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Retracing Chinese visits to America pre-Columbus
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Love it!
Fantastic and impressive achivement Christian and happy birthday today 🇩🇰 🇩🇰 🇩🇰
Applause 👏 👏 🙌
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How fantastic! Well done, guys. A monumental achievement. So glad you had a lovely welcome. So much to ponder, reflect and build on now but huge gains and glad you are back on solid ground. X
Tillykke med at I nåede målet. Vi glæder os til at se dig til august. Dbh Olav
Tillykke Christian Havrehed. Ses!
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This is a very worthwhile enterprise. Great idea
Well done you guys! Education with inspiration. Yours continues to be a great story. You will leave your own very positive legacy. Very proud of you both! Engage with China
Stage 1 - China to Japan - The New Xu Fu Voyage East
Past Projects
Global Canal Rowing Action
1 of 100 global rows in support of climate action, presented at COP27, Sharm El Sheikh, Egypt
Row Round Denmark for Clean Seas
Community engagement project to remove a ton of trash from the sea
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Transforming "Pito" into "Yantu 2"
Reverse Viking row for Mental Health
England to Denmark row with UK Marines in support of students’ mental health during COVID lockdowns
Swim-Run-Swim to get a Lifeboat
880 km coast to coast solo run in the Pyrenees to fundraise a lifeboat for Mozambique
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Exploring China by Sailboat
… to make documentaries for Danish TV
Trans-Atlantic Row with Chinese ex-Soldier
5,084 km ocean row to test the limits of Sino-Western cross-cultural cooperation and fundraise for Chinese students
POSSIBLE CHINA GRAND CANAL ROW IN MAY 2026…
My hallmark has always been to take on not-done-before maritime adventures with China to promote Sino‑Western understanding and real people‑to‑people exchange.
To be honest, it’s mostly a painful and thankless quest. But if it were easy, anyone could do it. I keep going because I genuinely believe China and the West need new ways to interact, understand, and inspire each other.
Ever since Sun Haibin and I completed our China–Japan "New Xu Fu Voyage East" in July 2024, I’ve had my eye on rowing the Grand Canal from Beijing to Hangzhou — several thousand years old, 1,800 km long, and a UNESCO World Heritage site.
Naively, I thought that because this was a domestic project, permission would be straightforward 🤦♂️🤣
Four trips to China later — and significantly poorer — I stand corrected.
Only commercial traffic is allowed on the Grand Canal, and getting special permission requires approval from:
• the Ministry of Transport
• the Water Conservancy Bureau
• the Marine Safety Administration
• all 8 provinces the canal flows through
• and the canal cities within those provinces…
Agh!!!!! 😵💫
I tried to leverage the fact that 2025 marked the 75th anniversary of Danish‑Chinese diplomatic relations and 150 years since the passing of Hans Christian Andersen - a household name in China and part of the middle‑school curriculum.
But neither Danish nor Chinese politicians, diplomats, nor officials were willing to go the extra mile. So the anniversaries were celebrated in the usual way: sending performing troupes back and forth. All things done before.
This “safe” approach makes for good photo ops, but it’s an outdated form of cultural exchange. It doesn’t capture the imagination of ordinary Chinese or Dane, nor does it bring China and the West any closer.
Which is why I’m genuinely pleased that Hebei Province has now contacted me. They’re interested in having me row the Hebei section of the Grand Canal - about 200 km - as part of their World Canal City Cultural Tourism Seminar in May 2026.
It’s too early to say much more, but the signs are good. I haven’t had to write a single project proposal yet (for the New Xu Fu Voyage East, Sun Haibin and I wrote close to 100…). Instead, Hebei has sent me two proposals 🥳🤩😃
Fingers crossed 🤞
#Yantu #CrossCulture #grandcanal #canalcities #WCCO #Hebei #christianhavrehed #yantuproject #inspirationalspeaker #China #unescoworldheritage #chinatravel ... See MoreSee Less
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Forget Taiwan. The uneasy China–Japan relationship goes back 2,000 years.
Last year, Sun Haibin and I were privileged to retrace the legendary voyage of Xu Fu — China’s earliest maritime explorer — who in 210 BC was sent by the First Emperor to retrieve the Elixir of Immortality from the gods in the Eastern Seas.
