So, Dom, have you always loved the ocean as much as you do now?
I grew up in Coffs Harbour where I spent all my time before and after school and on the weekends on or in the water. Things like surf club, fishing, and snorkelling, then scuba diving, all shaped my love of the ocean. My dad was an avid scuba diver and we loved listening to his stories about the amazing world under the water. I then worked up and down the east coast of Australia (originally as a scuba diving instructor and then a commercial boat driver), as far up as Heron Island and the Great Barrier Reef to Stradbroke Island, Coffs Harbour, Port Stephens, and down to Sydney.
I moved to Newcastle about eleven years ago to study at the Uni and I loved it so much that I never left. It’s the perfect balance of being close to so many beautiful coastlines with the luxury of what the city has to offer.
You decided to launch your own business before you’d even finished your university degree! How did that happen?
I studied a double degree of Business and Innovation/Entrepreneurship majoring in Tourism and Management and I had this real love of marine tourism. I’ve always had a curiosity that I wanted to start something of my own one day, but I didn’t really know what that might look like. Nearing the end of my studies, I thought about the skills and qualifications I had in diving and commercial boat driving and I paired that together with what Newcastle as a city might be missing. Then I thought about the sort of values that I wanted to instil in my business, and finally, what I’d like to do each day that would make me happy – that research and planning phase took almost two years! Finally, I committed to having a custom-made boat built in Adelaide and launched my business Coast XP.
You’re lucky to call the ocean your office, most days! Do you ever get sick of the view?
I love everything to do with the ocean and that you see new things all the time with no two days ever the same. I’ve worked for a long time on the water, and I still get surprised and excited by what I see daily. I also love seeing the reactions of our guests – some people have lived in Newcastle for sixty years and have never been offshore in the area.
When they get to see the diverse types of marine life and ocean caves and islands for the first time in their lives, it’s amazing!
“I love seeing the reactions of our guests – some people have lived in Newcastle for sixty years and have never been offshore in
the area.”
Winter and Spring means whales along the Newy coast – is it really as amazing as everyone says to see them up close?
Even though I’ve seen whales so many times, when a humpback whale comes in close to check the boat out, I’m always amazed. I’ve been left shaking sometimes at how huge these animals are. A pregnant female humpback whale can weigh around fifty tonne – they’re massive! When they come in close, we stay still and watch them until they move on and it’s an amazing experience. A few times, whales have done a spy hop which is where they push their eye just out of the water really close to the boat. It’s like they’re looking straight at you and then they sink back down.
Other times, whales have gone straight underneath our boat, sometimes with their belly facing up, so you see the huge white underside of a whale just slowly passing underneath the boat and that’s a really special moment.
What other animals do you see regularly in and around the waterways of Newcastle and Lake Macquarie?
It changes every single day, but commonly, along with the humpback whales in the cooler months, we see common and bottlenose dolphins, turtles, sharks, and long-nosed fur seals. We also get migratory seabirds like the Australian gannets, shearwaters or mutton-birds and other birds like crested turns, albatross, and sea eagles quite regularly out there.
You’re not just passionate about showcasing our spectacular waterways, you’re a real advocate for local tourism in general, aren’t you?
I love travel and tourism and I’ve taken on the role of chair of the Newcastle Industry Tourism Group, which advocates for all tourism businesses in Newcastle, including bars, hoteliers, and restaurants – supporting industries in logistics
and media. We promote major events and festivals in the area as well.
I love that my business Coast XP is all about small scale, nature based, sustainable tourism which really benefits the entire area. We’ve grown enough to employ five enthusiastic staff members, and this contributes to local employment. Plus we help attract people to the Newcastle and Lake Macquarie area and when they come, they often dine at local cafés and restaurants and stay in the area. There’s a flow on effect in a very sustainable way. One of our boats takes twenty guests and the other takes twelve, so we’re taking small group tours that come regularly and share special parts of our local natural world, which benefits local businesses and the area in general.
You also keep the environment at the centre of your business model…
Thinking about the environment is very much engrained in everything we do at Coast XP. We contribute to research and education with several different universities around Australia including Newcastle Uni within the areas of tourism and research. We also have a small-scale carbon offset program so our customers can choose to offset the carbon of their trip. This isn’t just a tick box exercise.
We work with a local program called MySequester where we turn those carbon credits into projects with local schools where students learn about how they have a carbon footprint and what choices they can make to reduce that. Then we collect all the offset carbon credits about every eighteen months and use them to plants trees at local schools to beautify and green the schools. This means collectively we’ve helped organised a closed loop system between our tours and the local community. So far we’ve had tree planting projects at Cardiff, Belmont and Speers Point with the program continuing to grow.
“Even though I’ve seen whales so many times, when a humpback whale comes in close to check the boat out, I’m always amazed.”
Coast XP has won tourism awards and you won Newcastle Young Citizen of the Year for 2023. You must be super proud!
It was lovely to be recognised in that way – it came about because of two reasons. Firstly, I was recognised for my contribution in the local tourism industry as I’ve done a lot in that space and secondly, I was recognised because of the role Coast XP played in completing a mayday.
We were out on the water, and we happened to be the closest vessel to a mayday call from a seventy-tonne trawler which was twenty kilometers out to sea and had started taking on water. We were ten kilometers out to sea at the time with a full boatload of passengers and we had to make our way to this sinking trawler. We travelled quite quickly to the destination, which was out of the sight of land, and met up with the boat which had lost power, was taking on water, and was sinking. The three men and their dog that were onboard were able to get onto our boat and within sixty seconds, their trawler sank to the bottom of the ocean – straight down 120 metres to the bottom. We were so lucky that the outcome was positive and we were able to help in that way.
You’ve certainly got a zest for life and a drive to get things done – what’s next for Coast XP?
I think life would be pretty boring if you didn’t have something you were passionate about and for me, it’s the ocean, the business I’ve created, Newcastle as a destination, and sustainable tourism. Many people in business chase growth in terms of size and getting bigger but I’m more interested in the quality of experience we can offer and the sustainability aspect of tourism so we’re looking to offer more amazing experiences and tours on and off the coast in Newcastle and Lake Macquarie. My wife and I have a new baby at home. Little Archer has already been on the boat once when it was docked, so I’m really excited to share adventures and experiences on the ocean with him as he grows.
“I think life would be pretty boring if you didn’t have something you were passionate about and for me, it’s the ocean, the business I’ve created, Newcastle as a destination, and sustainable tourism.”
