Edward Michael “Bear” Grylls is a British adventurer best known for his show Man vs. Wild, in which he spends days alone in the wilderness, testing his strength, discipline, and survival skills.

For our interview, Bear picks me up in his Grylls-o-Copter, which is what he calls his bicycle. “Hop in the basket,” he tells me. “Roll your suitcases on the sides of the bike, like training wheels. I can ride a bike, but I like the comfort of training wheels.” I tell him I didn’t bring a suitcase, because it’s an hour long interview. “That’s fine” Bear says, “Just sit in the basket and I’ll push. I can ride a bike though.”

As we roll towards Bear’s Cave—which is what he calls his duplex—Bear tells me about his childhood, where he learned how to lie. “I wasn’t always a liar,” Bear tells me. “I learned from my mom. Like, one time she made us a special dinner that she called ‘Salmon Surprise’, but the surprise was that she was getting a divorce.”

Once we get to his duplex, Bear peers in the window. “No one’s home” he says. “Let’s be quick about this.” Bear throws his bike over the fence, hops it, and then breaks into the basement. “I learned how to do that from Genghis Khan.” Genghis Khan has been dead for almost 800 years, I tell him. Whenever Bear gets caught in a lie, he just doubles down on it. “I met him when I was on The Voice,” he replies.

“Is this your house?” I ask him. This is the first question I’ve asked so far, because Bear was pushing his bike so fast that we hit a bird and it died and we were too sad to talk for the next half hour.

“I sleep here,” he says. After four forced ping pong games, Bear makes me play twelve more ping pong games. “I like ping pong because I’m a world champion at ping pong.” He tells me. “What about Man vs. Wild?” I ask him. “Isn’t that your whole thing?”

“Man vs. Wild was filmed during a single week of my life.” He says. “I had no idea they were recording and I got no money.”

“We’ve wasted enough time. Let’s work out right now,” Bear announces. “I’m going to do a super quick workout that I learned from the Peloton, which is a special device I invented, but I can’t tell you what it does.” Bear flails around for a bit, jumping and kicking and pirouetting, before falling asleep on the floor. Bear tires easily.