True Stories.
Real Adventure.
ASSIGNMENT
Share the Story of a Place.
What We do
Compelling. Exhilarating. Unforgettable. Full of purpose, discovery, and wonder. Enchanting settings. Remarkable characters. Authentic in the purest sense of the word.
Life has already perfected the art of adventure. We started Gift of Go to share it.
Each year, we guide a small handful of adventurous travelers into some of the most compelling places on Earth, in order to share the beauty & stories of life there.
Our trips are deeply immersive, profoundly educational, and full of motion, designed to push & pull us through the myriad realities that comprise a place’s essence. They’re also unique—not only in terms of their settings & itineraries, but in the quality of their story-telling.
We’ve dedicated our lives to understanding & celebrating these incredible, unsung places. It’s a privilege to be able to share their Stories, and to be part of your Journey.
- Eddie & Elisa
We’re Storytellers
And experiences are our medium. If it feels like you just stepped into a documentary (or better yet, an epic), we’re doing it right.
We’re Guides
Tasked with leading you deep into the Story of a Place and bringing you back out, safely & enriched. It’s a privilege to be a part of your Story, too.
We’re Stewards
Of the places we go, and keepers of the Stories we tell; as dedicated to the well-being & faithful portrayal of the communities we visit as we are to the incredible journeys of the travelers who come with us.
We’re Explorers
Which is a job that never ends. We’ll never know everything about the places we go, but it’s the promise—and process—of discovery that keeps us coming back.
We’re Trail Blazers
But we didn’t set out to revolutionize an industry. We simply followed our calling to dive deeply into the human experience on this planet, and believed that others might want to feel life like this, too.
We’re Escape Artists
And we reject the notion that truly compelling experiences can be designed en masse via the same formula as holiday package tours.
Cast & Crew
Your Guides.
eddie lott
explorer / guide / Experience director
A natural-born trail blazer with the indomitable curiosity of a 19th-century naturalist and an insatiable desire to experience life to the fullest, Eddie worked & traveled his way across 40 countries on 4 continents by the time he celebrated his 21st birthday (in the mystical beach town of Pipa, Brazil) and hasn’t slowed down much since, exploring more ways of life, in more places, than many families do across generations.
He has been featured as on NBC and the Magnolia Network as a social entrepreneur, been published as a photographer in Forbes & Financial Times, and can (still! somehow) be found crooning on Spotify, but his proudest accomplishments continue to come as a traveler, father, and student.
The reluctant beneficiary of a rigorous Jesuit education and an avowed social scientist, he is fluent in English, Spanish, and Portuguese, holds a bachelor’s in Political Science (with a concentration in Latin American Politics) from the University of Texas at Dallas, and is a proud alumni of the Boulder Outdoor School of Survival (BOSS).
He sold almost everything (gear & 1989 Toyota Bandeirante excepted) in August of 2021, and has spent most of his waking moments ever since exploring the lost trails & backroads of the Serra do Espinhaço in search of the Story of Brazil.
Today, when not bushwhacking, documenting, or storytelling on behalf of Gift of Go, he enjoys studying a wide range of cultural & geopolitical topics, playing pick-up basketball with the locals, and cooking up big meals with Elisa and his cubs, Luca & Kako, at their basecamp in the high Brazilian savanna.
You can follow his adventures (& see pics of his epic cubs) here.
elisa oliveira
researcher / guide / Experience producer
Just four short years ago, Elisa was living in a trendy neighborhood in a bustling metropolis, hitting the gym (& sushi parlor!) daily, and working 9-5 as a Partner at the up-&-coming agency she’d founded shortly after graduating from architectural school.
The daughter of a western physician and a holistic therapist, she’d always been curious about life beyond the confines of society, but her talents for communication, organization, and project management had rendered her transition from academia to career a natural, if uninspiring, one.
A fateful trip to Brazil’s Serra do Espinhaço in 2019 changed all of that, and within months she found herself hiking across the Texas desert and allowing herself to dream about things like medical school, live-aboard sailboats, and life on the road in western Africa.
Since then, she has lived in frigid warehouses & sweltering guesthouses; worked with power tools, drones, and audio/visual equipment; fallen deeply in love with Mexico; raised a pair of prickly pre-teens; spent 200+ days on the trail; and begun to see both herself & the world around her with new eyes.
On the rare occasion that she isn’t parenting or off-roading, map-making, or spreadsheet-whispering on behalf of Gift of Go, she can be found experimenting in the kitchen, digging into a good book, or studying the origins of the universe.
A licensed architect and certified Wilderness First Aid practitioner, she holds a bachelor’s degree in Architecture & Urbanism from Fundação Mineiro de Educação Cultura (FUMEC), and is fluent in English & Portuguese.
You can follow her journey (& witness her transformation) here.
Why We do this
All experiences have the potential to transform lives, but travel is unique in that it can expedite that process, and that it is a decision.