Volunteer travel does not offer your usual relaxing holiday experience, but as MercuryNews.com writer Vicki Larson found on a project in Utah, the satisfaction it can bring more than compensates.

Larson volunteered with an Arizona-based organisation that works towards protecting America’s wildest natural environments.

While she was aware of the burgeoning voluntourism market, Larson “wasn’t interested in being part of a hot trend”, she simply “desperately wanted a vacation…I wanted to be outdoors; I wanted to be doing something useful”.

Larson’s fellow volunteers seemed to have similar motivations for their trip. Paul Inderhees, a 60-year old from Cincinnati, explained that volunteer work “appeals to a little altruistic streak in me”.

Although strenuous, Larson reflects on the trip with great satisfaction. For her, what made the volunteer project “so special was the camaraderie as well as the sense of accomplishment.”

Inderhees agrees: “In addition to doing some good, hard work with a tangible result, there’s the satisfaction that comes from working with a diverse group of people who came together for a shared reason. That is my favourite part.”

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