Coffee Shack Hostel
Coffee Shack Hostel is definitely one of our favourite hostels in Southern Africa! If we could have teleportation device today I would go there every weekend for surfing, beach time, epic hiking and some of the friendliest people around.
Situated in the very rural area called the Wild Coast, this is the type of hostel from a time long ago – a time when travellers just ended up staying for months on end or even move there. That’s what happened to owner, Dave Malherbe and his wife Belinda.
Dave was a pro surfer and is now over 50 years old and going strong as he is still entering and winning surf contests. He and Belinda still run the hostel they started and now welcome their kids, who are all fluent in local and foreign languages – what a life!!??
Coffee Shack has been around since 2000 and has been a shining light in the Transkei (Eastern Cape) community for travellers and locals alike.
Coffee Shack hostel also started some of our favourite projects in Africa – Ikhaya Labantwana is a local school on the Montessori system and their Responsible Coffee Bay teaches local and foreigners about living the right way, right now and how that can affect our travels.
And all of this has been around way before “Responsible Travel” was a thing!
Precious Tree Project and How are going Paperless as of Dec 2019.
We love the friends at the Precious Tree Project and what they do – that’s why we’re one of their biggest supporters. Every bum that sits on a seat on any of our tours buys a tree and we include this in the costing. On occasion, we also add some more trees for project-related planting.
That’s approximately 240 trees a year! (The number is rising, and we’re working on buying at least 350 trees in 2020)
What’s awesome about this initiative is that it’s making us (and others) more aware of our carbon emissions while offsetting our guests’ travels in South Africa.
Fun FACTS – it take ONE tree 12 years to offset a flight from Europe and although all international flight, globally, only accounts for 3.2% of carbon emissions, we want to make sure that our travellers and exploring does not add to this number – so we have to get planting!
We’re totally in for going paperless.
Since the beginning of 2019, we don’t print business cards or any promotional media. But it goes beyond that… Get with the latest apps and see how you can transform your paper-world into a paperless one.
Some of our favourites are Asana, Slack, CamScanner etc…
What can you do today to reduce your paper usage? 🙂
Also, buy a tree here from the Precious Tree Project. Offset your holiday travels and even normal life – and when you’re in the Garden Route, come join us for a tree planting session!