ADRIAN LIPSCOMB played many parts during his lifetime – as a conscripted soldier during the early 1970s, an intelligence analyst with the Australian Department of Defence in the 1980s, a hippie vagabond, a university lecturer, an eco-tourism consultant, a businessman, a travel writer, a criminal lawyer, and an emergency services volunteer, among other things.
He travelled widely throughout the world, and keenly observed the foibles, the cultures and the customs of the people he encountered. As a young man he explored southern and eastern Africa (where he climbed Mount Kilimanjaro) and Israel (where he worked on a kibbutz), and he roamed the Hippie Trail through Iran, Afghanistan, Pakistan and India. Later, in middle age, his interest shifted to Southeast Asia and the South Pacific, where he worked with Australian Volunteers Abroad (AVA) and as a freelance travel writer with Lonely Planet and other publishers.
He was particularly enamoured of the life and times of his great grandfather, WILLIAM SIMPSON, a celebrated Victorian illustrator and commentator who travelled and sketched in remote corners of the world over a century earlier. His journeys frequently retraced Simpson's footsteps.
In 1987 Adrian and his partner moved to the picturesque shire of Bellingen in eastern Australia, which has long been a melting pot for artists and “alternative lifestylers” wishing to escape from the pressures of big city life. He continued to make frequent overseas forays for many years, and eventually settled down to practise law in the town of Urunga.
Adrian retired in 2015; in that same year he was awarded the Medal of the Order of Australia (OAM).