13/01/2025
As a fresh hotel school graduate in 2005, I was looking for jobs. I have been a qualified Chef since I majored in Culinary Management and I had two options secured to start my career. One with the iconic heritage hotel in Mount Lavinia, Sri Lanka and another to set sail as a cruise ship Chef. For some reason, within me, it was saying this is not your calling and I kept on looking for jobs. Wild Holidays, a company that promotes eco-adventure tourism and inward bound training for the corporate sector in personal development and team building. Arguably the pioneers of eco-adventure tourism in Sri Lanka with its mesmerising “Ella Jungle Resort”. Probably the ones who paved the way for what Ella, Sri Lanka is today as a hot tourist destination in the world. They were looking for a Sales Executive and I applied even though I had no sales background whatsoever. It was the name “Wild Holidays” that made me apply, and I landed the job. Don’t know how, but I got selected. Tourism was not doing well at the time in the country, so we had to find business locally. Especially from the corporate sector. Pitch and bring them down to Ella for corporate training in the wild. After a couple of failed attempts to do it from the comforts of the office in Colombo, I rerouted myself to Ella for a couple of weeks just to be a part of the ground force in the middle of the jungle. Exactly where I learned, “live it before sell it”
Selling a holiday package with sightseeing, hotels and transportation is easy and anybody with basic geographical knowledge and logistical skills can do it. Experiential travel is not everyone’s cup of tea. It’s a niche. When the masses are taking the highway by a luxury coach to see a particular tourist attraction, some take to go see the same place but take routes that nobody dares to take.
If you want to be that person who sells experiences and creates memories, dare to live that 1st!
Below are some of the memories made over the years while creating experiences. Some were planned and some just happened as a part of life.
If you like chasing experiences and making memories on your next holiday, now you know we are there for you.
