With their 7th event coming up in October, Fascinating Expedition & Adventure Talks (FEAT) has perfected the recipe for their one-night celebration of adventurers and their expeditions.
Even better than signature dishes from Nigella, Jamie and Martha, FEAT’s recipe reads:
Ingredients
- 10 adventurers
- Large stage with large screens and tasteful lighting
- 1,060 seats for an adventure-loving audience
Method
Introduce the adventures one-by-one. Let each speaker talk for exactly seven minutes about a recent expedition experience. To dazzle the audience, project images from the adventurer’s journey on to large screens. After five speakers, take a 20-minute break to recover from the excitement of the first-half before continuing.WARNING: This event is hot, fast-paced, exciting, inspiring and full of adventure. After the event audience members may be tempted to travel to exotic destinations to realise their own adventure dreams and physical feats.
“Lucky number seven,” says FEAT creator and director Lisa de Speville. “Since FEAT started in October 2010 I’ve had 66 speakers on the FEAT stage and every one of them has been interesting. Their tales of adventure are captivating and inspiring and they’ve spanned a range of disciplines from biking and running to paddling and paragliding and diving and big wave surfing and every other physical discipline imaginable.”
Finding adventurers
“I’m always amazed at the people and stories that cross my desk, often recommended by FEAT regulars,” she says.
“One speaker this year is my uncle’s old friend, a guy who has done so many big expeditions over the past few years that the challenge was in choosing just one of them to focus on for his FEAT talk. Another is a friend’s mentor. A media colleague recommended an adventurer and some speakers I invited after following their adventures online. I know a few personally; our paths having crossed at some stage over the past 20 years.”
Now introducing… FEAT Kids
With another hat on, de Speville has been involved in school sport development for a decade – in media and through hands-on coaching within the sport of orienteering.
“I’m very excited about introducing FEAT Kids this year,” she says. “This is an afternoon event where the speakers range in age from 12 to 22 and talk topics include an across-country trek, wingsuit flying, adventure-activity travel, expedition cycling (in World Record time!), sport-and-rock climbing and mountaineering in South America. What these young adventurers have done and experienced already!”
Many adults discover adventurous pursuits only later in life; through trying new sports, from something they’ve read or from being dragged to events like FEAT by friends.
“To be of high-school age now and sitting in the audience at FEAT Kids this year… The adventures that this young audience will be exposed to by the teenage and young-adult speakers could trigger dreams of undertaking their own adventures from now and for the rest of their lives,” says de Speville.
FEAT takes place on Thursday, 8 October 2015 at the Linder Auditorium in Parktown, Johannesburg. Details for this year’s two FEAT events (FEAT Kids and FEAT) are on the FEAT website at www.featsa.co.za. Tickets are now open through EntryTickets.co.za with discounts for block bookings of 10 or more seats. Follow FEAT on Facebook at FEAT South Africa and on Twitter at AdventureFEAT.
ABOUT FEAT
FEAT was created by adventure racer Lisa de Speville with the first event held in Jo’burg in October 2010. FEAT events have been held annually since.
FEAT events are also held annually in Canada and Denmark. FEAT Canada is organised by adventure racer Sean Verret and their first event was held in November 2011. FEAT Denmark is organised by adventure racer Sanne Elidsbo Hansen and their first event was held in February 2015. FEAT Kids was first initiated by FEAT Canada in March 2014. The two FEAT Kids events held have been very successful and popular.
