Although it's entitled "Travel", this page has turned into more of a general bio than just a list of countries visited. I guess it will be the place to write about the parts of my life outside of work.
Early days
I was born in Sydney, Australia in 1968, but my folks soon moved to New Zealand and I consider myself proud to be a Kiwi. I would say I had a fairly privileged middle class upbringing, growing up on a small farm just outside Auckland. My education started at a small local school, rural enough that they had an annual Agricultural day. Life at home was pleasant, living on a farm full of trees, horses, sheep, cattle and chickens. I enjoyed playing (and sometimes fighting) with my three younger brothers. Between primary and secondary school, the family traveled to Vancouver, Canada for six months, as my father, an academic, took a sabbatical.
Back in New Zealand, and off to secondary school at Orewa College. One of the first stops in my orientation tour was to the school computer room, where I was introduced to the single Apple ][ europlus in residence, an encounter from which can possibly be traced my ongoing enthusiasm for the fine hardware and software engineered by Apple. Five years of standard issue college education takes us to 1987, when I enrolled to study Computer Science at the University of Auckland. One memorable experience from the Orewa College days was a trekking expedition to Nepal, undertaken by about 20 students and two teachers in late 1987.
This is where life really started to get interesting. Along with more independence from parents and teachers came a whole rush of fresh experiences. Exposure to new friends, new music, fresh ideas and women were the hallmarks of the gateway to adulthood. During this time I moved out of my parent's house. I discovered motorcycles. I partied hard, and I even managed to fit in a little study. Two years in and things were looking good, however, by the third year my interest in the academic side of University life was definitely on the decline, and my grades suffered accordingly. In hindsight, probably the best thing I could have done at this point would have been to take a year out to travel, work, or do whatever I needed to to regain motivation sufficient to complete my degree. Foolishly though, I returned for another year of study and bombed out.
Time for a change of pace. I moved to Tauranga in the Bay of Plenty, and went into business with two friends. We figured that, although urgent courier services were common in Auckland, the trend hadn't hit the rest of the country yet, and so we started a motorcycle courier firm. All three of us were first time businessmen, and despite dire warnings that 90% of small businesses fail in their first year, and another 90% in the second, we worked hard and made Bay Sprint Couriers a profitable operation. After four years I decided that it was time to extend my horizons, and so I sold my stake in the company to my remaining partner, Andy, and moved onto my next adventure. As a testimony to hard work and to the viability of the concept, I'm proud to see that Bay Sprint Couriers is still in operation, 14 years later.
Looking back from the deck of Adventure at the receding figures of friends and family on the Tauranga pier, I didn't have too much idea of what lay ahead, but I knew it was going to be very different from anything I'd previously experienced. Adventure was a 126' gaff-rigged schooner, and we were headed to Indonesia to take part in the Arung Samudra celebrations, commemorating 50 years of Indonesian independence. Specifically, we intended to take part in the Bali-Jakarta race for Tall Ships. >>>