Ever considered volunteering in Central America? With it’s beautiful scenery, a tropical climate and pristine white sand beaches, it is certainly an attractive place to spend a few months. Volunteering opportunities are plentiful, some of the more common options include helping in hostels, working on organic farms and turtle conservation, but there are countless others.

If you are considering spending some time volunteering in Central America, you will find countless websites offering volunteer placements. These of course are all at a cost. Although they do provide peace of mind that you will have somewhere to go when you arrive, a lot provide little else. With a little research you can find the same opportunities online for free or for a small daily fee.

There are a number of websites that act as meeting places for potential volunteers and projects. These websites do charge a yearly subscription but it’s usually relatively cheap. One such site is workaway. I used this to find a volunteering job in a hostel in Costa Rica. It offers numerous different projects such as working on organic farms and in turtle conservation projects as well as volunteer teaching. Registration costs just $20 and allows access to projects worldwide and is valid for 2 years.

A similar site is wwoof. Wwoof is an organisation that puts potential volunteers in touch with organic farm owners. By signing up to woof you get access to a list of organic farms that are looking for volunteers. Conditions vary in the farms; some provide free food and accommodation in exchange for work whilst others require you to make a small contribution towards living expenses. It is worth noting that both woof and workaway do not guarantee placements and leave it up to you to get in contact with hosts.

Another useful site for finding volunteering opportunities is idealist. This is a free website with thousands of jobs and volunteering opportunities in second and third world countries worldwide, it is a good website for finding volunteer projects in development. A final website that maybe of interest is volunteerlatinamerica , for £25 it provides you with a customised list based on your specific interests with contact information for volunteering projects. Volunteering in Central America shouldn’t cost a packet, please have a look at these websites before paying vast sums of money to overpriced middlemen. Happy travelling!