ABOUT
More than thirty years leading journeys across Africa. Over 30 departures for National Geographic Expeditions across a 17-year partnership, and 25 years with Bushtracks Expeditions, from VIP Boeing 737 circumnavigations of the Sahara to a 50-bed tented camp built in the Niger desert.
VIVIENNE GUNNING
Senior Expedition Leader · Documentary Photographer · Writer · Speaker
National Geographic Expedition Expert, 2027 · Accessible & Assisted Travel Specialist · Advisory Board, Accessible Travel Press
30+ years in the field | 36 African countries | 100+ expeditions led and co-led | 20 years of accessible travel work |
“My feet on the earth. My eyes on the horizon.”
gunningvivienne@gmail.com · +27 82 795 0411 (WhatsApp)
viviennegunning.com · viviennegunning.substack.com · Instagram @VivieGunning
Gordon’s Bay, Cape Town, South Africa
Available to lead 2027 departures
BIOGRAPHY
High-resolution press photographs available on request. |
| Vivienne Gunning is a Senior Expedition Leader, documentary photographer, painter and travel writer based in Gordon’s Bay, Cape Town. She has more than thirty years of field experience across 36 African countries and has led or co-led over one hundred expeditions for National Geographic Expeditions, WWF and Bushtracks Expeditions. For two decades she led National Geographic Expeditions’ Southern Africa private air safaris, including Casablanca to the Cape, Cape to Cairo, Sahara by Air and Jerusalem to Cape Town. Her working life began with thirteen years at South African Airways. She later co-owned Africa Air Charter, spent two years developing and managing Doli Lodge in the Dzanga-Sangha forest of the Central African Republic, and worked as an expedition chef in remote camps in Mali and the Central African Republic. She trained in fine art at the University of Pretoria and is a qualified teacher. |
Her connection to the continent began on her grandparents’ farm on the Limpopo River, on the Botswana border, where her grandmother read National Geographic aloud to her. She leads by judgement rather than checklists: careful pacing, close attention to each guest, and local relationships built over decades. That is what makes ambitious journeys safe and rewarding without taking the wild out of them.
From January 2027 she joins National Geographic’s Victoria Falls and Chobe departures with G Adventures as Expedition Expert, teaching photography and storytelling in the field.
EXPEDITION LEADERSHIP
• Scale. Over one hundred high-end expeditions led and co-led across 36 African countries over three decades, including three full Cape to Cairo journeys and the Source of the Nile journey from Uganda through Ethiopia and Sudan to Egypt.
• Flagship programmes. Two decades leading National Geographic Expeditions’ Southern Africa private air safaris: Casablanca to the Cape, Cape to Cairo, Sahara by Air and Jerusalem to Cape Town.
• Operators and partners. National Geographic Expeditions, WWF, Bushtracks Expeditions, Lindblad Expeditions, Zegrahm Expeditions, Stanford University Illimani, California Academy of Sciences, American Museum of Natural History.
• Aviation and remote logistics. Co-owner of Africa Air Charter (1998–2006). Earlier work with South African Historic Flight on the DC-4s Lebombo and Outeniqua and the DC-3 Klapperkop. Working knowledge of light-aircraft operations, payload limits, strip conditions and charter scheduling across Southern and East Africa.
• Deep field. Two years developing and managing Doli Lodge in Dzanga-Sangha, Central African Republic. Expedition chef in remote camps, including Dogon Country, Mali.
• Safety. Medical evacuation arrangements, nearest reliable clinics, equipment handling on light aircraft, and back-up plans for vehicle, power and border-post failure, prepared so that guests never have to think about them.
• Crisis response. Emergency response team member with Blake Emergency Services (UK) since 2010, including international deployments after the MH17 and ET302 accidents, and forensic and documentary photography for the response to the Mombasa Air Safari Flight 203 accident in Kwale County, Kenya (November 2025).
• Alongside. Has worked with National Geographic experts including Dr Steve Boys, Dr Bill Branch and Sergio Pitamitz.
