A new start after 60: I was burnt out and facing redundancy. So I set up a bee farm – and learned the joys of a simple life

Jeff Lee had spent decades as an investigative journalist. But when he upped sticks with his wife to buy a farm in rural British Columbia, he didn’t just change jobs – he found a different way to live

Jeff Lee became interested in beekeeping in his late 50s after his wife, Amanda, took part in a “beard of bees” event at Science World’s “science of fear” exhibition in Vancouver, Canada, where they lived. She stepped into a Perspex booth, a caged queen bee was placed beneath her chin and thousands of bees climbed her neck – hence the “beard”. She was so calm that the stallholder was impressed. “You should keep bees,” he said.

Lee had a small collection of books on the insects – “the idea of homesteading and having something of an independent life, rather than a rat-race life, always appealed to me” – and the pair enrolled on a beekeeping course. Before long, they had put two hives in their back yard. Fast-forward to 60 and he and Amanda had moved 300 miles east to rural British Columbia to buy a bee farm. For Lee’s part, however, he didn’t just acquire a business. The bees taught him a completely different way to live.

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