Nice Stuff related to travel. we are also provide online hotel,flight booking
and all India tour package.

http://www.cultureholidays.com/

As detailed as this is, it can't tell the whole story or capture the magic that is the Black Sheep Inn. From the beginning, Michelle and Andres have been more concerned about being a part of their community than about their personal gain. They have brought water to local communities, supported local residents in any number of endeavors, helped locals learn about and practice permaculture, and helped to create a thriving eco-destination out of a formerly poor and remote town.

My wife and I have known Douglas McMeekin since 1991, have visited the Lodge several times over the years, and have both taken and encouraged groups of friends to visit it as well.

We have watched the Lodge, staff, and related enterprises -- including the school -- grow from ideas to reality and have been very impressed with the sense of self-worth, professionalism, and the opportunity for personal growth that these efforts have given to the residents of the Napo Valley.

The advent of the high school is a signal event in the region, as no other similar educational opportunity exits, and it has triumphed over numerous bureaucratic, administrative, and financial challenges posed by the government. It is very important that Yachana receive your financial support while it develops its base of self-sufficiency-oriented enterprises.

HI,

I am delighted P&P have entered, and having worked with them as a Project Manager in South Africa, want to make a comment.

Our company has been at the fore front of developing responsible tourism, and responsible volunteering practice in South Africa.

And working with P&P has been so refreshing. They are the first volunteer placement agenct that we have engaged with that actually get it! Communities need to come first! In terms of needs assesment, in terms of accepting or rejecting volunteers. They are the only placement agency we know off that insists on criminal checks......for every volunteer. With us they manage volunteer flows to ensure no oversupply, and a minimising of negative impact.

They are very respectful in there approach to us knowing local conditions best, and we never feel compromised in the way they work with us.

When they (Kate or Sallie) have visited the projects, they are open to hearing community views and concerns - and then finding ways of reconciling that with the business of doing business.

The calibre of volunteers we have recieved has done justice to community needs, and we truly are greatful that they entered the volunteer market. Changemakers indeed.!

Thanks to all of the organizers and sponsors of this competition. I am greatly enjoying the feedback we are receiving for our El Fuego del Sol entry. I’m also learning about so many other projects and project developers in so many places in the world. I’d love to hear of any other forums for Geotourism where we can be sharing information such as this. Please let me know in a reply or an email: kevadair@aol.com. Also, the information collected here is of so much value to potential geotourists, I hope it will continue to be available for years to come.
What will happen to all of these excellent entries when the competition is through? I think you have created a valuable resource network and a potential directory, and I hope you will consider allowing continued access to this information for the geotourists of the future. Thanks, Kevin Adair, www.elfuegodelsol.com

As tourism becomes the mainstay of the Cretan economy, developments are inevitable. Many are ugly, a shame but not a catastrophe. Others may be beautiful, but environmental and cultural disasters. The current proposal by the British company Minoan Group/ Loyalward to turn Cavo Sidero into a golf resort falls in the latter category.

We know this area well because for the last two years we have been conducting environmental and archaeological research there. It is a museum of ancient field systems and settlements unique in Crete. It is a Natura 2000 SPA (GR432003) with great biodiversity including endemic flora and fauna, abundant bird-life, and the famous palm-grove of Vaï. The proposed golf resort is ludicrous given the semi-desert climate and environment and a travesty given the antiquities it will destroy and endemics it will threaten.

It claims to be a "sustainable" development but we have read the Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) and find it poorly integrated and inadequate, in spite of Forum for the Future giving them their support. The most pressing problem is water. A desalination plant is slated for construction to meet the huge water needs, but desalination plants are notorious guzzlers of energy, something in short supply on Crete. Solar collectors and/or wind turbines would have to cover a very large area to accommodate it, something not provided for in the EIS. Provisions for disposing of the mineral refuse (salt, etc.) are cursory at best. These are two of the many places where the lengthy EIS by Minoan Group falls scandalously short.

We have recently organized an online petition to protest the construction of this golf resort. If you are in agreement, please sign and pass it on.

http://www.thepetitionsite.com/1/Save-the-Cretan-landscape

Please contact us if you are interested in more information on why we are convinced this development is sadly misdirected.

The court case is now set for 9 May 2008. Time is short.

Thank you for your consideration,

Jennifer Moody and Oliver Rackham
hogwildjam@mac.com, or10001@cam.ac.uk
authors of "The making of the Cretan landscape", 1996
"I Dimiourghia tou Kritikou Topoiu", 2004

I'd love to know whether others are having the same dilemma we're having, in terms of the difficulty choosing only one geotourism challenge that we address. I'm talking about the requirement on the entry form to choose EITHER "Quality of tourist experience and benefit to tourists" OR "Quality of the benefit to people of the destination."

Our project is working to build a sense of global citizenship among children and families, and it's a central tenet of our work that it must be carried out in a spirit of equal exchange. It's essential to us that both tourists AND people in the local destination benefit. If we're not doing both of these, we feel that we're not fulfilling our mission and that the project will not be sustainable over the long run. If anything, this is precisely the geotourism challenge we are addressing: making sure that both sides benefit.

Let's talk about it!

I am puzzled by the field on the competition entry form that asks entrants to specify which geotourism challenge they address -- specifically the requirement that we choose EITHER "Quality of tourist experience and benefit to tourists" OR "Quality of the benefit to people of the destination."

