The 100 Best Volunteer Vacations to Enrich Your Life Part 19

WHO KNEW?.

Humanitarian foreign aid provided by the government of the United States amounts to less than one percent of the federal budget. That is only a fraction of what most people think is spent on foreign aid. Among the top 21 industrialized nations, the United States ranks last in terms of the percentage of gross national product spent on humanitarian foreign aid.

Using working blueprints, volunteers build chicken coops and furnish them with chickens and eggs. They buy the supplies, build the structures, and help take care of the village's new source of livelihood. In their spare time, they teach English, play games with the kids, and provide support to local businesses and social workers.

Nestled among banana, papaya, and eucalyptus trees, Mamba Kisambo is near such iconic safari destinations as the Serengeti Plains, the Ngorongoro Crater, and Mount Kilimanjaro. If you're not up for the climb to the summit of Kilimanjaro, there are ancient caves to visit, waterfalls to hike to, and Chagga dances to learn.

And safaris-a Swahili word meaning journey-originated in Tanzania. You can safari here by jeep, on foot, on horseback, or even in a hot-air balloon. TVE can also arrange visits to traditional medicine men, Chala Lake (legend claims it has a relative of the Loch Ness monster), and to blacksmiths who make traditional Masai spears and tools. You'll get to interact with members of the Chagga, Masai, and Pare tribes.

Most of TVE's two-week programs run $495 and include shared lodging in the volunteer house 4 miles east of Arusha and three meals a day prepared by the on-site staff. The Chicken Ranch project, which requires a monthlong commitment, runs $895 (plus $100 for supplies) and includes living with a family in the village.

HOW TO GET IN TOUCH.

Tanzania Volunteer Experience, P.O. Box 16446, Arusha, Tanzania, 255 755 320 790, www.tanzaniavolunteer.org.

ROCK OF ZANZIBAR.

Stone Town, a UNESCO World Heritage site, is one of the oldest districts on Zanzibar, an island off the coast of Tanzania. This former Swahili trading town is a labyrinth of tiny streets and alleys, markets, mosques, and other historic buildings-including the Anglican church on the site of the old central slave market, East Africa's largest slave-trading port. Combining Persian, Indian, European, Arab, and African architecture, Stone Town has been occupied by humans for three centuries and is famed for its beautifully carved wooden doors. The House of Wonders, the former palace of Sultan Syyid Barghash, is open to the public. Its other claim to fame is that Freddie Mercury (19461991), the lead singer of Queen, was born there.

GREENFORCE.

research the great white shark.

GANSBAAI, SOUTH AFRICA.

Seeing a shark is like seeing a movie star, someone you have grown up watching on TV and then suddenly coming face to face with them.

-Joanne Lane, volunteer with Greenforce's great white shark project.

67 Thanks to Peter Benchley's best-selling 1974 novel Jaws, followed by Steven Spielberg's 1975 blockbuster movie version of the chilling story, the great white shark is widely believed to be a dangerous, man-killing predator. While it's true that these minivan-size animals with layers of serrated teeth are responsible for an average of 30 to 50 attacks a year, they do not prey on humans (their digestive tracts can't handle us) and have killed fewer people in the last hundred years than dogs do each and every year. Those frightening news reports? Total accident. The great white was simply "test biting," the same thing as he does to buoys, surfboards, and other unknown objects.

Between 150 and 200 million sharks are destroyed each year, targeted by fishermen for their jaws, teeth, and fins, which can fetch tens of thousands of dollars. In 2004, the great white shark was added to the list of endangered species. Because they grow slowly, mature late, and have low fecundity, they've been unable to keep up with humans' exploitation.

In South Africa, the first country to protect the great white, researchers working in what's known as Shark Alley use volunteers in their ongoing efforts to better understand and correct the misperceptions of the little-studied beast.

As a Greenforce volunteer, you'll start with a weeklong training in white shark biology, anatomy, and behavior, basic seamanship, and underwater filming and still photography. Then, safely ensconced in protective shark cages, you'll come eye to jet-black eye with this streamlined torpedo that can weigh up to 5,000 pounds. Your job will be to observe and record the great white shark's size, markings, s.e.x, and behavior. Be prepared to get your hands dirty. Preparing bait and chum is not pristine work.

