Guest Bio
Gonzalo Fuenzalida is the founder and CEO of Chile Nativo Travel, an adventure tourism company based in Patagonia, Chile. With over two decades of experience, Gonzalo has been instrumental in providing active outdoor adventures in Torres del Paine National Park and the broader Patagonia region. His commitment to sustainable tourism practices and deep knowledge of the area have positioned Chile Nativo as a leader in the industry.
Show Summary
In this episode, Gonzalo Fuenzalida shares his journey in founding Chile Nativo Travel and his dedication to promoting sustainable adventure tourism in Patagonia. He discusses the challenges and rewards of operating in such a unique environment and the importance of preserving the natural and cultural heritage of the region. Gonzalo also reflects on his role as an Ambassador for the Adventure Travel Trade Association (ATTA) and his efforts to foster collaboration within the tourism industry.
Key Takeaways
- ✓ Sustainable Tourism: Implementing eco-friendly practices is essential for preserving natural environments and supporting local communities.
- ✓ Authentic Experiences: Providing genuine interactions with local cultures enhances the travel experience.
- ✓ Leadership in Tourism: Guiding a company with clear values and vision leads to meaningful and impactful travel experiences.
- ✓ Community Engagement: Collaborating with local communities ensures that tourism benefits residents and fosters cultural exchange.
- ✓ Industry Collaboration: Working together with other tourism professionals can lead to innovative and sustainable travel solutions.
What You’ll Find on Chile Nativo’s Platform
- ✓ Trekking Adventures: Guided treks through Torres del Paine and other iconic Patagonian landscapes.
- ✓ Horseback Riding: Equestrian tours that offer a unique perspective of the region’s terrain.
- ✓ Wildlife Expeditions: Opportunities to observe native fauna, including pumas and condors, in their natural habitats.
- ✓ Cultural Immersion: Experiences that connect travelers with local communities and traditions.
- ✓ Customized Itineraries: Tailored travel plans that cater to individual interests and preferences.
👉 Visit Chile Nativo’s Official Website to explore their offerings and learn more about Gonzalo Fuenzalida’s contributions to sustainable adventure tourism in Patagonia.
Learn more about Chile Nativo Travel and connect with Gonzalo at:
https://chilenativo.travel/
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Podcast Transcript
This transcript is auto-generated on recording, and has not been edited by a human. It may contain lots of mistakes, crazy words, and stuff that makes no sense. The host and the guest are not responsible for the accuracy of the transcript.
All right, everybody. Welcome to another episode of the Big World Made Small Adventure Travel Podcast. So happy to have all of you here. It’s super excited to have Gonzalo.
Fuenzalida here from Chile Nativo Travel. I almost didn’t say that right. Gonzalo, welcome to the show. So happy to have you here. Hi Jason, thank you to invite me to this conversation. I’m appreciate your time, your show. Am I ready to have a nice talk with you? Well, thank you so much. It’s, you know, we were chatting just a little bit earlier about how whenever we’re with clients out in the field, they tend to wanna
ask us a few questions like kind of, oh, where are you from? How did you get into this? So we’re gonna talk a little bit about that and just kind of give our listeners an opportunity to kind of get a feel for who you are. And then of course, as we have that conversation, I’m sure some other questions that will pop up. So I appreciate you sharing the opportunity with us. So let’s start with that. Gonzalo, how did you get started? What’s your story? Okay, this is the…
Jason Elkins (02:28.778)
A funny story. I’m a I’m a auditing from profession, you know, people who work in Lanton, Clark, Price Waterhouse, So, wow, downtown. And I was working till my 30th. And I have a, I will don’t call middle age, but I have a crisis of 30th. Because I was working in an office in the stock market. I’m having a great time. But
I was focusing my life waiting for the weekends. So my whole life was waiting for the weekends. And I hated to use a suit to change every day. I couldn’t understand in the position I was, I was not able to use a short sleeve shirt because it was not proper in summer. So one day I was in my office at eight, 30 in the morning with already a coffee and a cigarette looking for the window. At that time you can smoke.
inside the office. And I was looking from a floor to the bottom in downtown Santiago and I saw an American guy, a gringo, walking in short and flip-flap with a backpack and a surfboard attached to the backpack. And I saw myself and I thought like, this is it. So I brought that resignation letter. I went to my boss and I presented to him. He couldn’t believe it. He kind of ripped it off in front of me. No, Gonzalo, if this is about money.
we can arrange this, I say, no, it’s not about money. It’s just, this is it. I cannot keep going on this. So after the day, I went to my parents’ house and I told them, you know, like, you know what? I quit, I going to take a year off to think about my life. And I have a month to get rid of all my possessions. That time I was renting a house. So I left the owner, I’m leaving in a month. So my parents were like,
Finally, what was the first? Oh yeah, I wanted to know what are the first words they said? My parents are hippies. So my parents, they knew that was not my life. So they were like, finally Gonzalo, this is not for you. Go take your gear and you know, you have me here. You have us here for anything happen. So that’s what I would start. Exactly at the month I sold everything. I pay all my debt and I…
Jason Elkins (04:53.482)
have some saving money and I took a year off. So- I’m curious before we continue, I’m curious. Did your parents, had they encouraged you to go live your dream before that or were they just kind of letting you figure it out? And then when you figured it out, they were like, okay, finally he got it. Exactly, they went, they let me to figure it out myself. Wow, that’s cool. And they knew I was not an office person. I was a sport person, I very out or I love.
kayaking, trekking, horseback riding, my passion, taking courses on how to survive in the waters, whatever the weekend allowed me to do. So to make the story short, I took that year off. I started in the state because my sister lived in Estelle. See, she’s more American than Chilean now. The year was amazing. I mean, I was so lucky. Everything went fine. I learned to snowboard in Lake Tahoe.
