The rainbow nation!

As locals, we are naturally biased when it comes to South Africa.

South Africa has so much to offer with 12 official languages and many diverse cultures and ethnicities. Not only the languages, but even the fauna and flora change drastically between provinces!

South Africa has come a long way from its oppressive past. Democracy was achieved in 1994 and the first democratically elected president was Nelson Mandela. There are still plenty of challenges facing the country, but we have faith in its people. With so much incredible natural beauty, iconic wildlife, magnificent beaches and coastline, delicious food, friendly people, history and colourful cultures, there is so much to offer visitors, which is why volunteers often return again and again.

We have projects across four provinces: the Western Cape, Eastern Cape and KwaZulu-Natal and Limpopo.

Our South African projects are in the fields of marine conservation, animal care at ethical sanctuaries, endangered species conservation, wildlife rescue and rehabilitation, animal welfare, veterinary medicine, social work, teaching, care, creative arts (drama, music and art), sports coaching, youth development and community development within the NPO sector in social work, psychology and counselling. We also have projects that are species specific with wolves, horses, monkeys and wild cats.

We can cater for groups, friends and families and try to incorporate an all-inclusive, smooth experience where most of the arrangements are made for you. This allows you to focus on helping and immersing yourself in the cultures and wildlife of South Africa.

Our home base is in Knysna, known as the “pearl of the South African Garden Route”. It is a town situated on one of South Africa’s most well-known estuaries, home to the famous Knysna sea horse, with surrounding beaches ideal for dolphin and whale watching, enclosed by the magical Knysna forest which is home to the southern-most free roaming elephants in the world.

We love Knysna and its friendly people and, although the communities we run projects in are extremely poor with very challenging socio-economic situations, it is still one of our favourite places in South Africa!

Our marine conservation projects are all coastal and our animal and wildlife projects tend to be more inland and rural with the Big 5 (elephant, rhino, buffalo, lion and leopard) projects mostly found on large tracts of more rural land.

Facts about South Africa

Population: Over 58 million

Capitals: Pretoria(executive), Bloemfontein (judicial) and Cape Town (legislative), although Johannesburg is our largest city.

Languages: The four most spoken languages are Zulu, isiXhosa, Afrikaans and English, with English taught in schools from Grade 1.

Climate: Temperate climate with summer from December to February and winter from June to August. Rainfall varies across the regions according to the seasons.

Currency: South African Rand (ZAR).

Applying for a South African visa