Our Team
We work with hundreds of people to help us design our trips and make them go as seamlessly as possible though, at its heart, the essence of our service is our core team and the human element we strive to infuse into each of our holidays: the person who meets you in Buenos Aires, time in which most of our trips include, is generally the same person who you spoke to when you first contacted us, the same person who helped you create exactly the trip you were after, who then carefully dotted each I and crossed each T on the run-up to your arrival (to make sure that everything possible had been done for you to have a wonderful time) and the same person who will be your principal point of contact throughout your time in South America.
We are a small, close-knit team and we spend a lot of time together, not just in the office though we often get together to cook and share a meal and to explore new services. We come from all walks of life and have vastly different personalities, though, through these shared experiences, our company is as close to a family as a business can be, and we don’t just rejoice in our differences, we use them to improve our service; for example, Mariana and Jimena’s experience as mothers has given us a deeper understanding on how to look after families on holiday or Paulo’s passion for dance has meant we are able to offer a behind-the-curtain look into a world that is virtually inaccessible to a passing visitor of Buenos Aires.
Below are brief descriptions of our core team:
Hugh MacDermott
CEO
After cutting his travel industry teeth in Kenya, at the green age of seventeen, Hugh arrived in Argentina aged twenty and, after a two-year walkabout, he spent another five years working as a guide – on foot, on horseback and behind the wheel of a 4×4 – around the Southern cone of the Americas before he created the first trip by Macdermotts in 2009. He studied nothing though, what he lacks in education he makes up with an on-the-ground knowledge of the region that very few people can match.
Paulo Salvador Jimenez Veron
COO
Adriano La Croce
Technical Destination Consultant
Born and bred in Buenos Aires Adri has a degree in tourism and a masters in Economics and Tourism Management; his dissertation was on the development of tourism in the little-known province of Formosa, with a focus on the even lesser-known La Estrella Wetland. His great passions are exploring the less trodden regions of his home country, acting, painting, playing the bass guitar and – his deepest love – the Racing Football Club.
Pablo Ramirez
Administration & Marketing
The most rational, level-headed member of the team; the indispensable Pablo heads up the administration of the company and the technical side of the marketing and he keeps us all on the straight and narrow. He studied business management specialising in tourism, though his meticulous, methodical mind hides the soul of a hopeless romantic which shines out in his inexpungible love for painting, photography and unceasing desire to understand more about the world he inhabits.
Mariana Luna De Bettin
Travel Designer
After a childhood of travelling, Marian was inspired to dedicate her higher education to the world of travel, which was followed by nineteen more years of life in the local travel industry. Marian is our most experienced specialist and her two adorable children have helped her become one of the best family holiday specialists in the country. She heads up our Patagonian office.
Florencia Enrri
Administration
Flor is the company overseer; as the one member of our team that has not come up through the travel industry, combined with her years of experience in business management she has an objective insight into the company that helps us anticipate potholes in the road ahead. Like all of the team she also has an ingrained creative side and is a talented fashion designer.
Juan Ignacio Pissareff
Travel Designer
Juani hails from the heart of the Argentine Pampas and, though the youngest member of our team, even at almost half the age, he challenges even Hugh with the miles he has under his belt travelling around Argentina. He has been documenting his travels in his excellent blog since 2017, with a joyful, celebratory voice for his country but also an honest voice telling his readers how it really is without any travel cliches and restraints of travel marketing. On top of this, he has also somehow found time to get a degree in tourism and hospitality.
Maria Jimena Puente
Travel Designer
Jime is the most international member of our team. Having worked for decades in the airline business, she’s travelled to all corners of the globe and her deep knowledge of all types of people and their plethora of idiosyncrasies is an invaluable part of our combined knowledge. We were very fortunate to convince her to stay in Buenos Aires and she is a passionate actor – revelling in the wacky, vast, culturally intrinsic world of porteño theatre.
Charlie Black
Marketing
Charlie spent half his childhood in the Dominican Republic and half in Venezuela, never really feeling part of either country. Rather than let this dampen his spirits, he embraced his nonconformity and by throwing himself into his passion for creativity he made his own, one-of-kind, mould. He studied fashion design though he is the ultimate autodidactic. He is a talented, self-taught photographer and cameraman, working in the field since 2014 when he arrived in Argentina, and he has evolved – purely on his own insatiable desire to learn – to become a creative director, editor and producer, working on and running a series of wide ranging projects. He once disappeared for several months in his apartment only to reappear, inexplicably, as a talented DJ and he’s recently launched his own clothing line. He also dances so well he’s the embodiment of Latin America’s joy of dance.
Goan Villanueva
Marketing
Goan’s passion for design started in childhood, sown and nurtured by his father (a self-taught designer and publicist). This early foundation helped him achieve a scholarship for Multimedia Design at the Digital Design Center in Valencia, Venezuela. After graduating, Argentina had the great fortune to be his chosen destination and over twelve years he has flourished into a marketing polymath: working for small and large companies and independently, on a myriad of different projects, in a range of different aspects of the industry, from brand development, websites, applications, video games, social networks, email campaigns, short films and every aspect of animated video production. He’s run projects on his own and overseen teams and he’s always looking to expand his knowledge, not just to advance his career but for the deep passion he has for what he does.
Tonina
Emotional Support
Though born on the streets Toni has always been a princess at heart. Her beautiful, melt-your-heart eyes meant she was a shoe in for emotional support and she uses them with laser precision to take the edge off even the gloomiest of Mondays.
Pangui
Emotional Support
Born and bred on the rough streets of Buenos Aires, Pangui, despite not being the sharpest tool in the box, used her innate tenacious charm to work her way up from street dog to emotional support dog in the matter of weeks. She majors in hugs and not fetching sticks.
Example Itineraries
Some examples of our favourite trips that we’ve organised over the years:
