Step back in time at Elephant Pepper Camp, a glorious tented camp hidden in a grove of giant ebony and elephant pepper trees overlooking the Masai Mara Plains. Modern comforts are set amidst hurricane lamps, and sumptuous meals served under a ceiling of stars.

The View Out

The camp is situated in the heart of the protected Mara North Conservancy, a spectacular wilderness area on the northeastern border of the Mara National Reserve. Here now for 20 years, it is one of the original, very small and exclusive tented camps, and is located away from other lodges. With only 9 en-suite tents, this magical camp maintains the atmosphere that is usually felt only on a traditional, mobile luxury safari.

The View In

What They Are Doing

Elephant Pepper Camp was built with sustainability in mind. There are no generators, cement, or any permanent structures, making the camp completely movable. Nestling almost out of sight under its canopy of trees, it closes for two months a year to allow the ecosystem to regenerate.

The Masai Mara

Elephant Pepper was instrumental in the formation of the Mara North Conservancy, a spectacular 28,000 hectares on the northeast border of the Mara National Reserve, a core parcel within the Masai Mara ecosystem. For the exclusive use of its 12 member camps, it provides some of the Mara’s prime game viewing in complete privacy. At the same time it guarantees the more than 700 Masai landowners stable revenue, with the camps paying $112,000 a month in fixed lease payments, or $1.3 million annually. Almost twenty percent goes to conservation management with employment of rangers, vehicle surveillance, and maintenance of infrastructure.

Zebra on the Mara North Conservancy

The camp has worked with the local Masai community for nearly 20 years, with the creation of the conservancy being the latest development in preserving this vital wilderness.

Among the initiatives the camp has spearheaded and participated in: Water from Wildlife, bringing water to schools without damaging the ecosystem; it has also introduced water-catchment and -collection systems, as well as the concept of shallow wells to support the local communities.

Place of Rest

When the area surrounding the camp was designated a wildlife conservation area by the Masai, Elephant Pepper was instrumental in helping the local Masai relocate to their new homesteads. The camp also transported their building materials for them, in order to reduce the need for tree felling. It supports the Aitong Primary School, which has, since 2007, added a new classroom, kitchen, and new desks and chairs.

Guests are encouraged, whenever possible, to go on game walks instead of drives. This experience is unrivaled, especially as all of the guides have the prestigious SilverLevel qualification, making them some of the best in the country. Over eighty percent of the staff are employed from the surrounding communities.

The camp relies on solar power, ecofriendly toilets, and traditional bucket showers. Food is sourced locally as much as possible; glass is separated and sold to a recycling plant in Nairobi, all of whose funds are donated to the East African Women’s League to support a family planning program managed by the North Lake Branch in Naivasha.

A Burst of Color Outside the Mediterranean Villa

Who They Are

In the heart of Cantareira State Park, 50 minutes from Sao Paulo, Unique Garden (the English translation of the website is a bit obscure, but can be found in the lower right corner of Unique’s site) truly lives up to its name. Besides being a sought-after spa and health retreat, with 26 deluxe chalets, as much thought has gone into pampering clients as into creating the lodge around them.

The Presidential Villa

Eight agronomists work at rehabilitating the environment, the buildings curve in such a way as to avoid destroying trees, and even waste water is treated well enough to be returned to the nearby lake.

From the Presidential Villa to the Flower Chalet, the lodgings aim to indulge, even down to a ‘pillow menu.’ You can pick your own salad in Unique’s eponymous gardens, pluck your own fruit while walking through the orchards, and know that natural and organic and healthy are key words here.

In a Forest Kiosk

A wide range of exercise classes are offered, from yoga to tai chi, or you can cycle on the grounds or swim in one of two pools. At the spa, treatments are offered in the main building or in five secluded ‘kiosks’ scattered throughout the forest. The organic meals, with a slant towards Mediterranean cuisine, are created by chef Daniel Aquino and an on-site dietician.

What They Are Doing

A Suite Unique

Unique Garden, like the Hotel Unique in Sao Paulo, is owned by the Siaulys family, which is well known for its commitment to the community. Its most famous creation is the Laramara foundation, which cares for people with impaired vision. (Founder Victor Siaulys’ daughter was blind.) Over the course of 20 years, Laramara’s clients, as well as the services it offers, have expanded and diversified, so that today over seventy percent of patients have multiple disabilities (visual impairment associated with, say, cerebral palsy, deafness, or some mental illness).

