 It is known as the Capital of Cars, the Engine of Italy. Born within a golden circle that surrounds the city of Modena, are the mythical brands whispered on the lips of car lovers the world over, along with the mega-rich, and boys of all ages. Maserati. De Tomaso. Pagani. The Italian sports car introduced the world to speed and luxury, the ultimate union of art and technology. Defining this perfectly are the region’s two most famous sons: Lamborghini, and Ferrari, vehicles that have transcended the circuits and bolts within them, commanding religious-like reverence from both drivers, and dreamers. Few car enthusiasts know there would be no Lamborghini were it not for Ferrari. Ferrucio Lamborghini was one of the wealthiest men in Italy, having made his fortune selling tractors and appliances. An avid car enthusiast and collector, among Ferrucio’s favourites were several Ferraris, although he found them to be mechanically temperamental. A recurring clutch issue led him to contact Enzo Ferrari, founder and namesake, a volatile character best described as being ferociously driven in the pursuit of automobile racing. How different the vehicle landscape would be if Ferrari had taken his customer’s feedback seriously. Instead, Enzo allowed the manufacture of Ferrari sports cars only as a means to fund his beloved racing initiatives. Private customers had to put up with Enzo’s notoriously dismissive attitude, viewed as an unfortunate by-product for owning a vehicle of such outstanding quality. Ferrucio was no different. However, once informed that a tractor manufacturer had no right to criticize Ferrari’s cars, Lamborghini was compelled to repair his own models, and discovered that the mechanics of car and tractors had encouraging similarities. If Ferrari would not improve their road models, Lamborghini had the knowledge and financial clout to do it for them. In 1963, Automobili Lamborghini was born. With the help of hired ex-Ferrari engineers, his first model - a 350 GTV - was rolled out, built in a factory set up not far from Ferrari’s own. Unlike Ferrari, Lamborghini would focus solely on sports cars, shying away from the racetrack. Today, Lamborghini is a name synonymous with the Italian sports car, a better-looking thorn in the much bigger Ferrari landscape. Did Enzo rue his decision to insult Ferrucio? Probably not. He was a man so focused on the chequered flag there was little time for Sunday afternoon drives in the countryside.  Just a few minutes across the municipal border into Bologna, you’ll find the headquarters and factory of Lamborghini. The eponymous Bull logo, taken from Ferrucio’s Taurus star sign, appears boldly on the walls. A parking lot holds dozens of Audis belonging to staff, now that the German manufacturer owns 100% of the Lamborghini brand. Since the 1970’s, the company has endured bankruptcy, a sale to Chrysler (itself sold to Italian car giant Fiat), ownership by an Indonesian consortium headed by the son of the dictator Suharto, and sporadic years of economic uncertainty. Yet it has continued to produce vehicles that have redefined design and car envy. Vehicles like the Aventador, Murciélago, the Diablo, and its predecessor, the Countach. As a teenage boy, I had a mounted poster of a blue Countach in my bedroom, a rocket ship on earth, my ultimate dream car. It was named after an Italian wolf whistle, for that is what it in inspired. Subsequent generations of the Countach, along with one of a kind prototypes and concept cars, are on display in an on-site gallery, open daily to the public. The Concept S has adjacent seat booths protected by individual windows, creating the distinct look of a jet fighter. The LM002 looks much like a Hummer, an SUV built in the mid-1980’s, way before its time. A green Countach sits so low on the ground it barely reaches my thigh. On show is also a Lamborghini police car, one of two donated to the Italian police department, to be used for emergency organ transplants and blood deliveries. It is the car you want to be arrested in.  Behind the gallery is the factory itself, where every Lamborghini created is carefully hand-assembled. There are no giant robots drilling sparks into the air. There is no loud industrial noise, or even a spot of grease on the floor. Every 190 minutes, the cars move forward on a U-shaped production line to the next work station, where a team of white-gloved engineers set to work installing the electronics, the interior, the wheels and dashboard. For factory engineers, they look young, healthy, and completely enthused by their job, paying attention to the finest detail, scribbling their efforts into a production book that will follow the vehicle for the remainder of its life. Lamborghini does not keep stock. Each model is made to order, customized according to the exact specification of the buyer. From station to station, the car matures, until at the halfway point, a marriage takes place. The engine, already assembled, is hoisted up and inserted into the chassis, the perfect metaphor for the soul entering the body. At the final station, the electronics are tested, the lights flicker on, and spark plugs get their first ignition. The birth roar of an engine is primal, like a dragon breathing fire, a lion owning the savannah. 190 minutes later, another customized model, black fly-wing doors open, will roar its approval. It takes the finest leather of five Austrian cows to furnish the interior of Lamborghini, dyed in lush colours and stitched by hand. One upholsterer has large photos of his kids above his work desk. My guide says “this is love, no?”, I am not sure if she’s talking about the kids, or the car. Valetino Balboni, a 60 year-old test driver hired by Ferrucio Lamborghini himself, pulls up in a silver Gallardo LP 560-4 Spyder. He’s been driving these cars longer than I have been alive, and he’s taking me into the countryside to demonstrate what all that marvellous production amounts to. A car journalist might tell you that the Gallardo Spyder has a new 5.2 litre V10 engine with an output of 560 horsepower, a power to weight ratio of 2.77kg, an 18% reduction in fuel consumption and C02 emissions from previous models, and a top speed of 324 km/hr. All I’ll say is that stepping into the Spyder for the first time made me giggle like a schoolgirl. There is not a head on this planet (or any other for that matter) that would not swivel the second it sees this elegant creation. No wonder that Jeremy Clarkson, presenter of Top Gear and the car man’s car man, replaced his Ford GT with a Gallardo Spyder. Valentino presses a button, the Spyder growls to life, and we effortlessly pull into the road. At the first intersection, I receive eight nods of envy and three photographs.  