“Vivienne is our most experienced Expedition Leader, having completed more journeys, served more guests and operated across more destinations than any other leader in our organisation. She combines operational rigour with empathy, leadership and consistent accountability.”
— David Tett, Founder & CEO, Bushtracks Expeditions
Qualifications
• BA Fine Art (Ed), University of Pretoria — qualified teacher.
• Digital Photography (100 hours) and Forensic Photography, University of Cape Town, 2025.
• Train the Trainer (Facilitate, Coach & Mentor Programme), Pro-Active College, 2014 — six unit standards at NQF Levels 4–5, 41 credits.
• 120-hour TESOL/TEFL certificate, World TESOL Academy, 2023, accredited by ACCREDITAT and the CPD Certification Service. Taught English as a volunteer in Fort Kochi, Kerala, India, for three months in 2023.
• FGASA Nature Site Guide (NQF2): theory exam passed, October 2026; practical assessment to follow. SATOUR registered tourist guide. First Aid Level 1, current.
Available on request: wilderness first responder certification, driver’s and PDP licences.
ACCESSIBLE & ASSISTED TRAVEL
Accessible travel is where her expedition experience and her writing meet. It is also where accuracy matters most: a traveller who is wrongly informed about terrain, transfers or distances is not just disappointed but put at risk. Her work here grows out of twenty years of leading older guests and guests with access needs, so that long-standing travellers can keep travelling as their circumstances change.
Principle. Vivienne does not write about, recommend or put her name to a journey she has not undertaken herself. Every recommendation rests on information she has checked in person: vehicles, aircraft, camps, distances and terrain.
• Accessible Travel Press. Advisory Board member and contributing author for the Amsterdam-based international platform for accessible and inclusive travel (6,777 subscribers and over 1.15 million website views, September 2026). ATP received two 2026 industry awards, including Best Global Accessible Travel Information Platform.
• Recognition. Nominated for Accessible Favourite by Public Vote 2026, Accessible Travel Press Awards of Excellence.
• Featured. Ten pages in Accessible Journeys (Mélange Media, Canada), July 2026.
• Films. Short practical accessibility films showing what a traveller with access needs actually meets on the ground, for example at Cape Town International Airport and Table Mountain.
• In development. An assessment of accessible gorilla trekking in Volcanoes National Park, Rwanda, with Africa Wizzy Safaris. Accessible Travel Press has confirmed it will publish the report. Dates to be confirmed.
PHOTOGRAPHY
Documentary and fine art photography of wildlife, landscape and the quiet human moments in between — across Southern Africa, East Africa (Lamu, Mombasa), Egypt, West and Central Africa, Morocco, India and the Mediterranean.
|
|
|
|
|
|
Photographs © Vivienne Gunning
• Signature. High-contrast black and white. Shot in RAW on the Sony RX10 IV and converted to black and white by hand.
• Integrity. No AI. Ever. Every frame is made in the field.
• Published. “NIKE Sponsorship” in AROUND, Issue 1, October 2026 — an independent international magazine for literature, photography and visual art. A second photograph has been selected for a forthcoming issue. Three photographs in the Seeing Happy “Images of Peace” collection, October 2026.
• Current project. Carpe Diem – Pluk die Dag: an ongoing black-and-white series on everyday life and joy in Mitchells Plain, Cape Town.
• Prints and stock. Fine art prints through Vanta Studio, Cape Town. Contributing photographer, Alamy. Member, SANAVA.
• Painting. Also paints in mixed media. A separate artist portfolio is available on request.
WRITING AND PUBLICATIONS
• Glow Talks Magazine, November 2025. Cover feature: From Cape to Cairo.
• Accessible Journeys, July 2026. Feature interview, “Vivienne Gunning shows how Africa restores body, mind and spirit” (Mélange Media, pages 22–31).