At the Unique Garden, there is a conservation facility that is run in conjunction with the Brazilian Environmental Protection Institute, where wild animals that have been hurt or dislocated by human intervention are rehabilitated and released.  A community center looks after ‘the personal and professional development’ of its staff and their families, offering them courses in computers, English, music, recycling, yoga, and even bread-making.

In Their Own Words

“For us, social responsibility is not a fashion.”

Africa’s Eden was largely – if not entirely – responsible for Gabon’s rise in the last decade on the world travel map. It had not only created camps such as its flagship Loango Lodge and Evengué Lodge, but it had contributed extensively to conservation projects, including studies of the lowland gorillas.

In September, Africa’s Eden announced that the hiccups had been sorted out, and that it would be back in business in Gabon. More than $1 million is also being spent to improve the camps, extend the runway, and increase the capacity of the local school. Loango will reopen for business in mid-December.

Local Products from Misool

In just a few years, Misool Eco Resort has become a diving hot spot, a top destination in Indonesia, and a driving force behind transforming hundreds of square miles around Raja Ampat into a sanctuary for marine life.

Being good to the environment, however, has not stopped Misool from constantly figuring out ways to be good to its clients – and the latest addition to the resort is a spa. And Misool being Misool, it’s a spa with a local twist. Massages as well as body and beauty treatments employ a range of products obtained and produced as close to home as possible, many of them organic and made on site the very same day.

Scrubs are hand-blended from ingredients such as candlenut and coconut, face toner is derived from freshly pressed cucumber, body wraps use aloe plants and banana leaves from Misool’s orchard, and scrubs are made from Papuan highland coffee.

As if the sea in these parts wasn’t therapeutic enough!

Singita Lebombo

Is it possible for a travel destination to be luxurious, hot (as in magazine-worthy), and sustainable? If anyone proves it, Singita does.

This African-based company has properties that go a long way to show that their hearts and minds are in the right place – they care about where they are and what they are doing. Travel is their business, but a business that has to last and in a country that has to last. Singita Grumeti, in Tanzania, has virtually turned what used to be a virtual wasteland (after years of illegal hunting and poaching) into an Eden. Bordering on the Serengeti, the 350,000 acres now have as good as you’ll get animal-wise (and probably even better than) in the iconic park next-door.

Sabora Tented Camp, Grumeti

Working with the community surrounding Grumeti is as much a part of the day-to-day as it is in Pamushana,  in Zimbabwe. For years now the property, which lies adjacent to the stunning and barely visited Gonarezhou park, has served thousands of meals daily to local children. Singita’s community work dates back to 1998 already. Whether it is buying products locally, supporting a cooking academy for staff (watch the video), or contributing to local schools, the company is doing it.

At the ever-popular Lebombo and Sweni lodges in Kruger Park, South Africa, Singita has tried to emphasize low-impact design, creating stunning rooms made of glass, steel, and reeds, perched singly on a ridge. An ongoing program of monitoring the wildlife and land around Singita’s first lodges, Ebony and Boulders lodges, in Sabi Sand, South Africa, endeavors to keep the much-used park seemingly untouched.

Children at Pamushana

At each of these properties, the work with low-impact design, the community, and the wildlife goes on daily and never ends. And that Singita doesn’t forget.

Kafue River

Certain countries and hotels are repeatedly brought to our attention for the way they train locals, pay for schools, invest in local artists, buy medicine, fund anti-poaching – if it’s not Costa Rica, it’s any number of lodges in Kenya or a resort in Indonesia. But one rather unusual candidate has started popping up in recent months – Zambia.

The Bushcamp Company's Chindeni Camp, South Luangwa

Until a decade ago, Zambia was relatively unknown to travelers looking at Africa as a first-time destination. Its economy small, it didn’t have the resources to fund the kind of international tourism campaigns of South Africa or Tanzania. So it has always come across as an also-ran, second or third choice. Its best national parks, South Luangwa and Lower Zambezi, have also never had the cachet of the Serengeti or the Masai Mara.

