Bangkok countdown

We're counting down to our next business trip. Eight days from now we're off to Thailand. We're visiting one of our largest suppliers and reviewing their factory near Bangkok. The last time we inspected their operation was 2016. 

I was seriously ill during our trip nine years ago. While we enjoyed an awesome view of the Chao Phraya River from our hotel room (see the photo posted), sadly, I spent much of my time in bed with a fever and chest infection. When we arrived back in Sydney, I took to my bed and slept for almost three days.

Hopefully we'll have better luck this time despite the tragic aftermath of this week's earthquake in neighbouring Myanmar. However, before we fly, my brother and sister-in-law are dropping by for a week. We have lots of fun activities planned for Matt and Shelley. Watch this space.

Dual citizenship

This morning, my calendar popped up with an anniversary reminder. It's 32 years since I became a dual citizen. Living in Australia and becoming an Australian citizen was never the grand plan for my life. Instead, thanks to a fortuitous set of circumstances, I came to live here.

Back then, becoming an Australian citizen was a relatively simple exercise, at least for New Zealanders. I completed an application, paid a relatively modest fee and attended a brief screening interview. A few months later, I received a letter advising that my application was approved. I duly attended a citizenship ceremony in the Hornsby Council Chambers and officially became an Australian on 29 March 1993.

These days, the process takes a year or more, costs a small fortune, and involves a mountain of paperwork, police checks, medical examinations, and other bureaucratic hurdles. I still vividly recall my screening interview at an office in Chatswood. 

I remember sitting in a waiting room filled with people. Most of the applicants that day were of Asian descent. I was one of the only Caucasians in the room. The interviewer emerged from an interview room and called my name, noting I was a New Zealand citizen. She breathed a sigh of relief and predicted a quick meeting. Apparently, I'd get her back on schedule. I was asked about my English proficiency, criminal record, and a few other details I can't recall. My interview then concluded.

A few months later, my friend Michele attended my citizenship ceremony. It seemed apt that she be there, given her pivotal role in helping me settle in Australia. Afterwards, we enjoyed a remarkably unmemorable afternoon tea with local councillors before heading out for a celebration dinner.

My motivation for becoming a dual citizen was relatively straightforward. After living in Australia for 2.5 years, I could see myself settling into a comfortable life. I couldn't imagine returning permanently to New Zealand any time soon. Hence, I didn't want a future Government or legislative change to hinder my ability to live or retire unrestrained in Australia. Once I discovered that I could hold dual citizenship and thus maintain my New Zealand identity, becoming an Australian was an easy decision.

32 years later, I have no regrets. My Australian life has been blessed (just read this blog!). Australia has been good to me.

The 1.9 percent club

I read today that the Antarctic tourism season is drawing to a close for another year. The season typically runs from mid-October to early April. The last season, ending April 2024, saw a record number of visitors. 124,262 people visited the Antarctic, with 80,251 making at least one shore landing, albeit on an offshore island or the continent itself.

These stats made me curious about the year Garry and I visited the white continent. We flew to King George Island and cruised the Antarctic Peninsula in the Summer of 2010-11. Interestingly, the International Association of Antarctica Tour Operators (IAATO) publishes a report at the end of every season. According to its report, the season we visited recorded 19,065 landings. Another 14,373 passengers cruised in the region without making landfall. Ten per cent of these travellers were Australians.

By the end of the 2010-11 season, it's estimated that around 450,000 tourists had landed in Antarctica since tourism started in the late 1960s. Including the season of our visit, only 304,811 tourists had done so since records began in 1992. Less than 7,000 were visiting annually before 1992, hence the lifetime figure of less than half a million. 

I was surprised to learn that only 531 people participated in air-cruise voyages including Garry and me. Only two vessels were supporting these visitors, Ocean Nova the ship we sailed on, and a smaller 12-passenger motor yacht. Apparently, the year before, only 345 people had arrived in Antarctica this way. As for our vessel, 501 passengers that sailed on her flew across the Drake Passage. This was the first year Antarctica 21, the company we cruised with, flew more than 500 people in a single season. It seems we were very much tourism pioneers.

As an aside, I’ve also read that in the years since our tour, only one other flight has been delayed three days like we were. If I understood the data correctly, this was the group that came after us as they were also delayed three days. Apparently, four flights have been delayed longer. Antarctica 21 has operated 310 flights up to April 2024. This means we were one of only six flights, or 1.9%, that experienced a significant delay. How lucky are we!

