Guest Bio
Jeremy Kehrein is the Manager of Travel Sales at Orvis Adventures, bringing over a decade of experience in organizing and leading fly-fishing expeditions worldwide. Originally from the Driftless area of Wisconsin, Jeremy developed a passion for trout fishing at an early age. His career has taken him from guiding in Patagonia to outfitting in Montana, and since 2012, he has been instrumental in curating exceptional fishing experiences for Orvis customers across multiple continents.
Show Summary
In this episode, Jeremy Kehrein shares his journey from a young angler in Wisconsin to becoming a seasoned adventure travel professional. He discusses the evolution of his career, the importance of building connections through shared experiences, and the role of Orvis Adventures in promoting outdoor activities and conservation. Jeremy also reflects on his international fishing expeditions and the unique cultural insights gained through his travels.
Key Takeaways
- ✓ Passion to Profession: Transforming a personal interest into a fulfilling career can lead to unique opportunities and experiences.
- ✓ Global Exploration: Traveling to diverse locations enhances cultural understanding and personal growth.
- ✓ Building Connections: Shared experiences in adventure travel foster meaningful relationships and community.
- ✓ Conservation Efforts: Promoting sustainable practices is essential for preserving natural habitats and wildlife.
- ✓ Continuous Learning: Embracing new challenges and environments contributes to professional and personal development.
What You’ll Find on Orvis Adventures’ Platform
- ✓ Curated Fishing Expeditions: Expertly planned trips to prime fishing destinations worldwide.
- ✓ Customized Travel Packages: Tailored itineraries to suit individual preferences and skill levels.
- ✓ Conservation Initiatives: Opportunities to participate in projects aimed at preserving aquatic ecosystems.
- ✓ Educational Resources: Access to workshops, tutorials, and guides to enhance fishing techniques.
- ✓ Community Engagement: Platforms to connect with fellow anglers and share experiences.
👉 Visit Orvis Adventures’ Official Website to explore their offerings and learn more about Jeremy Kehrein’s contributions to adventure travel.
Learn more about Orvis Adventures and connect with Jeremy at:
https://www.orvis.com/adventures
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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.
Welcome back to another episode of the Big World Made Small podcast for the adventure traveler. So happy to have each and every one of you back here listening to the show today. And I am super excited. This is a really big deal for me. I’ve got my friend and colleague, Jeremy Kehrein from Orvis Adventures.
here on the show with us today. Jeremy is a colleague from way back when we worked at Orvis together, running all kinds of great fishing trips and international stuff. We worked together on a lot of projects and this is just a real treat for me to have Jeremy here. Jeremy, welcome to the show. Thanks, Jason. Thanks for inviting me. Yeah, it’s such a pleasure. You and I haven’t spoken for a while. We spoke a little bit here recently about kind of what’s going on in your world.
I’m just super excited to kind of hear a little bit, you know, around a few things. Mostly I’m interested in sharing your story. You know, how did you get from where you were? And I know some of your story, but our listeners might not. How did you get from where you were to where you are today? So we’ll talk a little bit about that. And I always like to kind of frame that as, you know, and I know Jeremy, you specifically know this when you’re out with a group and you’ve been out fishing all day or doing whatever, leading a trip.
Jason Elkins (02:11.25)
And then you’ve got that quiet before the quiet. When you sit down after dinner, your responsibilities are kind of done and then the questions start. So these questions are the same questions that you’ve heard hundreds of times. And what’s great is those are also the questions that people wanna know. So it’s the, you know, geez Jeremy, how did you get into this? What’s your favorite part of it? All that stuff. So if you would just start by telling us a little bit about how did you get into…
the dream job, many would call the dream job, especially for anybody that likes to fly fish. What’s your story? Well, you know, I went to school, you know, college as a school teacher and decided one day decided that I wanted to teach somewhere in the world where I could experience something new, maybe even possibly learn another language that which is that is barely even
worked after 20 years of it. And so I took a teaching job in Argentina. And I also wanted to go to a place I could fish because I was an avid angler as well. Licensed Wisconsin, I said that in quotes, a license fishing guy in Wisconsin, which doesn’t mean anything but $45 in a piece of paper. So it’s $10 more expensive than the regular fishing license, right?
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Exactly. Back, back then. Now I’m sure things have changed, but, um, so, um, moved to Argentina in 2001 did, uh, worked at a international American school there outside of Buenos Aires. And then, um, let’s see, spent a year after that down there, met my wife still. And we’re
Luckily, I don’t know how she can say me, but we’re still together. Same wife. She’s wonderful and very patient because I know you quite well. So yeah, exactly. Exactly. But yeah, and was back down there, did a season in Patagonia and came back. Let’s see, taught school in Wisconsin where I grew up.
Jason Elkins (04:29.558)
And, um, then moved to Montana and became an outfitter and a guide. And then just went from there and tried to figure out how I could get into the, and, you know, I love that, loved living and working in Montana, but then kind of yearn for more. So, especially when you live overseas and you have that experience, it’s pretty easy to get, uh, I don’t want to say addicted to it, but it’s pretty easy to, to want to do, do that more. So.
