Wanna Be More Adventurous In Your Everyday Life? Explorer Pip Stewart Will Really Inspire You

Feel like you wanna be a bit more spontaneous this summer? You might want to take a leaf from adventurer Pip Stewart’s book.

Pip is the new face of AIB’s Everyday Rewards programme – they’re offering cashback on some of Ireland’s favourite brands, all in the aim of helping us break free from our routine and spend more time enjoying everyday summer adventures. And what better time to begin than in this scorching weather?

Brands involved include Lidl (cashback after your big shop? Yes please), Wagamama, Omniplex cinemas, Captain America’s restaurants and 365 tickets.

There’s probably no one better qualified than Pip to tell you to get out there and discover new things. She has travelled all over the world – cycling from Malaysia to the UK, and travelling down one of the longest rivers in South America by canoe – but she believes that some of the best adventures can be found right at your doorstep. So what are her tips to get more adventurous in your everyday life?

“Try and see your own region as if you were a tourist. For so long I had travelled around and just gone out into the great unknown, but actually when I come back I’ve realised that there are so many exciting things here that I’ve never really appreciated before.

Even coming to Dublin at the weekend – the coastline, the history, the nature was insane. There’s so much you can do if you start trying to do something new each week. Just get out and see what your region has to offer.”

For Pip, having adventures is all about overcoming your fears and taking everything one step at a time.

I try and find inspiration all around. I do veg out on the sofa as well, but I just like to be outside, to be honest. I like to be in nature, be active and go walking or to the beach. I think [being in] nature is the best thing that we can do for our mental health.

All of this could lead to the adventure of a lifetime – and for Pip, that was being one of the first people in the world to travel down a river in Guyana from source to sea, a journey that involved sleeping in hammocks in the jungle and avoiding creepy-crawlies. 

“I was really proud of that because obviously it was a world first, but more than that it was something that I was really scared by. So I sat with fear throughout so much of that journey, because before I set off I wasn’t a kayaker,” she says. 

“Every night we’d lie in the hammocks, you could hear the jungle behind you. It came alive. For the first couple of weeks I really struggled to sleep because of the noise. It’s quite terrifying, I almost sat on one of the deadliest snakes in the world, called the Labaria.”

All I wanted to do at the time was to come home and I couldn’t, and I think that was such a fearful moment for me. It’s a great example I suppose of how you can shift your mindset – I couldn’t change the problem but I could change the solution to the problem, which was to try not fixate on it and stress out.

Overall, Pip sees her adventure-fuelled life not as career, but as the culmination of small decisions she made throughout her life that got her to where she is today.

I see it as a series of small little steps… trying to challenge yourself. The first step is doing something locally, trying something new. You never know where these things might lead, it could be the start of a great new career shift or lifestyle switch for you. Always start local, start small, and see what lights you up.

To avail of the AIB Everyday Rewards programme, simply register here. 

• pip stewart