Sausage Tree Camp, Lower Zambezi

In a way, though, this off-the-radarness might have contributed to Zambia’s charm today. There are 19 national parks, none of them nearly as crammed with lodges as Kenya, Tanzania, and South Africa, with the competition good and yet friendly. The philosophy among operators seems to be less about being cut-throat than about working together towards a common goal. And the goal is to take care of the country without and within.

The SLCS on Patrol

First in a notable series of initiatives is Zambian Horizons, a group of lodges that, despite being competitors, pool their resources to publicize the country. At this year’s Indaba, the huge annual African travel-trade powwow in Durban, South Africa, these camps walked away with most Best Of awards. Working together has worked for them individually.

Inside the country the South Luangwa Conservation Society (SLCS) keeps tabs on conservation at every level. More than a dozen camps and lodges participate, including Flatdogs, Robin Pope Safaris, and Norman Carr Safaris. (See more). Each camp often does its own work too, generating small offshoot projects, and offering trips to local communities or craftspeople. Robin Pope Safaris is a case in point.

The Victoria Falls, Zambia

As in any country with parkland and a burgeoning population nearby clamoring for land, there is a knock-on effect. Animals get poached for commercial reasons, for sustenance, or for being in the wrong place at the wrong time. Some get shot for damaging farmers’ crops.

The School Gets New Chairs

By the early ’90’s, the Zambian Wildlife Authority was struggling to tackle the problem of increased poaching. Local tour operators and lodges offered to help ZAWA by providing scouts, whose salaries needed to be paid and who required uniforms, vehicles, and training. For this they carried out fundraising drives. And so was born the Rapid Action Team – better known as Ratz.

Planting New Trees

Over time the lodge operators and the Ratz team realized there was a lot more they could do, especially in terms of the conflict between humans and wildlife, education, and wildlife rescue and rehabilitation. Ratz became the SLCS, and its programs have expanded and flourished. In 2009, it even started a mini-marathon, which drew scouts, police, farmers, schoolchildren, teachers, and members of the Zambian Air Force. At the last event there were more than 300 runners. This year, it launched an Eco Awards program that is focused solely on local works.

Project Luangwa, meanwhile, is a charitable organization supported by five safari operators in South Luangwa – besides Flatdogs and Robin Pope, there is Kafunta River Lodge, Shenton Safaris, and Crocodile Valley Camp. It aims to help local communities improve their long-term economic prospects while also avoiding a negative impact on the environment and wildlife. By developing and improving schools, creating a vocational training center, and supporting the micro-financing of small businesses, it tries to give families the chance of a lasting and sustainable income.

Working with Chilies

Among Project Luangwa’s innovative projects is one to keep elephants and other wildlife away from crops by using chilies. Yes, chilies. The peppers are used to make fences and are also added to bricks made of elephant dung that are burned at nighttime to keep animals away. Locals are offered chili seedlings to grow themselves. Project Luangwa also builds schools (check out its website to get an idea of its range of activities).

On the Zambezi River

In the Lower Zambezi national park, SLCS’s equivalent is Conservation Lower Zambezi. Members include Sausage Tree Camp and Chiawa. For the past 8 years it has been funded largely by the Danish Embassy, which has allowed it to buy a plane and establish a base camp outside the park boundaries. From its environmental education center, it runs a mobile education unit, media promotion, and safari guide training.

That many travelers to Zambia don’t know about these projects says a lot about the lodges and operators that fund and run them. They could shout their achievements from the rooftops, but they rather focus on giving their guests a great safari, a great time, and a great lodge. Doing good things for the locals they do behind the scenes. For them it’s all in a day’s work.

- Caren Banks

Going Wild at Rincón del Socorro

Who They Are

Estancia Rincón del Socorro is a 12,000-hectare former cattle ranch on the edge of the Esteros del Iberá, wetlands in northeastern Argentina that have been turned into a nature reserve by the Conservation Land Trust. The trust was started in 1992 by Douglas Tompkins, co-founder of The North Face and ESPRIT clothing lines.

