And he would know. At 104, Mr Power survived active service in World War II. His wife of 70 years, Moira, didn't kill him either.

"She did threaten it a few times, but she didn't follow through, so I can't have been too bad," he jokes.

Born in Gunning in 1916, Mr Power grew up on a dairy farm. He says it was hard work, but a close knit family of eight siblings - two girls and six boys - home grown food and a love of sport set him up for a long, healthy life.

When his two older brothers signed up for military service, Mr Power wasn't far behind them.

He signed up in 1940, and by 1941 was on active duty in Malaya.

His battalion was part of the battle of Muar, one of two Australian battalions trapped at Parit Sulong bridge with an Indian regiment.

Of the 4000 men, only 900 survived.

"We'd gone straight into a trap and had no more ammunition and no air force," Mr Power recalls.

"We were held up at a bridge over Simpang River. We hadn't been able to get our wounded out - we had 40 at least.

"The Lieutenant Colonel took the white flag down to the Japs to ask if they'd let the wounded through and they said they wouldn't, unless everyone surrendered.

"One of the wounded said very loudly what they thought the Japs could do."

Lieutenant Colonel Anderson said the group had two choices - try to create a diversion and break through, or die where they were.

A group of men volunteered to make an attack as a diversion.

"Jimmy Smith was in charge, Sergeant Smith," Mr Power said.

"All of them came up at once. The Japs must have had 10 or more machine guns, and the noise they made was terrific. Those blokes were dead in about a minute, the lot of them."

The remaining men broke into small groups and retreated into the jungle. They made their way to a bend in the river, with the aim of swimming across and making their way through the jungle to headquarters at Yong Peng.

"Just before our little group went in the Japs machine-gunned up and down the river, so they must have seen some of us getting across, but a few of us made it through," he said.

"We started making our way up the mountain. Our doctor was with us and about half way up the mountain he said he couldn't go any further.

"So we cut down some saplings, made a stretcher, tied the crossbars with our shoelaces and put him on that."

They came upon the road to Yong Peng at about 3pm, and were relieved to see some friendly trucks in the bushes.

"They thought we were a pretty lousy looking lot, which we were - we hadn't had a wash or a shave or any food for a week," Mr Power said.

"They boiled up some potatoes and bully beef and took us back to Yong Peng. We stayed there for a week, then it was back to the island - that was where I got wounded and sent to hospital."

As Mr Power lay in his hospital bed, he could hear enemy fire approaching. He and another patient, Harry, decided to make a break for the wharf while they still could.

They were caught by a military police officer trying to buy water.

"He asked us what we were doing and we said we were clearing out because there was nothing we could do - Harry had malaria and I was covered in patches [from shrapnel injuries]," he said.

"The officer said that was pretty obvious and rowed us out to the hospital ship in the bay."

That was where Mr Power discovered the road between the hospital and the wharf had been closed - there would be no more evacuees.

About ten minutes after they got on the ship, the wharf was bombed heavily. The ship pulled out and made its way towards Jakarta, where the patients would be transferred on to Sri Lanka.

Communication with friends and family was nearly impossible, but a twist of fate let Mr Power's brothers know he was safe.

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As he lay on a verandah hospital bed in Sri Lanka, wounded and wracked with dysentery, Mr Power saw a familiar face walk by.

"I looked up and my eldest brother was walking past - I couldn't mistake him," Mr Power said.

"They had leave off the boat and just as he was about to go someone told him wounded had been brought in from Singapore.

"He asked where they were and got a taxi straight there."

More than 70 years later, Mr Power is still emotional as he remembers the unexpected moment of brotherly love.

"I didn't have anything with me in the hospital but my underpants, so the next day he brought me out a razor, shaving cream, toothbrush, a couple of face washers, some handkerchiefs and lollies," he said.

"I was living in the land of luxury then."

Serendipituously, and unbeknownst to them, both of Mr Power's brothers ended up in the same convoy of ships.

"He thought he saw John walking along the deck of the other ship and yelled out to him - and it was," he said.

"He told him 'I've seen Fred, and he's okay'."

After three months in hospital Mr Power was sent home - a month after that his parents found out he was alive.

Shortly after that he was deemed fit enough for service and packed off to New Guinea.

"That was a lot easier - we were bombed a few times, but when they start to bomb you you switch the lights off," he said.

"When you're in total darkness they can't see and the bombs just drop anywhere."

New Guinea was also where he met his future wife's brother, Herb.

Mr Power finished the war on an island off the coast of Borneo, engaged in an ongoing stalemate with Japanese troops.

His death-defying exploits continued - in one incident, a torpedo passed directly under the front of the ship he was on, while another torpedo just missed a nearby destroyer.

Returned soldiers received deferred pay - sixpence a day for time spent in Australia, a shilling a day while overseas - and he and Herb purchased a small shop.

It was while they were cleaning it up he met Moira.

"I remember she had her hair up in curlers, and she was wearing a greenish-looking dress," he said.

"We were carting out rubbish, so the first trip she had with me was in the panel van, carting rubbish to the tip - but she wouldn't get off.

"We just sort of clicked when we first met and that was it."

The pair wed in 1948 - Moira made her own wedding dress - and went on to have two sons, a grandson and a granddaughter.

They continued to work in retail businesses in Sydney, before retiring, when they purchased a caravan and drove around Australia.

Apart from a boat break-down in crocodile-infested waters, Mr Power managed to keep himself relatively well out of trouble on the trip.

It was on their way home in 1983 they stopped in to visit a friend at Sussex Inlet, and fell in love with the area.

"We were out fishing one day and Moira came back and told me she bought a block - she said she talked it over with the salesman, and he said it was alright if she paid $25 as long as she paid the rest when we got back to Sydney," he said.

"It was a beautiful spot - but eventually we got a little bit too old and the house was a bit too big and the lawns were hard to look after, so we moved in to Inasmuch."

Mr Power said there was a great sense of community in Sussex, and at Inasmuch.

Although Moira passed away in 2018, he continues to be an active member of the Inasmuch community, and greatly enjoyed his 104^th birthday celebrations in February.

He said his happiest memory was his wedding day, and he was proudest of volunteering to go to war.

His best advice for a long and happy life - other than not dying - is to stay in touch with friends and loved ones.

He believes he is the last one of his battalion left.

"I've been very lucky to survive," he said.

"Some choices you make and some are made for you."