South Africa family adventure holiday

Planet

CARBON REDUCTION
In Cape Town, our excursion provider gives guests the opportunity to include a social upliftment project on their Cape Peninsula tour. Guests can stop off at Masiphumelele to meet with Yandiswa Mazwana, an active community member, who facilitates the training of single mothers in the Masiphumelele Township. Waste material and plastic are recycled into works of art, and Yandiswa's creations have been exhibited worldwide. Recently she featured at Cape Town's Design Indaba and at Gauteng's Waste Art Expo in Sandton Square. Paris's La Galerie Ze'ge'talein took her work to France, and Australia's Tractor Homes saw her talent spread even further across the globe. She is an active community worker and was instrumental in organising a peace rally in Masiphumelele against the xenophobic attacks of 2008. Yandiswa is a remarkable leader making a positive change to our community and, in addition to meeting Yandiswa, guests can create a unique art piece from plastic collected from the Peninsula beaches at her house & workshop in the Township.

On the Garden Route, one of the lodges we use is partially off the grid with 50% of the lodge run on solar energy while rainwater is used to water the gardens. The lodge actively practises recycling and all refuse and organic waste is donated to a local pig farmer. Most of the fresh organic herbs and vegetables used in the restaurant are grown on the property and the lodge supports the local community in their purchasing polices, with produce sourced from farms in the area as much as possible.

In an effort to minimise the carbon footprint and counteract the potential negative effects of tourism, our ground team in South Africa have implemented a number of positive strategies:

- We run a completely electronic, voucher-free system, which was put into practise in 2014. An electronic link replaced the conventional printed itinerary and voucher, minimising the duplication of hard copy documentation.

- Our world-leading 'Agent Zone' was launched in 2012 as an effective means of communication with our partners. This web-based platform reduced the need for printed material for trade shows and sales visits. All information is now available via the internet.

- The move to digital was accelerated during the pandemic with a need for remote working and the office is now paper-less, using cloud-based technology to store and manage content. All recyclable office waste is collected and recycled by a third-party supplier on a weekly basis.

- All vehicles are bought brand new and replaced regularly, ensuring maximum fuel efficiency while all onboard pantry offerings are sourced locally.

- A new staff initiative is the propagation of 'Spekboom plants' within our staff gardening community. Research shows this plant to be highly valuable in drought-stricken areas for landscape restoration and as an incredible source of carbon dioxide removal - oxygen creation to counteract the destruction of the rainforests.

ENVIRONMENT AND WILDLIFE
In the Walker Bay area, the lodge has at its heart a conservation initiative, with every guest directly contributing to the protection of this fragile wonderland. Estuaries are one of nature’s most productive ecosystems, but the Klein River estuary is particularly important, with lime-rich soils producing a unique plant diversity, much of it critically endangered, and flowing out into Walker Bay – one of the world’s most important whale nurseries. As well as funding socio-economic development opportunities in the region, they employ local individuals, including a group of 12 previously unemployed single mothers from the Stanford community, to work on the ongoing eradication of alien vegetation to protect the endemic flora and fauna.

At one of the safari lodges, Sustainability and responsible utilisation are two of the foundations for the day to day management, administrative buildings, staff villages and workshops. They have partnered with the world renowned and respected Wilderness Foundation and their Green Leaf Environmental Standard (GLES) programme. Throughout the operation, processes and infrastructure are in place to run the lodges as ecologically sound as possible. The main considerations are; effective water and energy usage, including the capture of rainwater and the use of wood from alien plant species for fire places. Waste management includes the recycling of raw materials, composting of food waste and the filtration and use of grey water for irrigating lodge gardens. A final but equally important aspect is the education and upliftment of local communities and staff. The aim, using the GLES, is to reduce the effects of consumption on their environment and to improve upon environmental management and awareness in an eco-friendly manner, by addressing the direct impact of the Reserve on the environment, reducing the carbon footprint and by improving the environmental education of all stakeholders without compromising on the quality and experience.

