Plan My Gap Year - www.planmygapyear.co.uk

I booked a trip for me and 3 friends with Plan My Gap year to Tanzania to do volunteer work. I couldn't fault the communication and organisation skills of the PMGY team in Tanzania. We all felt well prepared before our trip with lots of info guides and videos and any extra questions we had were answered in detail and response was quick.

We arrived in Tanzania and were greeted by the PMGY team and taken for a delicious dinner before going on a tour of the town. We were giving a briefing of dos and don'ts and felt secure at all times. The food was delicious and the accommodation was clean and nice. The volunteering was well organised and we had a wonderful time. I would definitely recommend booking through PMGY to anyone and will hopefully be doing so myself again.

Thanks for the adventure and memories :-)

I returned from the Real Thailand Experience a week ago and can honestly say that it was brilliant. The tours and activities offered show Thailand in both a modern and traditional way. Nothing is too much trouble for (the in country guides) and the person I dealt with  at the volunteering makes you feel very at home. I would recomend this to anyone wanting to explore a great culture and make new friends :)

The pre-departure information that I received was brilliant, all questions that I had was answered very quickly and informatively by a member of the PMGY team. The handbook was very helpfully and made me feel fully prepared about my visit. It also supported me through my VISA application and provided clear instructions on the best way to apply.

When arriving in the county there was a member of the PMGY team waiting at the airport when my flight arrived to take me to the volunteer house. When arriving at the house I was warmly welcomed by the host family which allowed me to settle in quickly and easily.

On my first day I was provided with an orientation which was very informative and provided me with all the information I needed about the local area and the projects. This also included a visit to the local slum school, which was my chosen project. This allowed me to get familiar with the environment before my first day of teaching. The visit also allowed me to meet the children and teachers from the school. The visit also provided me with the opportunity to visit the slum in which the children lived and to meet some of the local people living in this area.

Throughout my teaching project I was fully supported at all times by both the teachers at the school and the host family. I knew where to turn to if I needed any lesson ideas or if I was unsure if the planned lesson would fully benefit the children due to the language barrier. I was also provided with a range of opportunity which allowed me to visit and get involved with a number of different projects to ensure I got the most out of my experience.

After the projects there was time to explore the local area and Delhi independently. The evening activities were brilliant and provided a range of different opportunities, this included; Attending an Indian wedding, a range of different temples, markets, pottery class and visiting Delhi.

At the weekends I travelled to a range of different places within India. The host family provided us with lots of recommendations about different places to visit and the main places we should visit. They provided support in planning our travel there and the hotel and ensured that the places we had selected to stay were in the correct area to get the most out of our trips. Vishy was always at the other end of the phone if we needed him when away at the weekend, or just to translate where we wanted to go, to taxi and tuk-tuk drivers.

A huge thank you to the host family to making my visit to India brilliant and making me feel welcome at all time, also a massive thank you to the person I dealt with who was brilliant support and put so much effort into ensure that every one had a brilliant time in India. Thank you!

doing the pmgy Ghana orphanage programme for 4 weeks is honestly the best thing I've ever done, working with the kids is so rewarding and humbling at the same time. the ghanaian people are so friendly and welcoming and i got to see and experience so much of ghana thanks to the amazing pmgy team. i would recommend it to anyone, it's an experience you will remember for the rest of your life!

I couldn't have asked for a better organisation to have spent 5 months in Africa volunteering with! Not only was the placement incredible and the staff extremely helpful but the coordinators, Jodie and Kelvin, could not have been more accommodating and fun! Thank you PMGY for giving me such a special opportunity and providing me with such a wonderful medical placement that allowed me to achieve and learn so much and thank you for connecting me with my second family in Tanzania! :) I highly recommend this organisation to any prospective volunteers because it is top of the line in providing the best volunteer experience out there!

I have just come back from doing my 2 week midwifery elective placement in Sri Lanka with PMGY and cannot recommend it enough!! It's mainly observational but the staff are happy to answer any questions you may have and will explain procedures as they're going along. I was lucky in that I spent my time in both the private and government hospitals so was able to get a range of experience and see the differences between the two. Ashika is so helpful and will continually discuss with you what you want to get out of your trip and make arrangements accordingly. Everyone out there is so accommodating and always have your best interest at heart. You'll be sad to leave !!

