\n
The More FM host and returning star of Celebrity Treasure Island on grieving, the joy of fishing shows, and the dad bod that stopped the nation in its tracks.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\nAn unspeakably bronzed Simon Barnett is shimmering away in a studded leather vest while perched on a raft in the middle of a field. It\u2019s a surreal scene, but the topic of conversation could not be any more real. \u201cYou think of your fist as grief, and that\u2019s all you can see at the start,\u201d he says, placing his own fist right between his eyes. \u201cBut what happens with time is this\u2013\u201d he slowly draws his fist away from his face. \u201cYou have the ability to see more than just the grief.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\nIt\u2019s been over two years since his wife Jodi passed away, and Barnett says he can now see more than just the grief. \u201cI\u2019m doing OK, but funnily enough it\u2019s doing these new adventures without Jodi that still make me a bit nervy and a bit twitchy,\u201d he says. \u201cIt\u2019s those terribly mundane things that one does, like packing my suitcase to come here, where I\u2019ll get flustered. She was just always the planner, the wisdom, the brains behind stuff, and now I don\u2019t have that.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n![\"\"](\"data:image\/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAIAAAAAAAP\/\/\/yH5BAEAAAAALAAAAAABAAEAAAIBRAA7\")
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/images.thespinoff.co.nz\/1\/2026\/04\/CTI_Kahu_Editorial_0369.JPG?w=1290&fm=auto&auto=compress%2Cformat\")
<\/span><\/span><\/p>\nWe\u2019re speaking amid a bunch of shipping containers and props for Celebrity Treasure Island, where Barnett and Black Fern Portia Woodman-Wickcliffe are set to arrive as surprise team captains in week one. Having first competed in the reality series back in 2004, Barnett says it was his children who convinced him to return, over two decades later. \u201cThey said, \u2018Dad, if you don\u2019t do it, you\u2019re just going to sit at home\u2019, and I realised they\u2019re probably right,\u201d he says.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n\u201cThis is less about winning, and more about me just trying to find some new things in life.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\nBarnett will be competing for the White Matter Brain Cancer Trust, and says that $100,000 would be \u201clife changing and game changing\u201d for the small charity. But even with one season of Celebrity Treasure Island under his belt, the new era \u201cterrifies\u201d the More FM radio host. \u201cThe old series was more geared towards physical challenges and now it seems a bit more cerebral,\u201d he says. \u201cI\u2019m a reasonably intelligent sort of a bloke, but puzzles I\u2019m not very flash at.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\nWhile he practiced his code cracking, we asked Simon Barnett to take us through his life in television, including the joy of World\u2019s Deadliest Catch and his Dancing With the Stars trauma.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\nMy earliest TV memory is\u2026 <\/b>It was black and white, and it took forever for the valve to warm up. You could turn it on, and then you could practically go to Australia and back and the picture would just be coming through, it took that long to warm up. I also remember the innovation of colour television. We couldn\u2019t afford it, but my grandparents got it, and I just remember feeling like the whole world came to life. From there, I would just always want to go to any mate\u2019s place that had colour TV.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n