Rodrigo Silva de Paula is a Paddle Canada certified Advanced SUP Instructor with 39 years of surfing and 26 of SUPing experience.

 

He learned how to swim at 3 months old and to surf at age 4. His first paddleboard adventure was in 1995, using a kayak paddle and a longboard on a flat day — years before the first Western register of paddleboarding as a sport.

 

Since the age of 5, he has spent at least 3 hours a day, 6-7 days a week (320-350 days a year) in the ocean, rivers and all kinds of bodies of water surfing and paddling. 

 

​He was a competitive swimmer from ages 9 to 16 and a competitive surfer as a young teen. By age 16 Rodrigo had spent much more time of his life in/on the water than on land. 

 

He studied Oceanography and Marine Biology and has been an Educator for the past 29 years, teaching hundreds of people surfing, windsurfing and several kinds of paddle sports since age 12, always with a focus on FUN THROUGH SAFETY. 

 

"Water, but especially the ocean and big rivers make anyone a humble-safety-first person! The ocean teaches and makes you learn before, during, after and between every session. Those who do learn are welcomed into the most amazing playground in the galaxy!"

 

Rodrigo also has 24 years of experience in broadcast and print media. Since 1997, he has worked as an investigative journalist and editor in some major newspapers, primetime TV news and journalism institutions around the world: among them the Global Reporting Center, Jornal Nacional, Jornal do Brasil, and Spin Magazine, and has been nominated for some major journalism awards. 

 

For 3 consecutive years, he was also selected as one of the world’s 30 most innovative and effective social entrepreneurs promoting Sustainable and Human Development.

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Since age 4 Rodrigo has surfed some of the world's most demanding and fun waves and has done more than 300 surf or paddling camping trips in 46 countries: from BC's fjords to the Amazon River system. 

 

The combination between journalism, social enterprise, paddling and surfing took him to 5 oceans (from the Arctic to Antarctica) and 67 countries.

 

Rodrigo is also an internationally awarded social entrepreneur, a specialist in strategic communications and cultural competence, focused on promoting innovation, Human Rights, Sustainable Development and JEDI (Justice, Equity, Diversity and Inclusion). 

 

​He is also a member of executive boards at multinational institutions based in Canada, the USA and Latin America, such as the University of British Columbia (UBC) and the Palmares Institute of Human Rights (IPDH).

 

Born and raised in Rio in Brazil, Rodrigo is a former swimming, paddling, water polo and surfing champion who moved to BC mostly for its waterways and Ocean, in 2011. The next day he was on the water.

 

He has lived with the Indigenous Nations of his ancestry in the Amazon forest, the world's biggest water freshwater system and paddling paradise and spent time in the Pantanal the world's largest tropical wetland area, and the world's largest flooded grasslands and another amazing freshwater heaven.

 

Rodrigo paddles year-round, for about 320 days a year, from winter to winter, in and around the beautiful bodies of water of the Coast Salish peoples and the lakes and rivers around BC. He loves surfing in Western Vancouver Island and Haida Gwaii on the territory that belongs to the Nuu-Chah-Nulth and Haida peoples.

 

He is also a cross-country skiing instructor at Cypress Mountain and when he is not gliding on water, snow and ice Rodrigo is a business leader, communications, and cultural competence expert, specialized in promoting Innovation, Diversity and Human Rights. 

 

Currently also devoting himself to writing 2 books, Rodrigo loves to spend time with Family and Friends from diverse cultures and in Nature in British Columbia, Brazil or anywhere in the world: surfing, cross-country and backcountry skiing, SUP camping, hiking, swimming, reading about history, learning new things, cycling, playing tennis and soccer, or taking care of his garden - always with good music playing.

 

More about him at: www.RODRIGOsilvaDEpaula.com.