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.  
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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. 
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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.
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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.  
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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

​T’was a time when chasing a bucket list did not necessitate cracking an Enigma code of shifting Covid tests and requirements, juggling what’s needed to board a plane, to enter a country, to embark on a boat, to disembark, to return in transit. T’was a time recently where nobody was allowed to travel at all, but it looks like we’re finally done with that bit.  There’s still too much friction when it comes to global travel, the legacy of Covid lingering like a suds stain around a student’s bathtub.  The good news is that much of the world has collectively decided to move on, focusing efforts on protecting the vulnerable while living with Covid the way we live with other problematic viruses.  It just took time and money, which tends to solve most problems. The better news:  last month I returned to both my Canadian and Global Bucket List after too long a hiatus, and I returned in style.   I’ve always wanted to sail in the Caribbean, and I’ve waited over a decade to once again experience to the deep virgin snow of backcountry skiing.  March presented the opportunities, and so I grasped them, tightly, with the wind at my sails, and a smooth path from peak to gully.

​Part One: The Caribbean
 
It started with a thought about sailing as an eco-friendlier form of cruising.  Then I got lost in the fascinating real-life history of pirates, and distracted by the pool-clear waters of the Caribbean.  Putting it altogether, I found the perfect itinerary on board one of the world’s largest passenger sail boats, a towering old-world tall ship operated by Swedish-owned, Malta-flagged Star Clippers.  My experience will get its full due in an upcoming issue of the Vancouver Sun, but I will say this:  Star Flyer – a 4-masted tall ship that swivels the head of even the saltiest sailor – is out of this world.  It carries up to 166 passengers served by 74 crew, sailing the trade winds and ocean currents in the Caribbean, Mediterranean, Central America and across the Atlantic. Unlike cruising, you feel the ocean (sometimes a little more than you’d like, but that’s part of the adventure), visiting bays, islands and beaches beyond reach of the cruise ships.  It’s a luxury sailing adventure for those who don’t know anyone with a luxury sailboat, which I’m assuming describes most of us. 

​Staff and service is fantastic, the meals top notch, the cocktails smooth and the onboard amenities (two pools, a massage therapist, deck chairs, an open bridge, stocked library, water sports etc) most accommodating.  Time slows down, and people read books, not feeds.  You can do bucket list things like hang out on the bowsprit, sprawled on the netting as it dips over rolling waves above playful dolphins (yep, that happened). You can climb up the rope ladder to an 18m-high viewing platform, gazing over islands and ocean. You can bake in the sun like those fried European passengers who don’t seem to know about skin cancer. You can dance at night, request tunes from the pianist, dress like a pirate, or ask a thousand questions of the patient crew as they pull ropes and release topsails with special names that I forgot the moment I heard them.   Pop into the Caribbean’s most legendary beach bars (the Soggy Dollar, Foxy’s etc) for a souvenir headache, nap in your cabin, listen to stories of fellow passengers, snorkel into sea caves, paddle-board, ogle at super yachts parking in St Barts.  It’s everything one would expect the good life to be, and a very different kind of cruise experience. The more I travel on a small ship – a luxury river barge in the Amazon, a catamaran in the Galapagos, an expedition ship in the Antarctica – the more I fall in love with boats as a bucket list form of travel.  If you can burn just 15% of the fuel of a regular ship, as the Star Flyer does under sail, it feels like the future of cruising, and the responsible way to go.  As time progresses, I hope to add more small ships to my growing, curated bucket list cruise collection.

​Part Two: Catskiing in the Skeena
 
The last and only time I cat-skied was on a private mountain in Chile.  We were filming an episode of Word Travels, and my single biggest memory of that adventure is nervously watching our cameraman Sean ski backwards while he filmed my descent with a large six-figure camera on his shoulder.  It was the only true bluebird ski day I’ve ever had, when the sky is crystal clear after a big dump of white snow.   Skeena Cat Skiing in BC would be my second, and this time I wouldn’t have to worry about my TV show crashing with a wipeout (I can do that all by myself, thank you). 

I had one day to switch my Caribbean bag for my snow gear, catching a prop flight north from Vancouver to the town of Smithers BC.  Here I met a group of elite ski journalists, gathering at the helipad for our memorable ride into base camp.   Any day you get to ride a helicopter is a good day.  Skeena Cat Skiing is a family-run affair and clearly a passion project of immense love and hard work.  Many hours away from anything, guests stay in heated dome tents buried in snow, which is a cool experience unto itself.  The comfy, wood-fired heated lodge tent is loaded with fine beer, snacks, worn couches, and a friendly chef who prepared outstanding hearty dinners and desserts.  We’re surrounded by the Thomlinson and Gail Creek mountains, 30,000 hectares of fresh powder and skiable glades in every direction.  Our ski chair is a customized Piston Bully snow grader, with a large heated cabin for 14 passengers on the back.  This ‘cat’ can go anywhere and everywhere it pleases, and it does.  Skirting a steep ride, it deposited us at the top of runs that funnel into valleys where we would be collected by the cat for another ascent.   Backcountry safety is taken seriously:  we’re all equipped with avalanche kits, air bags, walkie-talkies, and given a tutorial in rescue.   Veteran guides know what they’re doing and accidents are rare to non-existent.  Any nerves dissipate after the first run, replaced with elation and joy and wowzers because this is the skiing you dream about, every time you strap in, and every time you head up a mountain.  I was easily the weakest boarder of the group, and I’m no slopestyle expert (especially in the company of Olympic skier Yuki Tsubota).    But even at my own pace, I was able to keep up, sharing the pinnacle of what snow sport can deliver.   Cat skiing is more affordable than heli-skiing, and you can read more about both in my Bucket Listed column for Can Geo Travel.  Suffice to say:  it’s going to be hard going up a local ski hill again, but there’s always something to aspire to, and something to look forward to next time.