A Room at Rincón

Fresh from the Garden

There are two lodgings in the wetlands. Rincón del Socorro is a small, refined accommodations in the ranch’s refurbished main house. There are six rooms in the house and three more small bungalows, all with private bathrooms and one with a sitting room and a kitchenette. No two rooms are alike. The main house has a large living room, a screened veranda, a large dining room, and a terrace dining area. Guests can partake in boat rides, horseback riding, biking, wildlife viewing and bird-watching, nature walks, and fly-fishing for dorado.

Estancia San Alonso, a 56,000-hectare ranch located in the middle of the Esteros del Iberá, was a cattle operation until purchased by the trust in 1996. Today it serves as one of the key areas for the trust’s ongoing species-reintroduction program in the wetlands.

The Estancia

The main house of San Alonso, which has five rooms, sits at the shore of the Paraná Lake in the middle of the Esteros del Iberá and is coolly shaded by a grove of old lapacho and timbo trees. Many of the vegetables come from its own gardens. Visitors can walk or ride out onto the savanna, through native forests, around waterways. There is also a boat to go on the lake and up the Carambola River.

What They Are Doing

There are few regions in Argentina that can compare to the wealth and diversity of species found in the Esteros del Ibera. The trust is not only dedicated to the creation and expansion of national or provincial parks but also supports programs for the protection of wildlife, the reintroduction of locally extinct species, land restoration and programs for local development.

The Wetlands

Though there are notable species that have been wiped out by overhunting and loss of  habitat because of ranching and forestry plantations, there are also lots of species left to see, including carpinchos, freshwater otters, alligators, marsh deer and, with a little patience and good luck, the elusive maned wolf, howler monkey, or the sprocket deer.

A Rhea and Her Chicks

As part of a 30-year management strategy, biologists employed by Tompkins plan to reintroduce species such as the giant river otter, pampa deer, giant anteater, talking parrot and, eventually, the jaguar. After 30 years’ absence of anteaters in Corrientes, there are now seven in the wetlands. The transfer to the reserve of four pampa deer, which used to roam northern and central Argentina, took place in July this year.

In Their Own Words

“Our hope is to contribute towards promoting the ethos of a healthy earth, raise the management standards for protected areas, and create national or provincial parks by means of direct purchases and re-categorization or expansion of existing ones, so that the continuity of their natural processes is ensured. In this way we can maintain some parts of the territories in which we operate alive and healthy, so that these areas remain as seeds and genetic banks to revive the ecosystems in the event of a collapse.”

A Pool in a Place Like No Other

Who They Are

The unforgettable Ibo Island Lodge lies just north of the mainland city of Pemba in pristine northern Mozambique, and the island is one of 27 that make up the breathtakingly beautiful Quirimbas Archipelago.

Ibo, 1912

Remote and untouched by commercial development, Ibo is one of the most fascinating, idyllic, and romantic islands – adjectives that easily apply to the lodge too. For several hundred years Ibo was a prosperous Arab trading post on the east coast of Africa. Three forts, a beautiful old Catholic church, and numerous ancient trading buildings stand guard over the sea.  Pirates, ivory, intrigue and the never-to-be-forgotten slave trade are a part of its rich history.

Position at Sunset

The lodge takes up three magnificent mansions, each over a century old and located right on a prime waterfront site, where dhows sail out to sea at high tide. Each of the 9 en-suite rooms is individually designed, large, air-conditioned, and they boast antiques and handcrafted furniture with marvelous wooden doors and shutters that evoke the original design. Guests can immerse themselves in the unchanged, ancient culture of Ibo and the rare chance to interact with the wonderfully hospitable islanders.

Meals feature fresh Ibo-grown organic vegetables, fruits and produce, traditional specialties, and, of course, seafood. Romantic dinners are served on the wide tranquil verandas or on the roof terrace restaurant, both with awesome views over the sea.

The Sand Spit off Ibo

What They Are Doing

Ibo Island has 4000 inhabitants, of whom only a small number had formal employment. The lodge has made a significant impact on the local economy, employing and also training up to 150 employees during the construction and development phase.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=b5vEjN3WKBI

Click here for more videos about Ibo.

