Talk by Kate Rawles - Adventure in the Andes: The Life Cycle

Following the spine of the Andes, the longest mountain chain in the world, eco-adventurer and author, Kate Rawles, cycled 8288 miles - the length of South America - on Woody, a self-built bamboo bike. En-route, she explored biodiversity: what it is, what’s happening to it and why losing it is as great a threat as climate change. This powerfully illustrated talk will share tales from Kate’s largely solo journey through an extraordinary range of landscapes, from the Caribbean coastline to the classic high spiky white mountains of the Peruvian Cordillera Blanca; from rain and cloud forests to the Atacama desert and the Bolivian salt flats.

Kate will talk about some of the brilliant and brave environmentalists she met along the way, why biodiversity is vital to all of us – and what we can do. Woody, the bike, will be there!

Kate, who grew up in Scotland, has been resident in Cumbria for over 20 years. She currently lives just outside Kendal in a small eco-community. She is a former lecturer in Outdoor Studies at the University of Cumbria, an eco-ambassador for the Lake District Foundation and a Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society. She will be happy to sign copies of her book, The Life Cycle; 8000 Miles in the Andes by bamboo bike after the event.