Greg has over 20 years of experience in the adventure travel industry, having worked as a guide, a local operations manager, a sales/marketing manager, and a company owner in the US, Africa, South America, Central America, Southeast Asia, and Southwest Asia.   He is passionate about travel, which he defines as truly experiencing a place's people and natural history.   Greg is also passionate about connecting travelers with local travel providers (many of whom are his good friends), as he wants to help quality local companies stand out from the lower quality companies.

He started his career by taking a Semester in the Rockies course from the National Outdoor Leadership School in 1981, where he began to learn skills of safely leading and educating groups on wilderness trips. Here he also began to develop an ethic of preserving the environment everywhere he traveled. Immediately after the course he got his first adventure travel job as he worked at a summer camp for disadvantaged youth in Minnesota. Here Greg took campers on canoeing and backpacking trips, giving many of them their first wilderness and camping experiences. Greg then became a Nordic ski instructor at Jackson Hole Ski Resort, where he also guided backcountry ski tours.

In 1985 Greg was involved in a traumatic climbing accident in the Teton Mountains of Wyoming. Two of Greg's friends died of hypothermia in a horrible early season winter storm, and Greg suffered severe frostbite and hypothermia while nearly dying himself. This event has had an enormous affect on Greg's life and has made him stress the importance of safety on wilderness adventures.

While recovering from severe frostbite to his feet, Greg desperately sought to find a way to enjoy nature and wilderness travel. An old friend suggested he take a course to become a rafting guide on the Snake River near Jackson, Wyoming. Greg took the course and discovered that he loved traveling on rivers, and that raft guiding could take him around the world to guide American clients on international rivers, as most international locales did not have local river guides at the time. Greg's family had a long history of living and working internationally (his mother was born in China and Greg lived in the Philippines from the ages of 2-5), and knew instantly that this was the path he must follow. After spending several years guiding Class IV and V rivers in California, Greg gained experience on multi-day expeditions by guiding the Middle Fork of the Salmon River in Idaho. From there he was hired by Sobek Expeditions to guide the Zambezi River in Zambia in 1991. Following his first season in Zambia Greg was offered the position of Operations Manager for Sobek Zambia, which he accepted as his first real management experience and experience doing business in another culture.

Next Greg guided rafting and trekking trips for Mountain Travel * Sobek in Chile (on the Bio Bio and Futaleufu Rivers), and in Zimbabwe, Costa Rica, Turkey, and Peru. He also managed MTS's Patagonia trekking operation for several years. Over this time Greg got to know many outstanding local guides and outfitters, and began to understand how difficult it is for them to attract customers from overseas.

After leaving MTS, Greg was co-founder and President of Mukuni, Wilderness Whitewater Expeditions, a boutique travel company that ran international river expeditions. In this capacity Greg set up and guided exploratory and unique rafting expeditions in Peru, Bolivia, and the Philippines. Greg also served as a consultant to the Philippines Dept of Tourism for whom he designed and led the official government sponsored whitewater guides training course.

Greg found himself slowly morphing from guide to administrator and decided to pursue this transition by getting an MBA from the David Eccles School of Business at the University of Utah. Since then and before founding Detour, Greg has served as a business consultant to the National Park Service, and for PACT, the Protected Areas Conservation Trust of Belize.

Katie is a traveler whenever she gets the chance. Her wanderings have taken her through Europe, Mexico, much of the US and South America. Katie's latest excursions were to mainland Ecuador, the Galapagos Islands, and across Kansas.

After graduating from the University of Colorado, Katie backpacked extensively in South America through 2004 and 2005 . Certified as a TEFL teacher, Katie taught English both in a school and privately in Arequipa, Peru. Later, she volunteered at an animal refuge, Inti Wara Yassi in Villa Tunari, Bolivia. She has also spent time exploring the beaches of Brazil and the mountains of Argentina.

She also has a background in environmental and social justice causes. Most recently, she worked for local environmental and anti-violence campaigns in her hometown of Denver, CO. As an previous community organizer for corporate accountability campaigns, she found much in common with Detour's mission. Moreover, she is glad to be part of a company that focuses on the human and environmental costs of tourism without neglecting the traveler's experience.

Whenever she gets the chance, Katie enjoys running, backpacking, snowboarding, and yoga. While away from her landlocked state, she finds time to go sea kayaking and snorkeling.