So what I, what I hear you saying is Montana is great. And you were looking for an opportunity that would allow you to continue to travel, which is where you and I connect. Correct. Yeah. No, right. Cause you came right from Montana, um, working as an outfitter there to, to work with us there at Orbis, I was there a little bit before you did you were. And, and you came on board. So, and, and sure enough, I, you know, you were traveling, we had you out there on the road.
Quite a bit. And I’ve been gone for a while. So I don’t know how much you’ve been doing since then. But I have a feeling I see your social media posts. Is there any place you have not been? I’m just going to jump to this. Is there any place you haven’t been that you really want to go that’s on your list? Um, man, you know, I have, I’ve been so lucky, thanks to you, or of us and a lot of other people did to, to travel a lot of places in the world. Um,
Currently the only place that’s really, uh, I would say, Oh man, I hate using the term bucket list. I’m not going to use the term by the list, but the only term, uh, the only place on the list is the Seychelles. And I think in this upcoming April, I will be going with a group of anglers over there. So that’ll be my first trip there. I mean, there’s, there’s all kinds of places that I haven’t been to that I’d love to go to. Um, it’s a tough for a true traveler like yourself. That’s a really tough question.
Cause like there will always be a place no matter if you’ve seen them all there’s, or there’s going to be that. Cause yeah, even one country, if you look at one country, there’s so many different things in that one country. Yeah. I can appreciate that. The group that you’re, so you’re leading a group trip to the Seychelles. Is that right? Yeah. So, um, over the last, uh, you know, over, wow, over the last 10 years, I’ve been, um,
Jason Elkins (06:50.122)
assembling, you know, a small group of travelers that I’ve been traveling with over the years, some, you know, some you don’t know. Um, uh, you know, good, good friends and clients, Keith and Susan Hampton were some of them, you know, and it’s been a while. It’s been a while since I’ve traveled with them. But there’s others that I’ve kind of met over the years, maybe after you after you left Orvis too, but um, they’ve become friends, travelers.
we’ll have about half, half of the group will be people that I know. And half the other group will be people I don’t know. So should be it should be a good one. Yeah. That’s a fun dynamic, isn’t it? Where you’ve got, you know, you kind of your regular crew that you’ve been able to share so many cool experiences with. And then you get the mix of some I don’t know, I’m just lack a better way to put it. So new blood in there, not that the old blood is bad, but it’s what’s a lot of fun about that consistency of, you know, working with
one organization and leading groups with that organization for a while, because you just always have that really interesting mix. And Jeremy, it’s been fun for me because I watch you on social media. I watch Keith and Susan on social media as well. And you know, I see you guys off doing trips that I’d traveled with them and others as well. And it’s always so neat to see that they’re still traveling, that they’re going on trips with you. At this point they’ve gone on more trips with you than they’ve ever went on with me. But it brings back.
and those connections. Do you, because I think that connections are really such a big part of it. You know, it’s not really, especially with fishing, we can, you know, it’s fishing, okay. So if you don’t fish, a lot of people might just, oh, it’s about the fish. That’s not about the fish. It’s not about the mountain. It’s not about the river. It’s not about whatever. It’s about those connections and those shared experiences. And that was always my favorite thing, leading a trip with Orvis or other things that I’ve done.
is just that connection that is created that’s so powerful because I don’t know about you, but like, I’d love to go to Seychelles, but I don’t really want to go by my like, if you could just drop me in there by myself on a flat with a rod and say here you’re here for a week, we’ll come back and get you it wouldn’t be the same experience. So no, no. And there’s it’s I don’t know it’s you want to be put around. I mean, there’s probably a lot of people that
Jason Elkins (09:15.814)
I mean, listen to this, don’t even know anything about, I don’t care about anything about fishing, but you know, when the fishing goes, it’s good to have good people when the fishing goes bad because fishing isn’t like the, just because you go to the Seychelles or you go to the middle of nowhere, Russia or Mongolia or Cuba or Central America or South America, doesn’t mean you’re gonna have great fishing. So- Yeah.
Jason Elkins (09:43.658)
Now I’m with you completely and it’s because here’s the thing, even if you’re not on a fishing trip, and I think everybody can relate to this, because things go bad on all kinds of trips. You know, if you’re, for example, this past, I guess it was summer before last, I was with my son traveling through Guatemala and there was a mudslide and we spent 12 hours sitting on a bus, you know, waiting for them to clear the road. And of course the driver, this was not a…
guided trip I arranged or had anything to do with. I just bought the tickets and the driver really had no interest in explaining this, anything that was going on. Oh yeah. You know and we had you know 15-20 people on this small bus and fortunately they were just all a lot of fun and we you know it was like it turned into a fond memory so yeah having the right people along which is another perk of being consistent and staying in a particular role in the business is it gives you time to acquire
travelers that are fun and the ones that aren’t fun just kind of get kind of self select their way out I guess is one way to put it. But yeah it’s pretty cool and you’re right it’s not like fishing you don’t even have to know anything about fishing because this is all adventure tourism adventure travel it’s not you know it’s we I could be sitting here having a conversation with you about scuba diving and 98 percent of the conversation is going to be wow what happened to you as a kid
Right. What what did your parents think when you said, I’m going to, you know, move to Montana and be a fishing guide? Or, you know, what did your family think when you, you know, when you’re going to a place like Cuba or Russia, you know, stuff like that? Because that’s the same regardless. And on that note, I will ask, I’ve always been curious. I’ve never really had this conversation with you. What did your family think? I mean, you maybe took a couple steps. You didn’t go right to I’m going to Argentina to be a fishing guide. Right.