We are but two men comfortably seated on expensive red leather with a powerful state of the art engine strapped to our backs. Valentino shoots ahead, demonstrating the incredible power (0 to 100 km/hr in 3.9 seconds) and stop-on-a-penny all wheel drive braking. The sudden lurch of speed, as we taking sharp corners that could flip most cars, is not unlike being in a rollercoaster, catapulting forward but leaving my eyeballs trailing. We find a quiet stretch and Valentino invites me to take the wheel. With an advanced paddle shift transmission and various driving modes, he reassures me that I cannot make a mistake, as the car will automatically adjust itself as it needs. Sweat is dripping from my forehead, and this low to the tarmac, heat is radiating from the ground. The temperate in the cockpit reads an incredible 50C under a relentless Italian summer sun. I hesitantly pull forward, piloting a vehicle worth more than I could ever afford, well aware that I had signed a waiver holding me responsible for any mishaps. Valentino was right. The Spyder is beautifully forgiving, guiding my paddle presses, injecting fuel when needed, shifting solidly around corners. It doesn’t take long before I have the confidence to induce G-force and make this silver bullet fly. I drive back to the factory, pull up in front of a group of jealous tourists, and would have made a proud and gallant exit had my knees not buckled under the pure bliss of the experience. It is a short drive from the Lamborghini factory to Maranello, where Enzo Ferrari relocated his factory after his original workshops in Modena were bombed during World War II. Maranello is a mecca for racing and car enthusiasts, and is not so much a small town as a Ferrari theme park. There are Ferrari stores and Ferrari schools, red-painted restaurants and hotels. Images of the famous prancing horse - adopted as a logo by Enzo in 1923 from a famed Italian fighter pilot - are everywhere. While Lamborghini and Ferrari are both Italian sports cars, it is immediately clear that Ferrari is the much larger enterprise - a fast, bright red world unto itself. Enzo, who died in 1988, did not live to see Michael Schumacher dominate Formula 1 at the wheel of a Ferrari, but this was always his dream. Enzo was born to race, and when he realized his own skill was not up to par with the best, he changed his destiny so that other drivers could fulfil theirs. Originally working for Alfa Romeo, he left the company to start his own stable of race cars called Scuderia Ferrari, literally, Stable Ferrari. Founded in 1947, Ferrari’s impact on the world of motor racing was immediate if somewhat turbulent. It appeared to have more success off the track, as Ferrari road cars became the sought after toys of wealthy car enthusiasts. Yet Enzo viewed the consumer market as an afterthought. Plugging millions into racing development, financial woes in the 1960’s forced him to sell a large stake in the company to Fiat, which today owns 90% of the company. Yet Enzo’s tenacity, not to mention the raw power, stylish design and racing mentality of his cars, ensured not only the survival but also Ferrari’s growth into perhaps the world’s most sought after and recognized sport car brand. Ferraris are vehicles of success, on and off the road.  At the Galleria Ferrari, many of the most famous Ferraris are on display for an adoring public. From the original cars built by Enzo to the F1 triumphs of Michael Schumacher, the recreation of a pit stop inside the museum continues to emphasise the importance of the racetrack to the company. It takes some time for me to realize that the display cars are not replicas, but the very models that dominated sport headlines around the world, having won 31 Formula 1 World Titles. Upstairs are the sports cars, the famous Testa Rossa, the F40, the Enzo Ferrari, named in tribute. A red 308GTS represents my personal introduction to Ferrari – the car driven by Tom Selleck in the 80’s series Magnum. There is a marked difference from the sleekness and almost minimalistic lines I found inside Lamborghini’s showcase. These cars exude brute strength, more muscle than finesse. A special showcase houses a black 1957 250 Testa Rossa, an antique car that happens to be one of the most expensive vehicles ever sold at an auction. It sold for a staggering US$12.1 million, and it doesn’t even have headlights. Just about every car in the Galleria Ferrari is bright red, a colour forever associated with Ferrari, even though all Italian sports cars have been painted red since a racing organization assigned it to the country in the 1920’s. French blue, German white (later silver), British green. Ferrari came to own the colour because it came to own the idea of Italian race cars. Ironically, the 430 Scuderia waiting for me to test drive outside is a light metallic blue, with two silver racing stripes down the middle. Launched by Michael Schumacher at the Frankfurt Auto Show in 2007, this model was created to complete with the Lamborghini Gallardo Superleggera, offering a lighter body, more power, and faster speed. 508 horsepower at 8500 rpm, power to rate ratio of 2.5kk/hp, an F1-trac system and E-Diff stability control, and I’m not really sure what all that means other than this is a purebred racing machine built for speed. 0 – 100 km/hr in 3.5 seconds, and with a top speed of 320 km/hr, you’re always the pace car on the smooth Italian autostrade. My test driver’s name is Gabriel, and we both agree that a job requiring you to drive in a Ferrari all day is a job worth keeping. Of all the Ferraris he has driven at the company, this is his favourite, because this model, he tells me, was built for racing, period. The interior is somewhat basic, the seats practical, belts tellingly over the shoulder, like the jump seat in an aeroplane. A metal footplate lets me support myself as Gabriel screams around the bend of a quiet country road, the engine snarling as he shifts the transmission with the paddles. We are tigers lurking in the concrete jungle of automobiles, ferociously hunting prey. After screeching past a chicane, I ask Gabriel how fast he was going. With a wry grin, he tells me he doesn’t know. You’d have to have a Lamborghini police car to catch us anyway, and I happen to know they’re focused on other priorities.  It is late afternoon when we drive back to the Galleria, and in the traffic of rush hour, it seems almost cruel for the 430 Scuderia to trot at 40 km/hr back to the stable. A race car without a race is but an appetite without the means to feed it. I thank my pilot, awkwardly exit the cockpit, and walk over to my rented blue Peugeot 107. Like most cars in Italy, it is a tiny vehicle capable of squeezing through narrow cobblestone streets, slotting in miniscule parking spaces, but still exceeding the 130 km/hr speed limit on the highway. It is half the size of a Ferrari or Lamborghini, but it got me to both factories safely, with room for my suitcase and a couple friends. Comparing it in the same breath as these mighty Italian giants seems almost sacrilegious, and yet the realist might argue they are all machines of transport, on four rubber wheels, powered by an engine. Is a supermodel a better person because she looks better than the average housewife? Is a sportsman a better father because he has more strength and tanned, toned muscles? This is logic, and certainly, this is folly. Dream machines were not designed to carry groceries or pick up the kids. Lamborghini and Ferrari are the golden chariots that shepherd our inspiration, our quest for power, speed and beauty, the desire to transcend practicality in the name of art and technology. Placing a price tag on such an endeavour misses the point. For the majority of us who can appreciate if not afford the result, there’s always a visit to the Engine of Italy.
