HRH Prince William, The Prince of Wales
Venetia’s passion for exploration was sparked during teenage years spent in Maseru, Lesotho where she attended a local school and would spend weekends discovering the mountains. After studying Business Leadership & Management, an early career in London in marketing, design and advertising was overshadowed by the allure of Argentina, where she pursued a passion in equine therapy in Cordoba and learnt Spanish. She travelled extensively in Latin America and relocated to Buenos Aires, where she worked for a London based luxury travel company, leading sales and expanding their Latin offering. A curiosity for Central America took her to Costa Rica, where she spent three months driving across the country and discovering truly wild and unspoilt places. She started a travel advisory, working with a number of private ranches and reserves to create transformative experiences in, and for, conservation.
Venetia joined Journeys With Purpose at the early inception, and believes it is in the strength and passion of our remarkable team that we can achieve our vision for meaningful impact through travel.
Venetia is a Travel & Leisure’s A List Travel Advisor, and this year celebrated the Creativity Award by PURE for “finding ways to help travellers see the world in a new light”.
Listen to her podcast with May I Speak to the Manager Please – Catalysing Impact Through Travel
Lara’s love of nature began with family holidays to the remote Isle of Mull, off the west coast of Scotland, which, despite its soggy climes, remains one of her favourite destinations for its vast wild spaces, wildlife, and opportunities for solitude. At the polar end of the spectrum in terms of climate, Lara first travelled to Africa in 2013, a visit which sparked her ongoing obsession with this beautiful continent.
Over the years, she’s been lucky enough to return to Southern and East Africa, exploring areas across Kenya, Botswana, Zambia, Zimbabwe and South Africa – with more to come. She joined Journeys With Purpose as Journey Planner in 2023, where she specialises in travel to Europe and Africa, and has relished connecting with Impact Partners and conservation initiatives around the globe, helping guests access some of our most spectacular wildernesses and the exciting projects working to preserve them.
Katya comes from a photography and film making background which is where her love of travel began. With a love of visual anthropology she sought to capture images of people immersed in their natural environment.
Taking every opportunity to travel, she spent time working and living in the cloud forest of Ecuador before travelling extensively through South America and Asia and studying film at Manchester and Melbourne universities.
Moving back to London she started a career in furniture design, becoming a director of a contemporary furniture company in London for 12 years. Now happily ensconced in the Cotswolds with her family, she joined Journeys With Purpose in 2022 as Operations Manager and delights in connecting guests with remarkable people, places and projects across the Nordics and Asia.
Eliza has a deep passion for travel which has led her to explore more than 40 countries across six continents. From hiking ancient pilgrimage trails across the Kii Peninsula in Japan to sailing through the remote San Blas Islands of Panama, her love of adventure in wild places has taken her to far flung corners of the world.
Embarking on a Geography degree, Eliza was able to continue learning about different places and spaces while focusing on the interaction between humans and the environment. Inspired by fieldwork in Israel and Syria, she began her career in security intelligence, specialising in climatic and travel risks globally.
Seeking a new challenge that would marry her interests in exploration and the environment, Eliza joined Journeys With Purpose in 2023. As an Operations Manager she works behind the scenes to aid the day-to-day functioning of the company while helping to execute guests’ transformative journeys in wild nature.
Sophie carries a profound commitment to rewilding, wildlife conservation, and
fostering biodiversity. As Head of Community, she is dedicated to building meaningful connections that support conservation efforts and bring people closer to nature. Her experiences in the South African bush have deepened her passion for bridging the gap between communities and the natural world.
Having explored all seven continents, Sophie’s firsthand encounters with diverse ecosystems fuel her unwavering dedication to wildlife conservation. She strives to create opportunities for communities to engage with conservation efforts and rewilding projects, fostering a sense of shared responsibility for our environment.
With a unique blend of expertise in education and leadership, Sophie is poised to make a significant impact on conservation and biodiversity. She is committed to fostering collaborations on the ground and spearheading initiatives aimed at preserving the rich ecosystems that sustain us all.
Prof Alastair Driver has been immersed in nature and nature conservation since he was a toddler clinging onto his naturalist father’s coat-tails on birding trips in the early 1960s.
He was privileged to be appointed as the first conservationist for the Thames catchment in 1984 and went on to become the national Head of Conservation of the Environment Agency in the UK for 15 years, before taking “early retirement” from public service in 2016 and almost immediately immersing himself in a new challenge at the forefront of rewilding in the UK. Since then he has been thoroughly enjoying the challenge of mainstreaming rewilding as a crucially important part of the solution to nature recovery in Britain.
In his “spare time”, Alastair has had the privilege of visiting over 50 countries around the world for public speaking, advisory and exploration purposes and he has been hugely inspired by the many conservation success stories he has encountered in the process. He is therefore delighted to become an Ambassador for Journeys with Purpose and he is particularly excited by the prospect of visiting rewilding sites around the world with like-minded individuals passionate about the large-scale restoration of nature.
