Packshaw participated in the 1989–1990 Whitbread Round the World Race, representing Great Britain. In 1996, he crossed Mongolia on horseback searching for the nomadic Dukha people, and in 1999, he motorbiked across East Africa. In 2005, he won a 450-mile race to the North Pole, and in 2008, he helped guide 15-year-old Camilla Hempleman-Adams to ski the last degree to the Geographic North Pole. In 2011, he summited Mount Everest, helping to raise £130,000 for Walking with the Wounded, The Warrior Program, and Alzheimer's Research UK. In 2012, the centenary of Captain Robert Falcon Scott's "Terra Nova" Expedition, he led a team including three wounded veterans to the South Pole to raise money for Walking with the Wounded. In 2014, led an expedition across the coast of Nigeria from Cameroon to Benin via jet ski. That same year, Packshaw co-ordinated and led an expedition including two wounded veterans that followed the route of Sir Earnest Shackleton voyage of the "James Caird" from Antarctica to South Georgia to raise money for the Defence and National Rehabilitation Centre. In 2015, he led a team of businessmen to the North Pole, raising more than £400,000 for The Prince's Trust, and in 2017, he led a team to the South Pole that raised more than £685,000 for The Prince's Trust and the Roundhouse Trust.