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 Congratulations, it’s my 20th Travel Anniversary! In 2025, I set out on a 12 month, solo, round-the-world adventure to run away from adulthood and search for adventure. So many crazy things happened during that one amazing year, recorded in a long-form now defunct blog called Modern Gonzo, that I got a tattoo on my leg to permanently remind myself it really happened. The plan was to return to Vancouver and get a job doing…something. Sometimes I’m asked where I think I’d be if that car hadn’t run me down that fateful day on Alberni Street, triggering into motion all the wild adventures that continue to follow. It’s a silly exercise, wondering about the if onlys and the what ifs. What if one of the bands I believed in more than anything hit the rockstar jackpot? What if I wasn’t born in South Africa? If only that show got picked up, that book got published, that project got greenlit, that first internet boom didn’t explode while I was right in the middle of it! It’s easy to rationalize that things happen for a reason, and we humans are zen masters at it. What’s that wisdom: worrying about the past leads to nothing but misery, and worrying about the future leads to nothing but anxiety. Nonetheless, here in the now, I’m taking a moment to reflect on my journey from budget backpacker to TV personality to newspaper columnist to bestselling author to husband, father, landowner, speaker, travel expert, consultant, and however else you want to label me. Actually, it’s a little overwhelming and probably best left to a book one day. But it has triggered all sorts of nostalgia, although for some reason, my brain is casting for memories much further back than twenty years. Let’s see where it takes us.  First Time in the Sky My very first plane trip was recorded for national television news in South Africa. SA Airways had a special promotion for people to fly for the first time, taking off from what was then Jan Smuts International Airport (now Oliver Tambo) for a half hour joyride over Johannesburg. My parents booked us onto that flight. I don’t know how they did it, or why, or how much it cost, but off we went to the airport to hit the skies, in a plane much like the one above, accompanied by an SABC TV news crew on the plane to capture a feel-good story at a time when South African media were prohibited from covering the actual news, that is, the protests against the apartheid regime. I think I was 8 or 9 years old. My parents had been overseas once, so they’d been on a plane before. My older brother got the vox pop at the very end of the news segment, which we watched that evening abuzz with the flight and possibly more excited we might be on the news. They interviewed the whole family I think, because I remember saying something to the camera. But my older brother got his voice on national television, just a single line that I still recall. He said: “It was very cool.” He was always beating me at everything, my older brother, then as now.  I Got Stoned in Mea Sharim The next time we got on a plane was on an El Al flight to Tel Aviv. Years ahead of the intergenerational travel trend, three generations of my family were booked onto a bus tour of Israel. I think it was 1988. My grandfather, Abie Esrock, always wore a bowtie, walked with a cane, spoke with a thick accent, and looked much older than he was due to a stroke. My younger brother, who was 3 years old, threw up every day on the bus. We were joined by a large contingent of South African families. The teens gathered into a crew, the little kids played together, and I was a tween awkwardly stuck in the middle, as tweens are wont to do. I have some strong memories from that trip: the taste of the shawarma, hummus and eggplant; the typical Israeli breakfast, served each morning without the slightest touch of variation; the smell of pink Bazooka bubble gum; the T-shirts with funny catchphrases; the teenage girls on the bus with all their alluring mysteries. We went to Masada and the Dead Sea, we went to Jerusalem and Haifa. One day, a rock came flying through the bus window, landing close to my grandparents. This was the start of the second intifada, and I don’t recall parents being particularly bothered by it all, because I wasn’t paying too much attention. I’m sure the incident freaked them right out of their eyeballs, and the army showed up quickly. I was probably listening to music on my blue Sony Walkman throughout the entire episode. Someone bought a T-shirt that said I got stoned in Mea Sharim. Mea Sharim is an ultra-Orthodox Jewish neighbourhood known to be hostile, sometimes violently, towards modern visitors. I didn’t get the joke, because I was 13. Ironically, I think we were close to Mea Sharim when technically, we did actually get stoned.  At the Dead Sea, 1987. Envy the youth for their ignorance My family visited Israel again, when I was 15, and again when I was 17. That’s how I can honestly claim to have visited Gaza, because my great-uncle, an Israeli pioneer, lived in the territory in a tiny Israeli settlement on a hill surrounded by three large Palestinian towns. We were reassured that someone in the army swept the playground for bombs before our arrival. We climbed up a water tower, and I remember looking at the Arab towns, which looked peaceful in the late afternoon sun. I didn’t understand the politics back home in South Africa, much less Israel. Envy the youth for their ignorance.  Bloodsport with a Legend It's interesting what you remember, years later, even when your head is saturated with several lifetimes of experience. That same trip, my brother and I left the hotel in Tel Aviv one night to see a movie. It was called Bloodsport, with a then-unknown Jean Claude Van Damme, and it was the coolest damn kung-fu chop-socky movie we had ever seen. In the line-up outside the theatre, waiting with us to get tickets, was a tall, big, and handsome black American man. He had a moustache and looked like a movie actor. I don’t know what he was doing in Israel, but we struck up a conversation with the guy. I like to remember that he said he “fought in ‘Nam” but I might have adopted that memory from watching too many movies. In my movie-infused memory, he also looked very much like the actor Jim Brown in the 1970s, or Bubba Smith, the former footballer who played Hightower in Police Academy. Maybe it was. Anyway, he asked us where we were from, and my brother looked at me and I looked at him and we both remember, to this day, being embarrassed to say we were South African. Because we knew what apartheid was, and we knew it was wrong, and it was embarrassing and shameful to present our white sorry asses to this tall, proud, black American man, the first black American we’d ever met. But we didn’t fib, we told him we were visiting from Johannesburg, and to his credit, he didn’t shun or shame us. He just shrugged and continued the conversation. I think we sat next to him for the movie. Man, did Bloodsport ever kick Chong-Li ass. I think we were high-fiving our new American friend at the end. We did a lot in Israel that trip, but that’s the one moment I vividly recall the most. The people you meet on a journey often leave the biggest impression.  Inspiring Others to Inspire Others
