Campaigner Jessie Stevens hit the national headlines when she rode her bike from her home town of Newton Abbot to the COP26 climate conference in Glasgow.

Jessie writes a Green Champions column in the Mid-Devon Advertiser.

Here she records her experience as a YRE (Young Reporter for the Environment) at the conference that was attended by world leaders and international media:

COP26. What a week!

After finishing my cycle on the 31st of October, on Tuesday I was pushed into the full force and whirlwind that is COP26.

Having had little time to process the roller coaster and life changing experience that was my 12 day cycle to COP26, it was safe to say that I was pretty exhausted before even venturing into the summit.

It was on that cold crisp Tuesday morning that I queued up with quite literally thousands of others ready to jump through the multiple different hoops before I could get into the summit. Badge, ID, Negative Covid test, security – the process to get in, felt never ending.

A good two hours later, I finally set foot in the venue, the place I had been working towards, thinking about, pinning my hopes on for so long.

I can’t say if it was anything like I imagined, as I had never been to any summit or conference before.

It was a whole new world: Blue, green furniture and carpets; sterile white walls and meeting rooms; logos and brand sponsorship plastered everywhere and a sea of people all milling around.

It was certainly quite the culture shock from Devon.

Due to my role as a YRE (Young Reporter for the Environment), my job was to interview delegates about the summit, and also write about any topics from within.

It has to be said that I was extremely excited about my role and the opportunities I thought it would present, due to my passion for bringing the youth voice and perspective into the media.

So much has gone on and so much is still continuing, and so, at the moment it feels as though the whole situation is still very much unfolding.

For many of us up here in Glasgow, it has been a hectic, overwhelming period of being pulled in all manner of different ways.

It has been full of amazing connections, events and inspiration in contrast with a lack of political will, action and engagement within.

It is going to take quite a while to process our feelings, emotions and thoughts about the outcomes of the summit, and so in my next few columns, I aim to do just this.

Is this COP the one in which we have worked ‘Together for our Planet’ as the branding so clearly states? For now until we can all process what has occurred, I don’t know.

However what I can detect is a very exciting new feeling. Something I have never felt nor can completely comprehend.

If asked to dig a bit deeper and to identify it, it feels like an awakening in the people.

A stirring, rousing, feeling of change, of new horizons and of power coming from deep within.

If 100,000 plus people all marching together doesn’t tell you something, I am not sure what will.