Shownotes
What's on your bucket list? What adventures do you want to experience?
And are all your adventures big epic tasks like Harriet's 900 journey from Land's End to John O'Groats.
Well the good news is adventures don't have to be mega to have huge benefits for you.
In this week's episode Harriet takes a detour from her D Tour to enjoy some well earned R&R, before heading off to experience a day with a Dementia Adventure supported holiday.
If you like what we are doing and want to support the Dementia Adventure Support Fund please donate
Dementia Adventure has been at the forefront of providing fully supported, small group short breaks for people living with dementia and their carers for 15 years. Our supported breaks offer more than just respite; they provide meaningful, purpose-driven experiences that significantly enhance the quality of life for both people living with dementia and their caregivers.
The D Tour podcast is proudly sponsored by Macs Adventure
Macs Adventure specialise in self guided walking and cycling holidays for independent, active people who don't want to be part of the crowd or restricted by set dates and schedules.
You can listen to Harriet's playlist on Spotify. Each week she's adding songs to match her mood on her epic walk!
Transcripts
That was a robin. That was, he was sitting right or she was sitting right on top of the Hawthorn tree. It sounds like they're having a conversation. And high, high above, I've just looked up, the sky is white and right up there, there's a buzzard. And the buzzard's just circling around in these lazy, slow circles. Wonder what he's waiting for.
to:They encourage you to go at your own pace whilst they support you with all of the routes and logistics for a worry free adventure.
This week I'm exploring something close to my heart: the power of adventure and nature in shaping our most cherished memories and, crucially, in supporting our well being as we age. Think about your favourite moments in nature. You've certainly heard a lot of mine. Perhaps it's swimming in the sea, walking through the countryside, or simply sharing a peaceful afternoon outdoors in your garden with a friend. Now imagine a world where those experiences are no longer accessible to you. For many people living with dementia, this is a harsh reality, as a diagnosis often leads to a loss of connection with the outdoors. The relationship between adventure, whether big or small, and dementia is profound. Studies show that spending time outside not only lifts spirits, but can also help preserve cognitive health.
s motivational TEDx talk from:I can't play the whole thing due to rights reasons, but if you're interested, just search for "Thinking differently about dementia" by Neil Mapes on YouTube and it will come up.
Neil Mapes:The opportunities to live better with dementia through interaction with the outdoor environment is only limited by our imagination. It could be small things and local activities, or it could be more ambitious things. So here we see Agnes in the middle of a whitewater rafting trip on a grade four river in northern Scotland. So she's in the raft in the middle here with her good friend Nancy. Nancy and Agnes love mojitos, by the way, and I've had a mojito or two with them, I'm pleased to say. But Nancy wanted to do a bucket list adventure. So before she kicks the bucket, she's got a list. And one of them was whitewater rafting.
And so she phoned Agnes up and said, Agnes, you'll never believe it, but we're going on a dementia adventure rafting in Scotland, and so will you come? And she said, yes, of course. And so we organised this experience here, which was fabulous and it went well.
Harriet Thomas:Who wouldn't want to be a little more like Nancy and Agnes? Though maybe I should include a disclaimer here. I'm not exactly endorsing mojitos and whitewater rafting at the same time. I love the idea of a before I kick the bucket list. It really captures the essence of the D Tour for me. You're never too old for an adventure, no matter what your circumstances. My mum Susan led an extraordinary life. She was a Liberal Democrat politician, Baroness Thomas of Walliswood, OBE, with a double first from Oxford and Cambridge, and she even served as deputy speaker of the House of Lords. Diagnosed with dementia at 77, she lived with the condition for nine years.
While dementia brought its challenges, memory loss, emotional shifts and confusion, she remained who she truly was. Loving, intelligent, kind and generous. I'm walking for her to challenge how we perceive dementia and to show the incredible benefits that nature can offer to people living with a condition. Adventure doesn't have to mean daring feats. It's all about perspective, seeing the magic in everyday life, my mum taught me that. You don't need to be a daredevil or ultra fit but it does help to push your boundaries and it boosts your confidence when you achieve something you once thought impossible. Like mum,
I love being outdoors. Even in her final years, we shared precious moments in the garden, surrounded by nature. Inspired by those experiences, I want to help other families find peace and joy in nature through both small and grand adventures, regardless of their situation. And on this part of the journey, I get to share those moments with one of my daughters, adding another layer of connection to this adventure.