Building on her career as a photographer, Lorna moved to Kenya and spent seven years living in the Masai Mara. There she managed and built high-end safari camps for Great Plains Conservation, taught photographic safaris for ‘Wild Studios’, and worked in community conservation for The Maa Trust, helping to establish Maa Beadwork cooperative to empower five hundred local women to support their families across the greater Mara ecosystem.
Following this chapter, Lorna moved to Indonesia and worked for the founders of The Green School in Bali managing their hotel, Bambu Indah, during which time she also photographed for many organisations around the archipelago, including the Environmental Bamboo Foundation.
She currently lives between Costa Rica and the UK.
Sam is the CEO of the WaterBear Network: a B Corp-certified interactive streaming platform, learning academy and content studio dedicated to the future of our planet.
WaterBear transforms documentaries into popcorn worthy entertainment; turns people into active doers from passive viewers; and, ultimately cares more about measuring real-world impact than collecting awards. From pioneering storytelling training workshops across the Sahel in Africa, to spearheading global impact campaigns with NGOs across the world, WaterBear – and its partner, the Resilient Foundation – are innovating a new definition of success for the global media industry.
Prior to roles at WaterBear, Sam was the GM of The European Nature Trust (TENT), produced content and campaigns at Nice and Serious, and trained with the BBC’s Natural History Unit in Bristol. Sam is also the Founder of social enterprise DrawFor, and a Trustee of the Hartswood Trust and London Breeze Film Festival (re-launching 2024). He is a passionate conservationist and photographer, and is deeply committed to providing opportunities for the next generation of creative storytellers. He fundamentally believes that if you want to change human behaviour, the only thing that beats impactful storytelling is a transformative travel experience.
Sarah’s passion focuses on preserving wild, intact land and forests for the keystone species that depend on their habitat conservation.
She works closely with Space for Giants, and is an Ambassador for Panama Wildlife Conservation. Sarah co-founded the Leuser Ecosystem Action Fund (LEAF) alongside partners Ben Goldsmith and Leonardo Di Caprio Foundation, to protect 2.4 million hectares of pristine rainforest in Northern Sumatra where the last of Sumatra’s remaining orangutans, tigers, rhinos, and elephants can be found.
She has additionally helped to redesign and rebrand the islands of Islas Secas in Panama, a luxury desert island offering with sustainability and community at the forefront of its vision, as well as being a Journeys With Purpose Ambassador.
Sarah is thrilled to be an Ambassador for Journeys With Purpose because she believes both that seeing with your own eyes is the best way to understand these conservation efforts, and that making these experiences into an informative holiday is both pleasurable and rewarding. These journeys are eco tourism at its best!
Taran Kaur Gehlot has a profound love for nature and a deep commitment to the protection of our planet’s biodiversity. Growing up in Kenya, she developed a deep appreciation for wildlife and the interconnectedness of all living beings. Her passion for conservation led her to actively contribute as a board member of the Zeitz Foundation. She also serves as the Regional Daughter for Kenya for Daughters for Earth, a commendable campaign which is dedicated to revealing the power of women on the frontlines of conservation and environmental protection, and that aims to raise a staggering $100 million to directly support these impactful women.
Realising the importance of fostering personal connections between individuals and the natural world, Taran founded Soul Safaris. By facilitating transformative experiences in nature, Soul Safaris not only allows individuals to reconnect with their wild-primordial selves and our incredible Planet Earth but also instills them with a profound sense of responsibility towards its protection. Her purpose is clear: to champion the cause of Earth’s preservation, protecting biodiversity and inspiring others to do the same! She is thrilled to join as a JWP Ambassador and is excited to fulfil more of her purpose through this beautiful collaboration.
Our mission: deliver transformative journeys based on the Seven Worlds, One Planet model.
This extraordinary wetland, the largest in Argentina, is home to 30% of the biodiversity in the country including endangered species such as the pampas and marsh deer, the maned wolf and grassland birds like the strange-tailed tyrant.
In 2005, what was to become one of the largest rewilding programs in the Americas was started, with the goal of restoring keystone species that had been extirpated from Iberá through hunting and habitat loss and were extinct in the region, the Province or, in some cases, the country.
As the rewilding program developed, the cultural identity of Iberá began to recover alongside the ecosystems and natural processes, impacting a total population of 100,000 people who surround the park.
Today, Iberá stands as one of the world’s most successful ongoing conservation missions.
Exclusive access to the world’s top snow leopard trackers combined with an intimate photography masterclass by distinguished photographer, filmmaker and conservationist, Mattias Klum.
3rd – 14th December, 2025