This summer, I had a wonderful traveling experience courtesy of Reach Out Volunteers. I found out about this organization from a flyer that was posted in one of my classes. I was already planning on having an abroad volunteer experience and had thoughts about volunteering with a different organization. As I was looking at the various places that were offered as travel destinations for Reach Out Volunteers, I saw that Nepal, a country that I had been wanting to explore, was listed as one of the offered programs. I jumped at the opportunity and immediately visited the website.
Reach Out Volunteers is a non-profit organization certified as a charity with almost a dozen different projects to places such as Thailand, Cambodia, South Africa and Peru. The duration for each of these projects vary anywhere from a week to a month per project. As a volunteer, you can choose what type of experience you’d like to have. You can teach, trek, build, help with animal or marine conservation and adventure across the world! All of the projects are developed with and designed by local communities in these destinations to immediately benefit the villages and local wildlife.
I chose to embark on the Nepal Himalayan trekking adventure. The first week, we stayed in Kathmandu, the capital city of Nepal, and worked on a construction project at a Buddhist school. I helped create a functional classroom for the young Nepali students since their bedrooms were their primary structure for learning. For a week, the other volunteers and I were building during the mornings and exploring Buddhist temples in the afternoon. The city was an incredibly interesting sight to explore and we immersed ourselves in the culture doing some local shopping and meeting some of the locals who were so kind and friendly to us.
I spent the next three weeks completing two Himalayan hikes. The first week of trekking served as preparation for the next two weeks of traveling uphill to the base camp of Mount Everest! The fresh mountain air and dazzling sights of some of the highest mountains I’d ever seen was definitely a life changing experience. I will never forget waking up and looking at the sunrise over those beautiful mountains. I gazed at waterfalls, crossed tons of bridges and met many explorers. We engaged ourselves in discussions with people from all around the world as we trekked the mountains with the highest altitude being 5,380 meters (17,000 ft). The entire experience is one of the most astounding and uplifting treks in the world.
I highly recommend anyone who has the opportunity to engage in an explorative volunteer experience next summer to look into this organization. Reach Out Volunteers takes care of basically everything to ensure that volunteers enjoy their entire experience abroad. By ensuring the safety and fun of the volunteers, along with accommodating meals, sleeping arrangements and even assisting with flight planning, a volunteer can expect to have one of the most incredible and fulling experiences of their life!
Check out Reach Out Volunteers here!
All photos are courtesy of Aley Vesia.