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These adventures are designed to give you a chance to give something very real back to the regions you visit during your trip. Whilst still a great family holiday, on these trips, time is scheduled in (usually 2-3 days) to visit and assist with a variety of conservation and wildlife charities, getting to see their work up close and in action.
On this trip: An exciting addition to any visit to Sri Lanka, this adventure gives you a close encounters with primates and a deeper insight into the efforts that go into their conservation. You’ll spend 3 days at a Primate Conservation Camp, joining the researchers to track monkeys in the ancient city of Polonnaruwa and observe their behaviour. As well as assisting physically with this valuable research, your visit and stay at the Primate Camp financially supports the primate conservation and research efforts of Dr Wolfgang Dittus and his dedicated team.
Our small group adventures are designed to impact as little as possible on the regions through which we travel – this trip is no exception. We work closely with a Sri Lankan agent who employs local guides, drivers and the Group Leader on our behalf and money from our visit reaches a wide range of people from local hoteliers to restaurateurs. Our small groups have minimal impact on the environment, and our interaction with local people helps demonstrate the importance of preserving the region’s cultural heritage whilst protecting sites of historical and natural importance.
>Groups also visit the Elephant Transit Home at Uda Walawe National Park (a project which works closely with the Born Free Foundation) which rescues orphaned elephants, returning them to the wild when they are ready; the home also works to maintain a vital programme dedicated to ensuring the welfare of Sri Lanka’s elephant population. For every person that visits this project we donate USD$5 per person to the home.
For every person travelling on this trip we also donate $5 to the Hiriwaduna School in Habarana which provides education to a very rural and poor community. The money is being used to construct a library, purchase musical instruments and build a special classroom to house 2 computers previously donated to the school. You will have the option of visiting the school when in Habarana.
Our Responsible Travel Code: Clients who travel with us will automatically receive a copy of our Responsible Travel leaflet. This contains details and advice on how you can make a positive difference when you travel. If you would like a copy in advance of travel please contact us.
Charity Partnerships: We work in partnership with the following charities. SOS Children is the world’s largest orphan and abandoned children charity, helping some of the world’s most vulnerable children whose parents are not there for them. We also support Friends of Conservation – an international charity committed to working with local people to develop a balance between their needs and the wildlife with which they share the natural habitat and ecosystems. Other charities that we work closely with include the Born Free Foundation, an animal welfare charity working to prevent animal suffering in captivity and to protect them in the wild, the Galapagos Conservation Trust - a UK charity that raises funds and awareness for the conservation of the Galapagos Islands, and The Travel Foundation, a UK charity that has been established to promote responsible travel practises throughout the whole of the travel industry.
Carbon Balancing: Global warming is a real issue and is a direct result of your travel. We have teamed up with the Tourism Industry Carbon Offset Service to give you the opportunity to offset the carbon emissions from your flight. You’ll be asked upon booking if you want to donate to the solar stove and poverty reduction project we are supporting in South Africa – with set amounts from £4. As a company we offset the carbon emissions from all staff travel and office energy use in full.
Our Foundation: We’ve highlighted a few of the ways in which we offer our support, financially or otherwise, and now you can, too. We have set up our own foundation, which will administer funds donated by you and us. A small donation of £1 per person will be taken when booking a holiday and that money will be put to good use by one of our carefully selected projects. If you don’t want to make the donation, just tell us when you book. To encourage you to do this and to put our money where our mouth is, we’ll match every single £1 donated and this we’ll give to our charity partner, Just a Drop. This is a global charity founded by members of the international travel industry, aiming to provide clean water and sanitation where it is most badly needed. In the developing world it costs just £1 to supply water to a child for nearly 10 years, so for every single person who travels with us, we’ll give Just a Drop £1.
We invite every traveller who books a holiday via us to send in a review. Because we don't run the holidays they're completely independent and unedited... remember to read between the lines though, as two people on the same holiday can have different views!