Our geotourism project is working to build a sense of global citizenship among children and families, and it's a central tenet of our work that it must be carried out in a spirit of equal exchange. It's essential to us that both tourists AND people in the local destination benefit. If we're not doing both of these, we feel that we're not fulfilling our mission and that the project will not be sustainable over the long run. If anything, this is precisely the geotourism challenge we are addressing: making sure that both sides benefit.

Any thoughts on this? Any way to adjust the entry form to reflect our view of what we're doing?

I'd love to hear more about the competition's assessment criteria that an innovation show potential to affect the world and not just one place, that it can be replicated and scaled up.

Does this mean the judges are looking for organizations or individuals that are themselves prepared to scale up their model to affect the world, to replicate it in numerous sites? Or does it mean that a project should represent a model that other organizations or individuals could take and replicate in different locales?

Thanks!

"Competing for Change" article in the Stanford Social Innovation Review: http://www.ssireview.org/articles/entry/competing_for_a_change/

Tito Llantada
Changemakers.net
Competition Manager

This is fantastic! Take a another look at the grassroots work universities (usually on county borders) are starting. Small pockets of environmental advocates are joining with the hospitality students to develop informal volunteer groups to help international destinations create their own geotourism programs. And as proactive as this all is, having this sprout at the middle or high school level would be much more efficient in the long run.

Geotourism, geo parks, geotags, geo-caching, geo-guides! Earth, and our relationship to planet & place, is being is being re-mapped & rediscovered... with 'geo eyes'.

Geo-Greetings! from GeoTourism.TV!

Kudos & Thanks! to National Geographic and Changemakers! We will take "The Geotourism Challenge" to 'Celebrate Places' and 'Change Lives'!

GeoTourism.TV launched in spring of 2007 to promote geotourism "Online & On World", and to showcase "the new geo world". The Geo Revolution is taking place on many fronts, online & on world. GeoTourism.TV, with its user generated GeoTourism Search Engine and video portal, is giving visitors an online tour of the new Geo world!

I cant wait for this competition to go into the enter stage so that I can read all the entries.
Thank You Ashoka.

Kenya is still a democratic country and with so little in development. Housing is such a big issue that has given rise to slums all over the country. Living in a slum is such a horrible venture but in case you have no choice you'll have to adhere to it.

Changemakers do deal with a lot of development and in this case i would like to ask if there is any person or group or even an organization that is thinking of investing in development of houses here in Kenya. We have big pieces of land which are lying fallow nobody is ever thinking of developing it and if they do they develop the already crowded areas and that is the suburbs. My questions is, can somebody come to the rescue of developing simple and modest houses as an investment in a foreign country? This is a way of helping others so that they can in turn help themselves whereas you will be making profit in another way.
Think about investments in housing
Thank you.

Creo que es muy importante que los turistas, a más de conocer y divertirse cuando viajan, puedan usar su tiempo apoyando actividades de protección ambiental y también sea una oportunidad para aprender de la cultura con la cual van a tener contacto. De esta manera habrá un intercambio y aprendizaje mutuo. Nuestra organización trabaja con comunidades indígenas en Ecuador. Buscamos el desarrollo humano y el turismo ecológico es una buena alternativa que provee recursos a las comunidades. Estamos interesados en tener actividades de "turismo de servicio" en las que los turistas puedan compartir con grupos comunitarios, enseñar y también aprender mucho de esta experiencia.

I am not techno-savvy. I just wanted to learn more about this competition. It's not so much the competition I am into but more of how I am able to learn from others about what they do so that I can also help our own people here in my country.

I know that my country and its resources both human and otherwise have been 'used' and 'abused' by other irresponsible tourists ( a minority, I am glad to add - I believe there are more responsible ones.)

Through a venue provided here by changemakers, we will be able to exchange ideas and help each other so that our respective localities/areas become better places to live in especially for the ordinary people.

browneyes

Through this competition I'm hoping for new perspectives on mitigating the negative social/community impact of people building or buying lots of second-homes in small communities. I observe those second, usually empty/cold homes disrupting local communities in ways that ultimately undermind the cultural or environmental quality of these special place as a tourist destination.

we are seeking to publish a good hubs guide which we will also put on te internet and encourage people to edit loval versions of;

a hub is a physical space where citizens trust to meet to log up concerns and start pilot projects and/or a space that a segment eg youth or the poor may have lost any safe space to meet

moreover hubs seek to share knowhow interlocally across hubs with similar profiles

whilst this goes wider than geotourism; many hubs actually make deeper places to get locals intelligence on how tourism or other factors are causing destruction of local sustainability than more conventional sources -both could be tapped; hubs particularly for those who favour empowerment approaches

moreover hubs tend to be well informed as to what world citizen/issue networks actively branch through a city

please do get in touch with me at chris.macrae@yahoo.co.uk if hubs may interest you; I would also like to explore the suggestion that SEs who work in cities may often need some sort of hub space to operate under - do some SEs deliberately seek to partner each other in sharing the space? how is the need or n ot to have a space where people can come and identify their needs and co-mentor (or start up joint projects) coded across ashoka's SEs? the space issue does not seem to get covered in write ups to sustainability of SE franchises as much as it could be; or are there some bookmarks or ways of searching ashoka.org you would advise me to look at in this regard