My official CV/resumé >>

Another take on 'my-life-in-800-words >>

I was born in London in 1972, but was irreversibly affected by watching too many episodes of the cult British children's TV programme Mr Benn when I was little. I've since spent most of my adult life trying to emulate Mr Benn's ability to visit the costume shop down the road, walk through the back door, and find myself in the midst of a foreign adventure.

I grew up in West London. I believe I was perhaps born a latino in a previous life — i.e. I'm always late and I like hammocks — but I attended a French lycée in London for my entire schooling. So now I reckon I'm just plain confused.

Following a Degree in French and Spanish at Leeds University and a Master's Degree in Latin American Studies from London University's Institute of Latin American Studies (now Institute for the Study of the Americas), I began my journalism career while living and working in Venezuela in 1996. I initially went to the country chasing a French girlfriend. But instead fell head over heels for the unique Gran Sabana region in the southeast.

While living there, I wrote for an online news site, VHeadline, as well as for the fledgling Environment News Service, which is still going strong today.

In early 1999, I landed the commission to write the first edition of the Traveler's Venezuela Companion. I spent eight months researching it and took nearly a year to complete it. I made very little money, but came away a better writer, with a ton of experience and a 1980 Toyota Land Cruiser. The Traveler's Venezuela Companion won the Benjamin Franklin Award for Best Guidebook 2002.

I worked on a book project in Venezuela for several years. The travel book is/was about my cherished region of the Gran Sabana, tentatively titled Travels in the Lost World. For more on that go here.

I went on to work on two more Traveler's Companion guidebooks, published by America's largest independent travel publisher, The Globe Pequot Press. In 2001, I updated the Traveler's Ecuador Companion and then revamped and overhauled the never-published Traveler's Russia Companion.

I have also worked on various Footprint Handbooks, publishers of the biblical South American Handbook, as well as for Fodor's, Dorling Kindersley, Insight Guides, Intelliguides and the Starservice hotel reviews.

As a writer and photographer, my work has been published in the UK, US and in Latin America - titles include Geographical, BBC Wildlife, The Independent on Sunday, Wanderlust, Global, Adventure Travel, Interval World, New Law Journal and thisistravel.co.uk (the Evening Standard and Daily Mail travel site).

Conversely to what many people think, I haven't travelled that widely. I've never been to Africa, for instance, nor Australasia or South-East Asia. I only made it to Ireland in 2001. This said, you can't get much wider than Russia.

I was Chief Travel Writer for the Caracas Daily Journal from 1999 to 2001, where I acquired an unofficial (and hilarious) fan club, and was Contributing Editor of South American Explorer magazine in the US from 2000 to 2005 (I am also now a board member at the clubhouse in Quito). Both these publications were willing to adopt and send forth various 'brats of my brain' which no-one else would, so I owe them a thank you here.

As an early-adopter of the web, I've always enjoyed writing for the net. Over the years I distributed articles liberally over such sites as the great planeta.com, bootsnall.com and 2camels.com. I was a founding member of guidebookwriters.com, and was Contributing Editor of the excellent Travel Intelligence and Perceptive Travel.

I designed the pages you see before you now, as well as various other ventures, such as Sarah-Darling.com, BirdVenezuela.com, Jo's Place, VenezuelaVoyage, Ecuadorial and TheLostWorld. Although I enjoy creating websites, I find HTML and Flash to be pernickety and not much fun. I'm much more interested in the big picture of sites - whether editorial or visual - and would rather leave the programing to people far better at it than me... like my friend Manuel.

I started making videos in late 2002; a good avenue for my skills. I sold various short promotional films of travel destinations in South America, including Angel Falls, the Inca Trail and the Galapagos Islands. To view some examples, see my YouTube channel.

In 2003, I worked as the associate producer in Ecuador for a three-part programme for the BBC, PBS and CBC, broadcast in late 2004 as 'Extreme Oil' and 'Oil: The World Over a Barrel.'

Since 2003 I have been based in Quito, Ecuador, with my wife and three young children.

I worked as International Media Relations Officer and then as Head of Strategic Marketing and Communication for the Quito Visitors' Bureau from 2007 to mid-2010. I very much enjoyed my role promoting my adopted city, putting my experience of travel and guidebook writing, as well as web creation, video and PR, into good practice. See the Press section for an idea of what I worked on - as well as the site itself, which I led the creation and expansion of. I was fortunate to work with a great group of people, with whom we achieved much with very little.

Over the years in Ecuador, I have written copy for various tourism industry clients, occacionally contributing to Ecuadorian magazines, or writing and editing books published in Ecuador. I continue to write occacional articles and work on the odd guidebook. See the NEWS section or WORDS section for more.

One of those clients was the tour operator, Metropolitan Touring. In May 2010, I accepted a position in their Quito offices as Head of Communication. I'm enjoying this new role and its challenges. The company has expanded to open offices in Peru, Chile, Argentina, Brazil and Colombia since 2008, so it's an exciting place to be, at the headquarters of a pan-South American company.

My focus is on communication with our travel trade partners and end-consumers, supporting our marketing efforts, being part of the team developing the company's digital strategy (web, apps, social media, etc.), and expanding our video ouput.