G Adventures of Toronto, Ontario Canada with 28 offices around the world provides over 700 itineraries across 100+ countries.
Travel with G Adventures and join an expansive community of travellers dedicated to exploring the globe in a sustainable fashion.
G Adventures and Planeterra work closely together on projects designed to assist women, youth and Indigenous communities around the globe. Their social enterprises empower locals by creating job and income opportunities and conserving local culture.
The G Adventures Story
G Adventures was established by Bruce Poon Tip in 1990 as a social enterprise to make an impactful statement about global travel. Their tours focus on meaningful relationships with local communities that directly benefit those included on an itinerary while creating ripple effects that reach far beyond. Employees, supplier/agent partners, small business owners, customers/followers as well as travelers benefit.
G Adventures has long been at the forefront of community tourism. Over its 31-year history, they have pioneered this form of travel by organizing more than 600 tours that directly support local communities.
G Adventures’ authentic trips provide life-enriching cultural experiences like homestays and workshops – perfect for experiencing off-the-beaten-path travel and connecting with locals! To ensure travel remains sustainable, G Adventures provides a variety of eco-friendly excursions featuring these experiences.
G Adventures maintained its responsible travel commitment during the COVID-19 pandemic by making donations of over $122,000 to essential needs in local communities worldwide. Furthermore, a CEO Wellbeing Fund was set up in order to offer financial and mentoring assistance for former CEOs who have left G Adventures and established socially conscious tourism businesses on their own.
Planeterra Foundation
Planeterra Foundation, G Adventures’ non-profit partner, designs and promotes unique tourist experiences that generate essential revenue for communities in 50 countries around the globe. Through social enterprise projects, Planeterra supports Indigenous communities, empower women, grant youth access to employment opportunities and protect the environment.
Travellers on G Adventures tours can visit these social enterprise projects and experience how travel has an effect on local people and the world around them. Since 2003, Planeterra has enabled over 70% of G Adventures travellers to encounter at least one such project during their adventures.
Planeterra works closely with local partners to identify tourism-related community and social needs and develop innovative, scalable solutions. This often involves finding new partners, developing training materials, providing funding sources, and overseeing each tourism experience from its inception until completion.
Planeterra currently works with multiple partners across Asia Pacific. One such partnership includes Coope San Juan in Costa Rica which was provided with 20 bicycles to assist their community host over 1,000 G Adventures travellers each year on cycling tours.
Eco-Friendly Travel Practices
G Adventures is an established adventure travel company committed to ecotourism practices. Their small group tours combine cultural immersion and adventure activities designed to have a positive effect on local communities.
G Adventures places an emphasis on eco-friendly travel as part of its business model, striving to continuously improve its practices. Their responsible travel policy guides all of their operations while the Planeterra Foundation serves to support sustainability projects within communities they visit.
Furthermore, they encourage travellers to bring reusable water bottles and reduce plastic use, and work with accommodation partners to provide safe drinking water and create tools to reduce travelers’ environmental impact.
Travelers looking for proof that a destination practices sustainable tourism can rely on certification or rating systems, like the Global Sustainable Tourism Council (GSTC), to verify this fact. They provide global criteria that define responsible travel practices at destinations and travel industry players and validates them with gold certification.
Ethical Animal Encounters
Immersion with animals can be an amazing experience, but it is also essential that travellers consider the impact of their travel experiences on these organisms.
Recent years have witnessed increasing scrutiny regarding the welfare of wild animals at tourist attractions. To respond, major travel operators such as STA Travel and TripAdvisor have distanced themselves from unethical wildlife attractions.
G Adventures offers an ethical animal encounter experience for every occasion, ranging from snorkelling with sea lions in Galapagos to tracking endangered mountain gorillas in Uganda. Each once-in-a-lifetime experience is approved by Jane Goodall Collection to guarantee you’re supporting endangered wildlife and local communities while prioritising animal welfare.
Before booking any animal encounter tours, always research your tour operator’s ethical animal policy. A policy should detail which types of wildlife encounters are ethical and which ones aren’t, helping you make an informed decision before booking.