Fox Glacier

Here's the third and final retrospective post about the South Island road trip I took in the Summer of 1995. It’s another of my Kodak-era travel adventures. In other words, every image in these posts was scanned from an ageing photo album. You’ll find the first post here, and the second post here.  On 8 January, after three nights in Queenstown, my flatmate, Chris Ogg, and I drove over Haast Pass to Fox Glacier.

The drive through the remote Haast wilderness was wonderful. Lake Wanaka and Lake Hawea were at their best. We stopped to admire the view at The Neck lookout and again when crossing the famous Gates of Haast Bridge. That's the bridge below. I still vividly recall the craggy old-growth rainforest lining long stretches of coastal road in a verdant canyon. Our accommodation for the night was a motel at Fox Glacier.

We finished the day by visiting the Fox Glacier terminus. A short 1.5 km walk from the carpark along the river's gravel bed took us to its crumbling icy façade. The ancient slabs of iridescent blue ice were simply mesmerizing. I’ve read that the glacier was advancing a metre a week in 1996, the year after our visit. Sadly, in recent decades, thanks to climate change, it’s retreated almost a kilometre upstream.

The following morning, we made our way to the local airfield, hoping to score a helicopter flight over the Fox Glacier. Flights had been grounded for several days due to inclement weather, the same conditions we’d encountered in Milford Sound the previous day. I didn’t rate our chances as low-level clouds covered the coast.

However, we were in luck. The tour company told us flights had resumed. The glacier was in a cloud-free valley with perfect flying conditions reported at a higher elevation. We booked the first flight of the day. What a flight it was. We followed the Fox River towards the glacier's terminus, then rose over its craggy ice flows, séracs, and deep crevasses. 

As we climbed, the scene below grew increasingly spectacular. Lingering coastal clouds quickly gave way to a stunning deep blue sky. The first photo above shows our view back down the glacier. Its icy mass descends 2,600 metres from the Southern Alps, flowing almost 13 kilometres towards the coast before finishing near the rainforest just 300 metres above sea level.

Our pilot landed on an icy plateau at the top of the glacier. We spent ten minutes or so walking on the pristine, dazzling white snow, snapping photos and soaking in the alpine scenery. However, we were in for one more treat. As the first flight for several days, the pilot wanted to briefly survey the neighbouring Frans Josef Glacier. We flew north along the alpine ridge and briefly circled the second glacier before returning to base.

From Fox Glacier, we drove up the West Coast as far as Greymouth. Here we took a brief detour so that I could see the house I lived in for the first four years of my life. As we rounded a corner on Freyberg Terrace, it came into view. The two-storey building with its distinctive grey roof was instantly recognizable. It looked exactly as I recalled it in photographs from my childhood. 

The second image of the house below was cleaned up using AI and Photoshop. The original file my aunt shared was very low-resolution. Yes, that's me in the middle. The final image was taken by Hamish when he visited Greymouth last month. It's amazing the house is still standing 60 years later.

We then drove over Arthur Pass to Christchurch where we stopped for the night. Along the way, we stopped again and again to soak in the alpine landscape, which included the dramatic Otira Gorge and its infamous winding road. These days, an impressive 445-metre-long viaduct carries the road up the valley floor. When it opened in 1999 it bypassed the "Zig-Zag", a series of hair-raising hairpin turns that had made this section of road notorious.

My father used to tell stories of how he and Mum successfully navigated these tight turns by driving their modest little Morris Minor in reverse up the then-unpaved gravel road. Incredibly, this car is still in the family, although it's no longer roadworthy. My grandmother bought it from my parents while they were living in Greymouth and kept it until she died in 1997. My cousin Carolyn has it parked in a shed out the back of her home in Christchurch.

Back to our road trip. Auntie Pam hosted us overnight on a makeshift bed on her sunroom floor. We then spent our final day in New Zealand exploring the highlights of Christchurch and the Avon River before making our way to the airport. Before we knew it, we were back in Sydney.

Rivers, rain and rope

Here's the second of three retrospective posts about the road trip Chris Ogg and I took around New Zealand's South Island in January 1995. Our first full day in Queenstown was spent ticking off its popular sights. This was my first time in Queenstown, so I was determined to experience as much as possible. As a result, we took time out to ride the Skyline Gondola, visit the historic township of Arrowtown and cruise Lake Wakatipu on the SS Earnslaw.

We also spent half a day jetboating up the Dart River. It was a truly magnificent experience. Our boat threaded its way from Glenorchy along sinuous river channels weaving through the river’s gravel beds before stopping for a brief scenic walk. We then raced up an increasingly narrow channel framed by truck-sized boulders into the rainforest below Mount Earnslaw. Here we stopped for a second photo opportunity.

