Great Humanitarian Trips Around the World
Global Vision International
What It’s About: Indigenous and rural families living in Guatemalan, Honduran, and Nicaraguan communities have traditionally cooked over open fires set inside their homes—an arrangement that severely compromises household air quality, causes vision problems and respiratory disease, and requires families to overspend time and resources obtaining firewood. The construction of simple cement-and-brick stoves with chimneys—a project that can be completed by a team of volunteers in a week—markedly improves the families’ quality of life.
What it Involves: During the one-week program, volunteers spend about six hours a day working alongside a local mason—mixing cement, laying brick—to build a stove for a single family. The rest of the day is spent in cultural-immersion activities, like Spanish instruction and visits to museums and plantations; or adventure sports like hiking, rock climbing, or horseback riding.
Roughing-It Rating: Low. Volunteers stay and take meals with host families in towns near the communities where they work; they are given their own bedrooms and share common areas (including bathrooms with modern plumbing) with members of the household.
Cost: Starts at $1,190 per week
More Information: Global Vision International
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