Home > About CASA Tours

It all started in 1997/1998, when Aaron Bear Chan and Jeremy Thomas, best friends from high school, spent the year as adventure travel / rafting guides in Ecuador, Peru, Bolivia, and Colombia. Unhappy about the prospect of returning north, they dreamed up CASA Tours, the world’s first skiing and snowboarding tour operator in the Chilean and Argentine Andes. In 1998, after much planning and hard work, CASA Tours started operations in Chile. For nine years, from 1998 – 2006, Aaron and Jeremy grew the company into the premier skiing / snowboarding tour provider in South America, largely because of their passion for riding the Andes, sense of humor, hard work ethic, reliability, attention to safety, and intimate knowledge of the Chilean and Argentine cultures, landscapes, and mountains. Another reason for the success of CASA Tours is our dedicated crew of guides, who are proficient skiers and snowboarders, and all around great people. This combination attracts amazing clientele year after year. In fact, almost 40% of our clients are repeat customers, returning to CASA Tours to ride the amazing terrain of the Andes and reunite with their friends in the Southern Hemisphere.

The mission of CASA Tours is to help increase exposure to South America landscapes and cultures. By building cultural bridges and embracing sustainable travel principles, we hope to promote peace and prosperity to Latin America and the world in general. We also love that CASA introduces people to some of the best skiing and snowboarding the planet has to offer. While enjoying the Andes, we like to think we’re saving the world, one skier and snowboarder at a time.

In 2007, CASA Tours experienced another landmark in its evolution; long time CASA guide and friend - the eternal ski guru Dave Johnson (“Gomez”) - purchased CASA Tours from Aaron and Jeremy as a sole proprietor. Dave comes from an extensive guiding background, and has skied, traveled, and adventured all over South America. He is dedicated to continue and improve the quality of CASA Tours as a tour operator and a resource for travelers for years to come.