I get a job, I become a ski bump, snowboard bump, with a job. And so after a year I come back and then I applied to be a guide in a fancy hotel in Torres del Paine National Park in Patagonia, Explora. Yeah, so I do all the applications and I receive a call from the…
The manager then said, like, Gonzalo, you passed everything, but I need to have a serious talk with you, so please come to the office next day. So I went there and she’s like, I mean, you did great, but if I see your summary, you really are not outdoor background as a guy. So I was applying to be a guy. So the only thing I want to ask you, if you take this position, please stay the season.
because this is not a holiday. So a lot of people who think, oh, let’s go to this fancy hotel to work for a season. And they find out it’s a serious show and they quit in the middle of the season. So I say, no problem at all. I can bet you, you are going to fire me before I quit. So then the second part of my life was five years working in Explorer, Patagonia, where I learned a lot. I explore everything mostly by horse.
Jason Elkins (07:10.694)
And I become the head of the guide with the time. And when I was in my fifth season, I decided to create my own company with another guy, which was partnered with me working in the hotel. So we create Chile Nativo in a long overland drive from Patagonia back to Santiago through the Southern Highway. And that’s how the name came, because we
was a niche in between luxury and basic backpacking. We wanna do kind of luxury outdoor activities where the luxury was where we can bring you, but with good food, with quality guides, and eventually with good hotels or good campsite. So that was the beginning and was very focusing in horseback riding experiences. Piri, quick.
The other funny thing is this was 2001. So I just start, I launched my website a week after 9-11. You just can’t figure it out that everything we already have been talking with the old clients from Explorer, the travel agencies, the tour operator, everyone disappear. So the beginning was pretty rough. And also we decided to start at that time home office. So,
We have been home office since then, 22 years already. Everybody thought like, we are crazy. We are not going to be successful. You need to have a physical office. How are you are going to sell? At that time in Puerto Natales, we have internet connection by phone. Remember that? Yeah. Dialogue. And facts. So, but you know, slowly we start to get some requests and then with the connection word to mouth, et cetera.
We were first pretty hard and we sold a third of our company at the end of the first season to three of our really good friends. And to make some cash to lead and to survive. And then, you know, the company started to run and I was the one who was more focusing in the company. The other one started to get a different jobs because the company didn’t make enough money for everybody. And we’ll already have been
Jason Elkins (09:33.27)
22 years, several crises. Now I’m a partner with my brother. We are still very close with my original partners or my closer friend. We have 30 people working in the office. Plus all the… When you say in the office though, are they working remotely in the office? Yes, let me clear that. All the marketing, sales,
financial and sustainability are home office, which are probably 20. The other ones are in a physical office, which is the operation office. So we always have the headquarters, which was the operation where we have our transfers, the tent, all the equipment, and where the people go there and do the briefing before they start. But we don’t sell trips to the street.
everything is online. Okay. So the people who go to the office just go to, because they booked the trip with us way in advance. Right. Okay. Got it. And so, um, so when, when the COVID came, for example, uh, we already have a, uh, a software where we talk like we are talking now, uh, zoom at that time, I mean, was not famous. I wish I knew, I can buy some stuff there. Yeah.
whereby, still we use whereby, which is the platform we find out at the time. So that didn’t change to us too much or change a lot of things on the company with the crisis. But that, I would say, was kind of a short story about how we are right now here. Yeah, no, I appreciate that. And there were a couple of things, well, everything you said was interesting. And there was a couple of things that I wanted to ask you about because…
Really, you kind of started in a crisis, right? If you imagine you launched your business a week after 9-11, 2001, when, you know, obviously there was a, I guess we could call it a disruption in the travel industry for sure. And you talked about some of the challenges and struggles of, you know, kind of refiguring what your plan was. Maybe some people had to go do other things to kind of make it through those lean years in the beginning. And oftentimes when we go through something like that,
Jason Elkins (11:59.286)
When we’re in it, it’s like, man, this, I’m gonna, I’m not gonna censor myself. Man, this sucks when you’re in it. You’re like, oh, I can’t believe this is happening. Oh, why did we do it now, this and that? But then later on, you can kind of look back at it and look and say, well, what did we learn right from the beginning? Like, what did that situation help us realize early on so that…
we didn’t take 10 years to figure it out because we had to figure it out in a year, that type of thing, you know what I mean? So I’m curious what lessons came out of that you couldn’t have gotten any other way had things not happened the way they did. Well, first, I think for me, I am a very positive person. So it’s very difficult to, it made me feel down, you know? And I learned that any crisis we have been through is an opportunity.
And if I see to the past, every single crisis have been good. You see it after, after years, you know. At the time it doesn’t feel so good. At the beginning was rough, but at the same time was a new company. We didn’t expect to have too much sales. And the best learning we have is we don’t need to focus too much only in the US market.
So we started to look to Australia and we didn’t want to focus only on horseback riding because we find out pretty quick that the business was in the tracking. Okay. And that was probably at that time, but as I say, everything was new for us. So we were not, we didn’t expect to have a successful fair season. We were just contacting people and.
Actually after 9-11, after the season, I flew out to the state for my first meeting, tried to meet people with my folders, all nervous and presenting my options. And the other thing is that since we decided to be just an online company, we were very focused in the technology of the website. And at that time, everything was flat.
Jason Elkins (14:21.526)
this map, interactive map, like people can pop up the picture of the look at point, the little car moving around and a nice intro. And we, the webmaster actually, which is still is our webmaster and a good friend, we present the website to a competition and we get some kind of recognition and award for the, you know, the modernity of that at that time.
And for example, another crisis we have is a subprime, 2008. And we are still, our market was a strong American, even if we try to push the market European, Australian, South and Central America, American was our major market. And for some reason, and I still don’t know why, maybe because we didn’t have enough time.
and relationship with two operators, most of our sale was direct client, which is still is 50-50. We get last minute booking. So when the subprime arrived, suddenly the booking stopped. So we get the crisis before everybody else because the other companies in Patagonia were working with two operator booking in advance the group that were already set. Okay, I gotcha, yeah. Okay.
So what happened for that for us was we decided to create the budget getaways because we were a little bit too high end too expensive for what we were doing. Because we want to bring an extra port to cook our own food, having a refugio, a hat that can provide the food. So we kind of launched this.
budget getaways and we reduce the timing. We start from Puerto Natales instead of pick you up in Punta Arenas and buy expensive transfer for three hours. At the end, we sell the extra things anyway, or private transfer or public bus, but in purpose of selling and view the prices was a big hit. And we were the first one to start with the first independent double view trick. So do it yourself. We do the all the arrangement, we do a
Jason Elkins (16:39.094)
briefing in the office and the guys go to the park on their own. And it’s still is one of the major activities we offer organized. That’s cool. It’s free for people who want to hike on the. You know, it’s, it’s interesting because I love that you brought that up. It’s not always about the money, right? Cause I’m sure you have people that are like, okay, we’re going to do it. The do it yourself type of semi structured.
I can’t remember exactly what you called it, but you know, you, you’ve given the plan, you, you take care of some logistics, but they go by themselves into the book. Right. And there’s a lot of people out there that just like, they just want that freedom and that independence. Cause you know, for, for confidence builders, I mean, I’ve been traveling full time for the last two years. And I love, like I’ve worked in tourism for a long time. I understand the value of a guide and get it completely. And.
I gotta be honest with you, sometimes I just like to go figure things out myself. You know, a little bit of guidance, maybe I’ll do a little bit of planning on my phone. Like, okay, well, I know there’s a bus that gets there. And then I put the phone in my pocket and I say, okay, now I’m gonna go find the bus. You know, and I get a lot of sense of satisfaction out of finding my way on my own. So it’s interesting that by offering a product like that, you kind of get two birds with one stone, right? You’ve got the people that are doing it for the…
cost-effectiveness, but it also appeals to the person that’s just really that more independent traveler, right? Exactly that. And we already have, it’s one of the double new trick and the binary big secret, the two main tricks in the park. I will say our main clientele is independent. And you know, now we have a special application. So people go with an application with a off-signal map, you know, the whole thing. But it’s still is complicated for someone who want to organize on their own.
And at the same time, you get some kind of security note that there is a company who is back you up and you can call the company if any problem is in the book or the booking is not properly. And that’s what you pay for, but it’s still you pay less than going in a group with a guide and you can save that money, especially for John Brown who want to split the traveling between Chile and Argentina and Patagonia. Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. One of the things you mentioned was
Jason Elkins (19:04.094)
It sounds like you’re always pretty strong in the US market. That was your market for whatever reason. Would you say that was the case for all of the Chilean operators, or was that something that was unique to you at the time? More than Chilean, I will focus in Patagonia because that’s where I know the reach. I think this was a mix for the other ones. They have a lot of two operators from France, Germany, Spain.
Brazil is a good market to Mexico. But since we were coming from Explorer and our clientele were mostly from US, we were focusing in that market and it’s still, it’s a major market for Patagonia. And I will say probably for all the companies, you just do a percent, probably the majority of foreign years are besides Argentinian, you know, the neighbors.
the Northern Hemisphere will be US. I’m curious why you think that is because I’ve traveled, I’m not sure I’d say extensively, but I’ve been around South America quite a bit. And I’m in, I’m actually in Columbia right now. And what I’ve noticed when I’m in certain places in South America, it’s like, there’s a lot of Europeans and I don’t see very many Americans to be honest with you, like especially Columbia. There are some Americans here, but there are many more Germans, Dutch.
