Lisa Lindblad was initiated into the ways of adventure travel at a very young age, completing an overland journey from London to Nairobi when she was twenty years old. She now specializes in the creation of personalized once-in-a-lifetime journeys for both individuals and groups. Lisa Lindblad Travel Design provides access to exceptional guides and unique properties and means of transport as well as to Lindblad’s extensive travel background, which allows international clients to have memorable experiences wherever they choose to go. With particular expertise in East Africa, India and Europe and in family travel, Lindblad revels in the challenge of creating the next trip. Indagare recently met with the travel professional to discuss current trends in the luxury-travel industry and the concept of “designing” travel.

What is the most vivid memory of your first major trip? Africa. That was the benchmark; that was the tipping point. I describe my life as B.A. (“before Africa”) and A.A. (“after Africa”). It was an extraordinary moment of coming home within one’s self and finding a direction. It was a watershed. Setting my foot down on that continent, I found something different. I discovered something in me that was at home, at peace. I am truly lucky to have found a place like that. It has been very comforting. It is somewhere to which I return often because it’s always changing.

How much time is needed to plan a trip? I think that travel should be intelligent. I tend to start my planning where most people end theirs—that is, booking the hotels and making dinner reservations. And that takes time. I was recently approached to plan ten months of travel for a family of four in two weeks. My price tag got the husband on the phone, and though they agreed to it, I ultimately said no, because to properly plan ten months of travel of that ilk takes an effort that deserves more time.

What would you consider the trademark of an LLTD trip? The idea behind each trip is the same: to have scope and breadth. I design travel as theater. I always have a theme in mind. That’s my organizing principle. I also think of it in terms of stages or acts. I make sure to insert magical moments—that you are on top of a hill facing the setting sun while in East Africa; that you go up a Costa Rican mangrove channel early in the morning and not at 11 a.m.; that you stay at a glam hotel, but also a simple one; that you go out for a great dinner, and then have a picnic. That is design. That’s adding color and contrast to elements. Timing is also critical within the journey. There is a reason one day comes after the other. I spend a lot of time thinking about that. You want the complete journey to be greater than the parts. I think it is imperative also to see the underbelly and come home changed a bit. It’s not easy, and I can’t always do it. But it is important to try.

Do you have a favorite trip that you have designed? I love designing trips in Provence and Italy because I know them so well. But it is the voice of a trip that is very important to me. And that comes from my guides; that piece is very special to me. It is the relationships that can make travel sing. And guides facilitate relationships. For example, I designed a lovely trip for a client who wanted to look at architecture from London to Chatsworth. My guide accompanied the client throughout the journey. It turns out the relationship was so successful that when they left each other, there were tears in their eyes! Even now they stay in touch. To have it go both ways is so great. It was the perfect trip, everything the client wanted.

Why hire a guide? Are guides always necessary? It depends on the client and on my judgment. Honeymooners may not want a guide trailing behind them the whole time. It depends entirely on them. I recently had a client who was going to France, but her husband had never been there. She wanted to show him her personal Paris, but I insisted that my guide show them around the beaches of Normandy, as the guide could add the kind of personalized context to a place neither of them had been to.

Are there still places left to discover? There are still places in this world, even close to home, where one can go to feel remote and alone, or to be the first: the northern valleys of Bhutan, the Antarctic. But ultimately it’s not the destination that counts; it’s what you do with it. It’s calibrating as close as you can the discovery of a place to the client’s character, interests, needs and passions. We can all go to the same place, but based on who we are we have very different experiences. So it becomes about the quality of the experience. It is the idea of going vertical rather than horizontal, spending a lot of time getting under the skin of a place and doing it with somebody. That is the whole idea behind my “Walkabout.”

Does this mean there’s a trend toward a more active vacation? Not necessarily. This is the idea of being engaged in your travel, learning something from your travels⎯deepening your understanding of a region and turning travel into more of a journey. To stop and go deep. And that is more fun to plan and a much more interesting departure for travel.

All these clients must be keeping you busy. Yes, but a fun busy. Planning travel takes time, but I keep doing different things to keep me interested. I am currently on the jury for Travel + Leisure’s 2007 Global Vision Awards. I am very proud of that. I enjoy talking to people about the whole concept of travel.

What is the next generation of LLTD? My son is working on some projects to examine the next generation of clients. They want to do something different, so how can we come up with a product for them? Information is so widely available on the Internet, and the next generation seeks things out themselves. But the point of LLTD is that there still is more—it is more than just the hotels, the restaurants, the getting there. The magic of travel is about knitting pieces together, and this is what I am selling. I am creating the quilt, making and maintaining relationships—knowing John Heminway and having access to his Montana ranch, or having familiar faces in the Puget Sound and sharing those people with clients. Knowing people well enough to realize what matches whom to create the magic. That is the art and design.

Where are you going next? The Ganges. South India. Sri Lanka. Dubai. The different cultures will be interesting. It’s the one thing you learn when you travel. You can change hats very quickly.

~LARA RUBIN