So it might’ve felt like that to them. I don’t know, but how did your parents respond to you wanting to, to live overseas, to work overseas? And then when you really got kind of nutty with the fishing thing, uh, did they think it was nutty or were they supportive? Uh, they were supportive. You know, my, my parents in the sixties spent time in, in Europe. My dad studies in.
Jason Elkins (12:09.502)
in Germany for a little bit. Um, my mother worked for United Airlines. So they traveled like that was back in the days when you can get a, you know, a $50 first-class ticket on the weekend. And they would, you know, from Chicago fly to Paris for a long weekend. And so they, so they kind of, you know, they had that travel, they had that travel bug. And right before I decided to go to Argentina, we had spent the summer in, um, Europe. And I had
backpacked and traveled in Europe and spent a month with my family visiting my father was born in Switzerland, my law, a long story really short, my grandfather was an airplane mechanic. And after World War Two, he was sent to Switzerland to repair airplanes from the war. And so my father was born there. And so we were back there visiting, um, back there visiting all my grandfather’s friends, because he had he
And we, it was a great excuse to go to Europe. So I had spent two months with my, a month with my family and a month, maybe, maybe even more just with my brother backpacking around Europe and just traveling. And that was when I decided, I was like, yeah, just this small town Wisconsin thing is cool. It’s fine, you know, I grew up here, but I think it’s time to get out and see the rest of the world. And so they were, they were always, to answer your question, they were always supportive.
of it, um, big time. So, uh, my whole family. So, um, but it’s been a long time since I’ve been around or near my family. So you do what you want now. Anyway. Yeah. I mean, it’s, I mean, it’s kind of, you know, once, once that’s done, you’ve taken that leap. It’s you’re in it forever. It seems like so.
I would agree. And I’ve kind of had similar situations with my family. And it finally got to the point a couple of years ago, I sold all my stuff and just, I bought a one-way ticket to Columbia. And I’ve shared the story a couple of times that, now my father was very adventurous. He quit his job as an accountant. He was, I guess, a CFO for a mining company in Wyoming, quit his job as an accountant and convinced the state of Wyoming to buy him a hot air balloon and started traveling with it.
Jason Elkins (14:36.114)
So that was pretty bold and adventurous. He was a scuba diver and cavery. He just looked, growing up kind of in his shadow, I say in his shadow, felt like, wow, I just didn’t know anybody that was so, some people might call it impulsive. I don’t know if he’s listening to this. I’m not using that word, dad. But just, he knew what he wanted, and it didn’t fit the typical mold. And then when I got ready, I was like,
I had already traveled. I worked in the tourism business. I’d been to pretty cool places. And when I got ready to move to, I say move, come to Columbia two years ago, it was a one-way ticket and I figured I’d stay a month. But he was concerned. And the reason I’m bringing this up is because I do want to talk a little bit about safety because you’ve seen enough different places and you know that is a concern that people have. But when I came here, my dad copied and pasted the entire State Department warning.
off their website and sent it to me in a text. And I hope he’s okay with me sharing this story. Actually, I felt very loved. I felt very like, okay, he really, not that I didn’t think he cared about me, but I thought, okay, it’s a nice gesture. And it was a moment for me of just kind of feeling, honestly feeling grown up. It’s like, oh, I’m doing something that even my dad is looking at and thinking, well, geez, maybe that’s impulsive.
Jason Elkins (16:02.494)
Probably was. I’m happy with the choice. I’ve visited a lot of places since then. I happen to be back in Columbia right now, because I love it. And I also realized that there’s a lot of people. Actually, my first opportunity to visit Columbia was when I worked for Orvis. And I don’t remember if you had already joined the team or not, but I had been invited to go look at a destination here in the country by a tour operator. And I remember there was some conversation. My wife was not out, and she’s like, no, I don’t think so.
You’re not going. And even the folks at Orvis were like, well, I’m not sure we can justify this. And I’m not sure the insurance covers it if you get kidnapped. And we had all these stories that kept me from going. So it’s not a big surprise that years later, when I found myself divorced and really without a job, I guess, at the time, self-employed, that the first place I decided to start my journey was Columbia.
