I was born and raised in Yorkshire, UK. Farming was my life’s interest and I earned an agricultural degree and worked in all areas of farming, but being a farm manager in the UK just didn't cut it...
Fueled by an itch to explore, I started a life-long career in the travel industry driving an overland truck from London to Kathmandu. I later secured a position - based in Cairo - as a field manager and tour guide for a company operating trips throughout Egypt, Turkey, Israel, Jordan and Syria. The next frontier I dreamed of was Sub-Saharan Africa and I arrived in Kenya in 1984. My first trip was driving from Nairobi to Kigali to meet an arriving tour group. For the time being, I was happy driving and guiding trips in Rwanda, then-Zaire and Uganda with occasional trips in Kenya and Tanzania (every day was a new adventure...and I loved it!). The companies I was working with wanted someone to market travel to all five countries, so I headed to the USA. I found myself managing operations based out of Kigali and doing 2-month-stints in the USA. I had great times guiding trips for a couple of US-based companies - mostly an affluent, fun-loving, G&T-drinking crowd. Then in 1994, almost overnight, everything went wrong in Rwanda when the Genocide unraveled the country. Zaire (now DRC) seemed a good option and so I headed there, but that quickly went pear-shaped, too! So, off to Uganda where I set up and managed operations based from Kampala and made the trek to the USA a few times a year. Tourism to Uganda started to grow - at the time it was the only accessible country where you could still see Mountain Gorillas. At this point, my plate was too full! Mel Gormely joined me to manage operations in Uganda and I found myself on the other side of the World living in the USA as marketing manager and making 3-4 trips to Africa annually. Finally, in early 2000, Mel and I branched off and launched CAS...and the rest is history! Contact me at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.