French, you see people from all over Europe and Colombia. I would say I’ve noticed that in other parts in Latin America as well. And I think Americans have a very strong draw to Patagonia. So I’m curious because you are much more familiar with South American tourism than I am. Why do you think it is that Americans are so drawn to Patagonia, but maybe not as much other areas where you see more Europeans? Do you have any thoughts on that?
Yes, for example, it just focusing Chile, you go to the northern area of Chile, to the dry desert, San Pedro de Tacama, another hot spot in Chile, you see more European than American. Ah, okay. Even in inside Chile. So I think Patagonia, but also I think it’s something regarding the safety. I think America are more precarious.
Jason Elkins (21:32.394)
You know, and also Americans tend to book things well organized with someone who speak English because mostly they don’t speak Spanish. And Europeans, I think are more independent. We see Europeans in Patagonia, Germans are very independent in terms of rent and car and RV and just driving around. Spanish also, it’s the same language so they feel comforted.
comfortable to do it on their own. I’d love that you brought up the language because I, that, I think you’re onto something because I think Americans, when I say Americans, I’m speaking, you know, from the United States or even Canadian English speaking Americans, let’s put it that way. Um, they kind of have a handicap by just the nature of the English language and their location in the world, because they tend to learn English, obviously growing up.
they don’t tend to learn other languages. Whereas when you look at Europeans…
Virtually all Europeans have learned at least one other language, right? It’s so some of them, many of them have three or four languages under their belt. So for them to go to another country, maybe they don’t speak Spanish, but for them to go to another country that speaks a different language, doesn’t seem like that big of a deal because you can drive to other countries that speak other languages when you’re in Europe. So I can, I can imagine where that would make them more independent.
and so many Americans, English speaking Americans that I speak to, their number one concern is I won’t be able to talk to anybody. You know, what if I get down there, I get lost, something happens, I won’t be able to talk to anybody. And that’s unique to English speaking Americans, I think, because Europeans, I’m not sure that same thought goes through their head. I think they’re like, oh yeah, I’ve been to many other countries where they speak other languages and I’ve always been able to figure it out somehow.
Jason Elkins (23:36.234)
So that’s, I don’t know, what do you think? You think that’s it? I think you make a point because if you compare Northern American with UK, for example, you see more English people from UK traveling on their own. That’s a good analogy. And I can tell you my personal experience recently, I went to the summit of the ATTA, the Adventure Travel Trade Association, was in Japan. So it was exciting trip. And the first shock for me was
no one’s speaking English. Was it my first time in my life, I couldn’t communicate properly. So Google Translate became my first friend. And literally, you need to present yourself in the restaurant, the local restaurant, when they find you, you are a foreigner. They do like this, like they don’t have a space for you because they don’t feel right, they cannot understand you or speak your language or English. So you need to put- So I saw you hold up your hands.
Yes. Cross fashion. I’m saying that because it’s a podcast. So maybe somebody didn’t see that. And I thought it was pretty cool. So you said they hold up their hands, kind of like make an X with their arms, like, hey, we don’t. The rest of the things too much work to deal with you. Exactly. They don’t feel they feel a chain. They cannot speak English. Yeah. Well, I think Japanese in that sense, they feel bad to themselves. They cannot speak English. So I’d rather just avoid the whole situation.
I just stopped in a restaurant like I pop up Google Translate already with may I have a table for two, you know, and that was the way we can get it. You’re showing that your willingness to communicate however they need to communicate as opposed to sometimes North Americans just show up and expect everybody. Figure it out. Yes. Maybe I’ve heard that.
Jason Elkins (25:35.41)
Yeah. And I mean, in that sense, if you ask to any company, probably Americans are really good ideal clients because they want to book everything with you. They don’t want to deal with everything on their own. That’s true. And they’re crazy for tipping. So what can be better than that? They’re completely dependent on you. They’ll let you book every single moment of the day.
because they wanna make sure they don’t have five minutes where they’re not able to talk to somebody maybe. And you know, I’ve never really thought this out very much, but I’m curious, like just the word Patagonia is just understood on some level in North America. We’ve got a clothing and outdoor adventure company, you know, Patagonia. It’s like, it’s almost sounds American to us, right? And…
It seems like an English word. So the idea of going to Patagonia probably just feels like, okay, it gets as opposed to going to Columbia or Machu Picchu or Brazil or whatever. I think Americans would just feel more comfortable because they at least know the word. They know how to say the word. And I’m not saying that North Americans are intelligent. They’re incredibly intelligent as are people all over the world. But-
Also, one thing I know about people is many people are drawn to things they’re comfortable with, you know, that they recognize. So I can see where that might play into it. And I must say, Americans are the clients who get well-known where they go. So mostly of our clients from the US, they came with the right clothes, they have been reading about Patagonia, so they know where they are going compared with another client. So
that they read out and they follow the instructions. So it’s all good. Okay, now that, I’m interested in it. There’s quite a few questions. We talked a little bit about crises and how you, you know, you can look back at them and figure out, well, okay, what are, and I just wanted to share one more, one quick thing on that is like, kind of fortunate, like when you,
Jason Elkins (27:55.39)
Go into something at a bad time. You need to figure stuff out quicker, right? Because sometimes if you step in at just the right time, you can just be like, all of a sudden we’ve got business and we’re just trying to figure out how to keep up with the business. And we’re doing five or 10 years of business is great, business is great, and then the crisis hits. And you don’t even know why you had business in the first place. And all of a sudden the business just dries up and…
You, in meanwhile, you’ve bought a bunch of vehicles, you’d hired a bunch of people, you’ve, and you’ve over invested because you thought the business was gonna go great forever. And then it dries up and then there’s a crisis and bankruptcies and all that stuff. Whereas when you start in a difficult time, you maybe can kind of, you know, work a little harder in the beginning to figure things out. So then, you know, as the, as the business picks up, I don’t know, I, as just kind of what was coming up for me, did you see that, you know, back in your business?
