Galapatours: About Us

Born in Argentina, half raised in Canada. She knew from a very young age that traveling will be an important part of her life... she strongly believes that to travel is to learn. Did her universities studies in Buenos Aires, and became a multilingual Tour Guide. Seeking new challenges, she's now part of the Galápagos team as a travel specialist ready to deliver an amazing experience! In her free time, she loves vintage stores and is a spiritual truth-seeker who meditates 2 hours a day.

Born and raised in Ecuador, Cynthia has a deep connection to her homeland and its magical islands. With seven years in the tourism industry, she’s passionate about sharing the beauty of Ecuador and ensuring each traveler has the trip of a lifetime. She understands that a journey to the Galápagos is more than just a vacation—it’s an unforgettable experience. Now part of the Galapatours Team, Cynthia is excited to help you craft your dream adventure. She’s here to offer personalized travel guidance and make sure your journey is truly extraordinary.

Born and raised in Ecuador. As a daughter of a Japanese and Colombian, growing up in two completely different cultures caused her an enormous curiosity to explore the world. Passionate for tourism and with a vocation for service, Hitomi has been helping travelers to plan the best trip to the Galapagos Islands for over nine years. In her spare time, she loves being outdoors taking pictures of landscapes, visiting local cafes and learning new languages.

Andre founded Viventura - the first Ventura TRAVEL brand - while still a student out of a desire to make trips more fun and show travelers the real South America. On the ground there, he set up different offices that took care of travel organization, trip development and customer service. He moved back to Berlin in 2012 and, three years later, he founded Ventura TRAVEL. Since then, he has been supporting tourism professionals who have a passion for a specific tourism niche to build their brands within Ventura. Through this construct, these "intrapreneurs" develop their vision for their destinations, while having an experienced team with professional infrastructure on the background for areas such as finance, marketing, IT, and HR. Privately, Andre enjoys spending time with his wife and son and tries to eat good ceviche as often as possible.

Benno is a true travel enthusiast known for his remote work lifestyle. He has journeyed across the globe and speaks five languages. Benno discovered the Galápagos in 2014 and instantly fell in love with small ship expedition cruising. Since then, he has founded Galapatours, Polartours, and DiveIndonesia. In his free time, Benno is an avid diver and paraglider.

Born and raised in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, Bruna is passionate about nature and animals. She loves to communicate with people and create meaningful bonds. She graduated in International Relations and is a Travel Specialist at Polartours. For her planning a new trip is always a good idea.

Cristina leads Epic Trips, Ventura Travel’s AI-powered travel brand, redefining personalized travel. With a background in business development, partnerships, and strategy, she brings a global perspective and loves reimagining how travellers explore the world. Cristina has lived in Austria, Portugal, Germany, Kenya, South Africa, and Spain, speaks four languages, and loves discovering new destinations through their food, local culture, nature, and yoga.

Erick works from our Berlin office as Integrator and oversees our company's business operations. From a very early age, he's been fascinated by new languages and cultures, and he especially enjoys getting to know countries' politics and history. Erick's family is from Ecuador and Peru, and he previously worked on economic development issues across different Latin American countries. He joined Ventura TRAVEL after working in Washington D.C., Germany, Belgium, and Costa Rica.

Hanna works from the Cusco office in Peru and is responsible for creating attractive add-ons that complement our customers' trips. After studying tourism in Spain, she traveled to Peru for the first time to complete an internship with a tour operator for a year. Since then, South America has never left her. She immediately felt at home in Peru and fell in love with the country and its people. Her internship time was not long enough to get to know the diversity of South America. As a result, she decided to stay and started working in tourism.

Kathleen originally hails from Oregon, USA but has been living in Japan for over 17 years, where she has found her second home. She previously worked as an English language instructor and currently holds a master's degree in applied linguistics. She will be working with Japaventura in ground operations and is thrilled to share everything she loves about Japan with the world.

Ever since she can remember, Kim was driven by a natural curiosity that brought her to new places and cultures. Always searching for the unknown, she has lived and worked in Germany, Mexico, Costa Rica, Panama and the Canary Islands, before she finally settled down in France. Despite her adventurous heart, Kim loves when things are in order. As part of the Ventura team she can live out her two sides: organization geek and passionate adventurer.

Fredo is a tech-enthusiast with a never-ending thirst for knowledge. When he's not behind a computer screen, you can find him exploring nature on his mountain bike or indulging in his love for food. Fredo brings a positive and energetic attitude to the workplace.

Ana was born in La Paz- Bolivia and also works from La Paz office, she loves working with flights and reservations giving her best in taking care of her costumers, so they can have an excellent and pleasant air trip without inconveniences.

Born in Medellín, raised in Bogotá and Santa Marta. Ana is the HR coordinator for our office in Medellín. She has been an entrepreneur for most of her working life. She has a communication degree and her passion is to help others. She enjoys traveling to tropical places and loves the Caribbean. Ana is very family oriented and enjoys spending quality time with her family and friends. She enjoys cooking all kinds of food and watching movies. Dark chocolate, wine, and coffee are always welcome

Annie is part of Ventura Travel's marketing team, working remotely mostly from Germany. She's making sure the German-speaking people out there know just how awesome and exciting travel can be, hoping they will all put a trip with one of Ventura's brands on the top of their next birthday wishlist! Annie herself considers herself lucky to have lived in Australia, Turkey, Malta and Ireland. But no matter where she is, Annie loves to hike, read books or watch movies, do pottery, study Turkish and dance Lindy Hop.

