45,000 Elephants Want You to Attend this Sept 21 Vancouver Event

Folks with a penchant for pachyderms are invited to join the conservation-minded travel company, Wildland Adventures, and their Zimbabwean safari partners, Imvelo Safari Lodges, on Sept. 21 in Vancouver, BC, to learn about new efforts to bring water to thirsty elephants in Hwange National Park in Zimbabwe.

Water for Hwange Night will take place from 5 to 7 p.m. on Sept. 21 at The Beaumont Studios located at 316 West 5th Ave. in Vancouver, BC.The hosts will describe their new Water for Hwange project that aims to raise $24,000 to purchase, install and maintain four new solar hybrid water pumps in and around Hwange National Park in Zimbabwe, home to some 45,000 elephants. The pumps will also provide drinking water for adjacent villages. To assist this goal, Wildland Adventures recently launched a Water for Hwange GoFundMe page.

Canadian Mark Sissons, an award-winning travel journalist, will describe in words and photographs the magic of traveling through this often parched park located just an hour south of water-bountiful Victoria Falls that has no main tributaries coursing through its grasslands and mopane woodlands. In addition to elephants, the region supports over 100 species of mammals including lion, leopard, cheetah, African wild dog and the rare sable antelope. Sissons’ work appears in, among many other publications, The San Francisco Chronicle, Canadian Traveller, Nuvo Magazine and The Globe and Mail.

The evening will also touch upon the importance of tourism to this region where efforts are succeeding to turn poachers into conservationists. Community outreach is a focus of Imvelo Safari Lodges, which is involved in a range of wildlife conservation programs on a daily basis, particularly in the more remote portions of Hwange.

Guests will also learn how they can join an 11-day Water for Hwange Conservation Safari that veteran Zimbabwean safari guide Mark Butcher will lead in June 2019. Wildland Adventures designed this safari to support conservation efforts and to give a hands-on, behind-the-scenes look at conservation in Hwange National Park.  Visitors will be guests of Imvelo Safari Lodges throughout this adventure. As with all Wildland Adventures’ itineraries, this safari evokes its signature “Wild Style” of travel; an ethos based on sincerity, compassion and understanding that breaks down barriers of separation to build lasting intercultural, interpersonal and environmental bonds designed to enhance rather than exploit the people and places where they travel.

For more information about the Water for Hwange project visit www.waterforhwange.org.