"Don’t use Oyster"

Overall, the experience I have had has been pretty good.

HOWEVER

Don’t use Oyster when booking the city work Australia programme. Book through the actual company providing the experience. I paid £995 for this experience and was disheartened to know that the other people in my group only paid around ~£500 for the same experience. When I contacted Oyster demanding to know what the other ~£400 contributed to, I was sent a patronising email explaining that they use it to pay their workers wages along with other useless, already provided services. But don’t worry!! They plant a tree for you!! The extra payments that I made went towards a SIM card (provided free by the actual company so this was useless), a my oyster account (what a privilege, would have been fine without it), breakfasts and other meals that were never available, and ‘help’ in other areas.

At no point during the booking process was it made obvious that they were an agency, so I feel very mislead.

I would request a refund however they like to brush off negative feedback and will most likely only respond to the first sentence of the review stating that the overall experience was pretty good; this had nothing to do with Oyster and everything to do with Ultimate Oz who were AMAZING.

"Belle expérience"

Nous avons passé une quinzaine hors du temps dans ce sanctuaire d'ours bruns. Mon fils et moi en gardons un très bon souvenir. Vivre quelques jours dans leur domaine est une très belle expérience.
Le logement est près du centre ville et avons abusé des restaurants tout au long de notre séjour. Oyster s'est très bien occupé de nous.
Nous sommes content d'avoir pu aider un peu en préparant les ice-cream des ours et en peignant les kilomètres de barrières.
Bonne continuation à ce sanctuaire et belle vie à ces ours qui ont eu un début difficile.

"Highly recommend!"

I recently booked a fairly last minute trip with Oyster Worldwide to Costa Rica and I can confidently say I will be using them for my future travels!!

The support beforehand was great, and any queries I had about the project or the country in general were answered very efficiently. There were lots of tips on the MyOyster portal beforehand which was very useful!

The trip itself went very smoothly, all the transfers were bang on time and drivers were friendly.
Volunteering with sea turtles had been a dream of mine for many years and I’m so glad I chose OW for this trip of a lifetime!! Great people, great trip, great memories!🐢

"Turtle project - playa San Miguel, Costa Rica"

It was a great experience - really well organised. Kate answered every query so promptly before the trip. Friendly people at Casa Crema and the night patrols were fun and interesting - I learnt a lot. Brilliant trip all round!

"Wonderful week volunteering at Libearty"

I had a wonderful week volunteering at the Libearty Bear Sanctuary this summer (2023). The accommodation was great, the local agent, Razvan, very helpful & friendly, the bears and sanctuary rewarding to help and Brasov itself a delightful town.

The trip out was not perfect. Direct flights from Gatwick, just up the road from me, didn't start until the day after I got back(!) and a rail strike meant I had to leave very early and drive to Stansted. Meet and Greet parking was good, the 3+hr flight OK but no-one to meet me at Bucharest airport. After waiting 20 minutes I called Rasvan who apologised and got back to me a few minutes later to say driver had got held up but would be there in 10, which he was. From then on things went more smoothly though there were lots of detours to avoid traffic jams due to its being peak holiday season. After another 3+hours, we arrived at the flat in Brasov, where Razvan greeted me, and gave me an hour to get settled before taking me out for dinner. On the way back to the flat he showed me the nearby mini-market & greengrocers.

On Sunday morning at 7am we left for the familiarisation tour of the sanctuary. It started to rain as we left the car park on the 4 hour tour. It was fascinating seeing lots of the bears for the first time and hearing some of their horrific back stories, which was why I wanted to come and help rather than lie on a beach in the sun. The rain finally let up as we walked back to the car and by the time we got back to Brasov we were nearly dry! After shopping in the big supermarket for breakfast, packed lunch and liquid supplies we went over the formalities of the contract and daily routine for the following week. It was a little daunting realising that I would be on my own most of the time but Razvan promised to introduce me to the driver and give me any specific instructions from the head of sanctuary in the morning. There were, of course, several workers around and about food prep but none spoke English and despite a few weeks of Duolingo my Romanian was not up to much of a conservation.

The actual food prep is quite therapeutic and, provided you set up your work station carefully, not too demanding. You soon get into a rhythm - pick up product, stab/slash to open (Watch out for spray back!), mt into tray, bin packaging and repeat again and again. Then you look up for a moment and see a bear, in the enclosure just opposite, emerging from the scrub with 2 cubs :) Making bear ice-cream is specially fun as once you’ve half filled the tray with dairy and sufficient bread/cake you have to spend at least 5 mins kneading it slowly with your gloved hands – they like it smooth! The most difficult task is getting your gloves off quick enough to answer your phone as you don’t want to touch anything until you have!