After crossing dramatic mountain passes and driving alongside large, scenic lakes, we pull off the Trans Canada Highway to explore The Enchanted Forest and adjacent Skytrek Adventure Park.  With various high ropes courses through the tall forest trees, the latter is catnip for kids and adults channelling their inner gibbon.  The former is eccentric and certainly bizarre.  Dozens of tiny and not so tiny fairy tale houses have been built on the forest floor, complete with a castle, a giant climbing a tree, mermaids, wooden horses, and mischievous forest elves.  A passion project that has been a popular, quirky roadside attraction for half a century, my young kids embraced Enchanted Forest with sheer, unadulterated delight.  Happy kids, happy parents, and happier still that both these attractions are less than a half hour’s drive from downtown Revelstoke, where our room at the Regent Hotel awaits. ​

Revelstoke Mountain Resort is famous for the highest vertical run on the continent, but is embracing its four season possibilities.   This means world-class mountain biking, and for my bucket list, the longest alpine rollercoaster in Canada.   Taking the gondola up to mid-mountain, my family soaked in the stellar mountain views and fanning Columbia River, before hopping into yellow go-cart like contraption connected on a narrow single rail. My wife and I each put a kid in our laps and strapped in for a thrilling 1.4 kilometre descent.   The Pipe Mountain Coaster twists, curves and whoops its way 279 metres down the mountain, through forest and breathless dips at speeds of up to 42 km/hr.  A simple mechanism allows us to brake and go at our own pace, and most first timers will take it easy.   Get the three-ride pass (or more) and you’ll soon dispense with the brakes altogether, hitting the hell-yeah! controlled maximum speed that ensures it’s safe and fun for the whole family.    “Faster Daddy!” yelled my daughter, and who am I to argue? ​

Feet away from the exit point of the coaster is newly opened Aerial Adventure Park, where you can easily spend two hours navigating fifty different balance and height obstacles, rising four stories above the ground.   Graded like ski runs into green, blue and black difficulties, climbers are safely harnessed throughout the entire contraption. Watching brave little kids take on swinging rings or a knee-shaking four-story jump should add some pep to your steps.   Fortunately, great food and craft beer awaits the victorious in the village regardless (and for the kids, ice-cream). ​

​A Pirate Battle

River rafting is another popular summer activity in Revelstoke, with various companies offering grade three runs.   For younger kids, consider Wild Blue Yonder’s River Pirates Tour, complete with pirate costumes, face paint, bush battles and fun tales of yaargh!   Downriver from the impressive hydro dam, we drifted on the glass mirror of the Columbia River, listening to Captain Jack’s brogue as he recounted the myth of the man-eating moose.  My daughter - made-up with face paint, bandanna’d, and now known as Jolly Lips Sue - had a blast.  Nobody got wet, and foam sword battles continued back in our comfortable family suite at the Regent.    

Fortunately the sword stayed behind when we checked out the old world Railway Museum, although the knives came out when my three year-old had his thermonuclear meltdown when we told him it was time to leave the large, warm wading pool at the Aquatic Centre.  We packed a lot into just three days, and could have easily spent a week exploring this underrated wonder of the BC interior.    It’s all right there in the very name of the town, where families can revel in the stoke of it. ​

Three hours drive from the Chilean capital of Santiago is a ski resort without any shops, malls, or promenades.   There are no restaurants, bars or hotels either.  There’s not even a ski lift.  Yet it still attracts clients from around the world, and for good reason.  Ski Arpa is the dream of a lifelong ski instructor who scrapped and saved over three decades to open a mountain for anyone in love with stunning views, and untracked snow.    Here, two Pisten Bully Snowcats shepherd up to 22 skiers to the top of the mountain, where they have mind-boggling access to 4000 acres of skiable terrain.  ​

As we slowly make our way up the switchbacks, the van abruptly stops and one of my fellow passengers throws up.   It’s a rough road, which Toni maintains himself, zig-zagging 600m up the valley.  I’m feeling a little queasy from the altitude, but the excitement seems to settle my stomach.  I only discovered the joy of snow when I moved to Canada in my twenties.  When I was 6 years old, a once-a-century freak snowstorm hit Johannesburg.   My schoolteacher, having never seen snow, made the class hide under our desks. She thought it was nuclear fall out.  ​