Had a great time with PMGY. I volunteered on the medical programme in Faridabad near Delhi and gained some amazing experience working with doctors to diagnose patients and distribute treatment in small communities. The host family were awesome along with the other volunteers. Even though I only went for 2 weeks we managed to organize time to visit Jaipur and the Taj Mahal. Overall it was well worth it. India is a must see!

After just finishing my A-Levels I'd always grown fond of the idea of travelling so I researched a huge variety of programmes/companies to try and find the best price/destinations/support etc. and Plan My Gap Year stood out so far from the rest. The hardest decision I had to make was where to choose my first destination because they all looked excellent, Sri Lanka was an area I'd never considered so I decided to do something different! The team could not be any more supportive, having never travelled before I had so many questions! A couple of days before leaving we had a big group webinar where we could ask all the questions we required to either of two guys, this was a really great help! I felt extremely safe upon leaving, I knew everything I needed to know in terms of health and safety and what to expect whilst I was on my travels in Sri Lanka.

I spent a month in Sri Lanka on the Real Sri Lanka Experience and it was the best month of my entire life! The in-country support were absolutely excellent, they are so passionate about what they do and they could not have been any more help if they tried. There was always so much to do, never a dull moment and I met some great friends along the way. I also had the opportunity to work in an orphange and teach Monks for two weeks and that was a very emotional experience; (I think I learnt more from them than they learnt from me!!) I went on to use this as part of my Gold Duke of Edinburgh Residential. I also brought an excess of spending money with me because so much was paid for by the company. I honestly couldn't say enough about my experience, which is why I'm choosing to go on the Real Plan My Gap Year Morocco Experience in the summer of 2015!

The experience in one word...amazing! Even better than expected!

The best thing about PMGY In Sri Lanka was how relaxed and felxible it was! I thought i had just signed up for the turtle project but one morning i took part in the elephant project and most afternoons i helped at the school. I wanted to make the most of my stay and PMGY Sri Lanka helped me to do this!

The turtle project was my favourite experience. The work was really hands on and practical and unlike some volunteer projects you really feel like you are helping and making a difference! You can easily spend a whole day there cleaning tanks, talking to the turtles and medicating and feeding them. The local coodinator Saniru does a great job!

The food is also amazing. Its mostly all Sri Lankan style dishes and lots of curries. But its incredible. Just go for it and try everything its part of the experience! Its all cooked by the local lady who comes to cook 3 times a day for all the volunteers. She is so lovely to talk to and works so hard! I wish i could cook like her! (Go out for food if you want a dish from closer to home, pizza, pasta ect)

The local coordinators are so helpful (im glad PMGY support local employment) they are great to chat to and are always around to help with anything! Especially booking hotels for travelling at the weekends or booking tuk tuks (because they can obviously speak the local language which helps a lot) but also having Josh the english coodinator is very nice too! They all work so hard to help make sure you have the best time)

You live very closely with everyone in a very comfortable volunteer house (again better than i thought it would be)

Any problems will get sorted out so quickly so tell them as soon as there is one. Even in my short 2 week stay i have made friends i will never forget.

Minimum stay should be 3 weeks for the best experience. You will not want to go home! Thankyou!!!

I did 4weeks volunteering in Sri Lanka. 2weeks working at the elephant project and 2weeks at the turtle project. Thoroughly enjoyed both projects, although at the turtle project you did have to often ask for jobs to do once you had finished a previous task. Soon got into the routine and knew what tasks had to be done daily.

The volunteer hour is basic but has everything you need. The food is great and living with other volunteers is great. Leaving was the difficult part as it felt like we all became a family.

The coordinators were very helpful and friendly. Got to know them well and soon felt to be more friends with them but as soon as you needed them to help they were very reliable. Although they do tend to run on "Sri Lankan time" which means they tend to run late fairly often.

The weekend trips were amazing, you did so much in the short space of time. They see expensive but are well worth the money.

I went on my own and would recommend anyone to do the same, it may be a bit daunting but everyone is welcoming and if a was such a great experience.

Would love to do something like this again! Even better then I imagined it would be!!