Rio San Pedro is owned and operated by Ian and Maggy Staples.

We are an English couple who were drawn to Chile 12 years ago. At the time we were sailing around the world and initially sailed to Chile for an adventure in Patagonia where we wrote the RCC cruising navigation guide to the waters of Chile ("Chile – Arica Desert to Tierra del Fuego").

Whilst doing this we fell in love with the beauty and the people of the country to such an extent that we bought a farm in the Lakes Region of Chile and have settled here.

In addition to the farm, we have formed and are the principal shareholders of Rio San Pedro Miel Ltda with a passion for producing honeys from the native forests of southern Chile, free from all contamination and use of harmful chemicals.

Our backgrounds lend themselves very well to running a successful business such as this. My (Ian) commercial background was as Managing Director of Halfords in the 1980s and my academic and commercial background as a horticulturalist in my earlier career provided a solid base from which to build Rio San Pedro. Maggy's background as an artist and gardener all help feed the passion that is an essential part of being successful bee keepers.

In addition to business life we keep ourselves fit and healthy through sport. In 2006 Maggy completed her first sprint distance triathlon. In 2007 I completed my first full IronMan distance triathlon race at the age of 61 with our son and the “Rio San Pedro Racing Team”.

This is a small team of athletes who are interested in maintaining themselves in very good condition. None are professional and will never win an event. James to the left is a Systems Director for a major London based media company, Hugo is a geotechnical engineer, me (the old one) I am the bee keeper, Stuart, our son is a Sales Director and Simon is a Senior Executive with a major UK retail chain.

As honey has been shown to mirror the energy effects of manufactured sports drinks I use the following mix when training, consuming about 1 litre per hour:

• 1 litre of water
• 100 gm. of Honey to give 300 Kcal of energy
• 1.5 gm. of salt
• One squeezed lemon. This takes away the sweetness of the drink and makes it delicious.

Better than any manufactured sports drink.