Xanterra
Parks and Resorts has added ultra-luxury travel to its portfolio of products
with the launch of Privel,
a brand that debuts with a national parks itinerary by private jet.
A 12-day trip departing on
Sept. 18 is priced at $48,900 per person and is limited to eight people. The
trip begins in Las Vegas and continues to Death Valley, Yosemite, Crater Lake,
Glacier, Yellowstone, Grand Teton, Zion and Grand Canyon national parks.
“This
doesn’t exist within the national park environment,” said Betsy O'Rourke,
Xanterra's vice president of sales and marketing. “All of our inventory within
the national park environment is very accessible. Travel historically has grown
to be very accessible to many. So mass travel is very available, but when you
look at trying to curate a very high-end experience, that’s what we’re looking
to do with Privel. It’s a very small market but it’s an important market to
acknowledge.”
On Privel's new national parks itinerary, guests will visit Yellowstone.
Privel
has not yet announced other itineraries, but there are definitely more to come, O'Rourke said. Xanterra will rely on its global travel
assets to put together these high-end tours, which could be another private jet trip or an itinerary that revolves around a Windstar cruise.
For
the national parks itinerary, Xanterra relied on its national park hotel
assets as well as on Austin Adventures (a tour operator that Xanterra owns) to assemble some
of the pieces. The private jet was contracted
specifically for the journey. Privel also contracted with the Four Seasons in
Las Vegas and the Amangani resort in Wyoming.
Xanterra
is owned by Anschutz Corp., a holding company headed by Denver-based
billionaire Philip Anschutz.