Animal sanctuary or small, very ordinary zoo

The information available for African Dawn is very misleading. It is not so much an animal sanctuary - more of a petting zoo that you would visit for a day in the UK. It consists mainly of birds which is very disappointing. The staff work hard and are very supportive but there is hardly anything to do in the evenings except play cards or watch old dvd's. You are encouraged to use one taxi firm (the only number available in the pay phone booth)and go on their very expensive day trips (£150 to go to neaby Addo elephant park and Scotia half day safari)on your days off. You are warned about safety issues if you try to find out about alternative transport/taxis. The work is not interesting and very manual when you are required to do "project work" - in our case clearing ground and laying turf
Summary - you are paying a lot of money to work very hard for what is after all a business. We hardly saw any visitors in the two weeks we were there so assume they are making most of their money from naive people such as ourselves who believed they would be making a difference - not just lining someones pocket.