I vividly recall how stunning the Southern Alps looked with the last of their winter snow under a vivid blue sky. It’s also the first time I can recall marvelling at the vivid turquoise blue water of New Zealand’s alluvial rivers. Their unique colour comes from fine granite silt particles, or glacial flour, suspended in the water.

The following day, Saturday 7 January, we drove to Milford Sound for the day. Along the way we stopped to admire Lake Te Anau and the Cleddau Valley that leads into the Homer Tunnel. The forecast for the day was for heavy rain. While we were hoping for better weather, the experience was nevertheless spectacular.

As we exited the Homer Tunnel, we were greeted by a sight I’ve never seen before or since. The tunnel opens out into an ancient bowl-shaped glacial valley framed by soaring granite cliffs. The rain was pelting down. All around us the cliff face had been transformed into an endless parade of waterfalls cascading into the valley below. Years later, Garry and I drove through the same location on a sunny day. Not a single fall was visible.

We took a sightseeing cruise through the sound, stopped just short of the heads as a heavy swell was rolling in from the Tasman Sea. Again, everywhere we looked the soaring mountainsides were alive with waterfalls. Sadly, we didn’t see many of the Sound’s stunning mountain peaks. However, the experience of being immersed in a misty and watery landscape was genuinely breathtaking. Incredibly, the weather was dry and warm in Queenstown upon our return.

On Sunday, we departed Queenstown and made our way to the West Coast via Haast Pass. Again, another experience that had been on my bucket list for years. As we drove out of town we passed the AJ Hackett Bungy Centre. This is the world’s original bungy jump site. It operates from an old suspension bridge over the Kawarau Gorge. On a whim I decided to give it a go. Nothing would convince Chris to do the same.

I recently got the video of this jump converted from VHS to MPEG. I’ll eventually load it here. Until then I've saved a handful of screenshots that tell the story. My most vivid memory of my jump was simply the shock I felt upon hearing the wind whistling in my ears. I’d not expected to hear anything and could only recall hearing such a sound while travelling at speed on skis or riding a motorbike. The jump itself was fine. It was just the unexpected sound that did my head in.

Bucket list road trip

In 1995, I took my flatmate, Chris Ogg, on a road trip around the South Island of New Zealand. The trip was a bucket list experience for both of us. Chris was in Australia on a 12-month working holiday visa. I met him shortly after he arrived in 1994, working behind the bar at the local Beresford Hotel. At the time, I was living with a work colleague, Mark, and his partner Vincent. 

Mark had just accepted a transfer to establish and run my company’s new Hong Kong office. As a result, I was on the lookout for a new flatmate. I mentioned this to Chris one evening. He was looking for a permanent place to stay and asked if he could see my flat. He moved in shortly after. 

Chris and I quickly became the best of mates. We cooked our meals together, hung out at the pub with friends, attended dance parties and headed out of town on weekend excursions. Living with him was a year filled with plenty of happy memories.

We flew into Auckland on Monday 2 January. The date was deliberately chosen to give us enough time to recover from an all-night New Year’s Eve Party at the Horden Pavillion. At the time Mum and Dad were still living in Matamata but were holidaying in their second home at the Mount. I’m not entirely sure how we got to the Mount from Auckland. However, I suspect we flew down and were collected by my parents upon arrival.

While on the North Island, we took a day trip to Rotorua to experience its geothermal attractions. This included the famous Pōhutu and Waikite geysers. We also took time out to enjoy the Mount Hot Pools and complete an obligatory circuit around the Mount. However, there’s not much else I can recall from our time with my family.

On 5 January we caught a morning flight directly to Christchurch where we collected a rental car. We then spent six days making a circuit around the lower South Island. Our road trip began with a drive to Queenstown where we based ourselves for three nights. 

We stopped at Lake Tekapo to see the Church of the Good Shepherd. I was delighted to find the chapel open. We stepped inside to experience its famous panoramic window directly behind the altar. Another bucket list item was completed. Sadly, tourists are no longer welcome inside, or at least that was our experience in 2023. 

We then took a brief detour to visit the massive Benmore Dam. As an infrastructure geek, the dam had long been on my bucket list. It’s New Zealand’s largest dam and is home to the nation’s second-largest hydro station. Incredibly, the entire structure is built from clay and gravel. I’m not too proud to admit that I loved driving along the dam’s crest, and admiring it from a viewing point on the opposite side. It’s an impressive structure

We had one final sight I'd always wanted to see. As we drove south, we passed along the shores of Lake Dunstan and through Cromwell's relocated main street. Lake Dunstan is a manmade lake formed by the Clyde High Dam, which opened in 1993. 

