She was now the fastest and youngest person to circumnavigate our enormous island country, but breaking those records was breaking her marriage.

Bonnie had faced sea sickness, sharks, crocodiles, sea snakes and violent storms in her quest to conquer the ultimate opponent, the ocean. Her fingers were swollen to twice the size, discs in her back were bulging, but the deepest wounds from her epic ordeal were on the inside.

While husband and high-performance AFL coach Matt Palmer supported Bonnie throughout the eight-month adventure, quitting his job to help raise funds and managing the trip on-land while she was in the water, the physical distance, compounded by the extreme mental strain

of her ocean odyssey, created an emotional gulf she struggled to bridge.

Just eight weeks from the end of her journey, she told her husband she needed to take a break, that she couldn’t be a wife.

However, with the memoir of her incredible feat published this week, Bonnie said The Girl Who Touched the Stars was not just an account of her adventure or a tempting travelogue of the natural wonders of Australia, but also a testament to her journey of emotional growth and the strength of love.

With their marriage now as solid as the ground beneath her feet, Bonnie said the book was dedicated to her husband, who supported her decision to tell the whole story, including the toll the trip took on their relationship.

“Not only did I risk my life in the middle of the ocean, which is a difficult thing to ask your partner to support in the first place, but also my marriage,” said Bonnie, 33, now safely back on dry land in her Mermaid Beach unit.

“We bent so close to breaking that I questioned many times whether it was all worth it.

“We were essentially physically separated for eight months, he was always forward-planning to ensure we could keep going, but that was all done from land.

“Then when we would come ashore, he would want to know what had happened out there … but I had already celebrated those wins, or came to terms with the trauma, on the ocean with the crew. I didn’t have the energy or the words to tell him and include him. So you drift.

“It was hard to keep myself going physically, mentally and emotionally because the exhaustion was so intense, let alone to look after my marriage.

“His loyalty and sacrifice in never giving up on me was one of the hugest things to take away from this. Once I was back home and we were finally together at the end, we had learned so much about each other and ourselves, I can’t imagine we could be any stronger together.

“Dedicating this book to him is the least I could do, he quit his job for me, he put his life on hold, he put his life savings into this. I was the one who got the glory, but he’s the one who really proves the power of one person.”

Bonnie said recounting those heartbreaking moments was precisely why she wanted to write the book, she wanted to show the grit and ugliness that lay beneath the trophies, the media acclaim and filtered social media posts.

She said one of the biggest realisations she had during her surf ski circumnavigation was that winning was not about how fast she could paddle, but how deep inside she could dig.

To that end, not only did she paddle solo around the country in eight months, she also wrote the memoir herself. Fittingly, her own journey was inspired by a book detailing German Freya Hoffmeister’s record-setting paddle around Australia in 2009.

“The title of my book is about chasing that big win, getting it and realising it wasn’t the win that mattered,” said Bonnie, whose family, including older sister Courtney Hancock, is full of athletes.

“I’ve been competing my whole life, but I never scored the victories I thought I needed. When I was 23, I was cutting down my meals and increasing my training trying to get that edge, and I ended up getting chronic fatigue which took me out of sports for two years.

“But that actually gave me some perspective at the time, which lead to me competing in the surf ski events and then, ultimately, doing this circumnavigation.

“I was never naturally gifted with sports, but hard work always wins out … whether in paddling or writing.

“But hard work is exactly that, it’s not pretty. Often we only see the picture at the top of the podium, not the ugly grit on the way there – and that’s what I wanted to include in the book. It’s far from flattering, in fact, there’s a lot of vomit.

“Even when I reached that pinnacle and set the records, it turns out the win wasn’t what I was chasing.

“It was while I was out in the ocean that I learned to look right, back at the land, to remember to be there in the moment and not just chase the finishing line. I learned to make friends with the ocean, to not just see it as a place of competition, and to feel the love and connection with the community – my husband, my support team and the public cheering me on.

“I learned that greatness isn’t defined by what we do as individuals, but the impact we make along the way.”

The impact Bonnie created has been far-reaching, with her paddle raising more than $120,000 for mental health charity Gotcha4Life.

She said it was often comments from people who had struggled with their mental health, or whose family members had been affected, that inspired her to keep going in the worst conditions.

Incredibly, she said the only time she was pain-free during the paddle was the very first day when she set off from Mermaid Beach.

From there, she experienced not just physical issues but also sharks and crocodiles.

“I’m so glad I didn’t know how tough it was going to be, my naivety protected me in a way,” she said.

“I would get scared just paddling out five kilometres from the shore, I’d always stick with the pack, but this was just me in an 8m surf ski, hundreds of kilometres offshore.

“One day I was paddling with my headphones in off the coast of WA and I saw the crew mouthing at me to come in to the support boat, but I wanted to finish the song. Then I saw the looks on their faces, looked in the water, and there was a great white shark, diving down under the ski.

“I was out of there then. But the next day you have to start in the exact same place, so that’s a little unnerving.

“Then when we got to the Kimberley and the Northern Territory, it was flat, hot and perfect for crocs. I’d have to paddle at night because of the heat so all I have is a head torch and the crew shining their torches on the water, you don’t even want to look at the water because every log looks like a croc.

“One croc followed me for 20 minutes, it was stalking me. But they didn’t tell me until the next week, for my own sake.

“Sharks are terrifying but I think crocs are worse, they sit and watch you … plus they have legs.”

While not as deadly, Bonnie discovered she suffered from sea sickness during her 500km paddle across the Great Australian Bight, losing almost 10kg in the 12-day crossing.

Paddling across the top of the country, she also encountered strange flashing lights in what she still can’t discount as a UFO sighting.

“I had only really been on a boat through the Great Barrier Reef, so it was unpleasant to discover that I do get seasick. It was awful, just constant vomiting. We could see each other visibly losing weight each day.

“If anyone else wanted to try this paddle, I would help them in every way … but there are some things I wouldn’t tell them for their own protection.”

While it took a couple of months to readjust back to life on land, Bonnie said she would never retrace her paddle, considering herself lucky to have survived.

However, even after she made it home, having set the world record for the fastest and youngest to circumnavigate the country, as well as the world record for the longest 24-hour paddle by a woman, a massive 213km, she got back in the water just two weeks later to set another record.

“The men’s 24hr record was 228km, so I figured I’d give that a try, I still had a bulging disc but I knew I’d never be in better condition,” she said.

“I paddled 235km … and that’s it for me.

“Next time I go around the country, I’ll choose a caravan I think. I could do the grey nomad life.”

And there’s no doubt that husband Matt will still be by her side, as their adventure together continues.

The Girl Who Touched the Stars will be released on January 31 and available from Dymocks, QBD, Big W and all good bookshops.