Harriet Thomas:It's day 37, day 37 of the 900 miles D Tour, and I'm with my daughter, Lily. She's walking the Pennine Way with me for a few days, which is fantastic. And we're in this lovely village, well, town, not village, town of Marsden, which is kind of in between Huddersfield and Manchester. And so was, you know, at the heart of the textile industry in the 19th century. And there's so many clues to that that we've been seeing on the way, especially all the reservoirs that were originally designed and created back in the 19th century to provide power for the water mills. And this town is all made of this lovely sandy, grey coloured stone. And it's got a beautiful high street with loads of independent shops. It's just really, really nice.
Harriet Thomas:And it's got this lovely river. You might be able to hear that. That's the Colne River. C o l n e. Colne river. And it's a about. It's 830. And so we're coinciding with all the kids going to school, which is cute.
Harriet Thomas:Yeah. So today, the heavy low clouds of yesterday have lifted. Yesterday, we walked in the clouds all day, but it was fine. It was an easy path to follow and we had a nice time. The woods were beautiful. Today it says it's going be 23 degrees, so at the moment it's overcast, but it's not cold. Nice walking weather, actually. So we're going to Hebden Bridge today.
Harriet Thomas:So, um, how are we feeling? Lil?
Lily:A little bit achy, but excited for the day ahead.
Harriet Thomas:Yeah, actually, Lil did really well yesterday because we ended up walking a little bit over 20 miles, didn't we?
Lily:Yeah.
Harriet Thomas:And so that's a bit of a harsh introduction to the walk, to do 20 miles on your first day. But, but we did it fine, actually. And, yeah, so let's see if we actually get some views today, because yesterday we just got the view of whiteness because we were in the cloud. Walking through Marsden, I'm imagining what it must have been like back in the 19th century, when the textile mills were operating this. There's two huge. They must have been warehouse buildings or mill buildings that we've seen that are derelict now, but they're right in the centre of the town. Massive, massive buildings.
I'm sort of imagining them full of those very, very loud looms where the women will be working. You know, I guess this time of day, everyone will be rushing to work, probably much earlier, really. And it must have been a very noisy place, but it really. You can really feel the ghosts here of that time. It's a really interesting place.
So here's the thing about this adventure I'm on. Walking from Land's end to John O groats in 90 days. I love the pace. It lets me hear the birds daydream about life in the 19th century and stop for chats along the way. But still, I'm covering about three marathons a week over these three months. Maybe a little bit more. It feels like an achievement until you meet someone like record breaking long distance runner Sharon Gayter, who, despite her incredible feats, still finds time to chat and marvel at the mushrooms along the way.
Sharon Gayter:Yeah, I've bumped into you today and you're walking from Lands End to John O'Groats. And I was just telling you that I've done Land's End to John O'Groats and John O' Groats to Land's End. I broke the world record in both directions.
Harriet Thomas:And you weren't walking, you weren't cycling. How were you, what's the word? Moving from Land's End to John O groats?
Sharon Gayter:I was running. I was running.
Harriet Thomas:She was running. And she's running right now, by the way. We've interrupted Sharon's run
Sharon Gayter:While they're looking at these very colourful mushrooms.
Harriet Thomas:Yeah, we looked at the kind of toadstools that are in a fairy tale. They're red with kind of white dots on them.
Sharon Gayter:Yeah.
Harriet Thomas:So we've all stopped to look at them.
Sharon Gayter:Compared to your times. I did it in the first time. I did it, was 12 days, 16 hours and 22 minutes. The second time, I wanted to break 12 days again, but I still didn't. I went to 12 days, 11 hours, six minutes and 7 seconds. And that was at the age of 55. So there you go.
Harriet Thomas:And are you still the record holder?
Sharon Gayter:No, unfortunately, the year after I did it during lockdown, somebody broke it during lockdown.
Harriet Thomas:A man or a woman?
Sharon Gayter:A woman. And she still didn't break the 12 days. So that was what I was only chuffed about.
Harriet Thomas:That's interesting. Do you think women are better at long distance events?
I've been an ultra distance runner for many, many years. I represented Great Britain at ultra distance.
I did notice that you've got my.
Sharon Gayter:Old pair of that don't. I don't have to wear these for Great Britain anymore. So they're like old ones that I wear for running with and very few people notice them. And you're the second person...
Harriet Thomas:I noticed, I thought, I don't think you can get. It's like a Union Jack, which is Great Britain, and the athletics team. And I thought, no, you can't just buy that in the shop. You have to earn that.
Sharon Gayter:You can't buy this kit. You do have to earn it. So you're 100% correct on that. So, yes, not many people know that. So well done.
Harriet Thomas:That is very, very cool. I wanted to ask you, when you were doing your Land's End to John O'Groats, how and when did you rest?
Sharon Gayter:Well, I changed my strategy between the first one and the second one. The first one, I slept for 4 hours every night, but I used to run in four hour blocks because I'm not very good at eating and running. So I used to run for 4 hours, have a break to eat food, and then run again. So I'd done four blocks of 4 hours of running and then it worked out to 4 hours sleep a night.
