Groups are kept to a maximum of sixteen people, big enough to help the local communities, but not big enough to have a negative affect themselves. Back in the UK we also have our own environmental policy and we believe this is where responsible travel should start, prior to departure. It is simple things that help and perhaps the biggest impact in the office comes from recycling paper, as a rule where possible we print on both sides of paper and it is not until it is completely beyond use that we then send it to be recycled.
All our development projects have been carefully chosen to satisfy several criteria. They are of definable and sustainable benefit to the indigenous community and allow us the opportunity to work in tandem with the host community. Funding for the projects comes directly from the our Trust. For each person that joins the us, we, as a company, give at least US $400 to the Trust. 100% of the money the Trust receives is spent on the projects.
All development projects are over-seen by a resident Project Manager whose role is to co-ordinate the adventures, the funding and the project's objectives. We are committed to direct patronage within the local economies of the countries in which we operate. We pay local tutors to teach languages; accommodation throughout the adventure is in locally owned hostels or based in the project locations; and the entire expedition budget will be spent by the team at local "grass roots" level.
4. Be prepared to deal with insect bites, humidity, cold showers, mud, mosquitoes and rain.
I would highly recommend this holiday to anyone who wants to help make a difference. There is a lot of work to do to restore this inhabited Galapagos island to its former state and if you like nature, a bit of hard work, excellent, locally grown fresh food, meeting like-minded people of all ages and from all over the world and can put up with a few (natural) extremities as previously mentioned, I would suggest you stay here for as long as you can, like for a gap year. A stay of two weeks is acceptable but the time goes so fast and most definitely, if I could have, I personally would have much preferred to have been able to stay for at least 6 weeks.
You can trust responsibletravel.com reviews because, unlike many other schemes, reviews can ONLY be written by people who we have verified have been on the holidays. In addition, we don't run these holidays ourselves - our only interest is giving you the best independent advice.
