The Gap Year Blog

Welcome to our digital age that capitalists and our profit-driven social society disguised as modernity and in which communicating our love towards nature destroys it. Ironically, by writing this text to create more awareness about the environmental implications of digital technologies implies damage. Every communication needs to be mediated. Every mediation relies on materials.

I’d like to take a moment from my Friday afternoon to talk to you about the showers here on camp Madagascar. Before arrival, you are told that conditions on camp are ‘basic’, so you arrive & have no idea what to expect. Then you have your camp tour and the shower door opens...

I’ve really enjoyed my time here in Hellville so far. I’ve tried some new foods and experienced the excitement of two Madagascar football matches. I have really enjoyed teaching the children here in Hellville because they are all so eager to learn and I love seeing them all smile with excitement when they’re see our faces.

Standing over my Year 5 Creative Writing textbooks, tears of frustration pricking at my corneas, I try to focus on the task at hand. Do these bring me joy? I ask myself, a dense pit of emptiness weighing in my stomach, gaze drifting to a bedroom that resembles a deleted scene from Britain’s Biggest Hoarders.

Mountaineering, snowboarding, fishing, wild water rafting, mountain biking, volleyball, surfing, trail running – all those are amazing, adventurous and challenging sports. These are all silent sports as well. None requires a motor; none requires a cheering crowd. They don’t need much equipment and don’t harm the environment if done right. So, they are perfect for your sustainable travel. The reward comes in form of a great community experience or the connection of nature and being at one with oneself.

It has been a fun week at camp as Volunteers Matt and Jordan completed their PADI Advanced Course. Whilst on their Navigation Dive they were lucky enough to see a Green Turtle on House Reef! The Peak Performance Buoyancy dive was interrupted by a very curious White Tip Reef Shark who checked in on our buoyancy training multiple times. Assistant Research Officer Emily was over the moon to see a rare Glaucidae Nudibranch.

Close your eyes. Can you imagine a world without trees? There would be no paper anymore and everyone would completely rely on technological resorts. Maybe we even would have a controlled number of breaths per day. It would be desolate and lonely because life cannot exist without trees on earth. They produce most of the oxygen that we and wildlife breath. Do the quiz to test your knowledge about trees. Do you really understand how essential they are for our existence?

“We are not educated people, but I can sense something grave is happening around us. I couldn’t believe my eyes – the land that I had tilled for years, that fed me and my family for generations, has vanished’, recounts Tulsi Khara, resident of the Sundarbans region in India. ‘Displacement and death are everywhere here. The land is shrinking’.

On Thursday 27th June, Camp Osita was asked to give a presentation on their camera trap project to the guests at a local lodge – Laguna Vista. Four members were fortunate enough to participate, and we were super excited at the prospect of a meal at the lodge (which we were told about after volunteering for it!).

White sandy beaches, picturesque lagoons, lakes, rolling hills and a few mountains. The Garden Route on the southwest tip of Africa is one of the top travel destinations in South Africa and high on the must-see list. Spot whale and dolphins when in season, wander along the coast and into the country on an endless network of footpaths and be seduced by its natural beauty.