We all want to save the world. Don’t we? And we try. We buy organic, we recycle, and we drive fuel-efficient cars. (Well, that last one has more to do with high gas prices, but still.) Don’t you wish you could save the world all the time, like even when you’re spending your well-deserved two weeks off on a tropical vacation, drinking cocktails and getting massages? No? Bear with me here.

What if you could do both? What if you could save the turtles and work on your tan? Maybe plant trees and trek through the rainforest? Never fear, that’s exactly where Volunteer International comes in. Consider it your one-stop shop for all do-gooder vacations. It has a search engine with links to all sorts of charity vacations.

Want to transport supplies to remote village in Niger? Here’s the place! For me, that tilts too far on the “do-gooder” end of the spectrum rather than “vacation,” but there’s more than a few opportunities we found that offer a good balance, here were some of our favorites:

• Greenforce will take you to the Bahamas where you’ll spend your days scuba diving and assisting conservation efforts with the Bahamas National Trust. Chart coral, count fish, and locate feeding grounds - it sounds like too much fun to be helpful, frankly, but apparently it is. And even if you’ve never dived before, they’ll provide PADI certification during your first week! Four weeks of scuba bliss will run you $2,800.
• If four weeks of lounging about the beach sounds nice and all, but your boss freaked out the last time you took a long weekend, you might want to check out Cross-Cultural Solutions. They offer week-long Insight Abroad trips for those with a lot of heart but not a lot of time. The work is tougher than merely swimming around with dolphins - more like teaching English, caring for the children, or assisting with healthcare. However, with programs in Brazil, Costa Rica and Guatemala, it might be worth it to be spitting distance from the beach. Week-long programs cost $1,695.
• Another site worth checking out for weeklong stints is Globe Aware. They offer trips to a lot of the same locales as Cross-Cultural Solutions, so it’s worth comparing the two to see which offers a program more suited to your preferences. Personally, teaching Buddhist monks how to use computers in Thailand sounds too good to be true, so don’t be surprised if the next Consumer Advocate update comes at you from Thailand!

Happy camping!

***Picture thanks to Plan 59***

This entry was posted on Monday, June 30th, 2008 at 8:21 pm and is filed under I'd Love To Be a Better Person... Sitting Down, Who Doesn't Love a Makeover?. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.