Your hosts

Carl and Belinda Muir chose Tairua as their home because of its spectacular coastal location, relaxed lifestyle and as an ideal spot to base an adventure tourism business.  They want to share one of New Zealand’s best kept secrets with you!  They enjoy nothing more than seeing people discover Tairua for the first time, catching big fish, and having a great time on holiday!

Carl grew up on The Coromandel in Thames which is about half an hour from Tairua.  Many weekends were spent boating on both sides of the Peninsula and this is where his love for fishing, diving and the outdoors comes from.  He has traveled and worked overseas, as an exploration diver in the Philippines, dive instructing in the Pacific and and deckhanding on top gamefishing charter boats in Vanuatu.   Carl was recently voted 'Skipper of the Year' by the members of NZ's biggest fishing online fishing community.

He has fished and dived many of the reefs out of Tairua since he was a young fella, and knows them inside out.  Fishing runs in his blood and he has written for many of New Zealand's top fishing and diving magazines, and now writes regular articles for Fishing Coast to Coast magazine, usually on his favourite forms of fishing - Jigging, livebaiting and softbait fishing. As far as fishing goes, he is always searching for new spots, new techniques and ways of doing things - if you're coming from overseas, expect him to chew your ear off finding out what works in your neck of the woods.

Catching and cooking seafood has always been a big part of Carl's life, and in the last four years he got the Whitianga Scallop Festival off the ground, a huge annual local event which celebrates the areas seafood and marine heritage. Up until recently Carl also worked as Marketing Manager for Tourism Coromandel, but now the fishing guiding has taken over and Carl is full time on Epic Adventures.  Carl is stoked to now being working full time as a fishing guide - his dream job!! 

Belinda grew up on a dairy farm in the Waikato.  She has traveled extensively and worked in the hospitality industry in Swizterland and Germany, and speaks fluent Swiss German. Belinda spent eight years with the ANZ Bank in Wellington, Melbourne and Vanuatu.

Belinda cooks a mean ‘bacon and egg’ pie and chocolate brownie which always go down a treat on our fishing charters.   Belinda also runs her own Human Resources consulting business - Dynamo Consulting, from the Coromandel, working with many local and NZ businesses, team building and getting the most out of their staff. She is also currently the 'Sustainability Advisor' for Tourism Coromandel, the regional tourism organisation.

Since they have settled in Tairua, Bella and Oscar have been new additions to the Muir household!

Bella is an avid explorer already.  She loves going for bush walks and she's already trying to outfish Dad!

Oscar came on to the scene in Feb 07 and is already showing us how big the fish he's going to catch are!

Bella with her first snapper!

and they got bigger!