The volunteering program I'll be taking part in this summer is called Amazonas Explored and is run by the volunteering organisation Volunteer Eco Students Abroad.
VESA works hand in hand with the indigenous village communities to create real and lasting change using a combination of volunteering and adventure.
This year in the Amazon, we'll help to provide remote villages with fresh water, restore local primary schools, teach English and basic hygiene/sanitation to school children, and build bathrooms for those without access to safe sanitation. These basic neccessities are crucial in an area of the world where water born diseases are a major cause of death.
On the adventure side of the trip, we'll learn the importance of ecotourism and education in this fragile environment, which is dissappearing at an alarming rate due to logging and other man made threats. We'll embark on a jungle trek; hiking, tubing and canoeing our way through the rainforest. Along the way, we'll visit a rainforest animal sanctuary and a family cocoa plantation.
Finally, we'll hop on a bus up into the high Andes for a bit of relaxation after all that exertion.
Phew, that exhausted me just typing it....
