Our Commitment
We support the organizations "COCOS ANIMAL WELFARE" and "SNOOPI PROJECT" in Playa del Carmen where sick, hurt, injured, undernourished, and mistreated animals find help and care by vets. They are provided with food and love, and they get ready to find a foster home and later an adoption place. With your help, we can donate food, cleaning supplies, injections, rubbing alcohol, and bandages for sterilizations. We can support a lot of them to get healthy again. If you would like to adopt an animal, we can make the contact for you. We're also thankful for money donations as we will buy the needed resources and bring them over to the organizations. They always need food, toys, boxes, collars, ropes, jod, alcohol, towels, and much more. Thank you for your support !
We recycle the trash we produce during our tours in a small, private, recycling yard in Playa del Carmen. The small family from Fidel’s home town from the state of Oaxaca lives with 3 children in very poor conditions. Together with our guests we support this family with donations in forms of money, clothes, painting equipments, and stuffed animals.
Three quarters of the trash in the ocean is plastic. This plastic is a more growing problem, it kills about ten thousand animals every year and it is also getting more dangerous for human species. It takes about 350 to 400 years until the plastic is decomposed, before this happens it splits into smaller pieces. While taking a walk on the beach without shoes on , you will notice not only grains of sand beneath your feet , but you will also have tiny plastic items on your feet. 32% of the 78 million tons of yearly produced plastic packages get unconsciously into nature like for example into the ocean. A lot of microplastic particles get into different kinds of water and into the ocean, in the ocean the microplastic particles are a big problem because a lot of animals are confused and get mixed up with the small particles and the plankton. That is why they find a lot of shells, which eat plankton, with loads of plastic particles inside them. These microplastic particles are smaller than five millimeters, it gets into the bodies of the animals in the ocean really fast. Due to the fact that humans eat these sea animals, we also consume these particles. It isn't approved yet what kind of influence this has for our bodies , but one thing is for sure, plastic often contains toxic items like diluent or flame resistance which harms the ocean animals and gets into our human body through eating these animals.
Plastic doesn't only contain toxic items, it's also like a toxic magnet while swimming trough the ocean. Different kinds of research
showed that a accumulation of environmental toxics can take place in plastic. Fish, Shrimps, and Crabs absorb these and keep them in their bodies.
Microplastic ends up in nature through different kinds of ways, some cosmetic products contain small items of plastic. Also through washing different kinds of textiles or through car tire attrition, plastic also gets into the sewage water and then into the ocean and the rivers. Researchers believe that the car tire attrition is the biggest problem for letting loose all the microplastic at the moment. Another big source for the microplastic is the bigger parts of plastic swimming in the ocean and falling more and more into smaller pieces.
So what can we do?
1. Avoid plastic as much as possible and recycle.
2. Resign tooth paste and cosmetics that contain microplastic.
3. Take part at promotions to protect the nature, especially the ocean.
4. Awareness training for other unknown people.
We need to act now.
We as tour providers , started acting already and imported some new items in our tours:
1. We don't use any straws on any of our tours or in the restaurants we go to.
2. No using of aluminium foil for our breakfast rolls, instead we reuse usable boxes for our bread.
3. Awareness training in restaurants and beach bars for not using non-returnable dishes.
4. Collecting of our trash on our tours and sorting them out in the evening. Later on we bring them to a recycling yard.
5. We don't use plastic glasses in our tequila destillerie, we bring our own small glasses which can be used again.
We ask you all to help us and fight against all the plastic in our environment!
We made it our responsibility protecting the flora and fauna of México. Sunscreens with chemical UV-filtration (also with only low percentage of UV-filtration) endanger the reefs and make them die. This is why we ask our guests to if possible use biodegradable sunscreen and insect spray to protect the reefs, corals, animals in the ocean, and the cenotes. Please don't touch any corals, reefs, or animals while snorkeling in the ocean.
Whales and Dolphins normally live in groups and have a big need for movement. If they are held in small pools they suffer of stress not being able to swim free, which leads to aggressive behavior and also lowers the illness resistance and the expectancy of life. Close to Playa del Carmen, there are several Delphinariums which offer to swim with dolphins, the animals are given calmative medicine and live in very small pools , sometimes without any shade. Please don't support this.
Swimming with Turtles is a unique experience, the animals are so calm and relaxed. Only one of thousands of turtles reach the ocean and become an "adult", all others die during the difficult way to the ocean or are eaten by other animals. In Mexico, you can experience these amazing animals in freedom. Please keep in mind not touching these animals, pressure them, or swim behind them. These kinds of actions can cause different kinds of diseases a long time after you have went back home and can also make them die, as well as it is very stressful for them.
In and around Playa del Carmen, you can often find people that have big cats or small monkeys on a cord and they will ask you if you would like to take a picture together with the animals for a small amount of money. These animals are often caught in the Jungle and have been separated from their mothers, animals of these kind do not belong on a lead nor belong in a loud, full shopping, street. Please don't support this!
Mexico is a country with a breathtaking beautiful surrounding of nature. Unfortunately, the development of the people and the economy is not as far developed as well as they should be, the politics is often so ignorant that recycling is a rare occurrence here. Together with Santi Tour, we want to try to input as much help as we can. That's why we collect our trash during our tours, separate them into all the different kinds of raw material, and bring them to a nearby recycling yard.
In parts of Mexico the school system isn't always the best. The schools in very small towns don't have enough equipment and material to study, at the moment we are looking for a primary school which we can support in the future with donations. Things they will need will be pencils, paper, painting materials, bags, etc. As soon as we find a primary school which we can support, we can give you more information.