NOT THE OTHER WHITE MEAT.

Great whites are the largest predatory fish on Earth. But they don't purposely hunt humans. So where did the rumor get started? A few candidates: A great white shark's teeth are serrated, so when it bites and shakes its head side to side, its teeth act as a saw and tear off large chunks of flesh. Most sharks spit out human flesh after test bites that, admittedly, can cause some major bloodletting.

Great whites can detect a single drop of blood in 25 gallons of water and can sense even tiny amounts of blood from as far as 3 miles away.

After a great white shark is born, it's abandoned immediately by its mother. It leads a loner's life, developing ferocious coping skills to survive.

The great white's main diet consists of fish, sea lions, and seals-to which humans look mighty similar from underneath in the water.

Gansbaai, an unpretentious village on the magnificent coastline of South Africa's Western Cape, is located about two hours southeast of Cape Town. Dyer Island, where much of your research will take place, is the breeding ground of jacka.s.s penguins, cape cormorants, and gannets. Nearby Geyser Island has some 60,000 cape fur seals.

A four-week program, including lodging at the research center's accommodation house and breakfast and lunch each day you're on the research boat, runs $2,700. You'll have a chance to learn boat handling and underwater photography skills while you are here.

As of this writing, Greenforce is going through a major restructuring and rebranding, which includes the establishment of four new organizations, as well as an umbrella organization called GAPFORCE. Call or check the Greenforce website for the most up-to-date information.

HOW TO GET IN TOUCH.

Greenforce, 530 Fulham Road, London SW6 5NR, England, 44 20 7384 3343, www.greenforce.org.

TEMBEZA KENYA.

a.s.sist the kenya wildlife service.

NATIONAL PARKS, RESERVES, AND WILDLIFE SANCTUARIES, KENYA.

When spiderwebs unite they can tie up a lion.

-African proverb.

68 Whether you want to monitor cheetah behavior in the Masai Mara, fight illegal bush meat trading in Tsavo National Park, or build a community-run elephant sanctuary on the Kenyan coast, Tembeza Kenya (TK)-a travel company with offices in Kenya, the United Kingdom, Canada, and the United States-can set you up with a monthlong volunteer gig. Unlike many operators who book trips all over the globe, Tembeza Kenya arranges volunteer projects in Kenya. Period.

By specializing in one destination, they've been able to develop extensive collaborations with not only the Kenya Wildlife Service, Africa's oldest conservancy, but with Kenya's Ministry of Education and other government organizations. This communal spirit enables them to offer a wide variety of volunteer placements in teaching, medicine, journalism, community work, law, and even coaching. Needless to say, their five wildlife conservation programs in the country's more than 50 parks and reserves are, by far, the most popular with volunteers.

The December 27, 2007, election-related violence that resulted in the deaths of 1,000 Kenyans and the displacement of 600,000 others also wreaked havoc on the prestigious Kenya Wildlife Service (KWS). With tourist visits down as much as 90 percent, KWS is scrambling to maintain its parks, its ongoing conservation research, and its reputation.

That's exactly why TK volunteers are so important. Against the backdrop of Kenya's equatorial sun, you'll work alongside top scientists and conservationists on such pioneering research projects as cheetah monitoring, elephant tracking, and conducting biodiversity surveys on the Kenyan coast. Volunteers in Kisite Marine Park and Mpunguti Marine Reserve will work with research teams, who monitor hundreds of species of marine life. They'll also work with KWS rangers, who patrol the parks for illegal fishing. Volunteers in Lake Nakuru National Park will be treated to the spectacle of millions of flamingos who flock to a shallow lake here, just one of the park's 400 species of birds. You might do bird counts, water testing, or rhino surveillance, as there are 25 black rhinos in the park. Though volunteers do not need to have any specialized training, a science background can be beneficial for some of the research-based work you will be doing in Kenya.

BREAKFAST WITH THE GIRAFFES.

