Posted on

Delicious Diving – Alive in New Zealand – Ep 19

March is a beautiful time of year. The weather is usually somewhat settled, the holiday crowds are gone and the water warm. Do I really need to say more? Peep the latest episode below!

What a month it was. As I rebuild this series I will be dropping the regular episodes as per normal. Find out more about the new series here.

As always, I will see you at the beach!

-Sam

Posted on

Summer Heat – Alive in New Zealand – Ep 17

How do you fit spearfishing, Thundercats, surfing, skimboarding, van life adventures and a Great White shark into one video?

Firstly assign yourself to spending absolutely hours sitting in front of a computer. Once you’ve sorted that then get to work. Work I did and here is the result

I struggled a little bit with this episode as there was just so much content and I’m looking at a little change to the series too!

Stay tuned and I will see you at the beach!

-Sam

Posted on

Round 6 2018 Thundercat Nationals – Little Barrier

Ahh yes a new Long Haul! Would someone get lost? Would everyone have enough fuel? How many birds would get run over? This course had never been run before and with a creative approach to the coverage I feel we did the race justice! Find it all in the video below

How’s that weather though!

Pics

You all know where we’re going?

Target

McReddy was strong

Just like round 5 I was stoked to have an event at home with perfect weather and smiles all round.

See you at the beach!

-Sam

Posted on

1000 YouTube Subscribers and why it’s important!

I’ve never really been much of a numbers man. When it comes to social media, I can’t be bothered playing the game. It’s just not me.

What I do focus on is being consistent and producing solid content, which I feel I do.

Here’s some stats! At the time of writing I have 771 subscribers on my main channel and 696 on my second channel. Engagement is much higher on my vlog channel but views (thanks to a few videos kicking along) are much higher on the main. Currently I’m doing about 24000 views a month which is nice. A long way from making big dollars off ads but it’s a start.

What the hell does this all mean? It means with recent changes to YouTube monetisation has been removed from the smaller channels. You now have to have 1000 subscribers and over 4000 watched hours in the last year. This is the new goal. I don’t usually press people to subscribe as it all happens organically but right now I am advertising this point as well as bribing you to do so. Find out below

So there it is. A goal of mine that I would love your help achieving. Also watch some of the videos, I upload often and I think you’ll like them.

Thank you for your support and I hope you win some stuff 😉

See you at the beach!

-Sam

Posted on

What’s Been Happening?

Whenever I ask this question it usually gets one of two responses. The first and by far the most common, painfully boring, mundane and uninspiring is “not much, just work”, or very similar. Then add how busy you are. Choice bro.

The less common and considerably more interesting goes more like this. So much man, been shooting Thundercats, diving (been getting some good fish too), skimming, the boat’s running again, clocked up a fair few km’s in the van, Been up north a few times, had an epic dive out West, swam with a Great White, ticked over two years without an alcoholic drink, ate some fantastic food (incl a BBQ on 90 mile), there’s been waves and I’m off down White Island again this weekend.

Here in New Zealand we don’t like that sort of response. We don’t like people who talk about themselves.  Sorry but it’s been bloody hectic to be honest. There’s a Winter chill in the air so we have to cram as much into the next wee while before it gets cold. Then the same thing happens, it’s just colder ha.

Seeing I haven’t done an update blog post in a little while, here’s a clip from last week that you will enjoy if you’re into free range food

I will touch on the weather now. Shit it’s been difficult to get. Seems to be really nice… Or really not nice. Saturday was more of the latter but we were out there

On another note I’ve been trying to sell some of my merch. Not only do I want to sell it, I want to expand the product line and get really stuck in so if you’re on the hunt to rock some branded goodies then get to my online shop!

Lastly all the things I mentioned up top have happened lately incl the Great White part so if you need to catch up then get along to my main YouTube channel as well and my vlog channel!

As always, I will see you at the beach!

