Our Story

This entire website has been wordsmithed, reformatted, and perfected for optimal conversion rates, click through rates, and you name it. But this is an unadulterated story of myself and how Virgil came to be.

One of the first things people will tell you about me is that I’m from New Orleans. Mainly because I won’t shut the fuck up about it and secondly because I’m born and raised there. I describe it now as it’s own country within America, set apart from any place I’ve traveled to. A place where the only thing that matters is enjoying life and its export food, music, and culture.

Being born in this fantastic city shaped me tremendously. My favorite moments as a kid were sitting around a dinner table at a restaurant while my grandfather exaggerated the same story for the eighth time. On top of this my dad would talk about his time in Europe and my mom always pushing me to experience new things.

By college I had traveled to Asia and Latin America with family. One summer, I had saved up enough money to travel alone. I looked on a map where I could fly to for the little money I had and after a lot of research found that Nicaragua was fun, cheap, and relatively safe. This wasn’t the exact thoughts of my family. In their mind’s Nicaragua was still the civil war riddled country of the 80s. “If he goes I’m taking a life insurance policy out on him.” Thanks y’all…

Nicaragua was fantastic!

Fast forward from college to now. I’m a consultant for a major consulting firm typically flying 6:00 AM every Monday morning to the client and landing in San Francisco at 11:00 PM Thursday. Travel is even more a part of my life having seen tanks roll through Lebanon, ran with the bulls, and had opium wine with the Hmong tribe of Vietnam.

But there is still a pain for me when I travel. Planning It.

I’m beyond picky of where I want to go. Where do the locals eat? This looks cool on Instagram but is it just for tourists? This guy recommended X restaurant three years ago, is it still good? These are just three of the million questions I ask myself while planning. Every time I visit somewhere the best place was the one that was recommended to me by a local. EVERY DAMN TIME. I spend hours and hours researching only to get the best information from locals. In August of 2020, I had the idea of a business that worked with locals of each city to develop a personalized guide for you. It would send you to places to really get a feel for a city. You would feel it’s soul and understand what being a local was like. Show you everything from the high class Michelin star restaurant to the grungy local diver bar.

Virgil was born.

Virgil. The man who guided Dante through heaven and hell in the Divine Comedy. Now the name of our company to guide you through heaven and hell of each city.

Laissez le bon temps rouler,
Pat