The son of a mining family, Bob trained as a mechanic and, at 21 years old, found himself working in Nyasaland (now Malawi). He met his English wife, a nurse and midwife, in what was then Salisbury, Rhodesia, and together they spent the next forty years working and travelling around Africa and the Middle East. They spent six years working in gold mines in Tanzania and Kenya. Then, whilst working in Uganda, Bob met Idi Amin, who gave him a very expensive pair of Zeiss binoculars for recovering his amphibious vehicle! He was also involved in moving the 'African Queen' of movie fame through Kampala to raise money for Cancer Research. He was in Iraq during Saddam Hussein's regime and, together with a colleague, had a very lucky escape just as the 1980 war with Iran started. Whilst working in Nigeria, he built a 44 foot ketch with some American friends and was Commodore of the Apapa Boat Club. In South Africa he and his wife travelled extensively in their spare time; they crossed the Kalahari, Namib and Karoo deserts and visited the Skeleton Coast and the Wild Coast, among other places - and all this aside from all manner of pursuits from scuba diving to paragliding. They also spent five years in West Cork, Ireland, where they rebuilt a farmhouse, lived off the land and had a commercial fishing business.