This month I had the privilege to fly to the Mayan Riviera and address a conference room of travel agents and suppliers. I was invited to give a keynote about the Power of Story to the lovely folks at The Travel Agent Next Door, a network of Canadian agents, gathered for their annual conference at the fantastic Iberostar Selection Paraíso Lindo along the Mayan Riviera. Whoever designed this mega-resort is an artist, it’s absolutely gorgeous. I had some wonderful conversations with agents from around the country, learned a few things, pondered the future of tourism, and sparked up various opportunities. My keynote clearly resonated because it got a standing ovation, which in the world of speaking is like a year-end, feel-good bonus. I’ve mostly been doing smaller events of late and it felt good to be on a big stage with three jumbotrons, inspiring others to inspire others, making a positive difference at a time the world desperately needs some hope and positivity. I encouraged everyone to take a media diet from the bad news, and also encouraged myself while doing so. In a month of utter economic chaos caused by the will of a madman, this captivating hour on stage is the one moment I hope to remember.  This month I got a call from CBC Radio to talk about Canadian tourism on the national show, The Current. Nothing particularly unusual there, I’ve spoken about Canadian tourism a dozen times on CBC Radio before, although this time I would be patching in from a remote forest in Puerto Rico. There's always a compelling reason to have me on: it might be early summer and everyone is planning their vacations, or perhaps I have a new book out and want to promote it. This time, it’s because Canadians are being encouraged to explore their own backyard at the expense of our southern neighbours. The reason for this is entirely political. A new US administration wants to tariff Canadian products and flex its economic muscles to negotiate more favourable trade deals, to hell with the Canadian economy (and Canadians in general). It's Big Guy Bulling Little Guy 101, but this is not the space to get into politics or my thoughts about that guy. It is however a place to talk about tourism. According to a recent report, if Canadians stop visiting the US, it could have as much as a $6 billion hit on the US economy. That’s not peanuts, although given the size of the US economy, it’s not going to make much of a dent - or provide much negotiating leverage - either. This is assuming you can get every Canadian to stop travelling to the US, which you can’t. What it does do is hurt tourism on both sides of the border. With patriotic vitriol and retaliatory tariffs, Americans won’t visit their beautiful northern neighbour, and Canadians won’t feel compelled to go south. This will hit tour operators, hotels, transportation companies, restaurants, and a lot of other ancillary businesses too. For an industry that famously brings people together, tourism is now being positioned as an economic weapon, and one of the few Canada has when it comes to a much larger, richer and aggressive neighbour. It’s just one example of the chaos and disorder that guy is sowing in this strange new world, where nobody can believe anything they see or hear, and all the hard work to become socially responsible, ethical and empathetic appears to have been tossed out a window. It will, of course, all blow over, because it always does. In the meantime, more Canadians will choose to travel in Canada, which is never a bad thing, especially for Canada’s foremost bucket list travel expert! I do have several upcoming US trips planned, and have no intention of cancelling, despite feeling some pressure from colleagues in the industry. It’s been my experience that tourism people are open-minded, generous, informed, and believe in the benefits of welcoming people, in as opposed to shutting them out. It’s not US tourism's fault, and I’m not going to punish them. That said, apples for apples, if you have a choice between taking a Canadian or US vacation right now, until that guy quits threatening and mocking the sovereignty of its friendly normal neighbour, the choice for everyone north of the border should be obvious. And with their exceptionally strong dollar, the choice for everyone south of the border should be obvious too.  This month took me to Mount Baker and Big White to ski two very different hills, and then to tropical Puerto Rico for the first time to investigate three of the world’s seven bioluminescent bays. As the pandemic drifts into the haze of bad memory, I can see the resulting boom in tourism shows no signs of abating. I’ve also noticed that prices have taken a massive leap: it never used to cost so much to get an airport coffee, or a glass of wine, or order a round of appetizers. At some point, high value should return. There have always been multiple tiers of travel, and it’s totally fine to travel according to your taste and budget. Yet budget travel is now harder and harder to come by, especially for working parents with young families. I love a good ski hill, but mountain prices in top North American resorts have increased to dizzying heights, pricing out middle-class families who can no longer afford to get their kids on skis. Factor in the gear, transport, passes and meals, and budget at least $1000 a day for a family of four. It has me envying communities in B.C like Fernie and Kimberley that have access to such great local hills. Even as inflation has come under control, if the economy is not on everyone’s mind, it’s certainly on mine.  Upon my return from Puerto Rico, it was nice to be greeted with this physical award recognizing the quality and effort of my blog, www.canadianbucketlist.com. A Lowell Thomas Gold Media Award is one of the most prestigious awards in my wild and crazy profession. As Aesop said: "Gratitude turns what we have into enough." I heard a quote from someone, misquoted by someone else, which I will now misquote further: creative people need to be creating, otherwise they’re not breathing. It is why musicians make music, painters make paintings and writers make words. God help all of us trying to make a living doing it. My act of creation is rather specific: I travel and record my experiences in a positively authentic manner with the hopes I can inspire others to have these experiences too. Every year begins with a fresh slate with very little idea where I will end up, and what I will do when I get there. Each December, I look back on the year with a sense of bewilderment that can I assure you, never grows old. Did I really get the opportunity to go there, and to do that? Looking back on 2024, here’s a round-up of what I mean: January: A Theme in Orlando Can you take the kids to the theme-park capital of the world and not visit the theme parks? This was my idea for a story, and it almost worked. Under stormy skies, we air-boated in the everglades, took on obstacle, aquatic and rope courses, illusion museums, and graceful manatees floating in crystal streams. But I’m not a monster, so the kids did get to enjoy Legoland (before they grow out of it) and Sea World’s Discovery Cove too. After Orlando, we headed south to Delray Beach for a long overdue family reunion 30 years in the making. This combination, of busy activities with personal reconnections, kicked off another remarkable year on the bucket list. February: Showing off on the Slopes Every winter I like to profile a different ski destination. It’s usually the only time my family gets on skis, but slopes are only one aspect of any ski resort. This year we drove up from Vancouver to SilverStar Mountain Resort, discovering a compact, family-friendly resort with beautiful hills and a lot of fun off it. SilverStar had the best tubes runs I’ve ever seen, and the kids had way too much fun on the mini-sleds. My story took shape thanks to my sister and brother in-law joining us from New York. Who knew there was an authentic Austrian restaurant – shipped from Austria itself - in the hills of the Okanagan? Canada is always underestimated by visitors, and always overdelivers. SilverStar and Vernon proved to be yet another perfect example of this phenomenon. March: Between Belize and a Barrier Reef After conquering the skeleton at the Whistler Bobsleigh Centre and learning all about the non-alcoholic beverage trend, my daughter and I flew to Central America to climb Mayan jungle temples, eat ceviche, and float underwater. For I wondered: can a 10-year-old go scuba diving? The answer is yes, especially a 10-year-old like my daughter. With the help of PADI and a wonderful instructor at