To make the expedition happen, we needed unprecedented permission from the Chinese government to leave China in a rowing boat. Japan, too, agonized over receiving us, since we had no engine. Unfortunately, we had to abort this historic row a few days in due to adverse winds. Instead, we flew to Japan and complete the journey around Kyushu in sea kayaks visiting temples dedicated to Xu Fu along the way.
I’ve often spoken about the expedition. What I haven’t said much about is Xu Fu himself and his geopolitical significance in the China-Korea-Japan civilized nation upmanship.
Close to unknown in the West, Xu Fu may be one of the most controversial figures in world history. Some claim he became Japan’s first emperor. Others, like Joseph Needham, suggest he may have reached America, upstaging the Vikings and Columbus. If true, Xu Fu’s story could upend national self-images in both Japan and the US.
As an explorer, what better story to investigate?
Having now concluded the New Xu Fu Voyage East Expedition, I can say with confidence: Xu Fu was not Japan’s first emperor. But whether he reached the Americas? That will take another five years of research and exploration. Read more: yantu.com/current-expedition
But Xu Fu’s legacy still looms large in East Asia. Consider this:
• Japan had no written language until the 5th century, when it adopted Chinese characters (Kanji) from China.
• In the 9th century, Japan developed Hiragana and Katakana to complement Kanji.
• If Japan wants to learn about its ancient history it has to rely on Chinese history books.
• Korea adopted Chinese script in the 1st century BC — making Japan the last of the three to become a “historic” and therefore civilized nation.
This is difficult for Japan to accept. And that’s where Xu Fu’s legacy becomes useful.
If Xu Fu arrived in Japan in the 3rd century BC, then he must have brought the written language with him, thereby making Japan two centuries more cultured than Korea.
So, to the Japanese, Xu Fu is both inconvenient and convenient: a reminder of donor culture input from China that Japan would rather not acknowledge, yet also a way to leapfrog Korea in the civilizational hierarchy.
There are 7 Xu Fu Associations in China and more than 20 in Japan. I have had the privilege of visiting most of them. Due to the current political climate, they don’t really talk, but our New Xu Fu Voyage East project brought them together, if only briefly.
The picture shows Sun Haibin and me with Kaori Uchiyama, Chairwoman of the Main Japanese Xu Fu Association. The stone stele (that may look like a tomb stone to some) was erected by Nobeoka city in front of the local Xu Fu temple to commemorate the project.
Exploring comes in many shapes and sizes. It is more than pitting one’s wits against nature. If this post whets your appetite for unusual insights, then check out my speaker site:
#keynotespeaker #China #crossculturalcommunication #SinoWesternCollaboration #YANTU #ChristianHavrehed #AtlanticRow #LeadershipDevelopment #GlobalBusiness ... See MoreSee Less
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🚀 New Adventure, New Stage - Now Booking Keynotes
After years of global companies reaching out for talks and team-building - without me doing much promotion - I’ve decided to professionalise my speaker business.
Why now? Because my expeditions are taking longer to get approved, and I need some high-energy positive interactions to fuel the mind-numbing battle against red tape.
From rowing across oceans to stress testing cross-cultural collaboration, risk-taking, and championing ESG under extreme conditions, I’ve gathered insights that help corporates perform and employees deal with adversity, self-doubt, and set-backs.
Stage 2 of my “rewrite-the-history-of-exploration” project - investigating whether the Chinese, like the Vikings, reached America pre-Columbus - is set to launch from Japan through the Kuril Islands and Kamchatka to the Bering Strait. A small snag: Japan and Russia are technically still fighting World War II over the Kurils, and Kamchatka is Russian territory. So rowing through that route could take another five years of chasing permissions - just like it did to row from China for Japan last year.
The energy from giving high-impact keynotes to help others perform will help me stay sane while navigating expedition bureaucracy.
🎤 Check out my new site (link in comments)
If you see a keynote that fits your next event, please reach out. And yes (he asks shamelessly): please share it in your network, tag a booker, give your company a memorable Christmas present…
📅 Book before Chinese New Year 2026 to enjoy a special offer.
What am I like as a speaker? Check it out:
Thanks for your support - and for being part of the journey.
__________
Would you like a version tailored for corporate leaders, event planners, or cross-cultural teams? I can adapt tone and emphasis to match each audience.
#keynotespeakers #China #CrossCulturalLeadership #SinoWesternCollaboration #yantuattitude #ChristianHavrehed #atlanticrow #leadershipdevelopment #GlobalBusiness #risktaking #grit ... See MoreSee Less
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