Surrounded by 140 acres of indigenous bush, the Giraffe Manor, a small exclusive hotel just outside Nairobi, has a resident herd of giraffes who have a tendency to stick their long necks into everything. The butler, in fact, kicks off happy hour each night by offering nuts to Daisy, a 20-foot-tall endangered Rothschild giraffe, and her clan.

In 1974, Jock Leslie Melville and his wife Betty, concerned about the rare Rothschild giraffes, whose natural habitat in western Kenya was rapidly disappearing, bought the 15-acre manor. (They later added 105 additional acres.) They moved in Daisy and a partner and started the African Fund for Endangered Wildlife.

After Jock died in 1984, Betty opened the giraffe reserve and its faux Scottish hunting lodge to the public. Giraffe Manor has six bedrooms, one furnished with the furniture of writer Karen Blixen. The dining room is lit by candles only and meals are made with organic fruits and vegetables. Outside, with views of Mount Kilimanjaro to the south, warthogs strut their stuff next to the giraffes. Guests have included Johnny Carson, Walter Cronkite, Brooke Shields, Stephen Sondheim, and Sir Mick Jagger. The Giraffe Manor, P.O. Box 15004, Langata 00509, Kenya, 254 20 891078 or 254 20 890948, www.giraffemanor.com.

Tembeza Kenya also offers a wide variety of what it calls "mini adventures," which range from shorter versions of its wildlife projects to white-water rafting on the Nile, fishing in Lake Victoria, climbing Mount Kilimanjaro, and scuba diving off Pemba Island.

One-month wilderness conservation projects run $1,495 and include lodging, breakfast, and dinner each day. Additional months can be added for $1,095 per month.

HOW TO GET IN TOUCH.

Tembeza Kenya USA, 301 East 88th Street, Suite #12, New York, NY 10128, 646-216-9912, www.tembezakenya.com.

ECOVOLUNTEER.

protect endangered black and white rhinos.

MKHAYA GAME RESERVE, SWAZILAND.

We had daily intimate encounters with white rhino, black rhino, elephant, giraffe, hippo, buffalo, crocodile, zebra, warthog, impala, kudu, nyala, ostrich, and velvet monkey.

-Bob and Sofia Carter-Andersson, volunteers at the Mkhaya Game Reserve.

69 In October 2003, a BBC camera crew, looking for black rhinos to show their viewers, headed straight to Mkhaya Game Reserve, a privately owned reserve in Swaziland that had recently made some "top five list" for rhino sightings. Neither the crew nor their viewers were disappointed. In fact, much of their footage was taken from the top branches of a k.n.o.bthorn tree after they had been chased and treed by a less-than-happy black rhino.

Black rhinos are critically endangered, thanks to poachers who nab them, chainsaw off their horns, and sell them to Asians who pay up to $1,400 per pound for ground African rhino horn (they mistakenly believe it has aphrodisiacal qualities). Yet the rhinos are making a comeback at Mkhaya, where they were reintroduced in 1986.

RARE MEAT.

A recent volunteer at Mkhaya called it a "trip to the real Africa, a soul enriching experience." Here are a couple of the rare beasts you may be lucky enough to see: Wildebeest with starred forehead. Although some scientists think a wildebeest with a star on its forehead is a genetic anomaly, the Swazis who run Mkhaya believe it's a rare strain found only on their reserve.

Naring trogan. Although this bird has a bright crimson chest and a fancy plume, it's often difficult to spot (ask any birder) because it sits with its green back facing out, blending in seamlessly with the foilage.

The Mkhaya Game Reserve, in fact, is one of the few places in the world where you can see black and white rhinos living together.

At one time, black rhinos stretched from the slopes of Table Mountain in South Africa's Cape Province all the way through Africa, thriving in all areas south of the Sahara. By 1995, there were fewer than 2,400 black rhinos left, with 80 percent of them living in the southern part of the continent. Even in countries like South Africa and Namibia, where game reserves are under strict protection, their numbers are dwindling.

By the 1960s, in Swaziland, a small kingdom on the southern tip of Africa, wild game had all but disappeared. In less than a lifetime, Swaziland went from a wildlife paradise to a country with hardly a wild animal. At Mkhaya, a private Swazi-owned sanctuary with a fence and a highly motivated crew of armed game rangers, the rhinos and 20 other locally extinct species are shakily returning. Resources are scant, so volunteers are highly valued for both their money and their time.

Since the program began, volunteers have done everything from maintain fences and patrol the reserve to capture animals and help relocate them. They've staffed watchtowers, a.s.sisted with animal and bird surveys, and tracked and darted rhinos. They've fed crocodiles, inoculated indigenous goats, dragged a dead buffalo out of a mud pool, cleaned the wound of an eland, bottle-fed a baby nyala that got separated from its mother, and picked hundreds of ants off a baby weaver bird that fell from its nest.

THE RHINO'S TALE Two species of rhinoceros live in Africa; the black (Diceros biconis) and the white (Ceratotherium simum). The names refer not to color but to the width of the nose and mouth. The black, a browser, has a narrow prehensile lip; the white, a grazer, has a wide (wyd in Afrikaans, which is p.r.o.nounced vait) mouth; hence the latter's name. Both species have a pair of horns on the snout. The animals are similar in height, about 5.5 feet at the shoulder, but the white weighs twice as much as the black.

Black rhinos (said to be aggressive) usually attack simply because they have very bad eyesight. They've even been said to charge tree trunks. Adults are solitary, coming together only for mating. Mating does not have a seasonal pattern, but young are born at the end of the rainy season.

This unspoiled wilderness lies in the heart of Swaziland's Lowveld, between Manzini and Big Bend. When the reserve was founded in 1979 by the Ted Reilly family, its main goal was to thwart the extinction of Nguni cattle, an indigenous breed of African cattle that was brought to the area by the migrating Nguni two thousand years earlier. Today, Mkhaya has reintroduced all species indigenous to the area with the exception of wild dogs, lions, and cheetahs.

While volunteering at Mkhaya, you'll be invited along on the reserve's guided tours and game drives and, if it's available, allowed to stay in its stone-and-thatch safari camp. Nearby, Bulunga Gorge offers white-water rafting and both Hlane Royal National Park and Mlilwane Wildlife Sanctuary, sister parks to Mkhaya, are within striking distance.

Although Ted Reilly's father, Mickey, who settled at Mlilwane, Swaziland, in 1906, brought electricity to the country, your tented accommodations, albeit replete with mosquito nets, don't have that luxury. Expect cold showers and a pit latrine. Accommodations and three meals per day run $1,335 for two weeks.

HOW TO GET IN TOUCH.

Ecovolunteer books trips for American and Canadian volunteers through the Great Canadian Travel Company, 158 Fort Street, Winnipeg, Manitoba R3C 1C9, Canada, 800-661-3830, www.ecovolunteer.org.

TURTLEWILL.

set up a bush clinic for wodaabe and tuareg nomads.

ETHIOPIA, NIGER, AND MALI.

For the longest time there was this neon question mark going off over my head-so what, so what? What am I doing to help the world?

-Irma Turtle, former advertising exec who traded her power suits and Madison Avenue lunches to start TurtleWill, a nonprofit that helps Africa's poorest nomads 70 If you bought Robert Plant's Live in Paris CD, you've already helped out Irma Turtle, whose Carefree, Arizona-based nonprofit TurtleWill provides medical care, school funding, and drought relief to Africa's tribal nomads. The former Led Zeppelin frontman dedicated profits from his four-song 2005 CD to build eight dorms and provide meals, blankets, school uniforms, and medicine in Mali, one of three African countries where TurtleWill works.

But if you want to do more than just buy a CD, read on.

Several times a year, Irma Turtle recruits volunteers to staff remote medical bush clinics. Volunteers set up tents near the local watering hole and within minutes, long lines of people, many of whom have never seen a doctor, begin forming. "If we get a sniffle, we run to Walgreens where there's a whole shelf of over-the-counter medicines," Turtle says. "These people have no recourse for medicines, let alone doctors."