Vira Natura Tours

Christopher Gardner, is a lifelong plant enthusiast and naturalist. Originally from Essex, England, he gained a BSc in Horticulture from Reading University, England and spent fifteen years as a professional horticulturist and garden designer. In 1998 he co-authored the bestselling book ‘The Plant Hunters’. However, his fascination with travel brought him into contact with the flora, wildlife and cultures of many exotic countries and twenty years ago he began guiding botanical and wildlife tours. He guides and arranges botanical tours throughout Turkey, Central Asia, China, Chile, Morocco, Borneo, Australia, the Mediterranean and many other countries, having led over a hundred and fifty tours. Chris has been accorded the distinction of having a flower named after him Bellevallia chrisii - a species he discovered whilst leading a tour with Basak in the Anti-Taurus mountains of Turkey. At the same time his photographic interest and ability has grown immensely leading to the publication with his wife Basak Gardner of the acclaimed ‘Flora of the Silk Road’ (May 2014) a collection of 530 species of beautiful flowers from Turkey to China. The follow up volume to this 'Flora of the Mediterranean’ (2019) was recently published and other books are in the pipeline.

Chris will be organising and leading an exciting range of botanical, garden and photographic tours in Turkey and around the world as is also available for bespoke trips and lecture tours.

Basak Gardner, qualified with an MSc in Botanical Taxonomy at İstanbul University. Always fascinated by flowers she worked at the Nezahat Gökyigit Botanic Garden in Istanbul and then in 2004 she started leading botanical tours in Turkey and then many other countries. Basak is also an accomplished book designer and in 2014 designed ‘Flora of the Silk Road’ a major photographic book with her husband Chris, followed by ‘Flora of the Mediterranean’ (2019). Basak is also very much involved with the design of the revised ‘Illustrated Flora of Turkey’ an exciting new ten year project to up date one of the world's great floras. She speaks fluent English and Turkish and moved to live in Beycik, near Antalya with Chris and their two sons, Merlin and Aren, in 2010.

Basak will be organising and leading a range of interesting botanical and walking tours.

A Japanese native, Hiro’s interest in nature goes back all the way to learning the name of butterflies on his parents’s lap. Spending three formative years in Jakarta, Indonesia when he was around ten only made his interest more intense. Hiro’s primary interest is the world of butterflies, but his passion for plants makes him a reliable tour leader in this field too. Additionally he has some unique insights into wild orchids through years of experience in growing numerous species at home.

When not travelling through high Kyrgyz plateaus or the monsoon rainforests of NE India, Hiro is a classical pianist based in the UK.

Oli Cheney, grew up on a farm, and with both grandfathers being keen horticulturalists it wasn't long before his interest in nature and plants, particularly mountain flowers became a passion. Having worked at a specialist Alpine Nursery caring for the plants, he got a Merlin scholarship to see the flowers in the wild on an AGS trip to the French Alps. This further solidified his love of plants and indeed the whole experience of Alpine adventures and since then has visited mountainous regions many times in pursuit of rare flowers, particularly the Swiss, French and Italian Alps.

His day job is being a rock and roll guitarist!

Yiannis Christofides studied chemistry in London and returned to his mountain village of Platres in Cyprus to take up botany and eventually guiding. His travels have taken him to Greece and the Greek islands, the Alps, Turkey and South Africa. Yiannis has published the Illustrated Flora of Cyprus and Orchids of Cyprus, a particular interest of his. He is also one of the authors of the Red Data Book of the Flora of Cyprus. His other interests include butterflies, gardening, languages, geology and history.

Dr Toby Musgrave has a passion for garden design and garden history which began at a very early age and shows no signs of abating. An independent scholar since 1994 Toby is an international authority on garden history and design. He shares his passion and knowledge as an author - 10 books and counting, a lecturer - in the classroom at DIS, online with My Garden School, aboard Expedition cruise ships and with Botanica, on television and radio, and on his blog - Garden History Matters. As a garden designer Toby has created gardens in the UK, the USA, India and in Denmark. Where he lives, is 'between gardens' and finds the climate ‘challenging’.