Author: Eileen Mignoni

Two years ago, Sudan, the last male northern white rhino died, surrounded by the people who loved and protected him. If there is meaning in his passing, it’s that all hope is not lost. Planet Earth is the only home we have and without rhinos and elephants and other wildlife, we suffer much more than loss of ecosystem health. We suffer a loss of imagination, a loss of wonder, a loss of beautiful possibilities. Saving nature is really about saving ourselves.
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Ol Pejeta needs our help now more than ever. At a time when unprecedented events have turned our world upside down, it is easy to turn inward and focus on the challenges that Covid 19 poses in our own lives and to our immediate communities. We each must do our part to protect those who are vulnerable and at the same time, we can ensure that the causes we care so deeply about have the support they desperately need.
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We have launched a new campaign to help and you could win a trip to this incredible place! With a $10 donation, you will have a chance to win a trip to spend time with the last two northern white rhinos and learn about the incredible efforts to save the species from extinction. You will meet the committed keepers who spend their lives protecting these gentle, ancient creatures and I’ll give you a photography workshop.

While we social distance, let’s dream of a better future. The trip will be scheduled for when it’s safe to travel. Please share even if you can’t make a donation. Everything you can do is appreciated in these times.

Enter at omaze.com/safari

Thank you so much!

Ami Vitale is one of 20 honorees on Afar Magazine’s inaugural Women to Watch in 2020.

In celebration of Women’s History Month, and using the Society of Woman Geographers as inspiration, Afar Magazine has reinvented the all-female travel society for the year 2020.

“Singularly and together,” they say, “these travelers are our guides to exploring the world in a better way. They are pushing boundaries—be they physical, cultural, or mental—and they are women we would entrust to lead us around the world and show us how to experience it in new and different ways. They are women, as they say, who have done things.”

On Ami, Afar says, “Ami Vitale knew from a young age that a camera doesn’t distance you from the subject—it brings you closer. Her passion for human connection has carried her to more than 100 countries…Vitale recognizes that stories aren’t just about people—they’re about our relationship to the natural world.”

Read the whole article and learn about all the inspiring work on it in Afar Magazine.

In celebration of World Wildlife Day on March 3, The TreadRight Foundation named Ami Vitale its first ever Wildlife Ambassador.

TreadRight urges each and every traveler to take their pledge to make travel matter, for our planet, our people and wildlife by refusing single use plastics and, when not possible, to recycle them. To offset one’s carbon footprint. To promise to honor the people we meet, to respect their homes in the spirit of diversity and inclusion. To buy locally and pay fair prices. To experience wildlife only in nature, not riding animals that should not be ridden and not support any kind of animal cruelty. Together, we can tread right.

Said Ami, “We are at a crossroads right now and it is vital to think about the impact our actions will have on Earth.”

Ami is honored to be joining in this mission and hopes you will take this pledge along with her.

In one of her first works with the foundation, Ami will travel with the TreadRight team to document wildlife conservation work at Bushman’s Kloof Wilderness Reserve in South Africa and at the Nigeria Safari Lodge in the Okavando Delta in Botswana reports Travel Weekly.

The TreadRight Foundation is the non-profit arm of The Travel Corporation. Read the full announcement at Treadright.org