As a child I recall my parents taking us up the Cromwell Gorge in the 1970s, and seeing apricot orchards spread along its frost-free valley floor. All of this disappeared, along with lower-lying districts in the township of Cromwell when the lake was filled. I'd never returned to see the final result until this road trip.

Follow this link for our day trip to Milford Sound, plus my first and only bungy jump.

Toy Fair 2025

It’s been ten years since Garry and I saw Artiwood, our current business, for the very first time. We met with John Daniels, the former owner, at the Australian Gift & Home Association (AGHA) Home & Giving Fair in February 2015. He’d put his business on the market with a broker just ten days earlier.

We met John in the Dome, an exhibition building at the Sydney Showgrounds in Homebush. This let us to see the business in action, review its products, and meet its staff and customers. It was also the first time John had exhibited using a new custom-built. You can see an image of it below.

The new stand certainly made a strong impression. It professionally presented the brands Artiwood supported and gave us a sense of their potential. After meeting with John, we prepared a business case and made him an offer. It took another 3.5 months to complete due diligence, raise bank financing and complete the transaction.

It’ll be ten years next month since I flew to Mullumbimby, via Coolangatta, to meet John again. I spent four days touring his Brisbane-based 3PL warehouse and conducting more due diligence. John hosted me in a small apartment he owned in town. He also took me to Byron Bay and Brunswick Heads during my stay. It was a superb introduction to the Northern Rivers region.

Fast forward a decade. This week, Artiwood exhibited at the annual Australian Toy Association’s Toy Fair in Melbourne. This year we funded a new custom stand. It’s the smallest stand we’ve had at this event, and the smallest we’ve ever built for a major event.

Once again Garry didn't fly to Melbourne. He opted out of the Reed Gift Fair last August to spend more time with his Mum in her final months. Although, after last year's Toy Fair, we'd decided four people on the stand were unnecessary. We coped fine with three of us in August - and again this week. If truth be told, I suspect Garry will never attend another Melbourne trade show.

Sadly, trade shows are no longer a primary marketing tool. As a result, we’re progressively trimming our show budget and spending our marketing dollars elsewhere. However, the week’s event still felt like a watershed experience. We scheduled meetings throughout the week with key accounts and strategic prospects. Collectively, these engagements felt more productive and more progressive than many of the interactions we’ve had previously.

Trading conditions are tough at the moment. Australian retailers are enduring another year of what’s technically a retail recession. If the quality of this week’s engagements is any indication, then maybe we’re almost through the worst. I’m equally encouraged to see our customer base quietly evolving over time.

Build it and they will come

The rumours are true. I’m an infrastructure geek. I love learning about major civil engineering works. Over the years, I’ve blogged about structures like the Akashi Kaikyo Bridge, the world’s longest single-span suspension bridge, the Panama Canal, and Burj Khalifa, the world’s tallest building.

Currently, a couple of construction projects in New South Wales are firm favourites. That is, the Coffs Harbour bypass and the M1 Motorway Extension to Raymond Terrace. Once completed you’ll be able to drive from Sydney to Brisbane without encountering a single stop sign or traffic light. In fact, following the recent completion of the Northconnex tunnel in northern Sydney, you’ll be able to do the same from Melbourne to Brisbane.

Last December, Garry and I drove past both projects on our way to our holiday in Ballina. I was surprised (and delighted) to see an elevated roadway rising on the Raymond Terrace bypass. It’s part of a 2.6-kilometre viaduct across the Hunter River and surrounding floodplain. The scale of this roadway was impressive, to say the least.

Once completed, this 15-kilometre motorway extension will remove five sets of traffic lights and cut 15 minutes or more from travel times during peak periods. For years, we’ve dreaded this section of road as traffic slows to a crawl for kilometres in the run-up to the existing river crossing.

Likewise, the Coffs Harbour bypass will involve 14 kilometres of dual carriageway and three tunnels, diverting traffic around this north-coast city. Last December, massive earthworks were underway at either end of the bypass. The Coffs Harbour bypass is scheduled to open in late 2027, while the M1 extension at Raymond Terrace will open in 2028.

