Homosexuality is punishable by hanging in Iran. In Moscow and Warsaw, marches by gay groups have been banned. There has been so much anti-gay violence in Jamaica, Time dubbed the island “The Most Homophobic Place on Earth”. No wonder American homos like to play it safe when they go on vacation: Provincetown, St. Thomas, Ft. Lauderdale!

But tour guide Dan Ware says there’s no reason why a gay guy shouldn’t see most of the world, if he wants to. Since 1990, Ware has been leading all-male, all-gay "Toto Tours" to places like Egypt, Poland, and Peru. Next year, he’ll add the Himalayan kingdom of Bhutan to his itinerary.

Queerty correspondent Ilya Marritz recently sat down with Ware to chat about queer adventuring, gays in China and bullfighting with Richard Hatch.

Ilya Marritz: When you go somewhere, do you tell your local contacts that you’re leading a gay group, and do you ever get a negative response?

Dan Ware: When I give the hotel my rooming list, I say, “This is a couple, two men, and I want you to arrange for a king-sized bed for them, rather than two twin sized beds.” And I won’t say that that always goes flawlessly – sometimes that goes wrong and we get a twin bedded room, but then we just ask them to change it. I always tell our operators that it’s a gay group, and I’ve never gotten a bad response.

IM: Should gays who are traveling independently do the same thing?

DW: Always. People who deal with travelers from the United States are used to this. Even in a conservative Muslim country. If they’re the hospitality business, they expect it.

IM: Can you really find gay people in every country? What is the most remote location in which you have found another gay person?

DW: Easter Island. We actually had a guide to the island who was gay.

IM: That’s Easter Island, the rock in the Pacific Ocean about 2,000 miles west of South America. Did this guy have a good life?

DW: Yeah, Easter Island is like a 3 hour flight out of Santiago, Chile. Our guide didn’t have a partner, and he said that the gay people on the island all pretty much knew each other. Of course there was no gay bar or anything, but the local gays would get together and hang out.

IM: Tell me about one of the most surprising gay establishments that you’ve discovered in your travels.

DW: Once, when we were in China, we were getting ready to get onto a boat cruising the Yangtze River. We were in Chongqing, which a very big industrial town. It had a red light district, so we asked our taxi driver if there were any gay bars there. And he took us to this little bar that was obviously a workingman’s kind of place, a total surprise. There was some drag performance going on… The performers dragged our guys up on stage and were being all affectionate, and just clapping to see this little group of Americans that stumbled into their bar by accident.

As the years have progressed, there is more and more gay life becoming evident in China. Years ago, we would find brightly-lit bars with almost a restaurant atmosphere in Beijing. And now they have what we’re more used to, bars with a disco, mood lighting.

IM: Do your clients ever embarrass you with their behavior? You know, like a big ol' group of homos prancing around Machu Picchu as if it were their own personal catwalk?

DW: One problem is the old fashions of the 70s and 80s, when gay men were wearing really short shorts. Sometimes those items have lingered in people’s closets for far too long, and in Asian countries shorts are just not done - on men especially. Locals look at the person who’s wearing short shorts like we would look at a hooker today with the crack of her ass showing. So I try to discourage that.

IM: Ever had someone famous on one of your trips?

DW: Richard Hatch. Twice. He did the Grand Canyon river rafting and the Costa Rica trip. This was after Survivor, and people would recognize him all the time on the street and run up and say, “That’s Richard Hatch!”

On the Costa Rica trip, Richard and I had some adventures. Over there, they have a different concept of bullfights. There’s a ring, and a crowd sitting around it, but they don’t harm the bull. They just let the bull out and anybody who wants to can get in the ring and try to run from it.

Richard and I are sitting there, and we just look at each other and we go, “I’ll do it if you’ll do it!” So we went down and we ran around the ring, with the bull chasing after us. It was a pretty amazing adrenaline rush! We’re gonna re-run that trip in February, including a bull fight.

IM: Will Richard Hatch be there?

DW: No, I believe he’s in jail now!

Keep track of all Dan Ware's adventures on his travel blog.