He's an adventurous spirit
Published Saturday November 28th, 2009
Brian Jones has climbed Mount Kilimanjaro, skied to the North Pole and attempted to run across the Sahara Desert.
While each is impressive by itself, these adventures had the added bonus of being for a good cause. Mount Kilimanjaro resulted in a mountain of books for South Devon Elementary School's library, the North Pole was a learning experience for schools across the province and that trek in the Sahara helped raise awareness about autism.
He's a motivated man, whether he's tackling a personal goal or serving his clients at TD Waterhouse Private Investment Advice, the investment arm of TD Bank. He's been there since 2005 and loves the work, as it's kind of like running his own business.
"You manage business investments (and) high net worth clients, their personal, retirement, tax, estate plans," he says. "Really, it's about building relationships with people."
His title is vice-president, branch manager and investment advisor. He enjoys learning about people's lives to determine how he can best help them manage their money.
"I manage the office too. We've got four advisors, so basically (it's) more of compliance supervisions because these guys are all really good advisors and really experienced."
They work in partnership with TD Bank as well, he says, adding that they all work together to help their clients make as much money as possible.
"Sometimes it's not about making money, it's just peace of mind, having clearly set out goals and knowing where they are today."
Based on the work he's doing now, you might think that Jones has always been a numbers guy. That isn't quite the path he followed, however.
Jones graduated from the University of New Brunswick in 1994 with a bachelor of arts, majoring in military history and economics. In 1995, he spent a year in France and played professional rugby in Évreux, 100 kilometres west of Paris.
"When I got done playing rugby, I had three months of cruising around Europe and figuring out what I wanted to do. I wanted a job that was flexible, allows me to travel and do the things I want to do, and is very lucrative."
He returned to Fredericton and set about figuring out what job fit that criteria. He started in insurance, where he learned to sell, then worked for a bank before moving to the brokerage at RBC Dominion Securities. He was there for six years before joining TD Waterhouse Private Investment Advice.
Born and raised in Fredericton, he was happy to settle in what he calls his favourite city in the world.
"It's home. You go away to all these places and they're big and flashy and stuff," he says, but after a couple of weeks you're ready to come home.
"I go to Toronto every quarter and Montreal, and North Pole, Kilimanjaro, other places. When you're there, you just want to get back and share it with everybody."
His love of travelling came out of rugby, says Jones.
"When we played a lot of rugby we were always away every weekend and we always were travelling and every time you travelled you played the game and that was the whole highlight of the trip. Everything around it was a bonus."
The first big trip he decided to take was to climb Mount Kilimanjaro in 2006.
"That was one of those things where you read the books and saw the movies and thought 'I could do that,'" he says.
His sister, Lori Jones-Clark, teaches at South Devon Elementary School and suggested he do the climb as a fundraiser for the school library. The teachers and students got into it, learning lots about Tanzania and partnering with a school in Arusha, which he visited while there.
"Once you do something like this, once you go to Kilimanjaro and you climb it, and then you come back and you think, 'That was awesome.'"
The only thing that was bad about the trip is that he broke his fibula playing basketball about three weeks before he went, so he taped it up and managed to grin and bear it.
"It wasn't so bad going up, but coming down was step, ow, step, ow. I pumped a lot of ibuprofen into me."
This trip was so exciting and rewarding that he wanted to come up with something else.
"I was thinking what would be a great way to raise funds for kids again and I thought, 'I could take letters to the North Pole to Santa Claus.'"
Unfortunately, you can't go to the North Pole at Christmas, he says, the only time you can go is April, so he made the trip in 2008.
On this excursion, he decided to partner up with Science East and fundraise for environmental education.
"Then we partnered up with three schools - New Maryland Elementary, Harvey High (middle school students) and Leo Hayes High School, so you had three different age groups."
There was also a website where 70 schools across the province used his adventure as a learning tool. Jones admits he learned a lot right along with them.
"There is no pole, it's at the bottom of the ocean," he says, and the ice covering it is always moving.
He travelled as close as he could by plane, then skied into the North Pole with a group of people from around the world. The trip took 12 days.