Ocean Quest Dive Centre, Raquel took her online courses and pool classes in Vancouver, completing her Junior Open Water Certification in Belize’s San Pedro. Adults struggle with the tests and it wasn’t easy, but watching her resilience to overcome the fear and challenges gave me pure nachas. This is a Yiddish word you’ll have to Google. Exploring the world’s second largest barrier reef with her, underwater and from above with a snorkel, meant more than one thousand Taylor Swift concerts. Enya slays in my video, but Raquel as always owns the show. April: Vacations vs Adventures in Mexico I don’t begrudge anyone who chooses a flop-n-drop vacation, especially with kids. Others, like myself, are just wired differently and prefer an adventure. With the family in tow, we headed to Puerto Vallarta in Mexico to see if it’s possible to combine an adventure and vacation. You can read my story here, or watch the dreamy video that makes me appreciate that trip more with every viewing. Back in beautiful British Columbia, the legendary Ange Chew backed up her claims that Surrey – soon to be the largest city in the province – has an incredible culinary scene with a Spice Trail worth salivating over.  May: What the hell am I doing, speeding in LA? IPW is a massive annual US tourism expo, where states and companies one-up each other for trade and media attention. Host city Los Angeles pulled out all the stops, including shutting down Universal Studios for a private party, and throwing an opening bash at the historic LA Coliseum (which will host another Olympic Games in 2028). Always chasing a bucket list experience, I hopped in three Porsche models to see what these babies can do around a special-built race, sliding, and 4x4 track. Back home, I volunteered at the Courage to Come Back Awards, which raised $1.7m for the Coast Mental Health Foundation, and then headed to Medicine Hat for an inspiring talk to a wonderful community. After years chasing the northern lights in the Arctic, a powerful solar storm brought them south, lighting up the skies of Vancouver in greens and reds on a beautiful and clear spring night. June: Sunsets in Botswana (and Johannesburg too) I’ve always wanted to visit Botswana’s Chobe National Park and Okavango Delta. It has also been 14 years since my last visit to Johannesburg, where I was born and raised. Welcome to June. Catching up with my old friends and driving around Jo’burg for a few days was as comforting as a weighted blanket. A lot has changed, but some things haven’t changed at all. Botswana easily lived up to its reputation as a Bucket List safari destination for people who love safaris. Desert and Delta Safaris have incredible camps throughout the country, with a literal view of unforgettable wildlife experiences. In a year of highlights, June proved hard to beat. Cherry on the top: while on safari I learned that my story about visiting Churchill with my son took First Place in the Family Travel category at the Travel Media Association of Canada annual conference. July: Biking Vancouver Island, the Stampede and Roadsurfing to Waterton For the third year in a row, I joined a group of motorbike riders for a road trip, renting a Harley Davidson from Eaglerider in Vancouver. We travel far and light, and there’s something about the open road, the fresh air, and the camaraderie that makes these trips particularly special. Swapping my Street Glide for a different mode of transport, the family joined me on a memorable trip to Alberta, first to the Calgary Stampede, and then in a roadsurfer rental RV for a roadtrip to stunning Waterton National Park in the Rockies. Meanwhile, a fully revised and beautiful second edition of The Great Western Canada Bucket List hit the shelves nationwide. It was too late to squeeze in Waterton, but it easily makes its way in the third edition of The Great Canadian Bucket List, coming fall 2025. August: Go east, young man I love multi-generational travel. You experience a destination through different eyes, and the bonding is priceless. Together with my mom and son, we headed to Prince Edward Island and New Brunswick for a road trip to natural landmarks, beautiful red-sandy beaches, green gables, lovely little towns, the Bay of Fundy, and fuzzy goats on a boat. Over two weeks we packed in a lot, covering Fredericton, Moncton, St Andrews, Saint John, King’s Landing, and so much ground (and history) in New Brunswick. Returning home, I joined some friends for a milestone adventure in the backcountry: a week-long rafting trip down Idaho’s Salmon River. That story is coming up next year in The Globe and Mail, and it was a metaphorical bullseye for the idea that life is but an adventure, flowing in one direction, never looking back.  September: Waltzing down the Danube My poor, beautiful wife. Here I am, travelling the world, stealing the kids for one adventure after another, while she stays at home contributing to the community. Hoping to remind her who I am, we left the kids behind for a romantic river cruise down the Danube, hopping aboard the Viking Jaal in Regensburg, Germany and disembarking a week later in Budapest. The weather was moody (the Danube flooded the day we left for home) but there was so much to keep us busy between the historic towns, grand museums of Vienna, the incredible food, and a lovely boat with fun and gracious company. October: Amalfi lemons don’t need lemonade Returning to Europe, my daughter joined me for our first Exodus Family Travel Adventure, exploring Italy’s stunning Amalfi Coast. Exodus knows exactly how to keep kids and their parents engaged: cooking pasta and pizza in an authentic Italian kitchen; hiking the most scenic sections of the Path of the Gods; making paper with medieval tools; painting traditional ceramics; lemon gelato; kayaking the terraced coastline; exploring ocean caves and wandering about the remarkable ruins of Pompeii. All of this a fun first for everyone, and another gorgeous highlight in a year full of them. Amalfi was a memorable location to celebrate my 50th birthday too, and we snuck in a quick visit to Paris too!  November: Travel is a Gift You’ll have to excuse me, I’m not at my best, I’ve been gone for a month...” The classic hit by Spirit of the West has always captured the exhaustion of travel, so I took it easy this month, dreaming up big adventures for 2025. I did jet to Cambridge, Ontario for an inspiring talk for the lovely folks at MD Financial. I checked in with the folks at the Saintlo Jail Hostel in Ottawa, and worked on a new edition of my annual Bucket List Gift Guide, which I’ve now ported over to my column at Canadian Geographic. Another unexpected gift: I won a prestigious Lowell Thomas Gold Medal Award from the Society of American Travel Writers, where an impartial panel of judges chose my Canadian Bucket List blog as the best blog on the continent. This shocked me as much as anyone. After almost two decades of working away in the shadows, receiving two top awards (and being nominated late last year as the Tourism Industry of Canada’s Travel Media Professional of the Year) is welcome validation from my peers for all the hard work. Remember, success is an iceberg: you see 10% of it shining under the sun, but 90% of the effort, failure, frustration, desperation, disappointment, sacrifice and discipline lies below the water.  December: Around the Corner