-Sam

 

 

Posted on

Summer Marine Life – Alive in New Zealand – Ep 16

16 episodes down of my favourite series and only slightly behind schedule… I’ll take it. We kicked off the Summer season in what only can be described as a stellar weather pattern. There’s even some unseen Orca footage in there. Enjoy!

With Summer now at a close, the next while looks bloody exciting! I can’t wait to show it to you.

See you at the beach!

-Sam

Posted on

Surfing & Big Snapper – Alive in New Zealand – Ep 14

Producing a series about living is ironically hard to do when you’re so busy out and about living.

I remember Winter vividly as it feels about twenty minutes ago. It was fun, long and I chose to start the move into a van. In this episode there’s a couple of months crammed into one episodea s a lot of my time was ties up with a van build. Heeeeere you go

As for what’s coming well I can assure you the weather and action turned on from November which is where I’m up to.

See you at the beach!

-Sam

Posted on

2017 – The Best Year Yet!

To say I learnt a lot this year is an understatement. I don’t really believe in a 5 year plan because things change so much. I’m finishing up this year in a completely different position that I could’ve even imagined at the start of the year. Even 6 months ago taking a stab at where I would be at the end of the year I would’ve been dead wrong.

It’s been fun, it’s been challenging, I built a van to live in, met a lovely lady, swam with sharp teeth, ate a heck of a lot of fish and almost drowned about 400 times.

Last Sunday had a few of those sharp teeth I mentioned.

 As for 2018 I really have no idea what’s going to happen except for the fact that it’s going to be a heck of a lot of fun. I will also be trying to build a fun email list so if you want to sign up to it then go here.

Lastly, thank you to those I’e spent time with this year it’s rally been a blast. I hope you’ve learnt a few things like I have and want to grow on it all.

Have a great break and rip into 2018!

See you at the beach!

-Sam

Posted on

Going Out On Your Own

The road to self employment is a piece of cake and everyone should do it.

Now that I have your attention I will come clean, That first line isn’t true. For most anyway.

Self employment for me is about a dream. Not just a boring business that I copy and paste a how to from others. It’s about creating what I view is my dream life and living each day as I want to. This isn’t at all easy.

Last week we shot to the Far North to help my parents with their little slice of rocky roaded self eployment. You can find Saturday here

They have had easily enough of their own problems incl that big shed burning down but boy, what an amazing process for the produce.

Sunday morning we were up and looking to score a feed (thumbnail hints as to how it went)

Back to self employment. As far as my dream goes, in my mind I want to go skim, surf, spear, run my brand and shoot content all day.

The complications arise when you actually have to make a few bucks from these things because life is expensive. One thing I’ve always had from the start is product to sell and I’m always looking to expand this. Selling is hard but when it’s your own product but boy, it’s satisfying. Anytime someone wants to fork out their hard earned cash on something I made makes the pursuit of the dream worth it!

Producing content is much harder than selling product as it requires far more of my time invested, for much less income. If I wasn’t so passionate about it, I wouldn’t be doing it. For some reason I love it!

Oh and on a sales orientated pitch you can sign up to my mailing list here.

On that note, I will see you at the beach!

-Sam

 

 

Posted on

How It’s Been In A Van So Far

Sunday the 29th of October was my first night out in the wild. By out in the wild I mean not living in a conventional house.

Bad blog 1

The van build has gone pretty well for a first attempt and it’s turning into one of those “shoulda done it years ago things”. As far as what I’ve learnt so far is that there’s no real drawbacks. There’s some mild inconveniences, but nothing I would consider a drawback. I’m writing this parked up by the Omaha Boat Ramp in fact.

Last Saturday was a great day. I got back out in the water after a injury and moving stint! No solid fish but was a cracker of a day!

Sunday we awoke by the water and set about competing with each other

So far the van is warm, dry and has been more rewarding than I thought it would be. I’m going to be uploading some New Zealand specific videos on the campervan/ tiny home/ mobile living scene regarding showering, biodegradable soaps and chemicals, general living and a full van build (when it’s actually finished).

See you  at the beach!

-Sam