Peru Porter Food Project

As a past adventurer to Peru, we wanted to share a fundraising campaign we started to support our local porters, cooks, and camp crews during this time. Our Peru staff comes from Patakancha in the highlands above the village of Ollantaytambo. They belong to a community known as the Puka Ponchos, whose ancestors were herders that took care of the llamas belonging to the Inca army and royalty. Wilderness Travel has been working with this community for as long as we’ve been a company, over 40 years. Many are even second-generation team members.

This staff and their families rely heavily on the income they receive from assisting trekkers and sharing their boundless enthusiasm and expertise. The salary and tips they receive help them feed their families, send their children to school, and pay for any social service needed such as medical care. Without tourists, they have no income stream and are receiving little to no financial support from the Peruvian government. April through December is typically the busiest trekking season, but COVID–19 has abruptly cut off their means of income this year.

Wilderness Travel and our local trekking partner are organizing emergency relief food boxes to our amazing team of hardworking ground staff. These food boxes will contain: rice, oatmeal, evaporated milk, lima beans, noodles, brown sugar, lentils, vegetable oil, and tuna fish. Our goal is to raise $10,000 USD in support of our local guides and camp staff through this season, which includes 45 families.

WT is not an NGO, nor do we have a non-profit arm, so these donations will not be tax-deductible.