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Robert Young Pelton
Pelton, 45, has led an adventurous life. His interest in adventure began at age ten when he became the youngest student ever to attend a Canadian survival school in Selkirk, Manitoba. The school was later closed down after the deaths of a number of students. Pelton went on to become a lumberjack, boundary cutter, tunneler, driller and blaster's assistant in addition to his more lucrative occupations as a business strategist and marketing expert. On his time off, his quest for knowledge and understanding have taken him through the remote and exotic areas of more than 60 countries. What he did with his time off turned into a career with the first publication of Dangerous Places, then Come Back Alive (www.comebackalive.com) and his autobiography, The Adventurist (www.theadventurist.com) He is currently shooting a series of specials for the Discovery Channel, a documentary for CNN and a story for National Geographic.

Some of Pelton's adventures include breaking American citizens out of jail in Colombia, living with the Dogon people in the Sahel, thundering down forbidden rivers in leaky native canoes, plowing through East African swamps with the U.S. Camel Trophy team, hitchhiking through war-torn Central America, setting up the world's first video interview of the never before photographed taliban leaders in Afghanistan and completing the first circumnavigation of the island of Borneo by land as well as numerous visits to and through war zones. It is not surprising that his friends include shepherds, warlords, pengalus, mercenaries, nomads, terrorists, field researchers, sultans, missionaries, headhunters, smugglers and other colorful people.

Stories about Pelton or his adventures have been featured in publications as diverse as Outside, Shift, Soldier of Fortune, Star, The New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Class, El Pais, The Sunday London Times, Der Stern, Die Welt, Washington Post, Outpost, and hundreds of other newspapers around the world. He has also been featured and interviewed on a variety of networks including the BBC, NBC, CBS, ABC, ATV, Fox, RTL, CTV, CBC, and is a regular guest on CNN. He seems to appear on entertainment shows like Oprah, The Late, Late Show, Today and Late Night with Conan O'Brian only when tourists get blown-up or kidnapped.

Not much slows Pelton down; he has survived car accidents, muggings, illness, attacks by the PKK, African killer bees and even a plane crash in the central highlands of Kalimantan. He attributes his numerous arrests and detainments to his hosts' need to get to know him better. Despite these minor setbacks, Pelton still faces each dangerous encounter with a sense of humor and an irreverent wit.

What makes Pelton's travels unusual is that they are his vacation. He wrote DP because he couldn't find an author who would.Unfortunately since he now devotes his time to writing and updating DP, he is fond of cursing and yelling "It's not an adventure, it's a job!" He doesn't quite know what he will do for his holidays now.

Pelton's approach to adventure can be quite humorous. Whether it's challenging former Iban headhunters to a chug-a-lug contest, calling the taliban a bunch of women to their face, loading expedition members' packs with rocks, indulging in a little target practice with Kurdish warlords in Turkey or filling up a hotel pool with stewardesses, waiters and furniture in Burundi during an all-night party, he brings a certain element of fun and excitement to dangerous places. As we go to press Pelton is off on a DP tour of duty in Algeria, Egypt, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Tajikistan, Kazakhstan, Myanmar and Papua New Guinea, winding up with a visit to the rebels on Bougainville. He freely admits that he will also visit England, Germany, Australia, New Zealand, Singapore, The Solomons and Tahiti; "just so I don't lose my perspective, or my tan."

Pelton is a Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society in London and lives in Los Angeles California.