As we travel more and more, it’s important to consider the effect on the environment. Here are our top tips for ethical travelling when heading abroad…
In a time when travel has become more accessible than ever and most of us are taking more than one trips abroad every year, it is important to consider the effect it has on our planet. This rise in travel has also seen more people becoming conscious of the world around them and ethical travel has skyrocketed in popularity, yet many are still a bit dubious of just what ethical travel is. It doesn’t have to mean staying in eco-lodges, avoiding place rides and using natural toilets, for there are plenty of simple ways to make your journeys better for the world around you. Here are our top tips for ethical travelling when heading abroad…
Treat animals with respect
First on our list of top tips for ethical travelling when heading abroad is animals. The chance to see and interact with animals that aren’t native to our own country can be a truly enriching experience – but at what cost? It’s so important to observe ethical animal tourism and this can be done by checking five simple things. Ensure the animals are free from hunger and thirst, free from discomfort, free from pain, injury or disease, free to express normal behaviour and free from fear and distress. If you are in countries such as Johannesburg or Thailand there are often plenty of chances for Elephant rides, but pretty much all “domesticated” animals used in the tourism industry have gone through painful processes to get there and are often traumatised. Instead of putting money towards this, why not donate to charities that help shut down these organisations? Find out more about sustainable tourism here.
Book eco-friendly accommodation
When booking your accommodation, try to look past beautiful pictures of pools at sunset and instead into the ethics of a hotel. For while these hotels might look great, they could be doing significant damage to our environment. An eco-hotel or green hotel is a much better choice. These are environmentally sustainable places to stay which have made important environmental improvements in order to minimize their impact on the environment. This could include non-toxic housekeeping practices, the use of renewable energy, organic soaps and recycling programs. You can further help the cause by requesting your sheets aren’t changed every other day (after all, we never do it this often at home!) and ensuring your air-con or heating is switched off every time you leave the room.
Use public transport
When at home we use public transport to get everywhere – after all, where would we be without buses, trams and tubes to get us to work and around in the evenings? So why should this be different when abroad? A simple one in our top tips for ethical travelling when heading abroad is that instead of getting taxis everywhere, find out about the local public transportation. Plenty of countries have a great system -as we recently found this in Vienna! If it’s hot and you don’t want to cram into a metro system or bus, why not take a bike or use google maps and walk to your destination? It’s a great way to see the country and will wear off those holiday calories at the same time!
Travel to lesser-known destinations
While you may have always dreamt of wandering the streets of Venice and sipping coffee in a piazza in Rome, the influx of tourism is mainstream destinations are doing more harm than good. Budget airline prices and cruise ships are delivering record numbers of tourists to historic cities, overwhelming and destroying them all at once. Instead, head to beautiful lesser-known travel destinations. Not only will you help to infuse money into more needed local economies, but you also have the chance to support conservation projects and local artisans and avoid adding to the destruction in more popular locations. Read our piece on alternative travel destinations to find out which to head to.
Combine multiple trips
With so much of Europe on your doorstep, why not take some time out and combine a few destinations in one? Not only is this reducing your carbon footprint by taking fewer flights than heading to each destination separately, but it also means you can enrich your mind with plenty of new cultures all in one go. For example, a holiday to Vienna could also take in Budapest or Munich with travel overland between the cities.
Which is your favourite of our top tips for ethical travelling when heading abroad? Let us know! You can also see this infographic below for more handy tips and information…
