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This year's Passports with Purpose Travel Bloggers fundraiser exceeded all expectations with $58,000 raised in the month in which it ran.

That's a truly amazing feat - one that showcases the dedicated hearts and souls of the travel blogger community who not only how love to explore the world but also appreciate the need to give back.

The goal (and dream) was to raise $50,000 to build a Passports village in Karunganni in Southern India with Land for Tillers' Freedom (LAFTI) and their non-profit US-based branch.

Friends of LAFTI can build houses, with local materials and local labor, for around $2,000 each. Then they transfer the title to the woman of the house.

The success of this year's Passports with Purpose fundraiser means this will become a reality.

That alone makes me happy to be part of the larger travel blogger's community.

But, somehow, along the way, I also won one of the great PWP prizes...



...a 5-night stay in a Mediterranean Suite at the Riveria Palm Springs and a dinner at Circa59 restaurant. (donated by Ciao Bambino)

Looks like a trip to California is on the cards in 2011.

Sure hope the gals in Seattle who set the PWP in motion can here me clapping and cheering all the way from New Zealand.