So here we are, wrapping up my 19th year as a travel writer with another unexpected and extraordinary year. There are still a few stories to come, but I’m looking forward to the future in what I hope (although can never guarantee) will be another magical year. It’s been almost twenty years since I set out to see the world as a budget backpacker. So much has changed personally, globally, technically, politically, economically too. The mission has stayed the same: channel my energy and talent where it has a positive impact on the lives of others, while at the same time enjoying the juiciest fruits life has to offer. Coming up: kayaking the bioluminescent bays of Puerto Rico; a snowmobiling adventure in northern Ontario, skiing in Colorado, visiting ancient ruins in Egypt, exploring the French countryside on a small river boat, hopefully riding Route 66, and taking my daughter on the Inca Trail in Peru. One of the hallmarks of finding happiness is having something to look forward to. Regardless of what’s happening in the world, I hope you too have the good fortune and opportunity to see joy in the possibilities. - Robin  The idea was simple, if a little ambitious. I’d been asked to write a guidebook in the age of Google, TripAdvisor and Expedia, which seemed like being asked to sell typewriters when everyone is buying computers. I took the book deal and focused on storytelling in print, but recognized that information is the flip side of inspiration, and a companion website and blog would provide enormous value for readers. For starters, they could easily access destination and tour operator links, original or curated video, galleries, reading guides, fantastic products, and tips that didn’t make the print chapter. I could also interact with my audience, receiving suggestions and offering advice. Outside the limitations of a long print cycle, I also could add new experiences to the blog, which in turn could feed future book editions.
Canadianbucketlist.com launched with the first edition of my book, The Great Canadian Bucket List, in 2013. Thanks to a fantastic prize from VIA Rail and Fairmont Hotels, it quickly attracted thousands of subscribers. My publisher was a little concerned the website would cannibalize book sales, but we quickly learned that essay-length stories and short snippets of online information didn’t conflict at all. In fact, only 1 in 5 readers registered on the website, the rest arrived organically from people around Canada and the world searching for unique experiences in the country. They'd learn about the book, and a positive feedback loop was the result. Over the years, the smash bestselling Great Canadian Bucket List has been through a half dozen different editions. It's been updated, re-designed, focused on regions, and continues to sell well. Earlier this year Dundurn Press published the second edition of The Great Western Canada Bucket List, and next year will see the third edition of The Great Canadian Bucket List. The website, meanwhile, went through a complete overhaul during the pandemic (I had to do something stuck at home). Today it looks better and is easier to use, all the content is unlocked, and ads help me cover the costs. Each month I continue to update the blog with new experiences, commentary, travel tips, gift guides, and news from my world. I never understood the world of SEO, which left money on the table but kept my content authentic and real. Hi, this is Robin. Not an AI, not an algorithm, not a bot...just a guy with the good fortune to see and share the remarkable country I live in. This month, at a prestigious event in Istanbul, canadianbucketlist.com won the Lowell Thomas Gold Medal for Best Blog. Awarded by the Society of American Travel Writers, the Lowell Thomas Awards are the Oscars of travel journalism in North America. For 40 years, they has been awarded across multiple categories to the best writers, photographers, broadcasters and producers in the world of travel media. To quote the SATW website: “[The Lowell Thomas Award] is the premier competition in North America in the field of travel journalism. It has gained its stature for several reasons, most notably: it does not promote any particular destination or travel product; it does not have any membership requirements for journalists to enter; it is judged independently by the faculty at a top U.S. school of journalism. This year, judging was overseen by the University of Missouri School of Journalism with Emeritus Prof. John Fennell and Prof. Jennifer Rowe coordinating 25 judges and 1,430 entries. I had entered several writing awards, because I’m a writer and occasionally that’s what we do, especially when you work alone in a bubble with little validation. I entered this blog as an afterthought, but sometimes, years of hard work can sneak up on you and pay off. I'm deeply humbled by the recognition, and congratulate all award winners and nominees. I’d also like to give a shout-out to my hardworking, inspirational colleagues in travel media who somehow make it work in this bizarro industry we call home. It's difficult to see on the outside, but we make many sacrifices - personal and financial - to have this dream job. And my gratitude to you, the nameless anonymous visitor, for clicking on a link, spending some time with me on this site, and reading this far. Rest assured; my award speech would have been much more impressive in person.  The Fire Doctor of Taipei has coated my back with a brown paste of herbs, covered me with a towel, and spritzed on some alcohol. After lowering the lights, he tells me to be calm, and then lights up the blowtorch. I hear a sound not unlike that of a gas burner being lit, and catch the reflection of flames off a nearby mirror. It takes a few moments to register that the source of the fire is my back, followed by the sudden rush of intense heat.  For over a dozen years, Master Hsieh Ching-long has been using open flame to rid the pain. Master Hsieh (pronounced Shay) created fire therapy a dozen years ago after medical training in Beijing, applying his knowledge of traditional medicine, martial arts, and pyromania to invent a powerful treatment for muscle aches and sports injuries. Photos on display in his small clinic depict the doctor with several dozen local celebrities, and he tells me that business is booming. “Not anybody can heal with flame,” says the Fire Doctor. It requires years of martial arts training, so that you can channel your inner energy and use your hands as iron. I’m not sure what this means exactly, but it sounded comic-book cool, and when he demonstrated the above by ripping an apple in half with his thumbs, I knew I was in good hands.  Being set alight was my thrill of choice in Taiwan, the “other” China. The island nation lives in a constant state of tension with its larger Chinese neighbour, with mainland invasion just a few missiles away. Established in 1949 after the communist revolution, Taiwan’s US-supported economy boomed, its democracy flourished, and today it is amongst the sharpest claws of the Asian Tiger economies. With political rhetoric heating up, many look to the success of Hong Kong as a potential future for the peaceful reintegration of Taiwan and China. In the meantime, I had my own heat to deal with.  I was hoping Master Hsieh could use his able hands, scarred with burns over time, to untie the thick plane knots in my back. My treatment would come in three stages. Firstly, he would use heated glass cups to realign the energy. Gwyneth Paltrow popularized this treatment a couple years back when she revealed the source of the circular purple welts on her back. It was only during my second treatment, when the blowtorch was fired up, that my nerves began sweating. The herb paste burns for a several seconds before the good doctor douses the flames with a towel, and massages the intense heat into my skin. “Now for the dangerous part,” he says, in which open flame is applied directly to the skin. Photos of other patients on the wall showed grilled skin, lines like steak on a barbecue. I sit upright, and feel the flame rolled down my back on cotton doused in alcohol. It hurts. A lot. I smell the sickly-sweet scent of skin being scorched. Finally, the doctor uses his vice-grip hands for a deep tissue massage, and signals the end of the treatment. My back is bright red, but thankfully free of burn marks. I step out into the heat of Taipei, my adrenaline ablaze; the stiff muscles from yesterday’s long-haul flight slashed, burned, and cast off into oblivion.