Harriet Thomas:But you were running in the dark.
Sharon Gayter:I was running in the dark, yeah, I had a head torch and I run in the dark. And the second time I did it in three hour blocks, but I shortened the breaks to 20 to 30 minutes to try and get the food in quicker and then do shorter blocks but eat more because I lost so much weight on the first one. So if I did 3 hours running and then ate, I got more energy, more calories per. I still lost, but I cut my sleep down to about 3 hours a night, which was the mistake, because I think on the 10th day, I literally fell asleep on the grass verge and there was no budging me.
Harriet Thomas:Do you have another challenge coming up?
Sharon Gayter:Oh, I always have challenges. So, yeah, there's always challenges. So this year has been like the Race Across Scotland, which was only about a month ago. So I've done this because I've run the length of Great Britain twice. I've run the length of Ireland, broke the world record there. I did coast to coast in England. Got the record for that.
Harriet Thomas:Wow.
Sharon Gayter:So then we are speaking to a celebrity. I had to do the coast to coast in Scotland, and then I've got to do the coast to coast in Wales.
Harriet Thomas:Oh, I see.
Sharon Gayter:That's why you was asking what I was doing.
Harriet Thomas:Yeah.
Sharon Gayter:So, yeah, so that's what I've done. The coast to coast in Scotland, which is the southern upland way, if you're walkers.
Harriet Thomas:The southern upland were nice. Yeah.
Sharon Gayter:So 215 miles, that one. So, yeah. Hold a few world records other than that. But the way I kind of learned about, like, I ran on the treadmill for seven days and broke the men's world record doing that. So again, by doing that, we were, I'm a sports scientist, and so, like, we were measuring various things every 3 hours. We were taking blood samples. She was weighing me. Everything that I ate was measured.
So, you know, I think the headline for the research paper was "runner breaks world record despite a 27,000 calorie deficit". So it shows you can run, lose weight and not eat enough, but still break world records.
Harriet Thomas:It's really interesting. And when, when you were doing some Lands End to John O'Groats, then was all your food intake kind of very scientifically? No? I love it! Give me a pasty!
Sharon Gayter:Living in a campervan, I managed to get one shower in twelve days.
Harriet Thomas:Nice.
Sharon Gayter:So, yeah, you wouldn't want to be anywhere near the campervan. And whatever, whatever food was. I did have a sort of lots of pasta, rice stuff, carbohydrate based stuff at the top, a few protein things. But it was case of what you could get on the route and it was case of what they could cook in the campervan.
Harriet Thomas:Right.
Sharon Gayter:And we only had a very small campervan. It wasn't a big. I didn't have a lot of money to spend on big campervans and crews and everything else. So it's what we could afford with what we've got and friends campervans.
Harriet Thomas:I think we're privilege to speak to you. It's so cool. I can't believe we've met a multi record breaking runner. I mean, it's just like, phenomenal just running up this little track.
Sharon Gayter:I'm beyond the age where I could probably break records now, but I still like running. And so, you know, I think age is catching up. And I'm a much slower runner than I used to be, but I can still do long running.
Harriet Thomas:You can still run. Exactly. Yeah..
I'm nearly halfway through my 90 day adventure, rather than a twelve day mega challenge. And I'm heading off to the Lake District for a few days of rest, relaxation, and of course, a little bit of fun thrown in. I actually have some paddle boarding on the lake planned, the wonderful team at Another Place - The Lake in Ullswater will be collecting me from Penrith Station and taking me to their hotel, where they're generously putting me up for the first night at the Brackenrigg Inn. I'm very curious to see if it's too early in the year for them to get the fire going. It's the same team at another place that runs the beautiful Watergate Bay Hotel in Newquay, where I stayed right at the beginning of my journey. Listen back to episode two to hear about that. That feels like ages ago when I indulged in all those fabulous bath and body products from land and water. If you haven't discovered land and water yet, I urge you to immerse yourself in some of their invigorating recipes, perfect for mind, body and soul.
You can check them out at www dot land dash and dash water dot UK. Oh, and I'm really looking forward to this - getting into clean, crisp bed covers after taking off my boots, of course, and having a shower with some beautiful products.
So it's day 45 of the 900 miles D Tour and I'm back on the Pennine way after having three whole days of a detour from my D Tour, going to the Lake District, where I had a day off and then spent a couple of days with Dementia Adventure volunteers and Dementia Adventure holidaymakers and finding out a little bit more about Dementia Adventures work. And it was really fantastic to meet some of the volunteers and to meet some of the families with dementia who were coming on the holidays and to take part in one of the activities and have a little walk. So that's been really good and a great inspiration for my walk. I'm here at Bassenthwaite Lakes and I've joined this lovely holiday and we're having breakfast on a beautiful old steam train...
