History

Touch the Southwest was created by Bruce Sawyer, out of his passion for exploring the wild places of the west and his desire to share what he discovered with others.

In 1998 he began taking clients camping into the wilds of the Colorado Plateau. These trips were not your usual camping trips, however. These were private “cush camping” trips, where camp was set up and waiting, complete with hot and cold running water, showers, flush toilets, comfortable above-ground bed racks with large down bags and pillows, and a classically trained Chef to prepare all the meals.

Doing these private cush camping trips opened new doors into the luxury travel industry. One of these doors was that of Stacy Fischer, daughter of the famous luxury Travel Agent to the Stars, Bill Fischer, owner of Fischer Travel in New York City. Working with Stacy allowed us to do some amazing high-end tours and events for some of the wealthiest clients on Earth. This then led us to being invited into the “invitation only” luxury travel network, Virtuoso: Specialists in the Art of Travel. To this day, Stacy and the agents at Fischer Travel continue to honor us by entrusting their clients to our care.

In 2002, Virtuoso invited us to join them as an OnSite, their go-to luxury travel expert in the southwestern United States, and one of 140 OnSites worldwide. Working with the agents within the Virtuoso network allowed us to expand our range of services and our areas of expertise. We began developing and producing complete vacations and events across an ever expanding territory. From fully guided adventure vacations to luxury corporate events, we were doing them all. And, we were doing them across the entire southwest. As time went by we received increasing requests for our services in regions outside of the southwest. In response, we developed services in the Yellowstone/Jackson Hole region as well as in the Yosemite and Death Valley areas. Now, we cover the entire southwest, as well as most of the inner mountain regions in the western United States.

Somewhere along the way, Condé Nast Traveler Magazine caught wind of us and in 2008 asked us to apply for a spot on their list of Top 126 Travel Specialists of the World. For the past three years we’ve been honored by Condé Nast as their Top Travel Specialist in the southwestern United States.

In summary, for more than a dozen years we’ve been taking people into the wilds of the western United States. Showing them the wonders of this uniquely beautiful place in comfort, providing them with the most exclusive Insider Access into the rarest and most sacred of sites, lodging them in the most luxurious hotels and resorts, as well as creating unique and efficient itineraries, we have developed a reputation for exceptional service and unsurpassed expertise.

We are proud to be continuing this tradition of excellence, as we are proud of our professional and personal affiliations with the finest luxury travel experts in the world.

It is faith in something and enthusiasm for something that makes a life worth looking at.

Oliver Wendell Holmes