Long way to bring up the conversation of safety, because I’m sure I know that you have had clients that have gone on trips with you to places specifically because they felt safe with you. And they’re like, if Jeremy is comfortable there, if we’re going to be with Jeremy, okay, fine, we’ll go. We don’t want to go by ourselves or whatever. And then maybe once they get there, the attitude changes. Do you have any stories or any insights for people that maybe kind of fall into that same camp and-
share with us what happens when you go to one of these places and your clients are like, Oh, wait a minute. This is not what I expected. Yeah. And I don’t, I mean, I don’t know if I, I mean, I’ll, I’ll say, I’ll say this is I, I’d be hard for us. I’m not going to travel to a place that I feel is going to be unsafe. I have an eight year old daughter. So, um, you know, I mean, and I’m,
And yet, have you been to Cuba? Yes. Have you been to, have you gone to actually to Russia? I know you’ve been to Mongolia. Yeah, Russia, Mongolia, Korea, you know. A lot of places in South America. A lot of different places. Mexico. Mexico, you know, all those other, you know, it’s, I don’t, I don’t know. I am, I’m pointing that out Jeremy because.
Jason Elkins (18:25.478)
I’m not saying you shouldn’t have gone to any of those places with an eight year old. I’m just pointing out anybody that’s listening to this is what you said. What I heard you say was I’m not going to go any place that I think I’m not going to be able to come back from. Yeah, right responsibilities. And that’s why I wanted to point out some of those countries because some of those places I named are places that if you haven’t traveled much you might think yeah, I’m not going to do that for the same reason. So I just wanted to point that.
So, right. Yeah, absolutely. And I mean, so there was a, there was a trip we went to Mongolia a couple of years ago. And, um, uh, I said a couple of years ago, it’s probably more than that, but that was, there was a height of threats like there always is with North Korea and South Korea. But I mean, to the point where people were starting to get worried, um, we, we started working with a, uh, medical evacuation company called global rescue years ago.
They have a securities team. And so I actually used them and I said, Hey, what do you, what do you think? You know, this, like, I can’t answer these people are going to be worried about different things. Um, I might be more relaxed than a lot of other people because I want, I want to go and I want to do things and see things. Um, um, but.
In this case, I talked to the guy and I felt pretty confident. He’s, you know, I mean, you know, it’s all these ex military security people and he, they kind of gave me the, the rundown. They’re like the chance of something happening when you’re in South Korea for two days is, you know, like a 0.001% chance. So I told everyone that we, but if it does, we’re going to send in the, you know, the green berets and take you out by helicopter. Yeah. I mean, well.
That’s what everyone thinks, right? But I mean, it’s, I mean, whatever. I mean, and of course it was, it was completely fine. But you know, if, if you’re going to be in the wrong place, the wrong time, you’re going to be there at the wrong place, the wrong time. I, when I lived in Argentina in 2001, they, the, the country went through like, I think three presidents or six present, I can’t remember in three weeks.
Jason Elkins (20:42.646)
and there are protests and everyone like my friends from back home are saying like, oh my god, are you safe? Is everything okay? Yeah, in fact, I’m just out at the bar having a beer with a bunch of friends and we’re having a great time. I don’t know what you mean. Oh, we see this, you know, so there’s a lot of this, you know, that you just, it’s really hard. I mean, with social media and our, you know, phones and computers and the internet these days, we get instantaneous news.
So yeah, and when’s the last time you saw a real positive feel good story about how great it is in Buenos Aires or Medellin, Colombia or Mexico City? Yeah. You know, if you’re not looking for it, if you’re really into adventure tourism and you’re looking for it, you can find some cool stuff because there’s plenty of people out there that’ll talk about how great these places are. But if you’re just kind of passively paying attention to the news or social media, it’s no one like
you know, as many people that watch it, it’s amazing that anybody travels. Cause it is, it’s full of a lot of negative stuff. And Columbia is a good example. You know, I’m not, there was some really unpleasant things happening here for quite a long time that the news reported on as I was growing up. I grew up watching that. It’s part of why my dad was concerned. Cause you know, while he was raising me, that’s what was on the news. Was Columbia, or you know, and then,
when things tend to resolve themselves, because things change. I don’t know if it always is for the better, but things change. And then you just kind of quit hearing about it. It’s not like they come on and they don’t do the, where are they now type of news broadcasts about countries. They’ll do it about childhood actors. You’ll see that stuff. But you don’t see, where is Colombia now after all that? Or Argentina, the same type of thing. So well.
I mean, just some big football players, soccer player from Columbia, what his, his parents just got kidnapped. Right. I mean, we see, I mean that
Jason Elkins (22:49.47)
Okay. Does that mean Columbia is not safe? No. I mean, you know, who knows? I don’t know. Um, you know, I had, I’ve worked with a friend in, in Argentina. He grew up in Columbia and American international school in, in Bogota in the eighties. Yeah. And I’ve, and I’ve, I mean, um, and there were things going on, you know? Yeah. And I’ve also spoken with, with tourists that traveled here in the eighties and nineties that just fell in love with the country.
Because the reality is, yeah, there’s, you know, every place has its things and its seasons, I guess we should say. But I gotta tell you, had I not gotten on the plane, had I read my dad’s text and said, yeah, you’re right, I’m not going, I would have missed out on the opportunity to learn just how amazing the Colombian people are, and friendly, I mean, the friendliest people on the planet. Just, and they really look out for each other. I mean, I’ve seen, you know, a young girl stop her scooter in the middle of the intersection.
to stop the traffic because she noticed an ambulance was coming. They’re looking out for each other. There was a guy two days ago, I was walking down the street and someone was trying to get his attention. So I kind of looked up and this guy’s walking down the street with a bunch of cash hanging out of his pocket. And another Colombian’s trying to stop him to let him know. And then I went over and stopped him and they, and I’ve had people, I’ve dropped money on the ground. I’ve had waitresses chase me out of restaurants because I…
I left what I thought was I was just leaving a tip and it wasn’t necessarily not something they expected. And they’re like, Oh, senior, you know, for your one million pesos or whatever. And the people are just so gracious and wonderful. They help each other out the other street. And I wouldn’t have that had I not, you know, just say, you know what, I’m going. That’s what I think what keeps people going is the culture they experience, whether it’s different. I mean, there’s just a. It.
Yeah, it’s, I’ve experienced a lot of different cultures and just different things in different places of the planet that keeps my faith in humanity. You know, I mean, it really does. So I mean, I, there’s parts of cities in the US that I wouldn’t go to then. Yeah, Jerry, I don’t know if you were at Arvis already, but I remember I was having a conversation with a client.
Jason Elkins (25:10.57)
And I had suggested Belize. He was looking for a place to go saltwater fly fishing. And I said, yeah, Belize. And he came back a couple of days later and I said, okay, you know, do you have any more questions? Like, you know, I’m really concerned because I read an article about something that happened on the border between Belize and Guatemala. I was like hijacked or something. I think it was a few years earlier. And just, I just had a hunch. I didn’t know where the guy’s from, but I was curious. I said, I’m just curious, where do you live?
And he said, I live in Oakland. And like a week earlier, and it was why I remember it so much, is a week earlier, they’d had a big shootout with a few cops. Unfortunately, had lost their lives. And he lives there. People can make any choice they want to make. I’m not judging his choice or decisions to go any place. But it’s just interesting how when it’s close, we kind of get it. It’s like, OK, if something bad happens in my city,
I can get my head around it because I can understand. Well, that neighborhood’s really bad. Or this is something that I’m just used to seeing. But when it’s another country, another culture that we aren’t familiar with, it’s all we can do is latch onto that because we haven’t seen the amazing things as well. So we latch onto those things. And that was kind of always a really interesting, you know, thing that I remember coming out. Yeah, and I think you bring up a good point because it’s like every time I talk to my family down in-
in Argentina, they always tell me how dangerous it is. They always tell me how dangerous it is. When I know there I’m feel threatened. I don’t know. So it’s you know, there’s they’re telling they’re telling you how dangerous it is. It is in Argentina. Yeah, yeah. I mean, it’s like it’s a big city. It’s, you know, 40% poverty right now. There’s there’s a lot of there’s a lot of issues, you know, but um, I mean, I mean,
But here, let’s, let’s put it this way too, is I think that we all have our own idea of, of safety. And, um, I mean, I can tell you there’s people right now that don’t want to travel. Why? Because of what’s happening in the middle East or I mean, I even had someone ask me if there’s going to be a civil war in Argentina. I mean,
Jason Elkins (27:33.398)
because there’s an election coming up. And I mean, all these other things, I mean, it’s just, it’s amazing what we tell or what we convince ourselves of what’s safe and what’s not safe. So I think that’s a huge, huge thing. And that’s a big factor of once you take that step and you live in another country, it helps you feel safe when you travel. I mean, I’m…
9-eleven happened when I was in Argentina and I’ve never I mean, I felt scared when I was there and it was weird because why would I? But I saw everything from afar. So that was a very interesting time. I think fear and these things are completely normal.
Yeah. So, you know, I can say, well, that guy in Oakland was afraid to go to bullies. What’s wrong with them? I’m not saying that at all. Yeah. I get it. And, and I also think that when you travel and when you get outside of your comfort zone, I don’t know if I want to say the world feels safer, but that’s been my experience. Um, when I, the more I traveled, the more places I see actually, like you said, it restores my faith in humanity. When I go to
I spent some time in Malaysia this past spring. It’s a Muslim country, significantly different culture. I’ve not been to the Middle East, but I assume it’s kind of the same thing. And you see these people, yeah, they’re dressed differently. They, their beliefs, their religious customs are different. And you know what? Their little kids are just as frigging cute as ours. And walk, you know, watching them walk down the street, maybe in a burka.
or whatever, holding their kids’ hands, and the kids are happy, and they, you know, it’s just like, oh, okay, this is, you know, I get to expose myself to that in order to, well, the name of my brand, Big World Made Small, right? It’s all about how do we make this big world that can feel very overwhelming, feel a little bit smaller through travel? And I think that that’s, I mean, I know that this is not the conversation you and I had planned to have, and I really, you know, I appreciate that you are having it
Jason Elkins (29:52.33)
some interesting insights that others don’t, that maybe people are listening to this. And the other thing that came up for me is people here in Columbia, when I tell them where I’m from, you know, like I’ll ask them quite often. I like to ask people, if you could go anywhere, where would it be? And in Columbia, I hear a lot of Switzerland actually. I, you know, like 90% of them like Switzerland and the rest are maybe Spain. And I say, what about America? And they’re like, I would like to go to America, but it’s dangerous.