I think I’m a person who don’t like to have death. So I do what I can with the money I have. And in that sense, we were, when the COVID arrived, we were in a pretty good position economically with saving money for the company. We didn’t own, we didn’t win working with credit to the bank or anything. So we were really proud to keep all our staff, 50% salary right away.
for almost two years, but we didn’t fire anyone. And that was a great opportunity because we have a lot of time, because the season is starting to be so busy that the season ends and already sales and marketing and in high season and operation are doing the inventory and buying new tents and preparing for the next season. So we didn’t have a moment to stop and see ourselves. And these two years were great for that. We had time to stop.
we start to focus a lot in redo the organization of the company, especially because trying to don’t fire salespeople. We take some people from sales and put it in marketing, for example, because we knew they have a skill in marketing. And we focus a lot in doing actually in a table 3.2, I call like because.
Jason Elkins (30:19.67)
focusing in, for example, now we are in the process of being a big corporation. So sustainability and how we can change things. Now we are in, we have a coaching for the company. So we have coaching for the company and we have a coaching for the manager to the head of the company. And we are focusing in a mission which is called a growing with happiness.
So which means like how we can grow properly like everybody’s happy. Because me as an owner, if I don’t see people working for me happy, I’m not happy. I want to feel proud of the company and feel like everybody’s happy working here and want to work here. So these two years give us the first step to like kind of stop and see ourselves and see where we wanna go, how we wanna go there. And what we are going to do.
in the time. And that was the beginning. I don’t say that was easy or that was not difficult or stressful because when we start having business again, it was very stressful. It was very stressful because we didn’t have too much people for the huge amount of sales we had. And so everybody
Jason Elkins (31:49.942)
we start to this program growing with happiness because it’s pretty hard for everybody. What do you think the thing is, so when it comes to tourism professionals that work on your team, when you say, okay, what is the thing, if there’s one thing that you need to provide to your team in order for them to be happy? Because in some businesses, you know, some people talk about, well, you gotta pay them more,
give them more time off, you gotta give them this, that, and this. So what have you found is the most important for tourism type of people, especially Chilean tourism people, what makes them happy? Well, our team is Chilean, Argentinian, and American. But one is difficult. I will say money definitely is important. I mean, they’re behind that employee is a family. And so…
I think is you need to, we always try to focus in, get better salaries than the average, almost to the top of the industry. And that also give you the chance to that, the best people want to go with you, work with you. And, but also I think it’s important to listen them, because sometimes you don’t see the needs.
It’s funny because you mentioned this, because since we are doing all these procedures to apply to these big corporations, one of the areas if the being a staff wellness, how you say being a staff wellness? Wellbeing. Wellbeing of the staff, of the employees of staff. And we find out we never have been doing a feedback form for our own staff.
We send feedback to our clients, we fix the stuff. Oh yeah, yeah. And we find out we need to send this and send this to, okay, if we planning to do this five benefits, please order your important for you, for your life. Good for you. Because that is going to be, give us a fair picture of, okay, so how is, because like you say, it’s not salary only. Okay, we have no salaries. But…
Jason Elkins (34:13.174)
What happens if somebody is struggling with something different? A disease in the family or the partners have not a job, have tons of kids, I don’t know. So that was our first job today. Duty is to create this feedback form to start to take a picture and a feeling of how the people feel with us or the needs they have.
It’s interesting because different people obviously have different needs. And when you explained all that, I recognized that from my perspective anyway, well, you mentioned that your team is Chilean, Argentine, and English American. Yeah. Yes. And, you know, people in the U S and tourism, I think I’ve got a story in my head that a lot of people in the U S and maybe even yourself was willing to take a pay cut.
to go into tourism, right? Because presumably back in the day when you’re in that building in Santiago, you probably took a pay cut to go down south and work at Explora, I don’t know. A lot of Americans will leave jobs where they’re making pretty good money to go do tourism stuff. My experience working with guides in other parts of the world.
they probably didn’t go into tourism. I mean, it was a legitimate job choice. It was like they went into tourism because they wanted to make more money. They went, you know, go into tourism because they wanted to provide, you know, for their families. They wanted to have access to people that would tip and that type of thing. So I’ve got this story in my head that maybe the typical guide in Chile or Columbia or Central America, I managed to lodge in Belize. My guides in Belize didn’t become guides
they thought tourism was great. They became guides because they saw it as an opportunity to provide for their families. So a guide in Belize might be like, what makes them happy? More money. A guide in America, sometimes what makes them happy? I don’t know, more free gear, more trips, more time off so they can go do their own cool trips. I don’t know. So do you think there’s a difference between your guide team and maybe other places in the world or what do you think?
