Kin is Family
To be Kin is to honor our interconnection.
We leverage the power of travel to transform communities, ecosystems and travelers. We do this by designing extraordinary travel experiences with regenerative tourism leaders and local changemakers.
Our Story
Kin has evolved from a small curation of adventures focused on building community through group trips into three travel planners who share a passionate obsession for safari and regenerative travel. Each with our own area of expertise, we design safaris in places and with people we know personally and love deeply; journeys that are as transformational for travelers as they are for the ecosystem and communities you visit.
Brian Jones founded Kin after a career in non-profit childcare and healthcare work in Kenya and Nepal. He fell in love with safari and became interested in ways travel experiences could fuel critical conservation and community work. Early experiments included a tented camp and sailing expedition on the coast of Haiti, a mobile camp in support of a community-owned conservancy in Kenya, and journeys in Wyoming and Cape Cod with conservation leaders. He is an experience designer, community builder, storyteller and guide. His biggest adventure yet was planning a wedding safari in Kenya to marry his wife Valorie Darling on the enchanting island of Lamu.
Brian met Mark Boyd in Kenya, they went on a gorilla trek in the Congo together and started planning safaris thereafter. Mark is a qualified guide, trained ecologist and an award-winning photographer, his heart beats for sustainable tourism and connecting people to the wonders of our natural world. He has managed luxury safari lodges and camps, and led sustainability and community conservation efforts for The Safari Collection for 6 years. Based in Nairobi, Mark knows East Africa inside and out, designing and guiding safaris in Kenya, Tanzania, Rwanda, Uganda, Ethiopia, Congo, Seychelles and beyond.
Then Mark introduced Toby Pheasant, a qualified guide, former wildlife ranger and expert in Southern Africa. Toby is a maven of wildlife safaris, food and wine adventures and coastal escapes in South Africa, Botswana, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Namibia, Mozambique and beyond. He is based in Noordhoek South Africa, a dreamy coastal village outside of Cape Town, with his wife Olivia, who leads marketing at Natural Selection, one of our favorite collections of camps.
Both Mark and Toby have their own companies and teams, so we have many hands throughout the process. East Africa safaris are led by Mark and Mark Boyd Safaris and Southern Africa safaris are led by Toby and Bonamy Travel. Booking through Kin is no different than booking with them directly, you just get our combined contributions, experiences and options shaping the details of your journey. We pride ourselves in designing a trip uniquely fit to you, handling every detail so you can sink into the full magic of safari.
Our Model
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We drive travel spending into sustainable tourism leaders and local businesses.
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We immerse travelers in the real beauty, challenges and solutions at play to inspire action.
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We engage our travelers, their communities, talents and creativity to propel priority initiatives.
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We invest in reforestation projects and minimize our carbon-impact to serve the health of our planet.
Highlight Initiatives
Female Rangers
Women in leadership roles is the missing piece of the conservation story. We worked with Cottars Wildlife Community Trust to fund, train and document the first cohort of 10 female rangers, as symbols to women and girls in the community, and develop a campaign to achieve ‘20/20 by 2020' : 20 female rangers to equal 20 male rangers by 2020.
Empowering Girls
In schools, there is an immense drop-out rate for female students between grades 4 and 8 when they are often married-off once they have their first period because of cultural forces and financial strain. We developed a campaign to sponsor the school fees of all girls in the conservancy and partnered with CORA to assure access to pads and health education.
Waves for Change
In South Africa, we dive into the water with Waves for Change which provides mental health services to at-risk youth living in unstable communities. Through access to safe spaces, caring mentors, and weekly Surf Therapy sessions, W4C gives children skills to cope with stress, regulate behaviour, build healing relationships, and make positive life choices.