Like these are Colombians telling me, I don’t, because they think everybody has a gun and every day, you know, a school and every town is being shot up. And those are horrible things. I’m not discounting when it happens and how horrible it is, but I’m just highlighting the differences in perspective because also these are people that have never been to the United States. So of course they think that. I can’t imagine not thinking that. I can’t imagine thinking something else.
I’ve also told local Colombians that I’m heading off to Mexico. And they’re like, oh, you shouldn’t go to Mexico. Mexico is really dangerous. So this is not a unique thing to Americans when we look out at the rest of the world and say all these other places are dangerous. We all, this is a human thing, you know, because most of us, most of us care about our safety. Do Colombians ever tell you that they’re also Americans because they live in South America? Oh, yeah, yeah.
Thank you. So anybody that’s listening, you know, yes, I am aware of it. Actually, the other day, I was Yeah, the other day I was having a conversation and someone said that they were doing some trips to Costa Rica, we’re talking about different places. She said Costa Rica and I say, Well, how about anything else in South America? And as soon as the lips, the words left my mouth, it was like, I mean, Latin America. But yeah, they definitely are proud to be Americans. And half the time, you know, they get it if they say, you know, they say, Where are you from? I say America.
it looks. But I also don’t say any things about how great America is. You know, I’m not down here promoting how great North America is. I’m here in their culture. I want to absorb and kind of, you know, enjoy the things they have here, which is just friggin amazing. I know this, you know, this is not the promote Columbia hour here, but, but it’s really just about traveling. I just think I think everybody should do it if they if they can.
Jason Elkins (32:14.082)
Jeremy, we’ve discussed quite a few things. I think we could just, you and I, I know you and I could just chat for hours because we have many, many times. And I want to talk a little bit about Orvis, Orvis adventures, just so anybody that’s listening to this that maybe they’re not in the fishing space. I don’t know a lot about fly fishing, maybe even touch on what Orvis is. So next time somebody hears Orvis or, you know, they kind of have a clue because I run into people quite often.
that just don’t know what it is. Um, which is hard for me to believe because I was, it was my identity for quite a while. So Jeremy, what is Orvis? Tell us about Orvis adventures and let our listeners know whatever you think they need to know, uh, about the business, your business. Sure. Feel free to correct me as I’m messing it up too. Jason, you’re closer to it than I am, Jeremy. And I won’t, I won’t throw you into the bus. No, no, no. Um, you know, I guess one of the.
unique things that I found out when I, when I, when I started working at Orvis is, you know, Orvis was the first mail order catalog in 1856 years ago that started selling, uh, selling, I think rods and flies to New Yorkers and from, you know, from Southern Vermont. Um, and it then became morphed into kind of what it is to now until or even until into the
60s when the current family, the Perkins family bought it in a mail order company that not only sold fishing tackle rods, reels, lines, flies, but then also kind of got into the some of the home goods stuff too. So and even soft goods from clothing to all sorts of other things. So we are a part orifice.
Adventures is now a part of Orvis that was started and maybe and you probably even know the history better than I do, but it was started 30 years ago. Maybe well maybe more now. I was teamed up to sell gear to people on trips. And and I think yeah, no, I think your stats and figures and a lot probably more spot on than minor and it was
Jason Elkins (34:41.066)
What I thought was interesting, it was like, yeah, it’s a mailer retail, a merchandising company, but it’s so tied to the activities, the outdoor activities, traditionally fly fishing, wingshooting, that type of thing. And I think it just made sense that, we’ve got our customers are coming in, buying all this stuff, let’s help them use it, which makes sense, because let’s give them ideas of places to go. So we started, we meaning Orvis, which I’m not affiliated with at this moment, but.
but started giving people suggestions on where to go use it. It’s actually like, if you think about it, it’s the Michelin. I just heard recently Michelin, the tire company, I had no clue about this until recently, so I’m going to share it, that the Michelin tire company was looking for reasons to encourage people to drive more, because the more they drove, the more they wore down the tires, which were fairly soft back in the beginning. And then they were able to sell more tires.
