Voluntourism -- Volunteer Travel & Vacations Expand Your Horizons

These Web sites and companies are the best sources for travelers who want to find and book volunteer travel, service-based travel, or a vacation with a volunteer components

Voluntourism -- combining a vacation or trip anywhere in the world with a few days or weeks volunteering is one way a growing number of travelers are making a difference. How do you decide if volunteer travel, whether it's spending a day at an African preserve feeding lion cubs or two weeks helping build a town hall in a third-world country, is...

The Earth Day theme - Walk, Bike, Row to an Earth Day Event Around the World - exemplifies ways to have fun yet help the environment. Earth Day is always April 22, but it's Tuesday in 2008. If you can t play hooky, there are lots of Earth Day activities and trips on surrounding weekends. Earth Day promotes awareness of environmental issues...

A definition of Volunteer Vacations, sometimes call Voluntourism

Three volunteer vacations guide books with advice for travelers who want to take volunteer trips.

During the annual National Public Lands Day thousands of volunteers help clean-up and fix-up America's trails and national forests that have been worn down by hikers, mountain bikers and ATVs.

Combine volunteering and adventure travel with this company, which has overseas jobs for students and active vacations for everyone.

Read how one woman's volunteer travel experience, helping at orphanages in India, inspired her to write the moving, non-fiction "The Weight of Silence: Invisible Children of India". It might inspire you to take a volunteer vacation.

The responsibletravel.com Web site is run by a United Kingdom-based travel agency that focuses on eco-holidays, including many that offer a volunteer work component.

On volunteer vacations with this volunteer wildlife conservation organization you can travel to help track tigers, scuba dive to repair fragile underwater reefs and experience other adventures.

The United Nation’s World Volunteer Web is an online global clearing house for volunteerism. Here, you'll find links to organizations running volunteer vacations and trips, information about the annual Volunteer Day and more.

On a volunteer vacation or trip with the non-profit Earthwatch Institute even the dryer aspects of science will come alive.

Voluntourism.com is a gateway to learning more about taking volunteer vacations, and the site lists specific trips that let you combine volunteerism and travel.

CheapTickets.com has teamed up with United Way to offer travelers a route to setting up volunteer vacations, or adding a day or more of volunteering during a planned trip.

International Volunteer Programs Association is a consortium of international volunteer programs that have one- or two-week to six-month programs.

Sierra Club Outings runs volunteer travel trips around the United States, from New York City's parks to Wyoming's rugged backcountry.

i-to-i is a company that sends more that 5,000 people a year to volunteer at local projects around the world and immerse themselves in local cultures. These travelers choose voluntourism -- combining traditional travel with volunteer work -- to help make a difference in their lives and others.

Voluntourism – combining traditional travel with volunteer work – is a growing trend. The Volunteer Abroad Web site lists many routes for finding interesting trips around the globe that let you travel with a purpose and immerse yourself in local cultures.

Exploring any of these types of adventure travel will enrich your life, and the pictures from your trip will fill a scrapbook with lasting images. From scuba diving to mushing huskies, these examples of unforgettable adventure travel will open new worlds to you.

Volunteer Vacations - This company's "adventure philanthropy" approach to volunteer vacations combines travel to remote locales with volunteer projects chosen by local non-profit groups.

Joining an archeological dig for a day tells you if you want to volunteer for an archeological dig in Israel or other countries for a week or much longer.