All the Breaks
Surfing Costa Rica’s Pacific Coast. Published in Sunday Star Times Magazine. We live in a world dominated by ever increasing competition for scarce resources is a given, and out on the water things are no different. As surfing numbers boom uncrowded waves are increasingly rare and competition for the right to ride them is intense […]
Men at War
Writer turned Oscar-nominated filmmaker, Sebastian Junger – Published in The Listener George Orwell once said “We sleep safe in our beds because rough men stand ready in the night to visit violence on those who would do us harm”. In his new book simply titled ‘War’, Sebastian Junger sets out to show us what these ‘rough […]
Motorcycle Masala
Riding Enfields in the Indian Himalaya Published in The Listener On the backseat of the night bus from Delhi, a pair of nervous newlyweds sit beside me. As the bus lurches through the night to the accompaniment of a noisy symphony of horn and Hindi music the lovebirds tentatively hold hands testing the parameters of […]
The Unbearable Lightness of Skiing
Heliskiing Alaskas Last Frontier Published in The Listener There’s something disquieting yet strangely satisfying about travelling to places where you’re not at the top of the food chain. It gives a sense of perspective rare in our comfortable cosseted world. It’s a feeling Alaska provides in spades. There are grumpy bears that would smite you with one […]
Adventures of a Lifetime
Polar Explorer and English eccentric, Sir Ranulph Fiennes – Published in The New Zealand Way. It’s 4 am and Sir Ranulph Twisleton-Wykeham Fiennes (“just call me Ran”) has been walking all night. As he traverses through the precipitous bluffs of Queenstown’s Hector Mountains with only the dim pool of light from a headlamp for guidance […]
The Herminator
Skiing Superstar Published in The Listener It is one of those sporting moments that, courtesy of a thousand lingering and lurid slow motion replays, is indelibly burned into the mind. Hermann Maier, the skiing machine they call ‘the Herminator’ is wearing the red and white ski suit and red helmet emblazoned with the eagle of […]
Frozen in Time
The Race to Save Scott and Shackletons Antarctic Huts Published in The Listener Some 4000km south of New Zealand in the icy moonscape of Antarctica stand a few huts: a stack of weather-beaten boards in a Godforsaken cold and desolate landscape. Walking into the huts is eerie, like stepping into a time capsule. It’s one […]
Dave Jenkins – Surfer, Healer
Surf Aid Founder Dr Dave Jenkins Published in The Listener Unless you are a surfer you have probably never heard of the Mentawais. If you do surf you will probably know that this chain of more than 40 islands is one of the hottest new surfing destinations on the planet. Deep ocean swells roll uninterrupted […]
Rocky Mountain Way
Ski Touring Europe’s Haute Route Published in The Listener From the land that bestowed upon the world the dubious musical gift of bagpipes comes a well-known folk song about two weary travelers walking back to the bonny homeland who are faced with a fork in the road. The chorus runs; “You take the high road […]