Family holiday in India, the backwaters of Kerala
Family specialist
This tour operator specialises in family adventure travel overseas, offering a range of different destinations, activities and styles to suit your family – whatever their age or interests. We provide escorted adventure and activity holidays as tours or tailor-made itineraries for families travelling with children. With over thirty years experience of operating adventure and activity holidays, we are passionate about our work, and constantly looking for ways of innovating.
How this holiday makes a difference
Environment
Most of the lodges and hotels we use in the Wildlife area focus on water conservation. Guests are encouraged to not change towels and bedding everyday in order to save water. Solar water heaters are used widely hand in hand with electric boilers.
There is a nationwide ban on using polythene bags in India’s National Parks. The Forest departments, naturalist local guides, drivers and our tour leaders work hard to maintain cleanliness in the Parks, this includes educating visitors and is taken very seriously. All biodegradable waste is disposed of in an appropriate place and some locations have installed bio-gas plants to produce gas used for cooking purposes.
Most of the resorts and hotels have R O (reverse osmosis) UV+ water purifiers for drinking water which is offered free of charge to guests to discourage bottled water. This is as good, tasty and safe as bottled water. Wherever possible, resorts and hotels recycle waste water and use it for irrigation purposes.
Resorts and hotels have been planting new trees every year on their premises to ensure the environment remains unharmed by tourism and development. Illegal uprooting of plants and trees anywhere in or around the national park is banned with out the prior permission of the Forest department.
Community
On this trip we use local Indian hotels who employ and train staff from that particular area. This means that the money generated through tourism stays in India and more importantly supports the economy in the local area. The drivers & local naturalist guides allotted by the forest department are also from surrounding areas, ensuring you get the most from your trip through local expertise and importantly provides employment in areas where this has been a problem.
The Forest department does not provide their own fleet of Jeeps/vehicles for game drives. They allow local people who have got safari vehicles in good condition to work for them, again creating a livelihood for the locals.
Whilst on your trip you will have an option to visit a local government school (most needy). You will have the opportunity to see the facilities they have, talk to them, conduct a teaching session and take much needed items such as stationary.
Our hotels and resorts (especially around the National parks) mostly use produce from the local villagers who otherwise would go to cities to sell their fresh vegetables, cereals & lentils, dairy products and meat. This results in fresh food and support for the local community!
Elephant Training Camp
During your time in Kerala you may come across domesticated Elephants on a number of occasions, often just walking along the road, as there are plenty of them in the state as working animals in the fields, plantations and forests. They also have a more ceremonial role attached to temples or making guest appearances at weddings & similar celebrations. The catching of wild elephants was banned many years ago however there is still a regular flow of new arrivals, mainly in the form of those injured or orphaned, where it is very difficult to reintroduce them back into their herds. At Kodanad you will see both young and mature animals, will see them getting fed and, with any luck, will get a chance to help wash them in the Periyar River.
