BURSTAfter passing through pouring rain, darkness and a gruelling climb, two cyclists on a 30,000 kilometre journey from Alaska to Patagonia arrived in Williams Lake to the sights of city lights.
Leanna Carriera, Canadian endurance athlete and adventurer, while Timm Dobert is a conservation scientist and ecologist, and together, they are the team behind the Wings of Survival.
The duo pedalled into town on Aug. 29 some time after 9 p.m., taking the Rudy Johnson Bridge route rather than staying on the main highway. On Saturday, Aug.30, they gave a presentation at the Scout Island Nature Centre and shared their mission behind Wings of Survival Journey.
Dobert explained, “Wings of Survival” is essentially designed to be a storytelling endeavour aimed at reconnecting people with nature and translating scientific knowledge about biodiversity loss and other environmental pressures.”
He told the Williams Lake Tribune that people like to see other people experience adventures and challenges.
“Because we follow bird migrations, we have this beautiful parallel journey between the whimbrels, which is our focal species, kind of representing billions of birds that migrate, and us.”
The project uses migratory birds – the Hudsonian whimbrel. The birds migrate along the Pacific American Flyway between the High Arctic and Latin America. GPS trackers allow the movements of tagged whimbrels to be followed alongside the expedition on an interactive online map. Wings of Survival will be a sort of world-first race with nature, where the cyclists’ map will document progress with photos and videos from the journey.
Dobert said as he and Leanne rolled into Williams Lake, “We were drenched. It was hosing down. It was pitch black, and then you come over the crest, and you see kind of the light of the city. As I said, we haven’t seen many cities, so it looked a bit surreal.”
Then, when he saw Williams Lake in daylight, he saw the lake and described it as really beautiful.
As Canada’s first female decathlete and former international and track and field athlete, Carriera witnessed rapid changes in the environment around her, as poor air and water quality and extreme weather began affecting, sometimes cancelling, sporting events.
Leanna also shared her experience about being away from her nine-year-old daughter, “It’s hard for her to understand why I’m gone so long, what I’m creating. If we’re having a hard day, I’m like, “Why am I doing this? Part of the reason I’m doing it is for future generations for sure, but it’s been definitely hard really hard to be away from her – harder than I predicted.”
After spending long stretches travelling through remote areas with few opportunities to meet people, Dobert jokingly described Williams Lake as metropolitan. Their arrival in the city came with more public engagement along the route.
He said regardless of the many hours on the road, the project is worth it and Wings of Survival is about highlighting the incredible journeys and struggles of migratory shorebirds, another reason they joined Birds Canada.
Birds Canada is a national non-profit organization dedicated to the conservation of wild birds and their habitats. Birds Canada joined the Conserva Aves Initiative to support the creation and sustainable management of subnational protected areas. The initiative aims to create an inclusive conservation and climate change mitigation strategy benefiting birds, biodiversity, and present and future generations.
When asked about the toughest things one had to endure on a thousands-of-kilometres journey on bicycles, Dobert shared that they have a support vehicle that’s also a shelter.
He said, “Someone has to drive the vehicle. So what happens is you bring in another person, and then it’s kind of essentially, like in any workplace, at school, wherever you are, in a human context, manage human interactions, so, this is not expected, but it’s a challenge.”
“You’re living on five square metres, with three people in that case. How do you manage the human interactions, the personalities, the characters, the needs? That’s a huge challenge on the road,” he added.
Another challenge he shared was what traffic feels like from a bicycle and he said, “People are not really aware of how noisy vehicles are, because a lot of people don’t cycle, and you don’t hear the noise in the vehicle.”
Dobert added, “It makes an incredible difference for us if a vehicle is overtaking us with 50 versus 100. That noise pollution really gets to you.”
The project “Wings of Survival” has also partnered with Exploring by the Seat of Your Pants, which allows them to take the expedition into classrooms. A free virtual classroom aimed to educate young kids about migration, and conservation and the science behind the journey, and also connecting scientists and explorers in the field to the young kids.
The cycling journey officially kicked off on Aug. 1, 2026, from Prudhoe Bay, Alaska and is scheduled to reach Patagonia by mid-March 2027.