Jason Elkins (36:35.726)
I don’t think so really. I think like something you missed there is a lot of people who work in tourism because they love nature. So it’s not just money and looking for a job, it’s because they love nature. And I include myself there. They love what we do. They love to be involved in traveling. They love to be and do a trip or a scouting and live in beautiful places too because most of these places are beautiful.
And I see that in the, I’m pretty strong in the ATTA, I am ambassador for Chile with another two guys from different companies. So I participate pretty strong in that community. And what I find out in that community, which is worldwide, is I find out- That’s a great organization. I mean, that’s how you and I connected. And I find that my tribe. I find that people like it’s exactly like me, but worldwide. So what I’m thinking is like,
I don’t think, for example, the people who have been working from a different, another country from Chile, Nativo is because they are already living in Puerto Natales. OK, OK. So for example, these guys, a lot of guys go to work there from worldwide, French, I mean, Canada, US, UK, Australia, New Zealand. And and these people, after guiding, you know, every guy after a few years, they get
run out of our guiding and they want, or they have a family, they want to have a home and come back every day to the house, not to the home. And so these are the foreigners who mostly are working in tourism in Patagonia. Not because someone from the state send an email say, hey man, I look into any kind of job to move there, it’s not money related. We have those and most of those are in program of…
a free job for a roof and food. I don’t do that, but there are several company branches, for example, people who dream to work with horses in a ranch, and they’re happy with that. But that is in the short term, after probably a season, or it’s super jammed, and they prove Patagonia, and they go back to their life, or they figure out they need to find a proper job, and they settle in Patagonia. Patagonia is the mix of…
Jason Elkins (38:57.81)
nationalities and races. It’s pretty mean to see myself. I’m married with an American woman. So and I met her there. So that happened a lot and probably in other places too. And I see that in the in the ATTA like it’s a worldwide community. It’s not just a difference between Latin America or US or Northern Hemisphere.
Yeah, it’s interesting because I have actually participated in a TTA summit as well. I went it was a few years ago in Namibia and like you, I felt like, OK, this is my tribe. This is like, man, I’m like. I didn’t grow up with a bunch of people like that, but here I found them in Africa and it was just it was really, really cool. And and also like the people that were there, the people that are really active in TTA are exactly.
you know, what we’re describing is people like, they’re doing it because they’re passionate about it. They love it. They’re, it’s not like probably, I mean, many of them are very successful in business, but they didn’t wake up one morning and thought, oh, tourism’s where I’m going to make a bunch of money. And they, you know, and go that route. So you see the people that show up at these summits or these events that are active in ATTA, they’re passionate about what they’re doing. And then maybe, I guess what I’m hearing you say is maybe,
you know, maybe some of the other people in their organizations enjoy it, like meeting with clients, like spending time with people from other countries. I have no idea where I’m going with this. So I’ll stop and change directions, but. I’m happy you brought that up though about the ATTA, they’re a great organization. And so.
And this is along those lines, because I know that with ATTA, one of the things is like, how do we become responsible stewards of the environment of these places that we use? Because most of us in tourism are benefiting from the natural lands, the landscape, the communities that we work in. And how do we do that responsibly? You mentioned like after COVID,
Jason Elkins (41:17.186)
things just got kind of crazy and you’re not the only person, like pretty much everybody I’m talking to is sharing stories like that. And it’s like, how do you do this responsibly as, in the age of social media and Instagram where one person can post a picture of themselves on a bridge and then, one million people wanna go stand on the same bridge and take their picture there. How do we do that and what’s the responsibility of tour operators?
Jason Elkins (41:47.466)
It’s not easy. It’s not an easy answer, but it’s a lot of job to do. And a lot of them, which is done already or is happening. And just to finish with the ATTA, then I think about for me at least, the ATTA is usually when you go to the summit, you go ahead of the industry. You talk with the big smart people who are thinking ahead. So when you come back to your country, you have a job to do.
which is trespass that to the industry and say, hey guys, for example, now, now is over tourism. Over tourism is coming and is there and it is going to be worth, especially because the huge amount of people want to travel to the hotspot. And you can see already problems in several areas where the locals are rejected the tourists because it’s destroyed the economy. The rent are too expensive. They cannot go to a restaurant because they’re focusing on the tourists, et cetera. So…
Overtourism is one of the main things now. And one of the things they talk about. Sharon, Gonzalo, bear with me here because what’s the word that you’re using? I wanna make sure I can hear it. I wanna make sure that everybody that’s listening can understand exactly what we’re talking about. Overtourism. Auto tourism. No, overt. A lot of people going to the same place. Okay. Okay, overtourism.
