Explore our guide to responsible travel with Audley. View our recommended itineraries and eco-accommodation ideas, specially chosen to help you plan a more ethical tour.
About our charity work
As part of our commitment to responsible tourism, in early 2005 we formed the ‘Audley Charity Portfolio’, which originally comprised five organisations we chose to actively support.
This has now evolved into an initiative where we have selected charities which involve countries across our range of programmes.
These charities are intended to help a wide variety of causes from wildlife, human rights issues and education, through to the environment and conservation.
Uthando
Uthando South Africa is a registered Non-Profit Organisation based in Cape Town.
Founded in 2007, the organisation raises funds for a broad range of community based projects which support the most vulnerable sectors of society in some of the most destitute areas of the city.
In addition to the yearly financial donation, Audley will also support Uthando with a R200 levy from every South Africa booking. The levy will be sent on a monthly basis to Uthando, who will in turn distribute the funds or purchased equipment to the community projects. We will also be organising fundraising events to continue to raise funds for Uthando throughout the year.
It is estimated that in 2006 over 290,000 children in South Africa were living with HIV/AIDS and that there were more than 1 million orphans.
A visit to Khumbulani Day Care Centre, one of Uthando’s projects, will reveal the tremendous sense of community that exists in townships and the brave will to combat the effects of this awful disease.
The Mara Rianda Charitable Trust
Our friend and former colleague, Ariana Grammaticas, left Audley in 2007 to return to her home country of Kenya. In early 2008 she wrote to us about The Mara Rianda Charitable Trust.
Set up by Richard Long, who visited Kenya in 2004, it supports the school and community in the wider Mara area. All the money Richard raises is used to provide this support, and he covers administration costs himself.
So far the Trust has installed a borehole to supply fresh water, built five new classrooms provided bursaries to secondary school for exceptional students and paid the salary for one teacher. Though much has been achieved, there is always much more that can be done!
On Richard’s most recent trip to Kenya, he visited Aitong school, another school in the Mara area. It has no running water and children here collect water from a muddy spring. Richard’s aim is to continue the success he has had at Rianda school, and bring clean drinking water to the children of Aitong. There is an untapped spring in the school grounds and he is raising funds to divert the water into clean tanks. From here he hopes to install a pump and piping to provide safe drinking water around the school for the children.
The Africa Safari team has made a donation to this excellent cause, and we look forwards to visiting on our next trip to the Mara!