villa maria, peru - gap year

learn

spanish and culture

Located high in the Andes, at 2,850 meters, on the slopes of an active volcano, Quito is a melting pot of Indigenous and Spanish Culture. Immerse yourself in the South American lifestyle. Open your eyes to a tantalizing mixture of food, dance and language. Learn Spanish with intensive one-to-one lessons. Put it into practice by visiting some true Latin American gems; vibrant indigenous markets, pristine beaches, dense cloud forests. Experience the passion of a football match, the cultural history buried under hundreds of years of colonial architecture, try your hand at balancing an egg on a nail. Quito offers a wealth of once in a lifetime experiences, all you need to do is be willing...

where: Quito

what: learning Spanish and getting to know your team

how long: 3 weeks

villa maria, peru - gap year

children

Kids, football, dancing and cross dressing?!

Villa Maria is home to around 700,000 people living below the poverty line, scraping a living by any means possible. The lack of facilities is evident - many houses are without electricity and sanitation. Long working hours and low pay combine to leave children alone, forced to wander the streets, often ending up in trouble with the law. Despite these setbacks, the children are enthusiastic and truly inspiring to spend time with. Their attitude, even when faced with terrible hardships, really opens the eyes of those who volunteer at Villa Maria. It is incredible how volunteering yourself and working alongside children can make a difference to their lives as well as changing your own.

where: Lima

what: providing children with the best summer holiday possible

how long: 4 weeks

villa maria, peru - gap year

explore

An assault on the senses

Being blessed with the most diverse landscape in the world, South America offers such a vast variety of natural wonders, from the driest dessert in the world to the largest mountains outside of the Himalayas. Ride the white water of the Urubumba river, learn to ice climb on some of the most beautiful mountains in the world, buggy over the dunes, strap on a sand board and shoot down, wake up at the crack of dawn to see the sun rise over Machu Picchu. The list is endless and the expedition is bespoke. It is an amazing place to explore.

where: Peru, Chile, Bolivia

what: an opportunity to delve into the wild

how long: 6 weeks

villa maria, peru - gap year

in a nutshell

trip summary

Learn Spanish in Quito, Ecuador for two or three weeks, then spend four weeks working with children in the a shanty town. Finish with a six-week adventure exploring the length and breadth of the Andes and jungle. Team sizes from 10 to 16.