Adventure Tour Guide Job
Black Sheep Adventures is hiring! We specialize in creating custom multi-day vacations and educational tours for small groups with a mix of bicycling, hiking, kayaking and sightseeing. The range of trips we run varies from barebones camping to all-inclusive luxury hotel-based tours for guests arriving by private jet. Most of our tours are mid to high-end and run 4-6 days for groups of 2-20 pax. We operate private tours under our own brand as well as tours for other tour operators. We also work with various non-profit educational travel programs. For additional information about what we do and where we go, please browse this website.
Job Description: We are looking for fun, talented and professional people to help lead our tours which are offered year-round (but our nominal season is March to October). Given our variable tour load, this is a part-time guiding job (some weeks have no trips, while other times we have had up to 6 trips running at the same time). We are looking for folks who can guide anywhere from 1-2 weeks per season to 1-3 weeks per month all season long.
Basic Requirements:
- Must be at least 21 years old
- Physical ability to lift 80 lbs and to lift a 35 lb bike overhead
- Must have an excellent driving record with NO history of DUI
- Willing and able to obtain a Commercial Driver’s License upon hire (requires DMV physical, a pre-employment drug test and enrollment in ongoing random drug testing program). Already having your CDL is a huge plus.
- If not already certified, must obtain First Aid/CPR certification upon hire
Necessary Skills/Qualifications:
- Knowledge of bike mechanics (we can help expand skills here if needed)
- Ability to bike 50+ miles/day with up to 5,000 ft of climbing on consecutive days. (but many trips have days that are 20-30 miles and normally guides trade-off days biking and driving)
- Ability to hike 8+ miles/day with 3,000 ft of climbing (but many trips have hikes are 1-4 miles)
- Basic cooking skills (to make beautiful picnics for guests)
- Basic computer skills (primarily to email reports and create trip videos)
- Excellent time management (to manage time well for a group of people with a range of interests and possible last minute changes to the schedule)
- Incredible sense of direction (essential skill for guiding)
- Previous bicycle tour guiding experience is a plus, but not a requirement
- Residency in the San Francisco Bay Area is vastly preferred (it will be harder for us to consider candidates that don’t live in Northern California)
Personality Traits:
- Innate passion to deliver excellent service (our guests expect a lot and we always try to exceed their expectations)
- Attention to detail (need to appreciate the small details while keeping in mind the big picture)
- Ability to think on your feet (Plan A can be quickly derailed. How do you do with plan B through Z?)
- Outgoing personality & appreciation of people from a variety of backgrounds (our guests can have very different backgrounds and motivations from each other and you – can you connect with them?)
- Professional and ethical behavior (guides have a lot of responsibility and are expected to conduct themselves in a professional manner when dealing with guests, vendors and colleagues)
- Self sufficient & team player (guides generally work with other guides as part of a team of 2 or 3 and eventually may guide smaller groups alone – it is important that you know when to step up, when to be flexible and when to fully step back and let your colleagues shine)
- Great communicator (need to be comfortable as a public speaker in front of the groups. Must also be able to communicate well individually with guests, vendors, fellow guides and office staff)
- Fun sense of humor (we all work hard and value working with people who can laugh, especially at themselves)
To apply: Complete the online application.
NO PHONE CALLS REGARDING THIS POSTING PLEASE. We are a small company so please respect our time and our process. Thank you!
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While we aren't interviewing currently, we welcome you to submit an application and we will get back to you when we are hiring.