Note: I visited Burning Man twice - in 2010 and 2012 - before the festival exploded in popular culture, having developed a mythical reputation in alternative culture. I wrote the report below for my defunct blog after my first visit. It found its way to Burning Man organizers, who shared it on their social networks as one of the best stories they'd read about the event. It received hundreds of thousands of views. Since then, the festival has grown significantly in numbers and received much media scrutiny , particularly around increasing commercial activity, celebrity attendance and climate challenges. A condensed version of this report was published in my book, The Great Global Bucket List. The full version deserves its place in the sun and on the playa. All photos are my own.  Burning Man is so famously impossible to describe, I’m not even going to try. I won’t talk about flying into Vegas to rent an RV for a 10-hour drive to Black Rock City, even if there was an opportunity to play craps with a purple-haired transvestite, but that’s another story. I definitely won’t talk about driving past the massive US military installations in Hawthorne, Nevada, since that, along with nearby Area 51, has severe access restrictions. I could tell you how, upon arriving in Burning Man, us virgins were made to roll around in the white flour dust of the Playa, embracing the dirt that we’d mentally prepared ourselves to combat. It took mere seconds for the dust to cling to our clothes, skin, and psyche. Look, I’ve spent the last five years waiting to get to Burning Man, and was as nervous and apprehensive as anyone. Nothing to buy? No taps, showers, or garbage bins? 50,000 plus people* in a hostile environment, and somehow this is meant to be fun? All these adventures over the years, and just when I think I’ve seen it all, something shows up to smash my head with an experiential baseball bat, letting my brain ooze into the mud. Something like Burning Man.  For those unfamiliar: It’s an art festival, showcasing thousands of sculptures and modified cars and creative structures. It’s a music festival, with hundreds of makeshift venues for DJ’s and musicians. It’s a costume festival, with everyone wearing something extraordinary, if they choose to wear something at all. It’s a conference for the mind, offering free lectures and educational seminars from thinkers across the creative-arts-and social science spectrum. It’s a religious festival, steering clear of organized dogma into the realms of free expression, open worship of the universe, and a deep reverence for the beauty of diversity. It’s a love festival, where nudity is accepted, sex is acceptable, and tantric workshops are held. It’s a community of likeminded individuals gathering in a remote place to avoid the confused, ignorant reaction of those who simply don’t get it, and probably never will. It’s a backlash against corporate America, where no brands or advertisements or promotion is allowed. It’s the wildest, most hedonistic party you’ve ever seen. And most of all, Burning Man is none of these things at all.  It started with a small group of artists in a hostile desert, challenging their creative limits and engaging in a form of self reliance and personal responsibility – this in a country so drunk on blaming others and passing the buck. Fundamentals evolved:
It’s jarring to read the Survival Guide in an age where long form legal disclaimers are posted on parking lots. There are countless ways to kill yourself at Burning Man, from exposure to extreme weather to getting toasted by a rogue art piece. It’s your responsibility to stay alive, even though just about everyone you meet will gladly help you out (including volunteer rangers and medical staff). You can scream and shout and spit and sue, but in the end, this is a community that lives according to its own rules. The guide sets it straight on the front page: “Above and beyond the provision for individual survival, everyone is requested to help ensure our collective survival by following very basic rules relating to public safety and community well being. Community membership is a privilege. “ If you don’t get it, please don’t come. You’ll hate every second of it.  Within hours, every expectation I had about Burning Man was blown out the water. I just didn’t expect the scale of the event to be so huge, the creative energy so vast. Black Rock City emerges almost overnight, shaped like a clock, organized by the hands of the hour and 12 long, circular promenades. Bikes are essential if you want to see a fraction of everything, with the city stretching over 5 miles across. There are hundreds of camps and villages set up along the grid, tribes ranging from a few members to several hundred. Each camp offers something of value to the casual passer by: Free cocktails, hot tamales, engaging conversation. Free massages, games of tennis, bowling, a mechanical bull ride. Free rides, free bad advice, free hugs, free drugs, free kisses, free help. Free beds, free art, free costumes, free decorations for your bike. Everyone seems to bring more than they need and need less than they want. It’s a free for all, and it took a while to recalibrate my capitalistic conditioning so that I stopped asking “what’s the catch?” There isn’t one. “Where am I?” It doesn’t matter. “Who are you?” A burner just like you. “Where are we going?” I don’t know, but there’s no rush, so lets take it slow.  I saw things that shocked, surprised, dazzled and delighted me. Moments of beauty, moments of overstimulation, moments of bewilderment. Every time I stopped to ask “how on earth did they get this here?” I was reminded to stop questioning and start accepting. My guides were friends old and new, veteran Burners and virgins like myself. As much as this is a community event, every single Burner develops a unique personal response to the environment. Some thrive in the heavy dust storms that blind and sting. Some thrive in the camps and villages. Some thrive in the scorching hot day, others in the cool, LED-lit night. Drawing it all in together is the Man himself, erected on a wooden platform at 12 o’clock, looking out over the gathering. He started small over a dozen years ago, a couple feet high, burned to the ground on a beach outside San Francisco. The Wicker Man fulfilled a similar role in Europe for centuries, but Burning Man’s founders claim that is a coincidence. This year’s Man stood 104ft tall, regally awaiting the climax of the week-long event, his destined combustion. The Man is Gonna Burn. What does it mean, this Man on Fire? A symbol of passion and drive, signifying anything is possible? A community bringing down “the Man” that traps us with its strangling laws and bureaucracy and tax and corruption? The collective ambition of a nation of pyromaniacs? I hear these and other theories under the sound of fireworks exploding at his feet, driving the massive crowd into a frenzy. Any second now he’s going to be a giant fireball. Sometimes he burns fast, sometimes he burns slow. A huge dust storm sweeps in, blowing fiery ash into the crowd. This is not cause for concern. We are prepared with the right gear and attitude. Only here do the harsh elements become cause for celebration.  The called her the Belle of the Ball. Standing on one leg, 40ft tall, skinned in polished steel that lights up at night, Bliss Dance is a staggering creation of beauty. This statue could compete with any major landmark in the world, stealing the spotlight with its immense size and brilliant execution. Is the world ready for such naked beauty, such unabashed appreciation of the female form? No, which is why this privately funded work of art will probably land up somewhere remote, somewhere special, outside the guidebooks but well worth a pilgrimage. It took a year to build. It could be appreciated by many generations.**  There’s a Monkey Chant in the Centre Camp. It’s different tribe from the Balinese one featured in the documentary Baraka, hypnotically blending their voices into a cacophony of sound. Hippies and corporate climbers, artists and thinkers, the haves and have nots. Is the guy playing the flaming tuba really one of the producers of the Simpsons? Did the guys at Google donate thousands of community bikes? Are there celebrities in the house? What does it matter? I spent a half hour looking for a friend at Center Camp one afternoon, and realized that even if I walked right past her, I probably wouldn’t recognize her, and she wouldn’t recognize me. I was wearing red underwear with printed eyes on my thighs, blue wings made out of recycled water bottles, a shocking green wig, ski goggles and a white dust mask. Costumes allow anybody to become anyone or anything, and they do. Superheroes or furry animals, desert squid or neon robots. Women can be naked or topless without fear of harassment. Burners just won’t stand for young, drunken fratboys. The community is a self-regulating system, an entropic organism that shakes out the dust and arises. While it might seem like I had a bit part in a Mad Maxian post-apocalyptic world (complete with a Thunderdome), there was order in this chaos. You know that weird friendliness that manifests itself on a hike, when complete strangers say hello to each other even though on the street they wouldn’t look at one another? The Playa dust intensifies that encounter, amps up the positive energy. We’re all going through this together, we’re all brothers and sisters. At least until the Temple burns and the Exodus begins, when you can just make out the sound of a bubble popping.  My friend Ian is never shy to initiate a philosophical debate. “Is this the real world, or is the real world out there?” “Perhaps the real world should be more like Burning Man.” “It’s all well and good until the food and water runs out, and then it will quickly turn into Lord of the Flies,” replies Bruce. Making the trek from Canada, hiring an RV, equipping ourselves with food and drinks and costumes and playa gifts, the final tally is not cheap. Everyone appears to have committed an extraordinary amount of time, money and energy to be here, and so everyone is doing their best to enjoy it. It’s a brief trip to Utopia, so far outside our comfort zone we forgot what a shower looked like. That Burning Man only lasts a week is calculated. A sustainable leave-no-trace festival cannot become permanent, even though there is talk of Burning Man owners buying up surrounding land. Applying the lessons of Burning Man is a common theme at many workshops. Taking away the sense of community, of environmental responsibility, of respect for those around you - it can only be a good thing. But it’s hard to hear those messages in the real world, when marketing and advertising and signs and media keep pounding away at you from all sides. You’re not happy unless. You’re nothing until. No wonder Decompression parties are held throughout the year.  The Temple is the spiritual soul of Burning Man. There’s so much more to this festival than flame breathing dragon cars, stilt bars and half naked discos. The Temple is a solemn place to say goodbye to loved ones lost, dreams abandoned, or anything that needs to be released. People write on the walls, in the cracks, on the wooden platforms. It’s an outpouring of energy so intense you can feel it throbbing. Life size photos of Burners lost before their time, tears dripping off the face of people in private confessions, their sad waters hit the wooden Temple, like syrup leaking from a bark tree. I could only stand and watch, aware and grateful that this week marked a personal beginning and not an end. It was here, in a camp dome surrounded by my tribe, that I asked Ana to marry me, and it was here, that our lives moved to the next logical step. The Temple can wait for as long as I can help it. On Sunday, with thousands already returned to the real world, the Temple is set aflame, designed to become a raging inferno of emotional relief. We could feel the heat from far away, an unmistakable energy rushing through us, flaming ash soaring into the sky. It was beautiful, it was sad, it was magic.  Cherie, our Camp Momma, gave us each a gift. It’s a small vial filled with the ashes of three Temple Burns, attached to a leather-beaded strap. I’m looking at it now. The dust and ashes of the Playa still resonate, even as I wake up each morning, wondering if it was all some weird, hallucinogenic dream. Perhaps it was. I don’t know how to describe Burning Man to those who have not been. Other than to say: If anything you’ve read above intrigues you, then find out more. It can be challenging, but then again, the best experiences in life usually are.
* Attendance is now around 70,000. ** Bliss Dance is now a permanent exhibit outside the MGM Grand in Las Vegas. Long in the shadows of its Maritime neighbours, New Brunswick has come into its own as a province packed with family-friendly experiences, gorgeous scenery, delicious seafood and wonderful people. It also tends to be less packed with tourists, which means fewer crowds, better prices, and perfect for family road trips. Canada’s most underrated province overdelivers, if you give it a chance. Here’s my report (and video below) from a multi-generational trip to New Brunswick this summer, visiting the cities of Moncton and Fredericton. Magnetic Moncton |
Greetings.
Please come in. Mahalo for removing your shoes. After years running a behemoth of a blog called Modern Gonzo, I've decided to a: publish a book or eight, and b: make my stories more digestible, relevant, and deserving of your battered attention. Here you will find some of my adventures to over 120 countries, travel tips and advice, rantings, ravings, commentary, observations and ongoing adventures. Previously...
May 2025
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