Visions Service Adventures

The largest state with a landmass one-fifth the contiguous United States has half the world's active volcanoes and more than half the planet's glaciers. Untouched wilderness stretching to the horizon; mountains not viewed so much as experienced; magnificent wild creatures. Because the Alaska sun never truly sets in July, the deep night skies stay like early evening dusk.

America's fourth largest state is home to less than one million people. Montana is vast prairies and range lands, golden grain fields and wildernesses abundant with timber, water, and wildlife. Spectacular sunsets are daily occurrences. Montana also is home to seven Plains Indian reservations, each a semi-sovereign nation with distinctive histories.

Since 2006 in partnerships with the North Gulfport Land Trust, Audubon Mississippi, and Turkey Creek Community Initiatives VISIONS participants have accomplished impressive service. This includes construction of a 600 sq. ft. outdoor environmental classroom; fishing decks and a 50' arched wooden walking bridge over a Turkey Creek tributary that eases access to community.

Islands rising up out of crystal clear blue waters. Mountain peaks touching trade wind clouds. Crescent-shaped white sand beaches stretching endlessly, startling the eye. A proud Afro-Caribbean heritage alive in a culture with all the flavor of the local fruit trees and all the rainbow variety of the fish swimming offshore.

Dominica is hard core service work in a West Indies country. The Nature Island of the Caribbean is one of the purest of paradises, relatively untouched by tourist hordes. Nearly two-thirds of English-speaking Dominica is undeveloped. Its 365 rivers and streams are mostly usable by boats no larger than canoes. So abundant is fresh water that Dominica exports it to neighboring islands.

This five-week experience embraces both urban and rural Vietnam: the bustle of historic Hanoi, Hue, Da Nang, and the serene green landscapes of unsurpassed beauty contrasting rice paddies, rolling hills, mountains and jungles.... Service is the centering lens through which you will view Vietnam. We live in the Ba Vi district an hour southwest of Hanoi at the Thuy An Disabled Children's Center where you will mingle daily with Vietnamese of all ages and backgrounds.

In the French West Indies where French is spoken with a musical island lilt and Creole is a second mother tongue, Guadeloupe is comprised of nine inhabited islands, two very large and seven relatively small. It has seen Spanish, English, and French Colonial settlers and the importation of West Africa slaves and indentured servants from Asian India. All brought traditions that have blended over centuries into a cultural complexity experienced in a local cuisine that combines French sauces, curry spices and fresh seafood.

The island nation of the Dominican Republic is one of the most culturally vibrant and historically rich countries in the Americas. The warmth and resilience of Dominicans have charmed and inspired VISIONS participants since 1991. VISIONS's history in the communities where we live is one of mutual respect, deep friendships and enduring partnerships such as with the Sabana Perdida Lions Club with whom we collaborate every summer.

Well past the political turbulence of three decades ago, Nicaragua has become one of the safest of Central American destinations. Arguably, it has the most breathtaking landscapes in all of Central America. Nicaragua is second only to Haiti as one of the poorest countries in the Western Hemisphere. It is the least densely populated yet physically the largest in Central America. In the Americas only the Brazil Amazon rainforest is larger than Nicaragua's rainforest; one-fifth of Nicaragua remains protected in national parks or biological reserves. The population, largely mestizo, is youthful with 40% of Nicaraguans under the age of 18.

Mitad del Mundo is a land of extraordinary contrasts where wood-burning stoves, thatched roof dwellings and cell phones co-exist. Where the planet's rarest species live on an isolate of islands 600 miles off the coast, drawing scientists and tourists from around the globe. Where the fishing and farming activities of growing numbers of Ecuadorians living on the Galapagos threaten the very existence of this extraordinary eco-system.

Peru claims 84 of the world's 103 known ecological zones and 28 different climates, placing it among the five countries with the greatest biological diversity in the world. Stretching along its Pacific Coast is a continuous coastal desert at whose southern end begins the Atacama, one of the world's harshest deserts; its eastern boundary lies within the lush Amazon Basin. The Andean peaks rise to their most majestic height in the heart of Peru's southern interior in which lies our home base of Urubamba (population 8,000). In the Sacred Valley of the Andes, about one hour from Cusco, Urubamba is the old Inca capital and un centro de turismo. Evidence of the formidable Inca Empire is everywhere in the highlands where Quechua, the ancient Inca language, is widely spoken.

Nowhere else in such a small area of the world is there such diversity of flora, fauna and natural habitats. Costa Rica's position in the Western Hemisphere made it the link for millions of years between North and South America for animal species and eco-systems, and for the earliest humans and ancient cultures. Please note that VISIONS Costa Rica is for custom programs only.

Virgin Gorda is a small, quiet, closely knit island community. Our home base will be St. Mary's School, long familiar to VISIONS. The roomy space is atop a hill on the north coast, and it boasts the best breezes on Virgin Gorda. From our back door we can see down to the ocean below and hear the waves.

The Northern Cheyenne Reservation in southeast Montana has been home to VISIONS groups off and on since 1992. We will live together in the Head Start or another community building in either Lame Deer, the central town on the reservation, or 20 minutes away in Birney Village, a tiny enclave of 50 families on the Tongue River.