Promoting Cultural Preservation
Responsible travel means respecting and preserving the culture of each area visited – this includes languages, stories, songs and dances as well as traditional arts and crafts, buildings, sacred sites and forms of subsistence that relate directly to land use.
G Adventures is committed to conserving and protecting the cultural heritage of each place its tours visit, working closely with local suppliers and tour guides to ensure its trips benefit both their economies as well as helping preserve local cultures.
Planeterra Foundation promotes community tourism and educates travelers on the value of social responsibility through tours that visit projects created by its non-profit partner Planeterra Foundation, which assists communities around the globe with sustainable projects.
Travelers can select from an assortment of itineraries, such as classic adventure tours and active/cultural tours. In addition, National Geographic Journeys with G Adventures provide tours specially curated by both organizations.
Traveler Benefits & Experiences
G Adventures offers tours that promote responsible travel and community tourism, making it easier than ever before to find something to suit your travel style. They provide an impressive variety of tours aimed at responsible tourism that are tailored specifically towards local communities.
These tours offer small-group experiences (usually 12 people or less), designed to combine structured activities and free time, giving travelers an opportunity to connect with other travellers as well as make memories together with their tour guide while at the same time exploring independently.
Excursions provided by this provider are known for being of superior quality, taking visitors to some of the world’s most stunning destinations. With several styles of tours available ranging from luxury and eco-friendly tours, there is bound to be one suitable for you and your needs.
G Adventures is committed to minimizing their environmental footprint, which is why they work with local businesses instead of international chains and have partnered with Planeterra as a non-profit to reduce their carbon footprint. Their trips also offer guaranteed departures as well as eco-friendly accommodations.
G Adventures’ Sustainability Initiatives
G Adventures takes pride in its ethical and sustainable travel policies. These policies include animal welfare, respecting indigenous cultures and non-profit partnerships; every tour also features a Ripple Score that indicates how much of the money spent goes back into local communities.
G Adventures collaborates with Royal Mountain Travel (RMT) to foster sustainability and empower women. They do this through supporting local communities and their indigenous populations via the Community Homestay Project and by creating opportunities for all types of vendors by opening restaurants and hotels that source locally.
G Adventures’ Bike with Purpose program on Caye Caulker in Belize provides training to high school students so they can serve as guides and share their expertise with travellers – bringing not only tangible benefits to these young individuals, but also giving them a sense of purpose in life.
These partnerships serve as an outstanding example of how community tourism can have a positive impact on both the environment and local economy, making an ideal model for replication globally.
Responsible Travel Tips & Guidelines
An ethical choice to explore the world responsibly, responsible travel is not only ethically sound but can make your trip even more enriching and meaningful. Additionally, responsible tourism helps support local communities while strengthening tourism sector with respect to nature, rights, history, culture and wellbeing.
G Adventures actively supports responsible travel through its various initiatives and their sustainable policies are designed to minimize their environmental footprint, assist local communities, and advance more environmentally-friendly travel practices.
As well, they offer an assortment of travel styles, trip itineraries and departure dates that make incorporating responsible travel into your vacation easy. Plus, should anything arise to delay it further they will reimburse your deposit!
Responsible travel is an integral component of travel and it is ultimately up to each one of us to take responsibility for our actions while traveling. While it may not always be straightforward, G Adventures has put together some useful travel tips and guidelines which should help ensure responsible travel experiences!
In Conclusion
G Adventures offers a unique and responsible approach to travel that benefits both travelers and local communities. Their commitment to sustainability, responsible tourism, and ethical practices are demonstrated through their partnerships with non-profit organizations, eco-friendly travel practices, and cultural preservation efforts. G Adventures’ tours provide an opportunity to explore the world in a way that is both meaningful and enriching, while also empowering local communities and preserving cultural heritage.
As travelers become increasingly conscious of their impact on the environment and local communities, G Adventures’ approach to sustainable tourism offers a refreshing alternative to traditional travel. By choosing to travel with G Adventures, individuals can feel confident that their trip is having a positive impact on the world around them. With a wide variety of tours and travel styles, there is something for everyone, from adventurous backpackers to luxury travelers. G Adventures is paving the way for a more responsible and sustainable future of travel, and we can’t wait to see what they do next.