Debbie Ireland:It was in fact made as the set of the Kenneth Branagh version of "Murder on the Orient Express". So, in fact, although it looks old and what have you.It is. It isn't.
Debbie Ireland:It is a film set.
Harriet Thomas:So we're not actually going to chug off anywhere, we're just. We're just going to sit here, which is. But it's beautiful, isn't it?
Debbie Ireland:It is beautiful. It's a beautiful setting and really, we've had a lovely week.
Debbie Ireland:My name is Debbie Ireland and I come all the way from Woodbridge in Suffolk and I'm a volunteer for Dementia Adventure. Not very long, I have to say, in terms of time, but I have been on a number of holidays and really value the experience, the chance to go away with people who maybe wouldn't be able to manage well in the sort of holidays that they come on here. But it's made possible for them by the fact that there's an adventure leader who knows all the locations, all the practical aspects of the holiday, and the volunteers who help.
Harriet Thomas:And so when, when you're volunteering on holidays, do you, are you always coming up to the Lakes or do you do different locations?
Debbie Ireland:Not at all. When I first started and I didn't know much about it, I said, oh, well, because I'm retired and I've got time to do this, I just said, well, you know, somebody lets you down at the last moment or you haven't got something, just. Just tell me. So I've been up to Scotland, down to Devon, and their holidays all over the country.
Harriet Thomas:And what sort of activities have you been doing this week in the Lakes?
Debbie Ireland:We've done a reasonable amount of walking, looking, obviously looking at the countryside. We've been to some nature parks to see animals. We've seen a really amusing demonstration of flying birds of prey. But we've also done some more active things, like sailing and canoeing, made possible by adapted equipment. And also cycling, again, made possible by adapted bicycles that had a nice route around an old airfield where you could manage really easily on paved tracks around it.
Harriet Thomas:And what do you think the couples who come here, what do you think they gain from it? What have you seen?
Debbie Ireland:I've seen people come out of themselves, be able to express themselves better by the end of the week and enjoy it. But I wouldn't presume to voice other people's experience. I think what we have to do is make it possible for people to do things, and then it's their experience, not mine.
Harriet Thomas:So I'm talking to another volunteer on this Dementia Adventure holiday, and her name is Elona Laurie. And it's exciting because we're about to sing a song together because Elona plays the violin, and so we're going to put this song. But before I, before we do that, I just wanted to ask Ilona how she came across Dementia Adventure and just how the whole experience is for a volunteer.
Elona Laurie:So I first heard of Dementia Adventure through an OT while I was doing my training. And as soon as I looked more into it, I thought it was the most incredible organisation and it just was something I had to be a part of. So I've done one before, and I have to say it was just the most fulfilling thing that I've been involved in. Yes. I'm so happy to be back again, and I hope to do more again in the future because I think it's really, really wonderful.
Harriet Thomas:That's so lovely. And I think it echoes what whenever I've been speaking to people along my journey who are volunteering, that's all I get from them is how happy they are. You know, this happiness and joy that they get from, from volunteering is so incredible. I kind of want to, like, spread that message a little bit. You know, if anyone's thinking of maybe I should volunteer, you may get more out of it than the organisation or people you're volunteering for. What was your favourite activity that you've done? If you have a favourite, this holiday?
Elona Laurie:Ohh actually, for both the holidays that I've done, being out on the water on each of them has been just fantastic. And everybody lights up, everybody eats really well afterwards and sleeps really well afterwards just for the fresh air.
Harriet Thomas:And while we're enjoying music, I'd like to share the songs that will be going onto my playlist with you this week. I'm adding the song you've got a friend in me by Randy Newman. You probably know it from Toy Story. I've chosen this song in honour of my new friend, Fons. Fons is a great guy. He comes from the Netherlands and he's also walking from Land's End to John O Groats. We met at a campsite where we were both staying and we've had a great time walking together since then.
And it's really, really nice to share the journey with somebody who has come all the way from Cornwall like I have, and who is going all the way to John O' Groats. So this song is for Fons. The second song I'm choosing is Bye bye Baby by the Bay City Rollers. And that is because I am 40 miles away from Edinburgh, which is where the Bay City Rollers came from. And they were a big hit when I was at secondary school and everyone used to have tartan at the bottom of their jeans. So this is to honour Edinburgh and one of its greatest exports, the Bay City Rollers. You can find my playlist on the d tour website, dtour.UK. That's D T O U R dot UK. You can also find the playlist on Music For Dementia radio at www.m4dradio.com. After we left breakfast and the glorious singing and violin playing, I channelled my inner Agnes and Nancy for a bit of wild fun on a trishaw ride with Fraser Dooley from Amy's care. These fabulous bikes are designed to be accessible for everyone, including wheelchair users. And the volunteers gently sweep you around, letting you feel the wind in your hair.
