Scott Stallard is not your average businessman. When he's not running his gym, The Olympic Club, in Dundonald Street, he's likely to be capturing images from some remote corner of the world on his camera. Mr. Stallard spoke with business reporter Alex Wright about his extraordinary life.

From photographing tribes deep in the jungles of New Guinea to trekking across the ice sheets of the North Pole.

Those are just some of the activities Scott Stallard has been up to during his time spent exploring the world.

And the owner of the Olympic Club, based in Dundonald Street, has also enjoyed an interesting career in business, ranging from working for a top US film producer to setting up the first commercial gym in Bermuda.

Bermudian Mr. Stallard graduated with a BSc degree in Health from Springfield College in Massachusetts, before becoming a teacher and going on to work for Delta Air Lines in the US for a year.

But he soon found himself drawn back to his homeland and joined Lowe's Hotel (the predecessor to Club Med) in St. George's for a year, running the swimming pools, golf course, tennis courts and watersports facilities.

A move to New York beckoned, however, where Mr. Stallard went to try his hand at acting and modelling for three years, working on films and television advertisements, which led to him meeting with film producer Robert Stigwood, who offered him a job as an assistant, helping make movies such as Grease, Saturday Night Fever, Staying Alive and Andrew Lloyd-Webber's Evita.

During his three years working for Mr. Stigwood and having travelled the world with him, he decided to take up photography and has never looked back ever since.

"It was a great opportunity to practise my photography and really learn the craft — I learnt a tremendous amount and got an excellent insight into what is possible from someone of Mr. Stigwood's stature," he said.

By then Mr. Stallard had reached a stage in his life where he wanted to be his own boss and returned to the Island to set up the Bermuda Nautilus Fitness Gym in Front Street, going into business with Nick Jones and Bobby Mulder in 1987.

Three years later, the gym, which was the first of its kind in Bermuda, relocated to its current premises at Dundonald Street, with the building being converted into a 8,000 square foot purpose-built health centre, and was renamed the Olympic Club.

Along with the name change, came a change in management that same year, as Mr. Stallard and Mr. Jones bought out Mr. Mulder, before Mr. Stallard bought the business in its entirety in 1999.

Mr. Stallard has been in sole charge of the gym ever since, expanding the business with the erection of a climbing wall outside four years ago and then landing a contract to help design and manage the corporate gyms of HSBC and American International Group/Allied World Assurance Co. in 2007, bringing events right up to date with today.

"We have had our best year ever in 2008, but we have to see about 2009," he said. "We have not seen any effect from the economic downturn and I would not really expect to either — one of the reasons I am in this business is because it is the kind which should survive any downturn.

"In the world of business in Hamilton and Bermuda in general, executives and people from all walks of life want to keep healthy.

"I remember when I first got into this business 22 years ago my father said to me: 'Are you sure it is not just a fad or a phase you are going through?', but with my education in health behind me, I was quite confident that it was something that people needed and that it would be a long-term investment."

During his holidays, Mr. Stallard, who was represented by The Image Bank/Getty Images for 10 years before collecting his own library of images from across the world (including more than 50,000 original transparencies), has devoted his time to a love of photography, visiting far-flung places ranging from Mongolia, China, Thailand, Nepal, Indonesia and Australia to the Amazon, Brazil, Cuba, the US, the Caribbean and Canada.

He has also travelled to capture scenes from Iceland, Greenland, the Arctic, Europe, Uganda, Tanzania and Kenya, with many of them being used in publications, including Time, People, Travel & Leisure, Golf Magazine, Elle Decor, Homes & Gardens, House Beautiful and The Lonely Planet Guide, as well as The Bermudian magazine, This Week In Bermuda, Preview Of Bermuda, Bermuda Business, and provided the imagery for Capital G Bank's credit cards, Cable & Wireless phone cards, the Bank of Bermuda annual reports and advertising, brochures and adverts for a number of international businesses and websites.

His larger images can be seen in the form of duratrans at the LF Wade International Airport, 360 degree panoramics at CellularOne and Frameworks and a 300 square foot glass photo mural at the Bermuda Underwater Exploration Institute (BUEI). Some of his original photographs adorn the offices of Capital G, the Gibbons Co. and the new TeleBermuda offices. And he supplies international advertising work for Bermuda through J Walter Thompson and Arnold McGrath based in New York.

Mr. Stallard has also worked in conjunction with fellow photographer Ann Spurling on both indoor and outdoor pictures for hotel brochures.

"Photography is my love — because of my work for Mr. Stigwood, most of my photography tends to be based around geographical images, unusual places and unique cultures," he said.

"And I have really continued that in my spare time, going out travelling and photographing on explorations maybe once or twice a year to places like the North Pole, Greenland, Brazil, Cuba, Thailand, Kenya, Uganda, Mongolia and China."

But his favourite trip was a month-long expedition in 1997 to one of the remotest outposts in the world — Irian Jaya in western New Guinea — where he journeyed through mountains, jungles and valleys, meeting tribes still living a neolithic existence, and which he plans to be the subject of his book called 'Three Tribes of Irian Jaya'.

During his time in the wild, Mr. Stallard lost 20 pounds, living off one meal and one bottle of water a day.

"It was a bit of a life-changing event," he readily admits. "After that, I decided to I was only going to travel to the most remote and difficult places that I could find while I still had my health and I was relatively young.

"It has also made me realise how short life is and now I like to utilise all of my time to the best effect — doing all of my business in St. George's in the morning, doing my job at the gym during the day and then working on projects, enjoying cooking something special, doing my art and reading books in the evening — I love books on politics, geography, travel and exploration, of which I have a collection of about 400 from the 1800s, including first editions, which is where I draw my inspiration for travel and exploration."

Mr. Stallard became an international member of The Explorers Club in New York, courtesy of Teddy and Edna Tucker, and the National Geographic Society, as well as sitting on the board of trustees of BUEI and giving lectures on his photographic expeditions around the world.

He said he was keen to preserve as many memories on the world in which he lived in his documentation for future generations to enjoy in what has become an ever-changing planet due to the effects of climate change and global warming and human destruction of the environment.

Mr. Stallard, who has a 15-year-old son and lives in St. George's, has produced seven books on Bermuda, including two featuring aerial photographs, four of pictures on land and a book entitled 'Bermuda 1899' based on letters written by his grandmother about life in St. David's before World War I, all published through Oakwell Boulton.

But during his whole career, just as with his photography, he has stuck to the same principles which have served him so well, including customer service being the key to running a successful business, having never used a computer to ensure his staff give their full attention to customers at the gym.

"We provide people with everything they need to be healthy at a price they can afford, and health should be something they can afford," he said. "A service which may cost around $100 per month could prevent 100 possible ailments."

And it is a mentality which his employees closely adhere to also, for example, 72-year-old Burnell Williams, who works with all age groups and abilities, acting as an inspiration for others, who even taught jujitsu to former world No. 1 tennis player Patrick Rafter during his stay in Bermuda.

The equipment and facilities at the gym are also maintained to a high standard, with Mr. Stallard pumping all of the profits made back into the business, in the form of new machines, weights, carpet and flooring, while it is proud to boast some of the Island's top aerobics and spinning class instructors.

It has been very much a case of learning on the job, but during his 22 years in business, Mr. Stallard has gleaned a lot of useful information from the likes of his accountant Lawrence Dickson, of Oakley Capital Investments Ltd.

But Mr. Stallard, who won two gold medals competing for Bermuda's track team in the Carifta Games, plans to broaden his travel horizons even further, with Antarctica, Chile, Easter Island and Kamchatka next on his list, proving that he will go to whatever lengths it takes to live his life to the full.