So they came up with the whole Michelin star thing, the restaurants to encourage people to drive. And a one-star restaurant was, I guess it was basically recommended if you’re there, you know, like, hey, this is a good restaurant. If you just happen to be there, a two-star would be that it warranted a detour and a three-star was this place is so good that it warrants a specific trip. So it’s kind of like that in the sense that Orvis is like, you know, Orvis were selling flies and those, anybody that doesn’t know anything about fly fishing.
flies, you know, you don’t come back with the same number of flies you left with. You’re always buying more flies. Every time you go on a fly fishing trip, you buy probably a hundred dollars worth of flies if you’re like me. So it made sense that Orvis would say, you know, there’s great fishing. They even have fishing reports now on the website to say, hey, there’s great fishing going on up here. You should, you know, pack up and go up there. And of course, probably have an Orvis dealer right on the side of the river. So it made a lot of made a lot of sense to do that. And.
Yeah. And then I think, you know, I mean, one thing we’re missing too, as we talked, um, you know, like you said, with the Michelin, I mean, years, years ago was in the eighties, nineties. I’m not, I’m not really good with my, with my, um, Orvis history, but they started the endorsement program and, and that has become a huge thing too. You know, that, that seal or mark of the fact that
Jason Elkins (37:04.03)
I remember when I was chatting with lodges and outfitters, it’s like, hey, it’s like the good housekeeping seal of approval. And of course most of them would look at me crazy cause they’re outside the country and they’re like, what are you talking about? But you know, most of our listeners can, yeah, the, the Orvis endorsement is basically the good housekeeping seal of approval when it comes to outdoor operators. It’s kind of the way I saw it. Real Chateau and all, you know, all those other marks of excellent excellence. If you want to, if you want to so call it.
Um, yeah, yeah. And so that’s become a big part. So not only that, so our, our orifice adventures is encompassed with that. Uh, schools are another thing. You know, we’ve been pretty, uh, pretty aggressive with teaching, um, people how to fish, um, because more people teach how to fish, the more stuff you sell them, people buy so, and then they want to go on trips.
And the, and, and Jeremy, they want to conserve the environment. They want to preserve the environment. Cause if they like to fish, they want to keep it around. So they’re more likely to make a decision. Correct. So, and that’s, and that’s, and that’s in all, honestly, that’s, that’s a very, that’s what I was going to get to. And the kind of the last section part of this is that, you know, the, that is a part of live fishing more than any other angling.
sport if you want to, if you still want to call it. And I’m not really sure why that is, but I mean, I think it’s, it goes back to the, the whole Lee Wolf thing of, you know, learning how to catch and release and, you know, you catch a fish and you put it back, someone else can catch it. So, I wonder if it’s, I wonder if it’s because you really need to work a little bit, not to say that somebody can’t go out on their first trip with a guide or something and catch fish because they can.
Yeah. And I wonder if it just has part of it just has to do with the amount of time and effort that some people and resources that some people will put into catching fish. It becomes a little less about the fish a little bit more about you know. Yeah no 100. Maybe. Yeah no no. It’s a little bit more about the skill set and the learning and the social because there are social elements and of course trout fortunately trout live in beautiful places.
Jason Elkins (39:25.494)
So it’s like, OK, that makes sense. So I’m there for the mountains. And I know earlier I said it’s not about the mountains, but I’m there for the natural environment and what that does for my soul, my connection with myself and the environment. And it’s really not about putting a fish on a plate, where most of us, many of us, I know I did. I grew up fishing with my grandpa. It was there was no real thought and effort into what’s the most complicated way we can find to catch this fish. It was.
We’re going to go catch fish. We’re going to bring them home. We’re going to put them in the freezer and we’re going to eat fish. It’s just the way it was. So it’s, it’s a total, I think that’s where fly fishing kind of went a different direction and it’s just so much more about the challenge and you know, that’s why you see the guys, some people that don’t know, like, you know, they see the pictures of guys holding up fish. They don’t get it. It’s like, look what I was able to accomplish as they release it back into the water. So anybody that thinks fishing is kind of gross, barbaric, whatever. Okay.
That’s fine. Everybody can have their opinion. But when you see a picture of somebody holding up a fish, I think it’s great to know that 98% of the time, it’s because that fish is three inches above the water and is going back in the water. So when you see the photo of the fish like that, recognize that the person holding that fish probably cares more about the natural environment and more about having fish in the rivers than maybe the person looking at the picture. I don’t know. There’s no judgment there. But.
I’ll get off my high horse here a bit. Um, thanks for bringing that up. Yeah. And I, and I think that’s important and important part of, of Orvis too. They’ve, you know, they’ve been the leader of conservation for many, many years. And I think that has a lot to do with, with the, the Perkins family too, and protect what you love kind of mantra. I mean, and, you know, we’re, we’re getting into that phase with a lot of different fish throughout the world. I mean.
from the Pacific steelhead salmon to trout in general. I mean, yeah. I mean, here’s, and here, I’ll tell you, this is complete change of subject. I can’t stand eating fish. I think it’s the most disgusting thing on the planet. I remember that about you. And you don’t even like fish. Like if you go to a restaurant and like they put some sustainably caught fish on your plate, you’re not gonna touch it, are you?
