Southeast Asia · Conservation
Northern Thailand
Community-based elephant, gibbon, and forest conservation in the mountain forests of the north.
Central America · Conservation
Costa Rica
Community-led rainforest and wildlife monitoring inside an Indigenous reserve on the Caribbean coast.
- Track record
- Since 2005
- Focus areas
- 1 offered
- From
- $1,340 USD for 2 weeks
- Start dates
- Rolling
Your host
Who you’d be working with
Your host has run a long-term biodiversity monitoring program inside an Indigenous reserve on the Caribbean coast since 2005: thousands of acres of lowland rainforest surveyed almost daily, in close partnership with the Indigenous community whose land it is.
The science is genuine fieldwork: line transects, point counts, camera traps watching for wild cats, and raptor counts under one of the world’s busiest migration corridors. The research station sits an uphill forest walk from the road; that’s the commute. Data goes to conservation partners and builds the community’s capacity to run the work for good.
- Region
- Central America
- Focus
- Conservation
- Established
- Since 2005
- Launch destination
- Yes
The work
What you’d actually do
4–6 hours a day, matched to the partner’s current needs during your screening call.
Focus areas offered
- Line transects, point counts, and encounter surveys across the reserve
- Camera-trap network monitoring wild cats
- Migratory raptor counts in season
- Amphibian and reptile surveys
- Species data for conservation partners and community capacity-building
Included
Everything your Program Fee covers
- Shared volunteer accommodation at or near each project, from village bases and homestays to small hotels and hostels
- All daily meals
- Daily transport to and from the project, including boat transfers where the project needs them
- In-country orientation
- Basic language lessons, cultural events and community activities
- Role-specific training where the project needs it
- 4 to 6 hours of supervised work a day
- A local emergency contact and in-country support from our NGO partner
What your stay in Costa Rica costs
| Stay | Total |
|---|---|
| 2 weeksour minimum | $1,340 |
| 4 weeks1 month | $2,180 |
| 8 weeks2 months | $4,110 |
| 12 weeks3 months | Recommended$5,790 |
| 24 weeks6 months | $11,080 |
Deposit + Program Fee · all prices in USD
Not included: flights, visas, travel insurance (required), vaccinations and personal spending.
Safety & trust
Questions people ask before they go
How are partners vetted?
Every partner is an established local nonprofit with years of hosting experience, formal safeguarding policies, vetted accommodation, and a trained on-site supervisor as your daily contact. Partners commit to contracted expectations and regular reporting. More on safety.
Why don’t you name your partner organizations?
Naming grassroots organizations publicly gets them flooded with unsolicited outreach. We describe each partner richly without naming them, and you’ll be introduced to your partner by name a minimum of 30 days before departure. Why we work this way.
What if something goes wrong in-country?
You have a local emergency contact from your partner organization, and your Placement Coordinator as the escalation point. Travel insurance covering your whole placement is required on every program. Orientation covers exactly who to call, for what, before you need to.
Am I actually useful, or is this voluntourism?
Fair question. It’s the one we built the whole model around. Placements exist only where a partner has asked for them, you work under a local supervisor on their agenda, and we encourage longer stays because two weeks of goodwill doesn’t equal three months of consistency. We won’t manufacture a project to sell you a trip.
More destinations
Where else you could go
Indian Ocean · Conservation
Madagascar
Forest and reef research beside a national park, on an island off the northwest coast.
Southeast Asia · Conservation
Southern Thailand
Seagrass, mangrove, and dugong-habitat conservation on the Andaman coast.
Ready for Costa Rica?
Applications are open with rolling start dates, and the screening call works both ways.