Flight Operations Specialist. Responsible for providing Flights for Ventura Brands. Cintia joined the Ventura family in November 2016 as a Flight specialist for our brand Viventura. Her main roles are: making flight reservations and issuing tickets for the company's tours. She is committed in providing enjoyable and stress free flights for our travelers by looking for suitable connections for them.

Deyby technology, coffee and salsa dance lover. He has been involved in technological projects since his graduation. He combines programming development with entrepreneurship. Likewise, he loves to spend the time with his family, walking, drinking coffee, dancing salsa and bachata, flying drones and sometimes cooking.

There are few people in this world who know as much about Galápagos as Eduardo, and arguably no-one who can combines his expert knowledge with such an incredible rich, family history: Edu's great grandfather, Heinz Wittmer, was one of the very first settlers who came to the Galápagos, and his larger-than-life story has been the subject of many books and movies. Edu's grandfather, Rolf, born in a stone cave on Floreana in 1933, was the first person to be officially recorded as born on the Galápagos Islands (deceased in 2011). He would later become a true pioneer of tourism on the islands, opening up this little-known paradise to the rest of the world. Eduardo today continues his family's legacy and is one of the most accomplished guides in Galápagos: As one of the very few guides with a license to guide both, diving and naturalist tours through the Archipelago, he is an unparalleled source of knowledge, and we're proud to be able to call him our friend and Galapatours Ambassador!

Ericka works from our La Paz office as a Flight Operations Manager and is in charge of providing flights for all Ventura brands by negotiating with airlines in order to provide our customers with an exceptional flight experience to start an amazing trip.

Gabriela works in our Cusco office. She is responsible for all the accounting management in Peru, presenting on time all the monthly and annual reports of the economic status in Peru, in the same way she helps all the offices of South America in accounting matters.

Genesis spent six years developing software for enterprises even before finishing his studies in System Engineering at the University of Magdalena (Santa Marta, Colombia). He's an open source enthusiast, python evangelist, and javascript lover. He also has experience as lead developer, freelancer, and startup co-founder. Genesis loves to drink craft beer with friends, to attend rock concerts and to discover new places to walk and eat.

I love tech things, and use this passion every day in my work with our IT team to deliver great value for Ventura Travel. I like to travel and enjoy riding my bike along unknown roads. However, above all things, I really enjoy spending my free time with my family and my daughter.

Hannes, is a passionate designer. His love of data and design is reflected in his work. But above all, he is a team player who puts his heart and soul into the growth of his team and Ventura. His goal in life? To make every trip an unforgettable experience and leave the world a little bit better in the process.

Isabel works from our La Paz office as a flight specialist in order to book, issue and make individual offers assuring that our pax get the best possible flying tickets in cost and quality.

Specialist of performance marketing, he is a big fan of sports and gastronomy. After an MBA in Paris and first work experience in Berlin, he decided to move to Asia for several months and took Japanese classes to increase his immersion. In charge of performance marketing in the marketing department of Ventura Travel, he is able to combine two things he enjoys: numbers and writing.

Born and raised in La Paz, Bolivia she is mad in love with the cultural diversity of her country. She loves working with people and found her passion working in Human Resources. In her spare time, she loves to read historical novels, travel and feels the happiest when she can get to know a new country, a new culture and new people.

Patricio joins our Ventura Team as Head of Finance, bringing a vast experience with him. Not only in pure finance topics, but also in its relation across different areas of an organization. Passionate traveler, but the slow travel. Spending time and living in different countries and cultures has always given him good experiences. He is open to new challenges and willing to share with others.

My finance team and I manage all the financial aspects of ventura Travel. Our mission is to deliver accurate, prompt and useful financial information to the different stakeholders.

Flight Operation Specialist Responsible for provinding Flights for Ventura Brands This is Sandy, she was born in La Paz. She has a degree in tourism, since she finished her studies she started working in the tourism area, especially in Airline reservation systems. Now being part of Flights team in Ventura Travel, she feels pleased to contribute to many people travel and have meaningful and unforgettable experiences.

Sebastian is passionate about creativity, design, and writing. A software engineer who works in the IT department as a full-stack developer from a medium-sized city of Colombia called Bucaramanga. He studied music at university with a major in classic piano, plays the bass guitar as a hobby, and sometimes produces his own compositions / songs. He is eager to learn new stuff out of curiosity almost always, a team-player who does not believe in organization heroes, easy-going person, and has a great sense of product quality and user experience.

Stefan fell in love with Latinamerica on his first trip when he was backpacking in Venezuela. Since then, he visited most of the countries of the subcontinent. He plays guitar in a band. You can meet him rocking the stage in small pubs in Berlin. Others interests are foreign cultures, food, and music. Stefan works from our office in Berlin as a Flight Operations Specialist. He is responsible for providing flights for Ventura brands: Reservations, quotations and ticketing for all brands.