“My family came here in 1967 and I grew up at Snellings Beach. We moved to Kingscote and my family bought a property at Hummocky, between Stokes Bay and Cassini, when I was ten. It has a massive gorge and it’s one of the largest bits of bush on the North Coast. I spent a lot of time out there and just love the space, nature, heaps of wildlife, and an amazing sense of freedom we all enjoy. Those places are the places I continue to visit now, with the family. Take a picnic to the beach, have a wine, go snorkelling, have a beautiful meal. Just that sense of being in a beautiful place, having so much space. I know globally we are lucky with the amount of personal space that we have. These are my happy times, spending time with friends and family in the beautiful coastal environment.
The roads were pretty crappy when I was young and most winters, we’d get stuck. Western River and Middle River would both flood and we could not get out. To get to school to Parndana we had to take the tractor through the flood water or the horse. We also had a volksi beetle and one winter my mum decided to drive through the floods. The volksi started floating, going sideways and we thought we would be swept away until suddenly we hit high grounds again. Mum eventually packed us up and said, ‘not going to school today, kids’ which we loved of course.
I am not one for really long-term planning but I can remember thinking when I was around twenty, ‘if I am lucky enough to have a family, I’d really love to be able to share some of the things that I enjoyed as a child.’ It’s that sense of freedom, travelling through the landscape, the chance to just explore and learn, and I guess that is what we try and share with our guests in tourism. With small groups, you can really connect with people and get them inspired by the things I feel are important.
The combination of fires and then Covid last year has been extremely challenging, and I sense that people are looking for something positive. For the longest time there has been nothing but bad news, and by focusing on the right things, we can all get out of what has been a pretty shitty time.
We try to link our guests with the people who are doing good stuff in the community and our beautiful landscape and with that get a positive message across. We want people to slow down, connect with local experiences and local people. I currently have concerns about the experience people have on a self-drive through Flinders Chase, and they think all the wildlife is gone. I really want to open their eyes and make sure everyone has a positive experience because I love the island and want others to feel the same.”
Craig
