Primo Levi novel served as motivation for British sculptor Peter Naylor to attempt the 153-mile, 2-day run taken by Pheidippides from Athens to Sparta in the year 490BC. (Pheidippides was sent by the outnumbered Athenian...

Hey you… Welcome to Episode 9 of One Step Beyond, a fortnightly show about positively engaging with the world outside our door, with host Tony Fletcher . At the age of 4, Manu Shrestha, along with her two siblings, was found abandoned on the streets of Kathmandu, Nepal, a not uncommon occurrence in a country of devastating poverty, where women generally have little by way of education, opportunity...

Hey you… Welcome to Episode 8 of One Step Beyond, a fortnightly show about positively engaging with the world outside our door, with host Tony Fletcher . On this episode, we journey to Kenya, to talk with Nava Osembo, the co-founder and CEo of Enda Sportswear, Africa’s first performance running shoe company and a socially conscious, environmentally friendly, community-based company at that. Then f...

Hey you… Welcome to Episode 7 of One Step Beyond, a fortnightly show about positively engaging with the world outside our door, with host Tony Fletcher . On this episode, we go from the Catskill Mountains to the mountains of Colombia, in South America, with artist Ric Dragon , who gave up a successful business in the USA to pursue a dream of a rebirth abroad, founding an art center outside of Bogo...

Hey you… Welcome to Episode 6 of One Step Beyond, a fortnightly show about positively engaging with the world outside our door, with your host Tony Fletcher. On this episode, you’ll hear my interview with Carla Rhodes, who turned her own life around a few years ago when she quit drinking and picked up a camera, and is now receiving awards left right and center for her wildlife images while also se...