US$100
Buys 12 excellent-quality, warm and hard-wearing fleece jackets for children.
Giving Back to the Communities
Our Mountain Community Project
Each year we return part of our trekking profits to the families who live in the valleys we walk through. A modest fund, run with care: warm clothes for children, school supplies, a new toilet at a campsite, drainage pipes for a village. Small things that matter to the people who make our treks possible.
Profits Back to Communities
A Separate, Open Fund
Delivered in Person
Fund Started
Delivered On the Ground
People in Unchus Reached
Fleece Suits for Huarca
The Reality of Life in the Mountains
In many parts of the Cordillera Blanca and Cordillera Huayhuash, families and children live in hard conditions: very basic housing, no medical care, hours of walking to the nearest school or village, a poor diet, and no spare cash for clothes, school books or pens.
Each year Peruvian Andes Adventures gives part of its trekking income back to one of the poorer communities in the areas where we run treks and climbs. Donations of money or clothes from our clients are very welcome too, and we make sure every one of them reaches a worthy cause.
What We Have Given Back, Year by Year
The money goes to warm clothes for children in the poorest communities, to notebooks, pens and pencils for the schools, or to another project that helps the community — above all the children. Many families simply cannot afford warm clothing or school supplies, and many communities lack the means for small but basic improvements: keeping a school in repair, building a toilet, setting up somewhere to dispose of rubbish.
When the trekking season ends each year, we choose a community to visit, hand out clothes and school supplies to the children, or get to work on a project that makes a real difference to them.
[ Historical Profit Reinvestment Map ]
Trek Season 2016
US$246
Trek Season 2015
US$376
Trek Season 2013 / 2014
US$1,254
Trek Season 2012
US$818
Trek Season 2011
US$950
Trek Season 2010
US$630
Trek Season 2009
US$1,000
Trek Season 2008
US$1,000
Trek Season 2007
US$800
Trek Season 2006
US$360 What US$100 Buys in the Mountains
Even a modest donation goes a long way up here. The clients' contributions are kept in a separate fund, accounted for, and spent in full on the children. Here is what it adds up to.
US$100
Supplies 120 school notebooks for classrooms in remote valleys.
US$100
Provides 550 pens for children at isolated primary schools.
100%
Of the clothes our clients donate are checked, accounted for and handed out in person.
A Few of the Projects, Year by Year
At the end of each season we pick a community and go. Here are some of the visits and small projects your treks have made possible.
2016: Christmas at Copa Chica School
We visited the primary school of Copa Chica, in a remote spot at the foot of Copa mountain. These children rarely get to Huaraz, so we threw a Christmas party with cake, and gave each child a warm jacket and a pencil case with pencils.
2015: School Supplies for Pashpa
Hisao and Ami took notebooks, pencils, pens, educational games and hand towels to the primary school at Pashpa, at the entrance to the Ishinca valley. Many of our donkey drivers have children or grandchildren at that school.
2014: Rubbish Drums at the Trailheads
We placed rubbish drums at the start of some of the busiest treks in the Cordillera Blanca — Pitec, Cashapampa, Vaquería, Hualcayan and Llaca — since the National Park provides no rubbish facilities on the routes, to help keep the valleys clean.
2013: Chairs for Cashapampa School
The school at Cashapampa, where the Santa Cruz trek begins and where many of our donkey drivers live, had desks but almost no chairs. Our team delivered 50 sturdy new chairs at a ceremony at the school. The children are very happy to study in comfort now.
Josué: From Porter to Furniture Maker
Our friends from the USA — Rosalie Hilburn, Nancy Rathe, their friends and members of the Federal Way Lions Club, along with Mark Jedlinski — showed extraordinary generosity, raising a substantial sum to set up an education fund for our delightful young Josué. He had worked as a porter on a trek with this group in 2007, and they were struck by how responsible and helpful he was — rare in a lad of seventeen. Josué was burning to study and earn a qualification, but he had no way to pay for it. He comes from a village with few opportunities, and his father had recently passed away.
Thanks to the kindness of these friends, Josué was able to enrol and finish his studies. That August, Nancy came back to Huaraz and we held a small celebration where she handed the donation to Josué and his very happy mum.
Josué in His Workshop
With some of the handmade furniture from his own workshop.
Want to Help?
Lend a Hand to a Family or a Community
We are always glad to pass on and manage any help our clients would like to give — to a child, a family or a community in our area. Write to us and we will tell you how your group can take part.