Wildlife vacations for families
standing with my father on one side, and my sons on the other, as we watched a family of gorillas interact, was a moment of surreal symbiosis. And, of course, extreme emotion.![]()
Many wildlife vacation companies will bend over backwards to welcome families on their tours. They appreciate how bonding wildlife vacations for families can be and, ultimately, they understand that children are the conservationists of tomorrow, and so we need to share the wonders of nature with them now. Expert guides will be able to educate and inspire - this is a classroom come to life, full of budding ecologists and zoologists. While our vacations don't have upper age limits (great granny is more than welcome), most small group trips will have a minimum age. Sometimes this is for safety reasons, other times to comply with local regulation (such as gorilla tracking). But tailor made trips will often be happy for much younger siblings to tag along too.
Our Wildlife family Vacations
Costa Rica family vacation
Discover Costa Rica's famous national parks
From
US $4199 to US $4649
15 days
ex flights
Blue Whale tour in the Azores
Visit the Azores at the best time to see Blue Whales
From
£1145
8 days
ex flights
Swimming with wild dolphins in the Azores
Live a dream and swim with wild dolphins
From
£925
8 days
ex flights
Orca family kayaking tour, Vancouver Island
The perfect family adventure in a wilderness paradise
From
CA $1995
4 days
ex flights
Costa Rica Wildlife tour, tailor made
Visit one of most biologically intense places on earth
From
US $2850
11 days
ex flights
Family safari in Tanzania
A family friendly tour of the highlights of Tanzania
From
US $5010
8 days
ex flights
Top family wildlife vacations
Volunteer with sea turtles
Hands on volunteering vacations are a wonderful way for families to bond, as they learn together about ecosystems and environmental threats. Protecting with sea turtles in Costa Rica involves nighttime beach patrols, moving eggs, monitoring turtles and ensuring the adorable, tiny hatchlings get to sea safely. Just be sure the kids don’t sneak any in their backpacks to bring back home…
See tigers while you can
Seeing a tiger in the wild is very emotional, but spotting one with your children is something that goes way beyond words. But it’s not just a love thing. The tiger is highly endangered and may not even exist when they are adults. So given that our children are the future conservationists, showing them that tigers are more than tiggers, is vital.Born to see Borneo
Borneo is brimming with wildlife surprises and family welcomes. The endemic orangutans are a treat, but little monkeys will also love proboscis monkeys, elephants and crocodiles along the banks of the Kinabatangan River. Other activities include climbing Mount Kinabalu with a local mountain guide, taking you through tropical rainforest and cloud forest, and then back down to sea level to the beaches of Mataking Island.Galapagos on land
The Galapagos has an abundance of friendly, safe wildlife that will delight kids – and adults – of all ages. Traditional cruises are great, but even better for families are land based vacations that don’t have strict cruising schedules and may also allay safety concerns about younger children. There’s also more downtime, and space to run around in between wildlife excursions.Our top Wildlife family Vacation
Orca family kayaking tour, Vancouver Island
The perfect family adventure in a wilderness paradise
From
CA $1995
4 days
ex flights
Small group travel:
Travel Team
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Wildlife vacations advice for families
Land based tours in the Galapagos
Morag Prosser, from our supplier ROW Adventures, explains why families should consider a land based vacation on the Galapagos: “Our family tours are only open to family groups – we don’t do couples or singles. So if you have a group of seven- to ten-year-olds, they run the tour at a pace that’s suitable for that group. The kids have other kids to interact and learn with, and you don’t have single adults chomping at the bit to move faster, and feel like the kids are holding them back so that their parents are getting uncomfortable. The wildlife, particularly, is what kids love. The snorkelling with sea lions... most children will start off a little hesitant but our guides are in the water with them so they can begin to feel comfortable. By the end of the day it’s usually the parents who are more nervous about the sharks or sea lions, and the kids are having a blast!”
Why take the kids to Costa Rica?
Natasha Preston, from our supplier Exodus, shares her advice for family wildlife vacations in Costa Rica: “For families looking for that jungle experience, who want to see the wildlife and do some adventure activities, then Costa Rica is brilliant as it has all that but without feeling too remote or too punishing. You probably wouldn’t take your family down to the Pantanal in Brazil, for example, or to Guyana. You’d see very similar wildlife and birdlife, but Costa Rica has a much better infrastructure. It’s more geared up for the tourist market without feeling overly commercialised.”Seeing whales & dolphins
Amanda Stafford of our supplier Whale and Dolphin Connection, shares tips on family vacations in the Azores: “Boat trips are great for kids as long as they’re the right kind of age and into wildlife. On the larger, more stable wildlife-watching boats babies will be safe if held, but toddlers are likely to get bored, especially if there are lengthy waits between sightings. Zodiac RIBS and small, open fibreglass boats are not really suitable for young children. There’s no legal minimum age but operators tend to have their own restrictions on carrying pregnant women or kids under four or five, since the sea can sometimes get choppy without warning. If your family wants to go snorkelling with wildlife in open water, your kids must be confident swimmers. At six or seven they’re usually old enough to have a really worthwhile experience.”Where to go in Borneo with children
Nicki Hollamby, from our supplier Audley Travel, shares her advice on watching orangutans in Borneo with kids: “Go! It’s brilliant. If I was doing a family trip to Borneo, I would always take kids over to Sabah and to Sepilok, and then along the Kinbatangan River, because although you’re in simple accommodation, there’s no trekking involved, you’re just pottering up and down the river on a boat, looking at the wildlife. You’ve got other areas in Sabah where you’re going deep into the rainforest and it’s not necessarily very good for families, because you go deep into the jungle, and it’s quite rustic. But the boat’s really relaxing.”More about Wildlife
It is a good lesson to remember that, on wildlife vacations, it is the wildlife that calls the shots. They tell us when the best time to go on a wildlife vacation is. If there is a sudden change in weather, for example, you might find that the most reliable wildlife sightings are suddenly rare. Or vice versa
This wildlife travel guide is meant to be like a trailer for the new Attenborough series. Because we also have individual travel guides for more specific wildlife vacations, such as our safaris, bear watching and whale watching. The travel guide below gives you the perfect introduction to getting your head around the extraordinary life on earth, and where to go to find it.
Most people know that one day they would love to go to South Africa, Botswana or Namibia to see some of our planet’s great creatures in the wild.
Sometimes it is straightforward. It has always been your dream to see gorillas in the wild. Or polar bears in the Arctic. Others may need help working out how to choose a wildlife vacation.
You don’t always have to fly to the other side of the world to see wildlife. In fact, Scotland is one of our top destinations for wildlife vacations in Europe.
There are so many to choose from and yet people always ask us – what are our top 10 wildlife experiences? So here they are below.
Blue Planet returns to the BBC, inviting us into an extraordinary underwater world and inspiring us to explore and protect our oceans.
One thing we have learned at Responsible Travel is that the more respectful you are to wildlife, the more incredible your encounter will be.
One of the most important pieces of wildlife vacations advice isn’t about wildlife at all. It is about people. And their homes.
It is rare in the wonderful world of wildlife that watching wildlife in their natural habitats comes issue free. What can we say?…it’s complicated.
Is there really such a thing as an ethical wildlife selfie? The spread of social media has encouraged a worrying trend in pictures of tourists holding, hugging and feeding wild animals, and NGO World Animal Protection has campaigned to stop this.
This wildlife travel guide is meant to be like a trailer for the new Attenborough series. Giving you ideas of what you are going to see, when you can see it and where.
