Meet the world’s greatest living explorer – Charles Brewer Carias 


Our fellow explorers over at Hendrick’s Gin have been up to some very interesting things, including an expedition to Venezuela in search of a mysterious botanical with veteran explorer Charles Brewer Carias! Here is part one of their four part journey into the jungle: 

Hendrick’s Gin sent their Master Distiller, Lesley Gracie and Global Ambassador, David Piper to the Venezuelan rainforest last year on a Perilous Botanical Quest, guided by Charles Brewer Carias, the septuagenarian adventurer who has discovered an entire sunken fleet of ships, species of scorpions and the world’s largest quartzite cave, amongst many other wonderful things…. 



Born and brought up in the hills outside Caracas, Venezuela, Charles is a veteran of over 250 expeditions. A Victorian explorer born a century too late; Charles is a throwback to the age of Von Humboldt, Schomburgk, Spruce, Waterton, Im Thurn, Clementi and other Victorian men and women who poked around the far corners of the earth. Inspired by these exploring greats, Charles has followed in their footsteps with an impressive list of discoveries to his name. 

He’s discovered the oldest caves on Earth at Autana Tepui, the largest sinkholes in the world of Cerro Sarisariñama, and living silica organisms dated to over a million years old that he has named Biospeleothems, found inside the world’s largest known quartzite cave that he also discovered. Twenty-nine new species of plants, insects, snails and frogs have also been discovered by and named after Charles. 

All of Charles’ some 250 expeditions to discover and publish geographical, anthropological, ethnographic, genetic, botanical, geological, or speleological items have been made in the Guayana Highlands of Venezuela. This is the area of the high plateaus and Lost Worlds, south of the Orinoco River and north of the Amazon River. With his magnificent moustache and encyclopedic knowledge of the peoples, flora and fauna of the Amazon; Charles was the perfect leader for the ‘Hendrick’s Perilous Botanical Quest’. His knowledge of the largely unexplored and inaccessible Venezuelan interior and his ability to talk with the natives in this region, were an invaluable asset to the Hendrick’s expedition team, that and his 2.7 second world-record for starting fire with sticks… 

Intrigued to know more about the Hendrick’s Perilous Botanical Quest? Visit http://www.hendricksgin.com/ More to come in articles two through four!