I’m a man with an Honours Degree in Marine Biology who is passionate about developing and inspiring young people to reach their full potential. I grew up in Plettenberg Bay, where I lived according to the ocean tides and wind direction. On days when the wind blew offshore, I was surfing. When the wind blew onshore, I was fishing. The ocean with all its lessons was my classroom. Isn’t that cool?

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One thing leads to another, and I set out to solve the sea’s problems by becoming a Marine Biologist. Once I’d qualified, I found instead a far deeper problem to solve. This problem is the problem of a human kind – how to help people navigate their way to fulfilment, in a rising tide of demands, stresses and agenda-based advise. And how to make significance their success.

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Once I’d met Jim Musto, the owner and coordinator of Quest Africa - a gap-year program for young men - I took his job offer and he took on my wealth of natural environment knowledge and my adventure interests. Nothing had prepared me for the life-changing experience of helping young men and women understand how they thought, and challenging and helping them to reach their full potential.

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Inspired, I went back to University and studied to become a Biology teacher. During this time I took an assistant’s job in the Somerset College boarding house. There I was able to apply and refine the skills I’d developed at Quest in mentoring students. Having begun teaching Biology, I managed to complete a Life Coaching course through the UCT Graduate School of Business to further develop the skill-set needed to really help people.

It was at this point that I considered creating Ignite to help young people meet their potential! My heart was for an adventure-based personal development program for students looking for direction. Ignite allows me to share my adventure interests in a way that leaves students challenged and excited. And all of this, in places of exquisite beauty, where students will find life, and life lessons in abundance: where they’ll find themselves, their values, their abilities and their dreams.