Privacy notice
Short version: we collect your name and email only if you hand them to us, we use them to answer you and to introduce you to Safari Odyssey, and we don't sell them to anyone.
Who we are
This site is run by originstrail.com, which is responsible for your data (the "controller"). Privacy questions and requests: privacy@originstrail.com.
What we collect
Only what you type into our enquiry form: your name, your email, roughly when you might travel, and anything you write in the message box. We also record which page and campaign the enquiry came from, so we know which of our writing is useful.
What we do with it
We reply to you. If your enquiry is a fit, and only if you ticked the consent box, we pass your name, email and message to Safari Odyssey(https://safariodyssey.africa/) so they can send you expedition details. They become an independent controller of that data at that point, under their own privacy policy. We may also send you occasional writing fromOrigins Trail; every email has a one-click unsubscribe.
What we never do
We do not sell your data, and we do not share it with anyone other than the operator named above and the service providers listed below, who work only on our behalf.
Who handles it for us
We use a small number of service providers to run this site. They process your data only on our instructions, under data-processing agreements, and may not use it for anything else:
- Vercel — hosts this website and runs the form that receives your enquiry.
- Neon — the database that stores your enquiry, located in the EU (Frankfurt).
- Resend — sends the email that notifies us of your enquiry (EU region, Ireland).
- Zoho — our email provider, where your enquiry and our replies to you live.
- Cloudflare — cookieless visit counting (see below). It receives no form data.
Some of these companies are based in the United States, so your data may be accessed from outside South Africa and the EU. Where that happens it is covered by the providers' standard contractual clauses or an equivalent safeguard recognised under the GDPR and POPIA.
How long we keep it
Planning an expedition like this can take a year or more, so we keep your enquiry for up to24 months after you send it, then delete it automatically. If you ask us to delete it sooner, we will. Once your details have been passed to Safari Odyssey, their own retention policy applies to their copy.
Your rights
You can ask us to show you, correct, or delete everything we hold on you, and you can withdraw consent at any time — email privacy@originstrail.com, use our enquiry form, or reply to any message we send you, and we'll action it. If you're in the EU/UK you have these rights under the GDPR; in South Africa, under POPIA.
Analytics — and why there's no cookie banner
We use Cloudflare Web Analytics, which is cookieless. It counts visits and tells us which pages get read, without setting a cookie, without tracking you across other websites, and without building a profile of you. That is why this site doesn't nag you with a consent pop-up: there is nothing to consent to.
We deliberately chose this over Google Analytics. It tells us less about you, which is the point.
Origins Trail is independent. We may earn a commission if you book with an operator we introduce you to. It never changes the price you pay, and we only introduce operators we would travel with ourselves.