It was such a joyful experience. And the best part is they're so family friendly, too. Everyone can join in and go for a ride together. If you're looking for a bit of adventure, I highly recommend getting in touch and hopping on for a spin if you're in the area.
Fraser Dooley:We have two of these trishaw bikes and a minibus and some mobility scooters. And we just aim to get people out and about who need a little help to do it.
Harriet Thomas:And it's, it's really great because I know I'm pedalling now, but I had a little go in the front and you just feel like, well, you are out, you're outside, you've got the wind in your hair. You're seeing quite a good bit of nature around you.
Fraser Dooley:Yeah, it's free.
Harriet Thomas:Yeah.
Fraser Dooley:We just rely on donations to keep us going and a little bit of fundraising. Yeah.
Harriet Thomas:And what's really nice as well is that because this is such an unusual kind of bike, people say hello. Like, as you go past people, everyone said hello. So there's a bit of social interaction as well. And, like, now. Hello.
Fraser Dooley:Hi.
Harriet Thomas:Obviously, I'm doing all the work right now. I'm just trying not to go too fast because we're going downhill. Sorry. Put the brakes on.
Fraser Dooley:It's a little bit scary on the front here. We don't normally go this fast, but that's fine. I'm quite enjoying it. I don't get to ride in them very often, so actually, it's a good, a good experience being on the front end for once and feeling what that's like. I mean, you need to come to Keswick, really, but we can do rides for anybody and everybody, for families, for people that need a little help to get out there and it's all free. And if you want to support us with a donation, then that's brilliant, too.
But there's no obligation to do that. We want you to come and enjoy it and have a ride out and experience this.
Harriet Thomas:And do you also need volunteers as well?
Fraser Dooley:We always need volunteers. Yeah, great question. So, yeah, we always need volunteers. We never have quite enough volunteers to do all the rides that we want to. We could be out, you know, 24-7, and we probably do two to three days a week at the most. And it would be great to see them used more. So they can get in touch with us through the Amy's care website. If you Google Amy's, A M Y S hyphen care C A R E dot co dot uk, you'll find our simple web page on it. Thanks, guys.
And you can get in touch with us. If you're coming on holiday here, you can arrange some rides. If you know somebody that's coming on holiday, you can arrange some rides. Or if somebody needs to borrow a mobility scooter to get themselves around for the week or the time that are here, then that's great. And we have a fully accessible, wheelchair accessible minibus that Dementia Adventure has used on their holiday here this week. And we encourage people to come and use it. And if you need a lift when you're in the area, then that's what it's there for.
Harriet Thomas:Now that I've actually seen in person an experience, the joy that the dementia adventure holidays can bring, not only for the couples who are living with dementia, but also to the volunteers. I saw a huge amount of joy and love in the work that they were doing, but now I've also experienced a huge amount of generosity and care myself from Dementia Adventure staff and volunteers. Because I stayed one night at someone who used to work for Dementia Adventure. We had a beautiful night in her house in the Lake District and I was looked after and fed and it's really beautiful. Experienced her lovely house right on the lakeside. And then on the Friday, I was looked after by another Dementia Adventure member of staff, again taken to her home with her husband, who's also a dementia adventure volunteer, and again looked after, fed, you know, glass of wine, clothes washed, given a bed, you know, so I've really been at the receiving end of so much generosity in the last couple of days. I'm actually just trying to. I'm trying to squeeze through a stile.
Anyone who's tried to squeeze through a stile with a backpack knows that sometimes they just do not fit. And I'm just gonna try, no, I can't do it. So I'm gonna. I'm gonna pause this for a minute, take my backpack off, go through the kissing gate and then resume. Okay, that was a slightly longer stop than I expected because I suddenly realised I'm actually walking up a hill, the top of which is totally in cloud, so I suspect and very shortly going to be in the rain. So I've just taken that opportunity to put on my rain trousers, put on my raincoat and undo my sticks because my sticks were still packed up for travel and I am now ready to roll up the hill. And I just passed a man walking his dog and he asked me where I was going and I said, walking from Hawes to Keld, and he said, are you really? It's all uphill and it's gonna rain. So I was like, thanks.I still gotta walk it.
