Guatambu Travel provides receptivo (ground handling at the destination) in Porto Alegre, the metropolitan area, the Serra Gaúcha, Gramado and Canela, for agencies and organisers bringing a group to Rio Grande do Sul. It is a business-to-business service: the originating agency sells the trip to its own passenger, and Guatambu receives the group on the ground.

What is tourist ground handling and why is it a business-to-business service?

Ground handling is the work done at the destination once the group arrives: reception, transfers, local transport, the itinerary in the city, a guide accompanying the group and solving the unexpected problems that arise between one stop and the next. Whoever organises the trip back at the origin is the originating agency, which handles the package, the sale and the journey to here.

The two ends may sit within the same company, but the operating logic is different. The originating agency lives close to the passenger and knows the client. Ground handling lives close to the road and knows the terrain: it knows the real opening hours of an attraction, knows that a twelve-metre coach cannot enter a certain street, knows which restaurant can serve fifty people in an hour and knows what to do when it rains in Gramado on the day of the outdoor excursion.

For that reason, ground handling is almost never sold to the end passenger. It is booked by whoever is organising, and the passenger does not even need to know that two companies are involved.

In which cities does Guatambu provide ground handling?

Porto Alegre and the metropolitan area, the Serra Gaúcha, Gramado and Canela. This is the area the agency covers all year round on its own departures, and it is where it has its supplier network set up and tested.

Outside that area, the honest answer is that Guatambu assesses each case and says no when it cannot operate well. Promising service in a region where it does not operate is the quickest way to deliver badly.

What kind of operator books ground handling in Rio Grande do Sul?

Originating agencies from other states that have sold an itinerary in the South and have no team here. Independent organisers who have put together an excursion for a church, school, club or association group. Operators that need support on the ground for a delegation to an event, congress or trade fair. And companies that bring their own group and want to take the logistics off someone's desk in HR.

What these cases have in common is that nobody in the group lives here, and the cost of discovering the city during the trip is too high to pay in sightseeing time.

Can an agency from outside Rio Grande do Sul book it?

Yes, and that is what this service is for. The site's ground handling page says exactly that: it is for your agency, not for the passenger. Bring the group and Guatambu receives it on the ground.

There is no need for any prior relationship with Guatambu, nor to operate in the same segment. The operation is agreed between the two companies, usually over WhatsApp, and the group remains the group of the agency that brought it.

What is included in a ground handling operation set up with the originating agency?

The package is put together jointly, because every group arrives with different needs. What usually goes in:

Guatambu handles a lot of groups of older travellers, and that changes the design of the itinerary: no marathons, with stops, and with real boarding times rather than the time that would fit in a spreadsheet.

Can ground handling come together with a coach?

Yes, and it is the most frequent request from those travelling from afar. When the group arrives by air or reaches the state border and needs a vehicle here, Guatambu arranges the hire through partner operators and coordinates both services in the same operation.

The practical advantage is having a single point of contact. Anyone who has coordinated a group with three different suppliers in an unfamiliar city knows the size of the problem this solves. The details of how booking a vehicle works, what the ANTT requires and how to check the operator's authorisation are in the article on bus charter for groups.

How do you check who you are dealing with before signing?

This applies to both sides, and Guatambu recommends that it be done with Guatambu too.

Cadastur, from the Ministry of Tourism, is the register of tourism service providers. It is mandatory, among others, for "Accommodation Providers, Travel Agencies, Tourist Transport Companies, Event Organisers, Theme Parks, Tourist Campsites and Tour Guides". The search is public, at cadastur.turismo.gov.br.

When the operation includes a coach on an interstate journey, the operator's authorisation from the Agência Nacional de Transportes Terrestres and the Licença de Viagem (travel licence) issued before each journey are the second document to ask for.

Source: Ministério do Turismo, Cadastur, https://cadastur.turismo.gov.br/hotsite/, accessed 11 September 2026. Agência Nacional de Transportes Terrestres, Transporte Interestadual de Fretamento, https://www.gov.br/antt/pt-br/assuntos/passageiros/transportefretamento, accessed 11 September 2026.

What does Guatambu need to know to answer a ground handling request?

Where the group is coming from, where it wants to go, how many people and how many days. With that, it can already say whether it is possible to operate and in what form.

You do not need to arrive with a finished itinerary. A good share of requests arrive with a date and a wish, and the itinerary emerges from the conversation. The channel is WhatsApp, through the contact page or the ground handling page.

Who is Guatambu Travel?

Guatambu Travel is a travel agency in Porto Alegre with eight years on the road, running overland group trips departing from Porto Alegre and the metropolitan region of Rio Grande do Sul. It is the link between the Caravana Caminhos de Luz and Mundo a Passeio.

It has three strands: its own expeditions, which anyone can book at /expedicoes; the ground handling described on this page, booked by those who bring a group from elsewhere; and the bus charter arranged with partner operators, for an existing closed group. The network of partner companies built over those eight years is what allows it to answer all three without its own fleet.

Keep reading

Sources