Robin Esrock

Robin Esrock was born in Johannesburg, South Africa, in 1974. His early career involved working in the music industry for SL Feldman & Associates. A significant turning point occurred after a bike accident left him with a broken kneecap and a $20,000 insurance settlement. Esrock used this money to embark on a one-year solo backpacking adventure to 24 countries, during which he documented his experiences online, a nascent form of multi-platform travel journalism.

This trip launched his career as a travel writer; he became a regular columnist for publications such as the Globe & Mail, MSN, the Vancouver Sun, and Outpost Magazine. His writing has appeared in major international publications including the Chicago Tribune, The Guardian, Gulf News, South China Morning Post, Sydney Morning Herald, Dallas Morning News, Toronto Star, Canadian Geographic, Mental Floss, The Red Bulletin, and National Geographic. In 2008, he co-created, co-developed, served as associate producer, and co-wrote the 40-part TV series “Word Travels,” filmed in 36 countries. The series was broadcast on Travel Channel International, National Geographic Adventure, OutsideTV, HalogenTV, OLN, F/X, City, Amazon Prime Video, and Tubi. In 2012, his original idea for the OLN TV series “Get Stuffed” went into production.

Esrock has traveled to over 110 countries across seven continents. He is also a public speaker and has appeared as a travel expert on Vancouver’s Breakfast Television, Forbes Travel, and Travel + Leisure. In 2013, he received the Destination Canada award for Best Online Video at the Go Media Marketplace Awards in Winnipeg. He was also the master of ceremonies at the 108th Annual Explorer’s Club Dinner at the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel in New York in March 2012, presenting awards to prominent explorers. His TEDx Vancouver talk on the lessons of travel was selected by Yahoo as one of TED’s top travel talks. In 2013, he released “The Great Canadian Bucket List: One-of-a-Kind Travel Experiences,” which became a number one bestselling Canadian travel and history title on Amazon.ca. He published five follow-up books in the Bucket List series in 2015. HarperCollins and Affirm Press published “The Great Global Bucket List” in 2016, which entered the Toronto Star Non-Fiction Bestseller List at Number 9. A second edition of “The Great Canadian Bucket List” was published by Dundurn Press in 2017, reaching number 5 on the Toronto Star Canadian non-fiction book chart. In 2018, Affirm Press published “The Great Australian Bucket List,” which was long-listed for the Australian Indie Book Awards. In 2019, he released “75 Places to Take the Kids (Before They Don’t Want to Go).” He became a Royal Canadian Geographic Travel Ambassador and began writing a bi-weekly column for Canadian Geographic in 2021. In 2023, he was nominated by the Tourism Industry Association of Canada as its Travel Media Professional of the Year and won a First Place Award from the Society of American Travel Writers.