Guided Trips

Admin, Policies, & Fine Print

Andrew Skurka Adventures LLC is a Colorado-based company.

Trip cancellations

Grace periods

If you need to cancel within seven days of your first payment (e.g. the deposit or the full amount), you will be refunded your payments minus:

  • Any transaction fees incurred with your payments; and,
  • A $200 administrative fee if your trip is less than 75 days away.

If you cancel

  • If you cancel 75+ days prior to the trip’s starting date: You will receive a refund equal to your 2023 payments minus an administrative fee (equal to 10 percent of your trip cost or $200, whatever is more) and any transaction fees incurred with your payments;
  • If you cancel 45-74 days prior to the trip’s starting date: You will receive a refund equal to your 2023 payments, minus your deposit and any transaction fees incurred with your payments;
  • If you cancel 30-44 days prior to the trip’s starting date: You will receive a refund equal to your 2023 payments, minus 50 percent of the cost of your trip and any transaction fees incurred with your payments;
  • If you cancel within 29 days of the trip’s starting date, or after the trip has started: You will receive a credit for a future trip, equal to 50 percent of your 2023 payments that must be used within the next two seasons, minus any transaction fees incurred with your payments. No cash refund will be given.

If you are uncomfortable with this cancellation policy and the risk of being out hundreds (or thousands) of dollars due to an unavoidable circumstance, purchase travel insurance, discussed below.

Transaction fees

To help keep costs lower, I don’t build transaction fees into my prices. If you pay by check or Zelle, there are no transaction fees. Venmo charges 2%; PayPal, 3%. These fees will be subtracted from your refund, if applicable.

If we postpone or cancel your trip, you can:

A. Transfer to another trip during the current season, subject to availability and suitability. Cost differences will be balanced out with either an additional payment (by you) or a refund (from me).

B. Receive a voucher for the following season. If the trip is postponed or cancelled less than 60 days prior to the trip’s starting date, the voucher amount will be equal to your payments; if more than 60 days, it will be equal to your deposit, and payments in excess of your deposit will be refunded fully.

C. Receive a refund, equal to 25 percent of your deposit plus 100 percent of your payments in excess of the deposit. The non-refunded share of your deposit will cover expenses already incurred on your behalf while planning and preparing for your trip.

Travel insurance

Every year, clients must cancel due to personal injury or illness, unexpected scheduling conflicts, the health or death of loved ones, job changes, and other reasons.

I strongly encourage that you purchase travel insurance, especially if you have joined one of the longer trips and/or if you must fly to the trip location. Individual policies can be purchased directly from TravelGuard and from other travel insurance companies.

Commercial permitting

Last updated December 8, 2022

For the 2023 season, we have secured permits to operate commercially in:

  • Glen Canyon National Recreation Area (backpacking)
  • Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument
  • Great Sand Dunes National Park
  • Inyo National Forest
  • Monongahela National Forest
  • North Slope Borough
  • Olympic National Park
  • Sequoia-Kings Canyon National Park

We have applied, or will apply, to operate commercially in the lands listed below. Our permit applications in these areas must be renewed each year or every two years.

  • Gates of the Arctic National Park
  • Glen Canyon National Recreation Area (canyoneering)
  • Stanislaus National Forest
  • Yosemite National Park

Medical Certifications

All guides must be currently certified in (at a minimum):

  • Wilderness First Aid (WFA)
  • CPR
  • Leave No Trace Awareness

Required Forms

Before participating in any guided trip, clients must complete two forms:

Nondiscrimination

Andrew Skurka Adventures LLC is an equal opportunity employer.

In accordance with Federal law and U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) civil rights regulations and policies, this institution is prohibited from discriminating on the basis of race, color, national origin, sex, age, disability, and reprisal or retaliation for prior civil rights activity.  (Not all prohibited bases apply to all programs.)

Persons with disabilities who require alternative means of communication for program information (e.g., Braille, large print, audiotape, American Sign Language, etc.) should contact the responsible State or local Agency that administers the program or USDA’s TARGET Center at (202) 720-2600 (voice and TTY) or contact USDA through the Federal Relay Service at (800) 877-8339.  Additionally, program information is also available in languages other than English.

To file a complaint alleging discrimination, complete the USDA Program Discrimination Complaint Form, AD-3027, found online at http://www.ascr.usda.gov/complaint_filing_cust.html, or at any USDA office or write a letter addressed to USDA and provided in the letter all of the information requested in the form.  To request a copy of the complaint form, call (866) 632-9992.  Submit your completed form or letter to USDA by: (a) mail: U.S. Department of Agriculture Office of the Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights, 1400 Independence Avenue, SW, Washington, D.C. 20250-9410; (b) fax: (202) 690-7442; or (c) email: pr************@us**.gov.

USDA is an equal opportunity provider, employer, and lender.

Privacy Policy

Andrew Skurka Adventures LLC will not sell or share your information for commercial purposes.

In the event of an injury, medical information you have provided will be shared with the appropriate medical personnel who are providing care.

Wildfire protocols

When scheduling our trips, we consider the risks of wildfire and wildfire smoke. Even so, these factors seem to be a “new normal” in the American West, so we need a more detailed protocol in responding to them.

Trips will take place as scheduled unless one of the following conditions is met:

  1. The land management agency (e.g. NPS, USFS, BLM) closes our operating area or closes trailheads and/or trails that are critical to our operations in the area;
  2. The air quality index (AQI) at a representative nearby monitoring station* averages 150+ for the week prior to the trip AND the conditions are not expected to change based on fire management projections or weather forecasts.

Before cancelling a location or trip outright, efforts will be made to relocate our operations. These efforts by be limited by the availability of permits (commercial and wilderness) and the logistical complexities.

* For the 2023 season, representative air quality monitoring stations include: