Member Article

Madventurer joins forces with Virgin

A North East company specialising in helping people make the most of gap year experiences has partnered up with Virgin in order to help more communities overseas benefit from having travellers on projects.

Madventurer specialise in gap year programmes which combine overland travel with worthwhile group projects in rural areas.

Virgin Holidays agents have just spent five days rebuilding and teaching at Ngeteti and Karunga primary schools in Gilgil, where they helped paint classrooms and build a rainwater harvesting system to provide fresh water for pupils.

The experience of the agents will next month be offered to consumers in Virgin’s first ever “voluntourism” programme, which is believed to be a first for a mainstream mass market operator.

The programme is a joint venture between Virgin Holidays and adventure travel and gap year specialists Intrepid and Madventurer. It covers Africa, Vietnam, India, Thailand, Fiji, and Peru. Activities include teaching, medical, and sports.

Virgin Holidays head of distribution Mark Burns said it was unique because it allowed customers to book a volunteering trip with a conventional Virgin product as a bolt-on.

Mr Burns said: “It is a new concept for us and it is bringing two completely different worlds together. The vision is that in three of four years time we will be able to say if you want to do a few days in a hip hotel and a few days helping an African community project we have something for you.” John Lawler, founder of Madventurer, said Virgin were the biggest operator so far to commit to the concept, which was previously the preserve of small niche companies.

Lawler said volunteering was headed for the mainstream as demand was already expanding from lengthy “gap year” experiences to durations no longer than a conventional holiday.

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This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Ruth Mitchell .