"I went through the ice and fell in the ocean (one day), because I always went first because I'm the biggest."
Luckily, the travellers had practised what to do, just in case - though it had never happened before.
"They pull you out, you change your boot liners and you just get skiing and it warms you up again," he says. "But it was quite shocking to fall in the water. Initially it felt quite warm."
The water was warm compared to the -50 degree temperature. Following this, it's understandable that he wanted to go somewhere hot.
"When you get back, you're exhausted. It took me a while to recover from that, but while we were up there we were always talking about how cold it was and that gave me the idea for the Sahara."
A co-worker has a son with autism and through her, Jones learned more about it.
"I saw the work they did with (her son) and the changes in his behaviour were quite remarkable," he says. "Once kids get to two or three, if it's not treated, they just go to a place where they never come back from. They have to have these intervention services in place and these education services that get them to re-learn how to use their brains."
As well, one of his best friends, Jeff Thompson, has a nephew with autism.
To kick things off Jones, Thompson and Steven Burns travelled to Pamplona, Spain, in June to run with the bulls.
"Actually ran away from the bulls and hid from them, then waited for them to go by and ran after them," says Jones. "That was our initial awareness raiser (for autism)."
He followed this with a run across the Sahara Desert in October. It was hotter than the North Pole, but it didn't go as well.
Though Jones trained hard for it and did a lot of running, he wasn't properly trained for desert running. Nor did he have the right equipment. Thanks to travel delays, he arrived right before the race began, so he wasn't able to get used to the heat, let alone practice running in it.
"We got there at 12:30 at night and the race started the next day at 8 (a.m.)."
He didn't eat properly and wasn't feeling well, but when the race started he was feeling pretty good. At least he was for the first 10 kilometres.
"You're carrying all your stuff, so you're carrying 30 pounds, and they give you your water every 10 kilometres."
He got through that first marathon in 6 1/2 hours, though he staggered into the finish line and headed for his tent to lie down and get out of the heat. He was sick for three hours and the doctors advised him not to go the next day as it was another 44 kilometres.
Though he was sick all night, Jones refused to give up. He walked the next day, taking 11 hours to complete that leg of the race. He was still sick and, once again, the doctors encouraged him to quit. He wouldn't.
On day three, race organizers started to impose cut-off times. He got 30 kilometres in and had to cover the last 10 kilometres in two hours.
"You can walk that in good conditions when you're healthy, but I had lost 20 pounds in three days, so they were a little bit worried about my weight and my strength."
He tried to jog out of desperation to get it over with and only made it half a kilometre when two toenails on his right foot popped off. He taped them down as tight as he could and kept going - until he lost two toenails on his left foot. At this point, a doctor told him he was done.
While he was disappointed, he says, "getting sick drew more attention to the cause."
Since his goal was autism awareness and fundraising for Oscars for Autism, it was worth all he went through.
"Now I have to go back and finish this," he says of the race across the Sahara Desert. This time, he'll be more prepared for what's involved.
"People always think I'm crazy for doing these things, but I think the opposite. I think it's crazy coming to work every day, sitting in traffic, drinking a coffee, doing the same old day-to-day routine."
These adventures help spice up life a bit, plus through them he's learned a lot. He's also setting an example for his daughters about what they're capable of.
Jones is married to Raena Steeves and they have two daughters, five-year-old Forest and three-year-old River.
"I think if you have a dream, go for it. ... There is always a reason to put it off. We all make excuses why we can't, so make an excuse why we can. ... I think anybody can do these things."
Though his family can't help but worry when he heads off on these adventures, they're all supportive.
With all that has happened in his life, it's no surprise that his priorities have shifted over the years.
"I'm way more responsible. I was the most irresponsible right up until I started working. And once you have kids, the light bulb goes off."
Being a parent has helped him to appreciated what his mother and father, Alice and Harry Jones, did for he and his sister growing up. Among other things, his parents taught him the value of hard work.
"I'm the kind of guy who had to work for everything," he says, noting things didn't come easy for him. That has worked in his favour, though.
"If you work hard, you can do anything you want."
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