by WideWorld
24.05.2010
Dear all
This is actually a letter; a letter to say thanks. On WideWorld's first anniversary, thanks for reading, thanks for coming back day after day, week after week, and thanks for all the positive feedback. It's not easy starting a magazine at the moment, either in print or online. And we chose to do it in the middle of a recession. But we believed that there was something missing – in the UK at least – that really inspired people to get out and see the world, to attempt new adrenalin-fuelled activities and to challenge themselves to seek out new adventures.
WideWorld was born in May 2008 out of a feeling that there were more people like us who loved the great outdoors but who felt alienated by the magazines devoted to individual sports or activities that assumed some sort of prior knowledge or super-human strength and endurance; like some sort of exclusive club to which we would never be invited.
The last 12 months have been quite a ride. Our very first feature was 25 Great Escapes that you could embark on in the UK – places you could disappear to for a weekend, a week or a month where your iPhone wouldn't bleat and your Blackberry wouldn't chirp. They included shark-watching in South Devon and getting lost in the Highlands of Wester Ross.
Then, over the course of the year we've met and interviewed a huge number of stars of the outdoor world – from Olympic athletes to round-the-world yachtsmen and mountaineers. These are the WideWorld Heroes and they included nine times world surf champion Kelly Slater, Robin Knox Johnston - the first person to sail single-handed and non-stop around the world; 'greatest living adventurer', Sir Ranulph Fiennes; Olympic sailors Shirley Robertson and Ben Ainslie, Seven-times Everest summiter Kenton Cool, snowboarders Shaun White and Charlotte Dutton and hardcore British survivalist Bear Grylls.
But while we wanted to bring you exclusive interviews with these sporting and adventure heroes, we also wanted to prove that anyone can take advantage of the great outdoors. And that became our biggest mission – to provide you with the inspiration, the expertise and the passion to get up and get out.
That's why we introduced our 'How to' section so you could find articles easily that would guide you through those first steps – whether you wanted to learn to whitewater kayak, hike the Grand Canyon or go wild camping.
Over the past 12 months our writers have hitchhiked around the UK for free, been wild food foraging in Sussex, kayaked from Guernsey to Herm alone, and learned to Mongolian wrestle in order to highlight some of the thousands of adventures you could go on if you just put your mind to it.
One more thing about our writers: over the past year WideWorld has been honoured to build up a loyal stable of dedicated wordsmiths who are equally passionate about what we do. Without them – and the photographers we've featured – there simply would be no magazine.
By the end of 2009 we felt we could improve on the site's navigation, so we re-launched with a better design, a much bigger directory of outdoor outfitters in the UK and we recruited a few people to help us launch a dedicated Blogs site as well. Britain's best female surfer, Gwen Spurlock, explorer Mikael Strandberg, and WideWorld contributor Hannah Jordan have been keeping us entertained by chronicling their exploits around the globe.
We also established our first charity partnership – with international humanitarian organisation CARE International which is organising charity bike rides this year plus an ambitious hike in Egypt's Sinai region this October.
And so we move into our second year of existence. We've got plans to grow the site even more – to include even more exclusive interviews with the biggest names in outdoor sport, adventure and exploration; to bring you even more ideas for offbeat travel and tips and information on how to get a start in some of the most exciting sports and activities on the planet; and to inspire you to make 2010 the year you embark on your own adventure.
To paraphrase an old saying, 'to live is to risk dying; to hope is to risk despair; to try is to risk failure. But the greatest hazard in life is to risk nothing.' That's the motto we hope you'll take with you as you explore the big outdoors and all it has to offer.
Thanks again for reading, commenting, contributing and coming back for more. As always, we appreciate your feedback. Keep commenting on those articles, join our Facebook page if you haven't already, and follow us on Twitter. We're quite partial to a bit of Tweeting of late.
Cheers
Alex, Ed and Miles
WideWorld magazine
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