Jason Elkins (41:50.382)
I’ll try it. I try every single fish. I’ve tried every single fish that I’ve done. And there’s, so if it’s a very, very fresh, I’ll eat it. No problem. Yeah. I mean, um, let’s see, I’ve had, I’ve eaten a lot of fish. I ate a lot of fish in Brazil one year out of, out of the Amazon, warm water fish, you know, that’s, that’s weird. They ate a lot of fish in Cuba, ate a lot of fish in Cuba because that was all they gave us. Um, uh, where else did I have it? That wasn’t, it wasn’t bad.
But I mean, anyway, I mean, I try it. It just, it can’t be fishy as soon as it’s frozen or it sits for a little bit. I’m done. Can’t do it. Yeah. Especially for me, trout is just like, I have no desire. I mean, growing up, we had it. Maybe that’s why I don’t have any desire or maybe because I spent so much time. Um, you know, my livelihood, you know, feeding my family, dependent on there being wild trout and rivers and Montana. Cause like you, I was also a fishing guide there.
But yeah, for some reason I lost the flavor for it. It’s really popular here in Columbia. They have a lot of fish farms, you know, on the little streams and stuff, they’ll have these little truchorias and it’s real popular to order trout and the locals think it’s a real treat, you know, to go out and order trout. I just like, ah, there’s chicharron. Why would you eat trout? We have chicharron. But that’s me. I do want to ask you this, and I know we got to wrap up, but out of all your travels, because you started the subject of eating food.
What’s your favorite? It doesn’t say it’ll be most exotic, but what’s the, what’s the food dish that pops into your mind as being something like, wow, I, everybody should try that at least once in their life. Anything? Hmm. You know, I’m so biased cause I spent so many years and I spent, still spent a lot of- You’re gonna say steak with chimichurri, aren’t you? No, I’m not gonna say chimichurri. I’m not gonna say chimichurri. No, I mean, what I think that people should try sometime is a very good sweet bread.
So sweet bread in the sense of internal organs, sweet bread, right? Mm hmm. Okay. I haven’t tried it. There’s a lot of things that it took me a long time. I mean, that that’s the one thing, part of the experience of other cultures are, are eating different things. Like I’ve had some pretty interesting food in. Mongolia. Other than fish, what’s the one that you had that was just like, okay, I tried it. And.
Jason Elkins (44:18.034)
Ooh, ferment. Ever ever touched that. The fermented chart like in Scandinavia in Iceland. Yeah, in Iceland. Yeah, I’m a shark. When I I’ve seen him, I’ve seen some of the process there. For me, it was kidney pie in Ireland. I will never no desire to ever eat kidneys again after that experience. So on I should have left. I should have stopped this on the high note of the favorite food, not the have you done? Have you done Rocky Mountain oysters? Oh yeah. Yeah.
Back before I knew what they were I was just put on my blade here and what’d you think come on? What do you think honestly? Yeah, they’re fine. I think they were bad at all Most things actually are pretty good if you don’t know what they are And it’s and some maybe the shark the fermented shark probably is gonna taste funky no matter whether you know it or not But yeah, there’s a lot of things out there and you see it here on the streets and you know what I mean what I don’t mind at all in Iceland is the
Dung smoked Arctic char because it’s fresh. It’s sashimi and it’s they don’t have any trees. They didn’t have a lot of trees. So they, they smoke it with sheep dung. It’s actually pretty good. Okay. I could, I think I can see that. And if I can eat that as a fish, it’s fish. Yeah. All right. Fish. I’ll, I’ll give that a try.
Jerry, great having this conversation with you just real quick. Is there anything that I should have asked, forgot to ask, or anything that you want to make sure our listeners know before we wrap it up? No, no, not at all. Or do we just need to come back and do this again? Yeah. Well, it’s always, it’s always great catching up with Jason and talking about this stuff. It’s nice to it’s nice. I mean, it’d be, it’d be great sometime to talk about, um, what your experiences are.
living in another country compared to what my experiences are living in another country because I um it’s a completely different time I think we know we kind of we chatted about it earlier I mean um yeah I don’t know it’s uh I remember still reading a newspaper when I was living overseas it’s fascinating maybe what we’ll do Jeremy is we’ll come back and next time we’ll just I’ll move the we’re on a zoom call for those of you listening we’ll move the
Jason Elkins (46:32.63)
panels will just swap them out and then you can, uh, although I did talk a lot in this conversation, you can, uh, you can interview me. So that would be a lot of fun. So Jeremy, thank you so much for joining the big world made small adventure travel podcast and look forward to, uh, seeing you and hearing more from you again soon. And if anybody’s you’ve, you’ll have the website link, um, reach out to Jeremy, you know, this trip to the Seychelles I’ve, uh, you know, Jeremy would be a lot of fun to travel with this trip or a different trip.
There’s a reason that he’s got the following that he does he’s definitely one of the best in the industry so and So I highly recommend that well you’re with me learn from the best, right? So You’re humble thank you very much. I appreciate you Jeremy I’ll send the check later Perfect. All right, man. You have a great day. Thanks for joining us. Thanks, Jason. Thanks for having me
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