Well, I made it up the hill in the rain to keld, one step at a time. That's a bit of a metaphor, I think, for all of this journey. Getting to the top of that hill was enough for me today. It was a real challenge. But it's funny how the toughest moments often become the clearest in our memories. Memory isn't just about recalling facts or events, it's multifaceted. We remember how we feel, the sensory experiences around us, the rain on my face, the sound of my boots on the wet path, the relief of reaching the summit.
years. After he died in: Beth Britton:It's about the moments, small moments, live in the moment and be able to sit outside with a dappled shade, with a cup of tea, with my dad having a little snooze, lie down in the most beautiful way. So it can be many, many things to many people. But I would never ignore those small, small details and moments that can come along. And as it progresses, they become so important because the big is just simply too big to even kind of facilitate, really, for many people. So my dad was a real outdoors man. He was very proud of the fact he'd never left the UK, so he'd never had a passport and he never travelled. The reason primarily for that is he'd worked in farming all of his life. So in my childhood, we had a herd of shorthorn cattle.
My dad was out all hours of the day and night looking after the cattle, and then his main hobby was gardening, so he was outside. He had, I think, two or possibly three. We had a little bit of someone else's allotment and he used to grow all our fruit and veg. We had a huge garden. So he was basically just constantly outside. And it was actually when dad retired, we sold the herd of cattle, and things really started to change with him. He became. It wasn't so much memory problems, actually.He became a lot more withdrawn. He gave up his gardening so he didn't need to. That was his hobby. But he stopped doing it. And then he stopped looking after himself and doing all the normal day to day things that we would do. Then he started, he would get muddled up with where to put things. So you'd find towels wrapped up in the bed, you'd find honey in the fridge and cheese in the cupboard, and lots of things like that.
And he would sometimes get lost going out and about. But I wouldn't say that memory problems was his major issue. If I had to sum him up, I would say he was very kind, very gentle, very loving, and he loved the outdoors. That was my dad. He was. He was an outdoors person. In the last few years of my dad's life, he had a swallowing problem, and he needed support to eat all of his meals. There was one particular day, I remember, where he took the spoon from me, and he fed himself two or three spoonfuls of food.
And that was a massive thing for him. Now you would think it's the tiniest thing in the world, and it makes no difference at all. And you'd be like, Raymond, why are you taking the spoon? Come on, dad, give it back to me. I'll do it for you. But it was wonderful to watch him. It was a real expression of, I want to keep going. I want to have some semblance of independence. And I often use that example because it is the small that we often miss.
We think about the big, but actually it can be the smallest things. And for my dad, it was about being able to see the outside if he couldn't be outside, or being able to be outside, and we would wheel him around the garden. I eventually redid the garden and had some raised beds, so it enabled a little bit of gardening when he wanted to do that. It was so sad. In my dad's care home, I remember there were other residents who would have loved to go outside, and it never happened. And the really big wins for care providers are fresh air is really good for us. It's really great to have that fresh air. You have those wellbeing benefits and those mental health benefits of being outside.
Extensive research has been done on how nature and outside experiences help with mental health. It's a completely unchallenging environment. Plants and birds and animals don't make judgments about us. So it's a wonderful, supportive place for a person to be. I think that's really, really important. And then I think for family members it would be to just maximise those moments, create those bucket lists and do those things that you want to do, don't put off doing them. And as things progress, because we know with dementia it will, and it does still seize those small moments. They are so precious. Memories I have of my dad,obviously he died quite a few years ago now, but the memories are still very vivid and I draw a lot of comfort from those wonderful moments. And I tend to think about those more than dwelling on the many problems we had. So just find those moments, maximise them and enjoy them. And I think, for me, life slowed down when we were outside with my dad, and that experience with nature was so precious. So that would be my message. Go, go, enjoy the little stuff. It doesn't have to cost a lot.
Harriet Thomas:Beth's reflection on those small but meaningful moments with her father reminds me just how powerful even the simplest adventures can be, especially when facing the challenges of dementia. Adventure doesn't always have to be grand or extreme. Sometimes it's about finding joy and discovery in the everyday. And that's why I'm especially excited to introduce Doctor Helena Popovic. Helena is a medical doctor from Queensland, Australia, who specialises in brain health and teaches people how to boost their brain at any stage of life by embracing adventure, both big and small. She cared for her own father for over ten years as he navigated Alzheimer's and vascular dementia. And through her journey, she's discovered how staying active and engaged with the world around us can be one of the best ways to protect our minds.
Helena Popovic:Nature nurtures us. We now have, you know, an informal disease called nature deficit disorder. People who don't spend any time in nature have a high risk of depression, anxiety, stress related disorders, an increased risk of pretty much all illnesses. Because nature nurtures us. There is something known as the aerobiome. You've heard of the microbiome, the bacteria and viruses that live inside our gut. There is a whole zoo, if you like, that lives in nature. That comes from the soil and the flowers and the bushes and the trees and those chemicals and those bacteria help to lower our blood pressure, improve our mood, reduce our levels of cortisol, which is the stress hormone and all those things improve our health.
