Why is this man being celebrated?

His 'personal growth' rests on his abdication of any kind of responsibility to others, and just taking for himself.

What has he given to the world to balance out what he's taken?

David Attenborough is completely different because he has spent his life creating content which has been enjoyed by millions of people, and which has influenced behaviour. Ie actually making something of value.

It's fine to enjoy what you're building as you do it! But it should actually be useful, not pure self-indulgence off others' backs.

I haven't read this blokes book, but based on what he's done for the last few decades, it's pretty likely to be self-indulgent nonsense.

Thank you for feedback on my posts. You have said I’m getting in the way of the debate you wish to have. You have said that my shorter posts are irritating you.

Can I suggest that you just ignore me from now on and then you can have the debate you want and won’t be irritated any further.

I agree. David Attenborough was doing a job. He didn’t abandon his child as far as I know.

Oddly were there to be a film about all this he would make a lot of money and his son might ultimately be better off than he ever would have been otherwise.

The truth is that the mother had full custody not shared custody we don’t even know if the court allowed access at all. She went back to Belfast. He was a little bit lost as he had seen mates sleeping in the next beds shot and killed. His dad was highly successful in t army and there was parental pressure there to get in and succeed. He suffered from dyslexia, was bullied at school and made to feel inadequate and struggled to get into the paratroopers having to take the test 5 tines. He lived for the achievement of being in and doing well in the army and went from a killing machine ( as they are trained to be ) to doing nothing much as there was peace in the 1990s. At this pod t, he comes across as bring all over the place, impacted by his successful, dad, impacted by the training in the army, impacted by his marriage breakdown, impacted by seeing people he knew die to the extent that he got an idea in his head and had to see it though - the whole idea being odd and somewhat mad to be honest. So there seems to be a MH element to it all with this relentless, persistence above and beyond all things. He could have gone for a shorter challenge like other adventurers.

Clearly there is a lot more to all this but at the end of the day his wife had full custody of their son and went home.

Yes, lots of people have jobs with very long hours or lots or travel that take them away from their families. Some parents do have to miss first steps/first day at school/school plays/sports days/exam seasons…

But 30 years is quite another thing really. He’s missed absolutely everything.

He must have done something wrong for his wife to get full custody of their child and then move to NI where he couldn't live.......I would rather hear her version of this..

No I'm so old I'm on my phone and not wearing my reading glasses. Are you ok yourself?

His wife had full custody and if he wasn't allowed access by the courts then surely he's even less to be celebrated? If he managed to lose custody completely through his own actions then great that he was a bit lost

How do you know all that?

Full custody = Alarm bells.

it’s all on the internet. There are numerous recordings / interviews etc.

I suspect that he was a bit of a lost soul when he left the country in many ways. But that is my speculation.

More of his background from the Guardian

Bushby grew up in a military family. His father, Keith, is an SAS veteran who spent 24 years in the British army, and his younger brother, Adrian, is also an army man. His mother, another Angela, worked in a factory.
School, Bushby says, was a “living hell”. Dyslexic (though undiagnosed), he was branded as “thick”, and found solace in birdwatching. He left school at 16 with no qualifications and joined the junior Parachute regiment. But he struggled with the physical demands, and took five attempts to pass the gruelling P Company training before eventually joining the 3rd battalion of the Parachute regiment. Some mocked him for his repeated failures, but others were impressed by his tenacity. “Normally, they’ll allow you two or three attempts.” Why did he get five? “Because I wouldn’t quit … that was probably one of the first signs. I just won’t let go. I’m a bit of a rottweiler.”
Bushby remained an outsider in the paras, not least because he didn’t like booze. “I was never a beer drinker. And that’s very bad news in the army. Very difficult. It can be a problem.” Throughout his military career, he felt his peers didn’t trust or respect him.
In his early 20s, stationed in Northern Ireland, he married a Belfast woman, yet another Angela. Five years later, when they were living in Hampshire, they divorced. She returned home to Belfast with their young son, Adam. At the time, servicemen were only allowed into Northern Ireland if they were serving there, so Bushby was effectively separated from Adam.
There was another thing gnawing away at him. A professional, or existential, crisis. The world was at peace, which was catastrophic for those who had joined the military hoping to see action. Between 1990 and 1995, the British army was downsized from 160,000 to 120,000. Bushby kept his job, but he was bored and restless. “We were not being used. There was nothing going on. I was one of those guys looking for other challenges in life. We were all disillusioned because of the lack of action – the “peace disease”, as the Chinese refer to it. It’s hard to keep an army in combat fighting conditions when there’s nothing to do. As young soldiers, you’re up for the fight, and you end up in Northern Ireland on sentry on a gate every day. It’s not very appealing.”

New York Times

Bushby spent 12 years in the 3rd Battalion of the Parachute Regiment before quitting the army at the end of 1997. He was reeling from a bitter divorce and itching to prove himself.
“I had something to prove to my paratrooper mates,” he told Backpacker magazine.

Urgh I know someone like this, celebrated for his volunteer work in obscure locations on the opposite side of the world while his wife was left alone bringing up multiple children , he was an actual pig to her too

Maybe not a book and film could be another Salt Path debacle!

Agree.
What a selfish self absorbed twat.
Poor ex and son.
What a selfish loser.

Could Mumsnet servers even cope with that amount of threads/poems/songs/AI slop?

I wondered that. He practically abandoned his son as a young child, and has a twelve year old granddaughter he’s never met. Incredibly selfish.

I read about him and my first thought was that he was selfish and second was to wonder whether there was independent verification of the crossing of the Darien Gap and of the Channel.

He's due to arrive in Hull tomorrow. I'd be more impressed if he'd done it in one go.

Sounds like self-indulgent twaddle.

He's just been interviewed on BBC Breakfast. He seems to be extremely nervous about 'reconnecting' with family now that he is back in the UK. You would have thought he would be ecstatic about returning and completing the challenge. Instead he was very anxious in the interview and seemed genuinely worried about the next stage.

It's going to be extremely hard for him to settle back into some kind of conventional life. Wouldn't be surprised if he doesn't set himself another 'adventure' to escape again.

I just saw the BBC breakfast interview. It was odd that when asked what's next, he said he has to tell the story, people want to know. So felt like he's on a mission to 'sell' his story. The interviewers were trying hard to engage him but he was very detached and quite blunted. It was quite uncomfortable to watch.

It was quite uncomfortable to watch. @VenusStarr

Yes, it was really uncomfortable watching it. He didn't appear to be excited at all about seeing his family and being back in England. No enthusiasm. Almost as though he was depressed.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/gift/5b6602c897cf39a8

Bbc news are covering his arrival home 🙄.

Shall I bugger off around the world for 25 years and leave my family behind?