The Main Lounge

Before the lodge’s nascence, the community had no exposure to tourism or the outside world. Few had any education and in many cases did not even speak or write Portuguese.  The lodge has provided a solid training facility with the development of the Ibo Island Community Training Centre, delivering education programs that deal with, among other things, English literacy, guiding techniques, tourism etiquette, small enterprise development, and the presentation of the unique cultural and historical features of Ibo. The facility is free to all community members.

Jewelry Made by Ibo Silversmiths

Making use of the old Arab coffee plantations that still exist on Ibo, the lodge hand grinds and open-fire-roasts its world-class coffee. Its agricultural project will focus on the production of coffee, as well as a market garden producing fresh vegetables, herbs, and fruit for the lodge.

Even the Decay is an Artwork

A marine turtle research project aims to support international research efforts into turtle biology and ecology and to protect marine turtles, and turtle eggs, from illegal and inadvertent harvesting on Ibo.

Silversmiths, part of an ancient tradition here, hand-craft exquisite intricate jewelry using old Arab techniques and tools. The key element to sustain this craft is providing high quality raw materials.  In order to do this, the lodge has set up a distribution network with a company in Cape Town called Africa Nova who will be able to provide a far greater return for the silversmiths. This jewelry is found no where else in the world and guests can observe the art and commission pieces from the lodge’s silversmith project.

By creating jobs where there were none, Ibo Lodge has had other positive influences, reducing the reliance on fishing as a primary source of income and food. Among other projects the lodge is involved in is a local Montessori school.

Rooftop View

In Their Own Words

“As the first tourism investor on Ibo Island and specialist tour operator to the Quirimbas Archipelago, the company believes that it is critical that local communities benefit from tourism development. One of the key approaches of Ibo Island Lodge has been that of supporting and creating projects on Ibo that will serve to create income and livelihoods for other members of the communities.”

On Lake Chalalán

Who They Are

Started by the community of San José de Uchupiamonas, a Quechua-Tacana ethnic group, Chalalán Ecolodge lies in the vast Madidi National Park in the Bolivian Amazon, which is so big the altitude varies between 200 and 6000 meters above sea level.

A Cabin Interior

This tropical Andean hotspot is host to some 45,000 different plant species and over 1,000 tropical bird species, a world record. Thirteen cabins, which range from the more luxurious en-suite doubles to twins with shared bathrooms, have been built under thatch in the traditional Tacana style and lie near the edge of the magnificent Chalalán Lagoon.

Coming Ashore at Chalalán

The half dozen lodge dugouts lined up on the shoreline take you on adventures through the jungle waterways like the Tuichi River. Thirty kilometers of paths have been designed to show off the tropical rainforest and its ecological processes, natural history, medicinal plants, hardwood trees, birds, mammals, amphibians, insects, and a variety of fungi.

One of the Cabins

What They Are Doing

There are ecolodges, there are sustainable lodges, and then there is Chalalán, a place that seems to embody what good-hearted tourism is all about.

In the 1990s two major concerns for the remote community – it’s a five-hour boat ride from the town of Rurrenabaque – were poverty and the government’s lack of interest in health, education, basic services, and access to the region. Seeing tourism as their potential savior, several locals started to learn about lodge management, guiding, logistics, and other skills needed to be able to run tours for medium- and high-end travelers.

Starting with no money, they soon started receiving donations from individuals impressed with their vision and then from, among others, Conservation International. The lodge and its activities were developed with a respect to local culture, traditions, and the amazing natural surroundings.

The cabin walls are made from the copa palm and covered with matting, the roofs woven with asaí palm leaves, and the floors made of fine hardwood. There is solar power, water is purified, and they have a waste-management system, features that are only the more incredible because of the remoteness of the lodge and the relative inexperience of the community.

A Toucan, One of 1000 Species

The lodge is owned, managed, and staffed by the community of San José de Uchupiamonas, and all profits go entirely to them. Besides benefiting 450 families,  it protects the thousands of hectares of rainforest inside their territory.

In Their Own Words

“Our indigenous community is committed to the integral development of ecotourism in the Madidi National Park, aiming our efforts at the sustainable use of natural resources in the Chalalán region by offering highly competitive ecotourism services that improve the living conditions of the people of San José de Uchupiamonas, by generating direct and indirect benefits, which will also guarantee the sustainability of the territory and the Quechua-Tacana culture for the wellbeing of future generations.”