Do you love traveling but also care about the environment and our planet? You’re not alone.
Sustainable travel has become a popular buzzword in the last couple of years and has divided the travel community worldwide into different teams. While some travelers claim traveling is not sustainable at all, others promote domestic travel, and some are looking for other ways of how to travel more sustainably even far away from their homes.
But what does “sustainable travel” actually mean? Why is it important? And how can we travel more sustainably? If you’ve been asking all these questions, we might have the right people to answer them to you. Here are some eco-friendly traveling tips and tricks our favorite sustainable travel bloggers and green advocates picked up along their journeys as sustainable travelers.
1. Girl About the Globe
Lisa Imogen Eldridge runs the award-winning travel blog, Girl about the Globe, a travel resource for conscious female travelers. Having traveled to 131 countries and 100 of these solo, Lisa’s aim is to inspire you to solo travel the world. Her blog empowering women to travel solo with maximum adventure, minimum impact.
Sustainable travel is even more important in today’s world. Helping to direct our money to local communities of the countries that we visit is essential to creating sustainability around the globe. When travel is done right, it can be beneficial to communities.
To travel sustainably all you need to do is think ‘local’. Shop local, take tours that employ local guides, stay in locally owned accommodation and buy gifts and souvenirs from locals, especially those who are making it right in front of your very eyes, so you know exactly where it has been produced. Take a water filter instead of adding to a plastic problem in countries where they are unable to recycle, look for community-based tours where you learn about the culture and traditions of the country which also helps them to sustain their way of life. Most importantly of all, treat everyone that you meet with kindness and respect.
2. Mexico Cassie
Cassie is a London expat who moved to Merida with her family and now runs her own travel blog Mexico Cassie. She’s simply fallen in love with Mexico and keeps exploring every nook of it while sharing her adventures with her readers online. All her posts are family-friendly and most of the time focus on eco-tourism and sustainable traveling.
When I travel I try to be thoughtful and conscientious, as I am at home, too. We always carry water bottles for everyone in the family, we carry reusable cutlery and straws so we don’t need to take plastic throw-away pieces. Moreover, we carry zip-lock bags, reusable mesh shopping bags, and small reusable containers too. We try to eat locally wherever we can. We also don’t allow our kids to buy plastic tat souvenirs, we try to ensure that our purchasing supports local people.
If we take tours we try to ensure they’re run by locals and that the communities benefit from our cash. I get particularly ranty at airports where they force travelers to chuck away perfectly good water and then don’t provide refill stations. I am hoping with all my heart that this will change soon.
3. A World to Travel
Inma Gregorio is a co-founder of a travel blog, A World to Travel, which focuses on unique experiences around the world. Just like we do in Tripduck! She’s traveled through over 50 different countries and together with Jose, they feed their readers with dozens of travel tips accompanied by beautiful photography and share their thoughts about sustainability and its importance in the world of travel.
What was your journey of becoming a sustainable traveler?
It all started when I was a tiny human. I’ve been fortunate enough to be educated on the topic from a very early age. I guess my parents and closest acquaintances did a great job! Still, it wasn’t until a few years ago that I made it my number one focus. If I was to keep traveling, I should make it as sustainable as possible. From then on, I massively reduced the number of trips I embarked on and made them slower, purpose-driven, and taking as fewer planes as possible.
There are myriad other options in most cases, being train travel and hiking my favorite two replacements. These days I dream of micro-adventures such as walking the Camino from Finisterre to Muxia and crazier ones such as going from my base in Galicia (Spain) all the way to Beijing (China) by train over the span of a couple of months.
What does sustainable travel mean to you?
The only way forward. And something that should not only look after the environment and a few other issues but also question privilege and why only a reduced percentage of the world’s population can actually do it. It is perfectly fine if people don’t want to travel but if they do, it should be possible for them to make it happen. Keeping travel off-limits for most humankind is not fair.
What’s your best tip for eco-conscious people looking to travel more sustainably?
Be mindful and evaluate every trip you take beforehand. And walk, ride a bike and take the train more. There’s nothing like experiencing this planet at a slower pace.
4. Teja on the Horizon
Teja is an environmental scientist from Malaysia with a love for nature travel and discovery. On her blog, Teja on the Horizon, she writes about the experience of sustainable and reflective travel, about our beautiful planet, and the true stories from traveling through the world.
I would say that sustainable travel really rests on a foundation of mindfulness and intention. These days, as we look forward to being able to travel again, get comfortable with a slower pace of life. Use the attention span to think about a travel stage you could do more mindfully – just one, for starters.
You can find out what sustainable means for that stage, whether it’s about transport to get there, how to reduce tourism waste as a visitor, or websites that help you book sustainable accommodations. Even your spare luggage allowance can be used to bring much-needed assistance to local communities via platforms like Pack for a Purpose!
You’ll quickly go down a rabbit hole of experience that continues to enrich your travel. It leads you towards the true reality, that our world is actually impossibly abundant. But it is only the case if we approach it with mindfulness, and learn to let it respond to us in its own time.
5. Lauren Bath
Deemed “Australia’s first professional Instagrammer” by national media, Lauren Bath pioneered the Australian influencer industry. She has an impressive client list, having worked with global destination marketing bodies, and with a dedicated audience of close to half a million followers, she is not only one of Australia’s most powerful travel Instagrammers.
What was your journey of becoming a sustainable traveler?
Like most travelers, I didn’t know anything about sustainability when I started to travel. I did all the bad things! Rode an elephant in Bali, got my photo taken with a tiger in Thailand, stayed at chain hotels and flew budget airlines.
Through my travels, though, I very quickly learned what was and wasn’t sustainable. And I’ve made it a point to educate others along the way, without accusation and judgement. After all, you don’t know what you don’t know. In recent years I’ve been very conscious to travel sustainably but, more importantly, to ‘influence’ sustainably. As a person that others look up to, I believe it’s my responsibility to steer clear of promoting destinations, activities or brands that aren’t sustainable.
What does sustainable travel mean to you?
Traveling in a way that adds to the destination you are traveling to, rather than subtracts. Travel that does no harm! For me, being a travel influencer means that I have a duty of care to maintain my own integrity and ethical standards. It is always at the forefront of my mind when I am asked to represent brands or destinations, and I turn work away that doesn’t align with my own brand. Travel has been so formative in my life, I want people to travel. It is life changing, MIND changing. But, in order for us to continue to travel without harming the planet, we need to stop and think about how to minimise our footprint.
What are your best tips for eco-conscious people looking to travel more sustainably?
My advice to others is to ask questions! Be smart. Many brands will have you believe that they are sustainable but in the background their practices aren’t so ethical after all. Do your reading, do your research.
Steer clear of almost ALL wildlife tourism. There are some (few and far between) ethical operations but, for the most part, if there are animals involved for profit the practices are dubious. Steer clear of ALL orphanage tourism, Australia recently declared orphanage tourism as modern day slavery. At its best you are advocating for growing a relationship with an orphan that you cannot sustain. At worst, children are being stolen or sold for profit.
Do your best to avoid over tourism. Travel off the beaten path! When in destination choose local hotels, restaurants and operators to ensure your money is going back into the community. Fly less and stay longer.
Travel in the form as we know it nowadays is a true privilege and one of the greatest joys and experiences of our lives. We just have to make it sustainable. It’s all about making the right choices and we hope these sustainable travel ideas have shown you that traveling sustainably can be much easier than one can assume.
Are you looking for travel inspiration on Instagram? These are 35 Travel Accounts You Should Follow in 2020.