Sean Connolly (Instagram: @shanboqol) first travelled to Africa as a student in 2008 and returns to the continent whenever possible to research, teach or simply soak up the ambiance in Africa's countless little-visited corners. He's been poring over maps since before he could read them and working with Bradt since 2011. Along with authoring two editions of Bradt's guidebook to Senegal, he has also updated or contributed to Bradt guides to Somaliland, Malawi, Mozambique, Ghana, Uruguay, Sierra Leone, Gabon, two editions of Rwanda, and São Tomé & Príncipe. He first visited The Gambia when researching in Senegal and was thrilled to explore it extensively to update this third edition of Bradt's guidebook. When he's not working on guidebooks, leading tours or discussing the many merits of camel meat, you'll find him seeking out a country's funkiest records or clacking away at a desk in Copenhagen.

Philip Briggs (philipbriggs.com) has been exploring the highways, byways and backwaters of Africa since 1986, when he spent months backpacking on a shoestring from Nairobi to Cape Town. He is the world's leading author of guidebooks to African countries, with more than 30 years' experience. During the 1990s, he wrote a series of pioneering Bradt travel guides to countries that were then – and in some cases still are – otherwise practically uncharted by the travel industry. These include the first dedicated guidebooks to Rwanda, Tanzania, Uganda, Ethiopia, Malawi, Mozambique, and Ghana, new editions of which have been published regularly ever since. He has authored all three editions of Bradt's guidebook to The Gambia, and his other Bradt books cover Somaliland, Suriname, Sri Lanka, East African wildlife and safaris. When not travelling, usually accompanied by his wife, travel photographer Ariadne Van Zandbergen, he lives in the sleepy South African village of Wilderness.