We found that the higher your education, the more different things you've learned, the more different ways you use your brain, the bigger and more complex it can become. So an example, if you look around the world, the younger the age of retirement, the younger the average age of a diagnosis of dementia, because our brain, use it or lose it, our brain needs mental stimulation. Engage in lifelong, active learning. It doesn't matter what that learning is, as long as you enjoy it and it stimulates you. People will say, look, my mother did crosswords and Sudoku all her life, and she was really good at them, and she still got dementia. That's the problem. Sudoku and crosswords are only good for you if you're not good at them. You see, it's the struggle, it's the effort. It's the actual learning process that stimulates the growth of new brain cells and new connections between brain cells. So it doesn't matter if you're not good at something. People go, oh, I can't be bothered with a foreign language because I'm no good at it. It doesn't matter. It's the effort of learning. So continue to stimulate your brain in whatever way you enjoy. Don't make it a chore, make it an adventure. Unfortunately, we live in a world in which most health professionals, doctors, neurologists, geriatricians, still believe that there's nothing can be done to slow progression of dementia.
And, um, so many patients are just told, get your affairs in order, because things will only get worse. This is completely out of date and out of touch with the science. Just because something doesn't come in a pill doesn't mean it isn't powerful. But the medical profession is trained to only see drugs, radiation, and surgery. And as medicine, we have to recognize, this is my work. This is why I wrote my book, "Can adventure prevent dementia? A guide to outwitting Alzheimer's", to show people that sleep, stress management, food, exercise, music, meditation, art, nature, and a whole long list of other factors, all detailed in my book, are more powerful than medication. Just as an example, you've heard of the new drugs Lecanemab, Donanemab. They have been shown, at best, to slow decline in a subset of people by 28, maybe 30% slow decline.
In contrast, physical exercise, a half hour brisk walk, moderate to vigorous intensity walk, half an hour a day, not only slows decline, it actually improves cognition. It increases the size of a region of the brain called the hippocampus, which is our learning and memory warehouse. Exercise is medicine. Similarly, strength training, lifting some weights, doing squats and push ups to whatever degree you can. The stronger your muscles, the stronger your mind. We've actually just found people who squeeze one of those stress balls or just improve their hand grip strength, improve their memory and their thinking skills. And that's because you've probably heard of the communication between the gut and the brain. There is just as important communication between our muscles and our brain.
Whenever we move our muscles, we produce myokines, which are chemicals that keep circulating our blood, keep all our organs healthy, including our brain. And whenever we move our muscles, our brain produces a chemical called BDNF. It stands for brain derived neurotrophic factor, which acts like a fertiliser for brain cells, stimulates the growth of new brain cells and new connections. If we could bottle exercise, it would be the most prescribed medication for absolutely everything. We in Australia have a whole, there's a lot of centres, community centres that do chair aerobics, chair strength training, so you don't for those people who are unable to get up, so you just adapt it and do whatever you can. And sitting out in your garden, you know, even sitting out in your garden, if you can't, you know, go to the botanical gardens or just, just find any patch of green.
Helena Popovic:And they've actually done studies in the UK that have quantified this. You know, with exercise, it's 150, minimum 150 minutes a week of aerobic exercise. With nature, it's pretty similar. 120 minutes a week, 17 and a half minutes a day. That's not a big ask to start making a real positive difference. People are more powerful than pills. There was the power of positive relationships at every level, improves every aspect of brain function and also improves our health on every level. There was, you might have heard there was a Harvard study, it spanned more than 75 years, and they've expanded it.
They wanted to answer the question, what is the greatest predictor of a long, healthy, happy life? And they looked at everything. Diet, exercise, socioeconomic status, stress, sleep, alcohol, cigarettes, everything. What do you think was the greatest predictor of a long, happy, healthy life? Slashed the risk of dementia in half. Positive social relationships, having a confidant, feeling part of a community, having even those lovely little conversations with your greengrocer, with the person at the post office, knowing the people in your neighbourhood, small chitchat, even that improves our mental health, our cognition and our immune system. Why? Because when we feel connected to the people around us, we feel safer. It reduces our stress, it reduces our cortisol levels. High levels of cortisol, that is, high levels of stress, actually damage the hippocampus because cortisol interacts with our brain cells and damages them. Whereas conversely, good relationships strengthen our immune system, improve our mood, good relationships, feeling connected to the people around you, feeling supported by family and friends halves our risk of dementia and helps to slow progression of the disease, if not improve it.
