Tourism: Journeys to change your life

Situation

Your school is planning to invite a group of exchange students from Finland. To lure them to Germany you want to convince them of the attractiveness of your country.

Materials

Text: Journeys to change your life

Facts about Germany – sustainable tourism

Text: Journeys to change your life

Read the text carefully before you answer the questions.

A  Asia

Sometimes you seriously need to get away, and holidays don’t come much longer than a 28-week ‘Ultimate Asia’ adventure with Exodus Tours. Starting in London and taking a winding route east to Bangkok, this epic group trip crosses 12 countries, ticking off a score of see-before-you-die sights including the Pyramids, Petra, Jaipur, the Great Wall and Angkor Wat. The transcontinental odyssey darts once a year in March and costs from £ 6,464 per person including accommodation, transport and most meals. Travel is principally by purpose-built expedition vehicle with only 42 nights spent in hotels. For most of the time you’ll be sleeping in tents on campsites or out in the wilds.

B  Pakistan

Things look different when you’re high. At 8,616 metres, K2 is the second highest peak in the world, and a trek through the mountainous wilds of northern Pakistan to see it up close will certainly blow away the mental cobwebs. It’s also an arduous expedition, which means long, hard days and camping above the snowline, with strenuous trekking experience essential. A 25-day expedition in July climbing the Gondogora La Pass then descending K2 Base Camp costs from £ 2,295 per person including flights and accommodation with Himalayan Kingdoms.

C  Kenya

Another New Year arrives and those flabby bits are still there … do you really think the gym will fix it? For something more radical try an intensive workout on a Kenyan beach with Wild Fitness. It was set up five years ago by Tara Wood, a personal trainer, who believes in promoting well-being through natural movements rather than working individual muscles in isolation, as some gym machines and exercise classes do. The idea is to awaken the animal inside us by recalling the primal movements that helped us evolve as a species. Get ready to squat, bend, push, pull, twist, lunge and run, with yoga and nutritional advice included. Coffee and alcohol are discouraged but dispensed without disapproval if required. A nine-day ‘Kick Start’ course staying in a beach house at Watamu costs from £ 1,920 per person including meals, accommodation and instruction, with flights extra.

D  South Africa

Sitting in the Kalahari Desert counting meerkats is one of your options among the 140 scientific and conservation projects organised worldwide by the charity Earthwatch. On this two-week expedition to the Kuruman River in South Africa you help ecologists studying the exceptionally cooperative lifestyles of these mongoose-like creatures. Volunteers stay in thatched huts, working in small teams, and there’s plenty of spare time to appreciate the wonder of the desert. Accommodation, food and local transfers are provided but flights are extra, and the cost – from £ 1,495 per person – is a charitable donation that funds the research.

E  Spain

Once we went on holiday just to take a break. Now you can sort out your whole life while applying sun cream. In the Picos de Europa, northern Spain, the travel agency Pura Aventura offers life-planning holidays. Available in May, June and September, they are aimed at the ‘busy achievers who need to step back’. Group size is limited to eight, combining intensive thinking sessions with uplifting mountain walks. An eight-day holiday costs from £ 2,150 including meals, transfers, activities and coaching. Flights are extra and couples are requested to book on separate weeks.

F  Guatemala

‘I’ve never seen anyone so pleased to see two packets of Blu-Tack’, Steph Thorns records in her online diary about working with children in Guatemala. The life of the former hospital project manager was transformed after she volunteered to work with indigenous communities near Antigua, helping in rural schools where there would otherwise be no formal education. Her trip to Guatemala was organised through the charity-support organisation Global Vision International. You pay a contribution of £ 920 for a minimum of a month’s volunteering, mainly teaching and playing with local children aged from two to fifteen. No formal teacher-training skills are required. Side benefits include the chance to learn Spanish and experience South American life.

G  Vietnam

Cycle through Vietnam to Cambodia, safe in the knowledge that you are not really having a holiday – you’re working for charity. Click on classictours.co.uk and charitychallenge.com and you’ll find a wide variety of challenges where you can combine exotic foreign travel with raising money for UK charities. Oxfam, for example, is organising the Saigon to Angkor Wat trip above. But be prepared: you’ll cycle at least 80 km a day. Expect to pay a non-refundable registration fee of at least £ 200, after which you’ll have to raise a minimum of around £ 2,500 in sponsoring.

Adapted from an article in The Observer, January 30, 2005

Reading comprehension: Multiple matching: Types of travellers

Task: You have just read the travel suggestions. Please decide which type of traveller (1-9) should choose which journey (A-G). There will be two additional types of travellers who won’t match.

Crossword puzzle: Travel

Task: Click on the picture and fill in the grid. The crossword puzzle contains keywords for the topic „travel“.

The benefits of educational travel

Exercise on vocabulary.

Writing

You have worked on the given materials. Now you want to convince the students from Finland to come to Germany.