This lodge has pioneered land-use change in the region, painstakingly restoring eleven former livestock farms into a born again wilderness. Landscapes that had barely a blade of grass in 1997 have recovered, the deep orange of the earth now offset by green pockets of hope. Many indigenous species (that had previously been extinct in the local area) have been reintroduced to the reserve including cheetah, elephant, black rhinoceros, lion and herds of eland, hartebeest and springbok and they have had the pleasure of witnessing the return of species of their own accord - particularly the vulture and leopard. They view the land as a 'living laboratory' - a hub for learning about the Karoo environment and about nature in general. In light of this, they have set up an education programme with local schools as well as a volunteer programme. South Africa's first Tracker Academy, a training pision of the SA College for Tourism, was founded and is hosted at the lodge, while they have also entered into partnership with universities and research institutions from around the world in order to develop the lodge's potential as a site of learning and discovery.

The lodge is renowned for its successful cheetah conservation endeavours and on foot cheetah tracking, in addition to its Spekboom planting and community projects. The Reserve is privileged to extend over four of the country's seven biomes, providing habitat for over 60 mammal species including the cheetah, aardvark and white rhino, as well as the endangered desert-adapted black rhino (one of only 2 private reserves to have these animals). Guests can partake in game drives, guided walks, wilderness picnics, birding, luxury star bed sleep-out, mountain hikes and conservation activities.

People

LOCAL ECONOMY
The accommodations featured on this itinerary are locally owned, and have various local initiatives to support their local communities. For instance, on the Garden Route, one of the lodges is involved in a number of social development and sustainability projects and some of the projects that they have championed include providing ingredients and soup on a daily basis for two soups kitchens in the local communities, the sponsorship and support of local sporting events, including the sponsorship of a local soccer team from the Kwanakatula community, the annual sponsorship of nominated children's school fees, monthly support of the Red Cross and annual support of the National Sea Rescue Institute.

Our ground team in South Africa support Uthando South Africa, a ground-breaking and award-winning non-profit organisation based in Cape Town that focuses on bringing tourism and community development closer together. Guests are given the opportunity to experience some of the life-changing projects that Uthando supports in a non-invasive and culturally sensitive way. With a huge number of community projects ranging from animal welfare, food gardens and housing through to skills development, empowerment and childcare, the funds that are raised by Uthando get distributed far and wide and go a long way to improving the lives of the wider Cape Town community. As an overseas partner, we use the opportunity to work with our ground team in supporting these well-managed and reputable community development and charitable projects. One hundred percent of contributions are distributed by Uthando to a range of wonderful community projects on a monthly basis, thus having an immediate and direct impact on the lives of many people. Guests can visit the projects, and see first hand the empowerment and entrepreneurialism that have been generated.

EMPLOYMENT, INCLUSIVITY AND DIVERSITY
In Cape Town, the accommodation provider includes an Impact Levy, which supports their fund supporting Health and Wellbeing, Resource Sustainability, Education and Training, and Investing in Local Communities. Working alongside trusted partners, we ensure that funds create measurable, lasting change. For instance, in Health & Wellbeing, they support their employees and their families living in remote areas with healthcare access, where infrastructure is limited. This includes investing in healthcare screenings and providing wellness days to promote early detection and proactive care for their Cape Town team.

In Cape Town, one of our excursion providers is focused on growing the next generation of leaders and Young Adventure Academy guides, aged between 14 and 18, train alongside their hand picked and highly experienced guides. The Brave Adventure Academy aims to create the next generation of female adventure guides in South Africa - girls between the age of 14 and 18 from under privileged communities train alongside the guides and clients, working together to learn practical life skills at the cutting edge of African Adventure. Inspired in 2010 by girls from Manenberg who wanted to make their gang-ridden Cape Town community safer and cleaner, Rock Girl has partnered with artists, designers and government to install 55 Safe Space public benches around South Africa. The aim of the project is to provide opportunities for under-served local girls to reach their true potential. Confidence and resilience will develop as the girls explore and experience life's adventures, giving the chance to use physical, mental and emotional skills to cope with any challenge that comes their way. When on one of these excursions, guests can have a Rock Girl 'guide-in-training' join a tour which gives them the opportunity to engage and get to know some of these highly resilient, optimistic young girls, with the fee being donated directly to The Rock Girls.