However, I won't force Garry to make a special trip to experience the roads when they open. In 1998, I recall taking a detour while driving to the Hunter Valley with my friend Michele to see the recently opened M1 motorway extension to Tomago. Years later, she drove me across Hong Kong's recently opened Tsing Ma Bridge in her employer's convertible simply because she knew I'd relish the experience. Halfway across the bridge, its presentation floodlights timed out for the night, leaving us in total darkness.

 Lake George Dual Carriageway: Shutterstock

When I relocated to Australia in 1990, things were very different. Back then, the Pacific Highway was considered one of Australia's most deadly roads thanks to horrific head-on collisions including the Kempsey bus crash that killed 35 people and injured 41 the year before I arrived. 

The equally busy Hume Highway between Sydney and Melbourne was also incomplete with lengthy sections lacking a dual carriageway. I recall the opening of bypasses at Goulburn and Mittagong in 1992, plus the final section of missing road near Holbrook, which opened in 2013.

Likewise, a dual carriageway on the Federal Highway between Goulburn and Canberra was well underway, including an elevated roadway along the shores of Lake George. Fast forward 35 years, and the dual carriageway is now progressively extending south along the Pacific Highway towards Batemans Bay. I love it. Sad but true.

Where to next?

We have plenty of travel coming up. First, I’ll fly to Melbourne at the end of the month to set up our stand for another Australian Toy Fair. Then in April, Garry and I fly to Bangkok to meet one of our largest suppliers. We last visited their factory in 2016 and haven’t seen them in person since they stopped exhibiting at Nurmberg in 2020.

We also have Matt and Shelley scheduled to visit for a week in early April. We’ll take them to the airport when they leave and depart for Bangkok shortly after. While they’re in town I’ve booked all of us in for an overnight stay at Taronga Zoo’s luxury Wildlife Retreat. I scored a great deal on rooms before Christmas, a 30% discount, which made the whole experience way more affordable.

Finally, my EO Forum has scheduled its annual retreat this year in Queenstown. We’ll be off to New Zealand for three nights in late June. I’m just praying it won’t be bitterly cold.

What a difference a decade makes

We’re back from another year walking the halls of Spielwarenmesse in Nuremberg. It’s hard to believe we’ve been going to Germany every year since 2016 (COVID hiatus aside). This year’s event was as busy as ever. According to our iPhone apps we’ve walked more than 75,000 steps over six days.

Sadly, we missed out on our First-class points upgrade coming home this year. However, we did secure the first two bulkhead seats in Business that offered extra leg room, so all wasn’t lost. This year we caught a late flight from Frankfurt to London and stopped overnight before continuing to Sydney.

We made the most of our stopover with a day trip to Windsor. The day dawned with clear skies and sunshine making it ideal for some outdoor activity. We arrived in Windsor shortly after noon. We walked along the Thames before embarking on The Long Walk. This is an arrow-straight path extending 4.2 km from Windsor Castle to Snow Hill, home to an elevated statue of George the Third on horseback. 

The walk took more than an hour each way. Hundreds, if not thousands, of people were doing the same thing. The statue on Snow Hill was impressive up close. The monumental bronze statue is larger than life size, about 7.9 metres high, and is mounted on a rugged stone plinth 8 metres high. The view from its base, looking back to the castle, is impressive, to say the least.

However, one unforgettable sight captured our attention. Windsor Castle lies directly under the flight path of Heathrow's southern runway. As a result, low-flying passenger jets descend like clockwork over the northern end of The Long Walk every few minutes. The stream of aircraft was unrelenting. I've read that up to 37 flights an hour pass overhead. I'm surprised the Queen enjoyed staying at Windsor as much as she did.

Once we’d completed the walk, we returned to London. With an hour to fill before heading to Heathrow, we decided to try out Vagabond, a wine bar on the Grand Canal we’d spotted the previous week. We used the bar's quirky self-vending wine wall to toast another successful business trip. We've returned home with two new brands and a greater appreciation for everything we’ve achieved over the last decade.

We’ve developed some wonderful friendships with people from around the world. Our suppliers have become friends, and we regularly encounter people at the show and the airport who treat us with enormous respect. We’ve certainly become known as established players in our own right.

This was evident on our final night in Nuremberg when we organized dinner for an eclectic group of industry colleagues. Our table included a supplier’s trade show team, distributors of similar brands and other industry contacts. Nations represented at dinner included Australia, The Netherlands, Canada, the UK, Belgium, and Italy (plus two expats, one from New Zealand and one from Ireland).

It’s hard to believe it’s been ten years this month since we met John Daniels, Artiwood’s former owner, and decided to buy his business. What a ride it's been!