There was an extreme heat warning (35+) for the week I was there but as you will see it was broken by storms so take waterproofs. I was very glad I had a comfy, well worn pair of washable (hiking) boots for working in the food prep area even in the summer – you will be on your feet for hours and it can get messy. The other thing you must have is gloves - always have at least two pairs with you and preferably the thicker black sort. I was there at the end of July and wasps/bees were not yet a problem, but the flies… I had also worried that mossies or gnats might be a problem in the mountains, like in Scotland, but didn’t see any of either. One last tip - take a black sac to keep your belongings in as there is nowhere in the shed you will want to put anything down.

I must also say that Oyster and Libearty were very happy to rearrange things for me. I couldn’t do Friday to Friday, I could only arrive on Saturday but wanted to visit Bran and leave on the Monday so I worked an extra day and was able to stay in the accommodation for the second weekend when I overlapped with the next guy and we went round Dracula’s lair together.

Will I volunteer again? I’m certainly thinking about it for next year and would heartily recommend the experience to anyone who loves animals, wants to do something useful and is happy with their own company though I believe at times there may be other volunteers around.

"Brilliant experience"

Clear communication, realistic expectation for what to expect, available for questions. Working in the school was amazing to do something helpful and meet the children, meeting the elephants up close was magical and learning all about EHRAs work

"Bear Sanctuary Trip, Romania"

This was an unforgettable experience and I would highly reccomend travelling with Oyster. It was completely stress-free as everyone was helpful and events were explained clearly.
Knowing that my work was helping the bears gave me a great sense of accomplishment and opened my eyes to how these animals were mistreated in the past, and still are being mistreated in other countries. The bears at the sanctuary are happy, healthy, and well fed-- the feeding tour was incredible and gives plenty of opportunties to take some fantastic photographs. My main portion of time working at the sanctuary was spent making the bear ice cream: mixing up dairy products and bread. I found this fun, but prepare to get messy!
The town of Brasov has some wonderful views, plenty of nice walking routes, and many restaurants to try. I would highly reccomend walking up the hill/mountain near the apartment towards the Brasov sign as the views over the town make for some great photos.
In terms of money, I would say that it is absolutely worth it. You seem to be able to get the most in-depth tour of the sanctuary available, the work is very rewarding, and the accommodation was of a very high standard. As a disclaimer, I recommend not paying extra for the Time Tunnel if you do the Bran Castle excursion at the weekend, as it was disappointing (it was just a lift that went down to a corridor with some illuminated portraits), but I do suggest paying extra for the Medieval Torture exhibition (if it's still there) as this was fascinating to learn about.
I was only in Romania for one week and wish I had done longer. I will definitely consider doing this again, as it was an overwhelming positive experience.

"Amazing time at Kwantu South Africa"

Just back from an incredible experience at Kwantu game reserve in South Africa. I had two weeks over there and definitely wish I’d gone for longer. As I’m 17 I was one of the youngest in the group of volunteers but that didn’t matter at all because everyone was really welcoming and we had lots of fun. The accommodation and food was all great and I did lots of different activities across the two weeks all across the reserve. The staff at the reserve were all really friendly and helpful, and they helped booking weekend activities for me which was an amazing bungee jump.
The My Oyster portal was really helpful before I went as it gave me so much information and Kate was great at making sure I had all the right paperwork as I was classed as a minor travelling alone.
I would love to do a similar experience again in the future and would use Oyster again as they made the organisation of it all so easy.

"Libearty Bear Sanctuary in Romania…"

My daughter and I spent a wonderful week in Romania volunteering at the Libearty Bear sanctuary in Brasov.
Everything was so well organized from start to finish. This program is so finely tuned, we can only compliment and applaud Oyster. The local director, Razvan, goes above and beyond expectations to ensure a rewarding, fun and safe experience. Our accommodations were great and so close to Old Town Brasov with its many historic sites, restaurants and stores. We had plenty of free time to sightsee in Brasov and surrounding area the weekend before starting and after work in the afternoons/evenings.
We were driven to and from the volunteer site each day. Our work involved sorting through and preparing food for the bears. While it was somewhat messy at times the work days are broken up into manageable shifts and included a guided tour of the sanctuary and a free morning to watch the bear feedings.
We consider it a privilege to have had the opportunity to see so many bears up close. We learned a lot about brown bears and how and why the sanctuary was started.
We highly recommend this amazing Oyster program!

"Living my Australian dream"

I always wanted to spend some time in Australia and it was my biggest dream to combine it with horse work. The programme helped me to make my dream come true!
There was a lot to learn during the training week and the trainers really took their time to explain and show everything to us. We were taught in a small group and all of our questions were answered - and believe me, we had lots of them. ;)
After the training week it was time for the real job - and the preparation week came in really handy for it. It's hard work and of course you get dirty, but I loved every second of it - the people, the horses, the landscape and the weather!
If you love horses and have horse experience, then this is a once-in-a-lifetime experience that you shouldn't miss out on!