• Accessible Travel Press, 2026. Six articles, each based on places checked in person:
– Accessible Travel in Africa: Why Honest Communication Matters More Than Perfect Infrastructure (March)
– Dreaming Beyond the Ramp: Accessible Travel and the Right to Difficult Places (June)
– Africa’s Hidden Places Belong to Them Too (August)
– Accessibility at Cape Town International: What I Found on the Ground (August)
– Table Mountain: How Accessible Is It Really? (October)
– Rolling Through the Mother City: A Wheelchair & Mobility Guide to Cape Town (October)
• Substack. Long-form travel writing, including The Secrets of the Okavango Delta (eleven articles, 2026), Lamu Stories, and a new series on Chobe and Victoria Falls.
SPEAKING
Illustrated talks, given in person and led by photographs and stories rather than slides of text. Flagship talk: “Walking the Okavango Delta – Stories from Africa’s Last Great Wilderness”. Other subjects include wildlife and birdlife, photography, history, conservation, African cultures, accessible travel, and resilience and curiosity for women’s groups and corporate events.
Recent audiences include Rotary Club am Kap and the Rotary Club of Constantia (September 2026).
CURRENT AND UPCOMING
• National Geographic Expedition Expert, from January 2027. Victoria Falls and Chobe departures with G Adventures: photographic instruction, field interpretation and storytelling.
• Women Walking the Delta, March 2027. A women-only walking and mokoro expedition into Botswana’s Okavango Delta, for solo women travellers, with no single supplement.
• Uganda. Gorillas, communities and conservation — a storytelling and expedition project in development with the Justice Tourism Foundation.
GUESTS AND READERS
“A miracle.”
— Esther Murray (USA), on her journey to the Great Sphinx, Giza. Published in Accessible Journeys, July 2026.
Her audience is not an influencer following. It is the guests who travel with her in small, specialised groups, her readers on Substack and her website, and the readership of Accessible Travel Press. Most are over fifty: retired and semi-retired professionals with time, means and a long interest in Africa. They read at length, plan carefully, and act on recommendations they trust — many research and buy serious camera equipment for the journey.
Open to work with: expedition companies and safari operators · conservation organisations · tourism boards · wildlife and research projects · community tourism · accessible and inclusive travel operators · photography and equipment brands · media and publishing
“Every journey has a story. My work is to tell it with honesty, respect and authenticity.”This is my digital campfire — stories shaped by dust, silence, colour, chaos, heartbreak and wonder.You won’t find glossy perfection here. You will find stories shaped by dust, silence, colour, chaos, heartbreak and wonder—shared through photographs and words gathered over a lifetime in motion.
To travel is not to escape life, but for life not to escape us.
This space isn’t about travel tips. It’s about what travel does to you.
For more than three decades, my life has unfolded in the field—leading expeditions across Africa, photographing extraordinary places, working in remote lodges and airstrips, and learning that calm judgement is often the most valuable skill a traveller can possess.
Africa has taught me patience, humility and perspective. The greatest journeys are rarely measured by distance travelled, but by the moments that quietly change us.
Over the years, my work has taken many forms: expedition leadership, hospitality, aviation operations, guest care, crisis coordination, accessible travel and photography.
Each has shaped the way I lead, the way I observe, and the way I connect with people. Sometimes colour is the story. This collection sets documentation aside and simply celebrates it — the saturated, joyful, unruly palette of a life spent in motion.
Extraordinary photographs are rarely planned. They are found in ordinary moments — a glance, a gesture, a conversation, a shaft of light.
Whether you’re looking for an experienced expedition leader, an accessible travel companion, or simply wish to experience Africa through my photographs and writing, I hope you’ll find something here that inspires you.
If something here resonates with you, I’d love to hear from you.
Email: gunningvivienne@gmail.com
Follow my journey
Instagram:
@viviegunning
Facebook:
Vivienne Gunning: https://www.facebook.com/vivienne.gunning.96/
https://www.linkedin.com/in/vivienne-gunning-587a98b
Substack
https://viviennegunning.substack.com