You know, this is why dad and I were involved in so much. We did volunteer work with meals on wheels. You know, we would visit people in the neighbourhood every single day. We would do odd jobs and chores, you know, for people, you know, if you need help, you know, rearranging your bookshelves or doing some gardening, weeding your garden, we'd be out there helping. Not for the activity, even as much as for the social connection and having a sense of meaning and purpose and feeling valued. Nothing, nothing more powerful than that. People with dementia still need to feel that they contribute to others, not that others are simply helping them.
Harriet Thomas:It's day 48 of the 900 miles D Tour and today I've got a short walk. It's only 10 miles from Middleton in Teesdale to Langdon Beck, and the route follows the Tees river. So it's along Teesdale and because I don't have far to go and because it is the most glorious September. I was going to say September summer day, but early autumn day, I guess I should say, with blue sky, completely blue sky, no wind, very warm. I passed a section of the Tees river where it's very like the mountain rivers in the Pyrenees, where my grandparents used to live. And me and my dad and my sister used to have many, spend many happy hours damming the rivers because they weren't very deep, they weren't very. They didn't run very fast.
And there were loads and loads and loads of rocks everywhere. And this is the same. You could easily do little dams because basically the river's running in about two thirds of the width of the river, but then the rocks steadily build up. So I'm literally sitting on a beautiful flat rock and there are loads of these rocks that just litter the edges of the river. And I guess are a sign that if this river is in spate, it's a pretty powerful river because it's powerful enough to deposit these massive stones or small boulders, really, at the side of the river. So I'm sitting here on a pile of boulders. It's very, very comfortable. The sun is shining and, yeah, it's quite a pleasure.
Tomorrow I've got a long walk, 20 miles. So I thought I'd take advantage of my ten mile walk to and just stop whenever I want to and just take the time to look and listen. And this river sounds beautiful. It's got all sorts of levels of sound. So it's got the sort of whooshy kind of major sound, dominant sound. And then just every now and again you hear glug glug. So which is where it must be going around a rock or something and creating little pools. And because the floor of the river is all stone, it's kind of like very, very, very gentle rapids, which is why it sounds like the sea.
There's kind of millions of tiny, tiny, tiny little waves. It's sort of very gentle rapids. Again, I must. I'm sure that in winter this is pretty ferocious, but right now it's very gentle, very soothing. Sort of place I can imagine if you were. This is the sort of thing I imagine. I imagine if, you know, back in the, I don't know, 19th century or something, people would have come and washed their clothes here because there all these lovely pools where you could do your washing and then there's the rocks where you could lay your clothes out to dry. I can imagine that happening here.
And I'm sure you can probably drink this water as well. It's brown. It looks like Coca Cola. The Coca Cola rivers is what I'm calling them, the Coca Cola rivers of the Yorkshire Dales and of County Durham. But it's the peat, of course, and I think they're actually pretty clean. And the blue sky is sort of reflected in the waters, so it's this kind of bluey brown metallic colour. So I'm just going to sit here, look at the water and I'm going to close my eyes and listen to the water and just have some mindful moments.
Thank you for joining me on this episode of the D Tour, as I enjoyed some glorious adventures, both big and small. My big adventure continues next week, of course. Can you believe that by the end of the week, I'll be heading over the border into Bonny Scotland. As we transition into autumn, I'll be exploring the theme of seasons. I'm already noticing the colours of nature beginning to change and the days are certainly getting shorter. The pleasure of gardening has come up a few times in this episode and with the changing seasons, it feels fitting to focus on it a little bit more. While I was at another place in the Lake District, I had the pleasure of chatting with their head gardener, James Cox. He is full of energy and passion for his work.
Always on the move, as he described it, ambling through the gardens. James has such a relaxed approach, which got me thinking about the simplicity and beauty of letting nature do its thing. I've saved our full chat for next week, since this episode is already packed I promise it will be well worth the wait. I'll also be catching up with Freddie from Freddie's Flowers, who has been supporting dementia adventure with small donations from their flower subscriptions for some time now. Ten years ago, Freddie Garland was selling flowers door to door and now he's the mastermind behind a thriving business. He's on a mission to make flowers more affordable and accessible to everyone, which sounds perfect to me as we all need to bring the outside in when winter arrives. So make sure to tune in next week.
unds or by texting da five to:The D Tour podcast is proudly sponsored by Macs Adventure. Macs Adventure specialise in self guided walking and cycling holidays for independent, active people who don't want to be part of the crowd or restricted by set dates and schedules. They encourage you to go at your own pace whilst they support you with all of the routes and logistics for a worry free adventure.
