Falco
.TRAVEL
Hi, I'm Kevin, a travel advisor in the San Francisco Bay Area. I spent 35 years building software and traveled to more than 40 countries along the way. For me the planning was always half the fun: the research, the logistics, getting the details right so the trip itself goes smoothly. Retiring gave me time to plan trips for other people too.
I plan those trips the way I plan for myself. Deep research, with every option and every price in front of you. The cheapest and the most expensive versions of any trip are easy to find. Most of my work goes into the middle: finding the options where spending a little more changes the trip, and skipping the ones where it just costs more.
February 2026 · A trip I took
Two weeks from Buenos Aires to Valparaíso, with hiking in El Chaltén and Torres del Paine and a day on the Perito Moreno glacier. I booked it through another agency, and what I missed is why I work the way I do now.
Read about the tripShown with the travelers' permission. Photos are stock until the trip happens.
March 2027 · A client's trip: three travelers, two cabins, 14 nights from Southampton up to Tromsø and Alta.
Cruise booked, excursions next
Read the research
Summer 2027 · Four nights around Salida with a drive up to a 12,000-foot pass, then two in Boulder. A soft test of the altitude before Atacama.
Itinerary drafted, nothing booked
April 2028 · A group of four: two nights in San Pedro de Atacama, four at Explora, then one of us crosses to the Salar de Uyuni.
Early research, nothing booked
Read the researchStock photos: Lightscape, Bret Lowrey, Bailey Hall / Unsplash
Here's a rough picture of where I've traveled. A shaded country doesn't mean I know every corner of it, but it does help give context and direction to the deep research I do when planning trips.
45 countries · 24 US states
Most travel services give you two options. Book everything yourself and hope you don't miss something, or hand the whole trip to an advisor and lose sight of what's happening. I think most people want something between those two.
You decide how much you want to do. Research destinations yourself, or ask me to. Compare hotels on your own, or get a shortlist from me. The handoff point is wherever you want it, and it can change booking by booking. The goal is that you keep the parts of trip planning you enjoy and hand me the parts you don't. Whatever you hand off, you still see every option and path I'm researching, and what each part of the trip costs.
We start with research: the route, where to stay, how to get between places, what excursions to book. You get it back as a Google Doc or PDF, with the options I looked at side by side and what each one costs. You can stop there and book everything yourself.
AI has made the first pass at research much faster, and it keeps getting better. It also states things confidently that are wrong: a connection that doesn't exist, or rates that always seem to come in low, sometimes because they're from last season. You don't want to find that out at an airport, where your only argument is that AI said there should be a flight.
So most of the time I spend goes into the gaps: finding what's missing and checking what's there. Being an advisor helps, because it gets me into the booking systems and supplier portals that the public sites sit on top of. I can confirm a rate or a room type is real, see what's actually available on your dates, and catch the cases where a hotel's own site and the aggregators disagree.
Research is the core of what I do. It's a flat fee per trip, quoted before we start, and it covers a set number of hours.
If your trip needs more time than the quote covers, I'll tell you before going past it. Extra hours are $50 each.
If you book enough of the trip through me, the bookings cover my time and I waive the fee. That's about $1,500 in bookings for a simple trip, $3,000 for a bigger one. I'll tell you the exact line when I quote it.
For trips quoted before December 31, 2026, the fee is waived for everyone. I'll still quote it so you know what the research is worth. Hours beyond the quote are still billed.
Sample research docs
From client trips and my own, shared with permission.
Norway
Two March sailings compared on moon phase and cost for three travelers in two cabins. The best fare turned out to be one I couldn't book.
Read the research PDF, 12 pagesChile and Bolivia
The first pass at a trip for my own group of four, before anything is booked. Most of it is about pacing the altitude so nobody has to decide on the highest day in advance.
Read the research PDF, 8 pagesOnce we know the shape of the trip, we pick how to book each piece. Sometimes that's through me: I'm an independent advisor with Fora Travel, which gets my clients preferred-partner perks through programs like Virtuoso, Four Seasons Preferred and Rosewood Elite. That usually means breakfast, a resort credit, late checkout, and an upgrade when one is available, often at the same rate as booking direct.
Same hotel, better stay.
In a lot of destinations the best local operators (private guides, drivers, on-the-ground help) only take bookings through advisors. The industry calls them destination management companies, and on a complicated trip they're often what keeps everything running smoothly.
Sometimes the research turns up a cheaper path, like booking direct, a rental apartment or a rail pass. Those pay me little or nothing, and a lot of my clients have picked them.
When you do book through me, the hotel or provider pays me a commission.
Your itinerary and travel documents go on a private trip page. Open it on the web, or add it to your phone's home screen. Travel companions can follow along with a shared link, no account needed.
I keep adding to it: flight status, weather, time-zone differences, and anything else I can think of that makes traveling easier. Building it scratches my software development itch.
Tell me what you're thinking about, even if it's just "we want to go somewhere warm in February." You don't need dates or a destination yet. I'll get back to you within a day.