Like too many people going to the hotspot. Over, okay, I’m with you over to of course over tourism. Okay, so I think my little earpiece isn’t working here. Absolutely perfect. No, no, no
Let’s try to open the low season so people first work with the communities. So the community feel involved. They don’t feel like somebody came, used everything and leave. No, they feel involved. And if we can take people from the high season, and in particular in Patagonia, where the low season is beautiful. It’s just a misconception that if you go in Patagonia, you need to be in summer because winter you cannot go there.
Jason Elkins (44:07.274)
And it’s not, probably most of the state, middle west, US, it’s more cold than going to Patagonia in winter. So that’s the job we need to do as a community, as an industry and also working with the governments to promote, to create, to expand the tourism world during the year and not just focusing in three, four months. And it’s, you mentioned about sustainability, sorry.
Do you find that it’s difficult because there’s so many different players involved. You’ve got the adventure tour operators that maybe kind of have, I’m gonna say probably, or I don’t know, I don’t wanna make the assumptions, but maybe more sustainability focused, maybe a little bit closer to their communities than the bigger, you know, Airbnb companies or…
You know, the kayaks, the travel cities of the world, the resort hotel chains of the world, but we all have a role, right? And how do you get all those operators to, because, you know, I don’t know, that’s a challenge. I think it’s just, it’s two operators and different business, like you say, the resort and everything. Everyone needs to figure out how to do it and I think they are doing it.
most of the time. So I think this is not, we cannot see this as a negative thing, it’s a positive. It’s a chance now we have to change. And that means also the client need to change. For example, we decide to stop giving plastic bottle with water. Some tool operator requests to have a plastic bottle of water in every seat in the transfer every day. We say, no, we have a dispenser with water. And also you need to bring your own water.
Go to the kitchen and grab one of those 20 bottles you have there. I know everybody has them. Bring one of those because we are not going to give you a souvenir. If you don’t have a bottle, you need to buy it. OK, because it’s possible it’s also for the client. And I must say the clients are changing and clients are choosing companies that are willing to pay more for companies who do an effort to keep this earth healthier. And and because it’s expensive.
Jason Elkins (46:27.938)
cost more, no? And it’s a commending in between clients, in between companies, in between two operators. If a two operator doesn’t want to tell the client they need a bottle, well, you probably need to choose another outfielder and to eventually we are going to run out of outfielder and that two operator likely is going to change the mind, I’m going to follow the, you know, the situation of certain thing we can do. And…
The most important for me is just to start doing something because it’s so overwhelming, like you say, carbon footprint, zero waste. You know, there’s so many things like you can freeze, but someone said like, just do one thing. It’s a lot of things to do. Just start with something. Okay, no bottles, ready. Okay, no plastic bags for the pack lunches. Let’s do a compost. Okay, let’s do a serious recycle in the office.
Let’s start to measure the carbon footprint and let’s put that in the price and let’s make the client like he’s paying more because he’s paying for the footprint of what he’s doing and push him to pay also for the footprint of the flight. Yeah. Yeah, it’s an interesting thing because you’ve got some companies that are looking at it that way, others that are not.
you know, you and you want to be competitive. And yeah, there’s challenges. I get that. But if you don’t change, you are going to die on the way. I know you’re absolutely right. You got to do something. And if you’re just like, well, I can’t I can’t do it all. So I’m not going to do anything. Well, that’s a losing approach. Exactly. And yeah. And I love that you’re sharing that because I think it is important that the traveler also takes some response because if the travelers are constantly asking for a bottle of water.
that puts the tour operators in a pretty tough spot. Can they stand their ground and say, no, we’re not going to do it? Yes, of course you can. And if the traveling public is more aware of it and more flexible and playing their role, I think that that’s super important as well. But at the same time, if the travel requests have water, then you can bring a solution. We have water, fresh water with big tanks. You just need to fill the bottle every time you need it. Yeah.
Jason Elkins (48:48.542)
That’s the solution for the problem of the water. It’s just not a bottle of plastic that then you throw out in the garbage. Yeah, and it’s an interesting subject. So what, and about your business, because we talked a lot about business in general. We talked just about tourism, like people, like the tribe, right? And it’s probably a lot of great things. And I want our listeners to have an opportunity to kind of get pretty clear on what you’re doing now.
As far as your business, what you’re excited about, as far as new products coming online here in the next year. And when I say products, I hate the word products, but you know what I mean. Experiences. Experiences, right? Expeditions, tours, experiences is really the word. So what should they know that you guys are doing here in the next 12 months or so? What should they know about Chile that maybe is not obvious to them? And…
How can they connect with you and take the next step to experience it? Okay. So I just came back to my home from Patagonia to do a fun trip of Estancia and e-bikes. For the ones who know what Estancia is, it’s a ranch. That’s the name we do in Patagonia for the huge ranches. So just working about over-tourism and how you can put people out of the hotspot. We just ran for
two journalists from Brazil and US, an amazing eight days e-bike trip from Puerto Natales, ranch to ranch, around the park, not even getting to the park, to the main spot, but looking the towers away from the crowd, with the luxury twist of a private chef every night. Simple locations, strong relationship with the local culture. So the owner of the ranch is cooking the lamb.
a barbecue for you, drinking a matik with you, telling you how to use the calabaza. And that is something like it’s going to, I think, e-bikes is the new thing worldwide. It’s big, isn’t it? I’ve had a few conversations. Yeah, it’s a big thing. And this trip just blow my mind. My favorite part of the job is this county trip. And I was working on this e-bike for a year.
Jason Elkins (51:11.446)
going to the ranch’s owners, talk with them, see the facilities, see if they can fix it a little bit. You know, and, but it’s still, it’s not a hotel. It’s the ranch with a little hut or, or sometimes you’re sleeping kind of a refugio with band, band bed. Sometimes you have a better location with single room, but with the locals right there with local food. And the last day we arrived to the park with a different view, with a private entrance to the park with them from our ranch.
look in the tower and see like, man, we don’t need to go to the tower with a thousand people is walking there, we can have this private view. So for me, that’s luxury. Yeah. It’s being away and also it’s an excellent way to move tourists away from the hotspot, try to create community. Kind of spread it out a little bit. Spread it out. Involve more people. And people start to figure out that it’s just,
debut in Patagonia, there are so many places. And besides this is Tierra del Fuego. I am in love with Tierra del Fuego, particularly the Chilean side, because still is nothing developed. And for me, that is a luxury. So you can do an overland trip there and stay with cabins with local people, close to a lake, fitting, sailing a boat, kayaking in between glaciers. I mean, wildlife everywhere.
and feeling like you are the only one who have been there. And that’s something that excites me too a lot, like being to Tierra del Fuego, to Navarino Island, the southernmost trek in the world, the Dientes de Navarino is in front of Susuaya, the southernmost trek in the world, and you do a five day trek, pretty rough mostly for the weather condition.
And they have these teeth, the Navarino, Dientes de Navarino, which are kind of towers, running towers, so beautiful, lakes, glacier, the same thing, but away from the crowd. Okay, I’m ready. And I will say, the jewel in Patagonia is Aysén, which is the region, northern Patagonia. That region is a beauty.
Jason Elkins (53:28.182)
We have a horseback right there. I finished in February, eight days in the old times. Packed horses, everything packed with you. No shower, nothing, just little gouches hat, smoking side cooking in a little fire, glacier forest, wildlife condors, huge lake at the end. And that’s for me, it’s kind of…
come back to the roots and feel kid again, because probably you and me, we grew up camping with a fire, now it’s very rare where you are allowed to do a fire in a place, you know, for safety purpose. So that for me is exciting to create new experiences and to kind of develop the rest of Chile, which is Chile is so long, so narrow, but it has so many places you can discover and still are untouched.
particularly the Northern Patagonia, I said. Yeah, it’s just that my experiences in Chile, mostly in Northern Patagonia, is just the people, the beauty is just ridiculous. And I don’t believe her that without amazing people, doesn’t matter how amazing the beauty is, it’s just not the same. You know, I don’t travel for the mountains or the rivers or the…
the things, it’s the people that live in those places that are amazing. And, um, I, yeah, you’ve brought just this conversation brought back a lot of memories for me. So anybody that’s listening to this, um, like if you’re just listening to this, you’re not seeing his face and I’m sitting here looking at Gonzalo as he’s talking about this and it’s like, I see the excitement, you’re the real deal. So anybody listen to this. Yeah.
reach out to him. I just think you like, you can wrap everything up with a nice Chilean wine. Oh yeah. Do you like Pisco Sours? Oh yeah. We love Pisco Sours. Yeah. So that’s, and I learned something. When I was down there last, I was drinking Pisco and Coke, Piscola. Piscola, that’s a very Chilean drink. Well, yeah, that’s what people were saying, but I got the feeling they were
Jason Elkins (55:45.43)
like, and laughing at me as like, it just seemed to make sense. I like, can I have Pisco and Coke? And they’re like, yeah, but they gave me that weird look. But maybe it was like, you’re too gringo to be drinking this. I wasn’t sure what exactly the look was, but- No, that’s a very Chilean, I’m not fan of the Pisco, but it’s a very common drink. I love Pisco Sour. Yeah, no, I- Peruvian and Chilean, I love both. Yup. Just amazing, amazing part of the world. And I’m-
speak for all of us, I think we’re all better off that you were looking out of that window that day and you saw the guy in his shorts and blip blops with his I think you said surfboard or Yeah, it was the backpack and was a surf attached to the back back. Yeah, like, isn’t that cool. So good for you for taking, I was gonna say taking the leap, but that could have a negative connotation if you’re in a tall space. I think you took the more reasoned approach. So
Benzola, thank you so much for being here. I will have a link to your website in the show notes. So anybody that’s listening to this should be able to go quite easily, get through, take a look at your website, reach out to your team. And I have a feeling any question they could possibly answer, I have a feeling your team would be the right people to answer it. And then hopefully you and I will cross paths in person sometime soon. I feel like I’m just up the road a little bit. So maybe I’ll…
I’ll jump down and see you this, what I think of as my winter, but I guess it would be your summer. So, thank you so much. Anytime. All right. Thank you for having me. Great time with you.
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