What is Eco-Day Travel?
In truth, the essential components of an ecologically-mindful day trip, or an eco-day trip, need not differ too greatly from the essential components of an environmentalist’s daily practices. Seeking to minimize the impact of one’s travel, looking to support the local economy, and taking the time to plan well and to Leave No Trace are all important steps of the eco-day tripper’s activity.
BENEFITS: minimize your impact on the environment
There are many modes of transportation that can minimize your impact on the environment as you go about your eco-day trip. If you do not drive every day, you may be able to join a car share program in your area, which will allow you to use one of the program’s cars for your day trip without giving rise to the huge personal and environmental costs that come with owning a car of your own. You may also be able to find local attractions for your day trip that are in biking distance, if not walking distance. A day trip can be a good opportunity for the whole family to exercise together as you bike to the nearest museum or park. Public transportation is also one of the best options for low-impact travel on your eco-day trip.
While on your day trip, you can make the effort to eat local food, which is often more fresh and tasty than imported food and will add a yummy flare to your trip. Local food can be found at farmers’ markets, roadside farm stands, and restaurants and grocery stores that purchase local foods. In order to plan your day’s meals, you can check out websites like “Local Harvest,” which will help you locate farmers’ markets and farms, as well as restaurants, grocery stores and food co-ops that vend local foods in your area: http://www.localharvest.org/. Local food does not have to travel far to reach your plate, and therefore does not usually require the same kinds of chemical preservatives as do imported foods. Preservatives take energy to produce and may be bad for your health. Furthermore, you can save the environment the energy it would have taken and the pollution it would have generated to transport imported foods to you.
If you want to go all out, you can find an eco-friendly tote bag to carry your eco-day trip necessities with you. Some tote bags these days are made with recycled cotton, and some even include material from recycled soda cans!
BENEFITS: strengthen the local economy
When you choose to spend your money in your own local area, you will be helping to strengthen the economy of your town, city, or state. You can support local shops, restaurants, and other businesses, thereby promoting local jobs as well. Research has shown that people who travel on foot filter extra dollars into their local economies as they make their day journeys. An eco-traveler on a day trip is constantly presented with the opportunity to fulfill the popular environmentalist mantra: “Think globally, act locally.”
COST: Variable
The cost of an eco-day trip can be highly variable, depending on what you decide to do. Becoming a member of a car share program is economical if you do not need to drive every day, because you will save on insurance and maintenance costs for the car. Public transportation is usually cheaper than driving the same distance for a day trip, while biking and walking are the cheapest of all. Food costs may be somewhat more expensive if you are planning to support local agriculture. However, supporting local food systems has many benefits, which you might consider worth the extra cost. For example, in local food systems, less fuel is burned in transportation, and quality control is restored to producers and consumers through the removal of middlemen. Additionally, the less distance food travels the more nutrients it retains! Activity costs should not change much from a typical day trip to an eco-day trip. Prices will range from a free hike on public trails to a moderately priced canoe rental or museum admission charge.
TIME and EFFORT: Moderate
Whether planning for your day trip involves whipping out your maps of local trails or consulting the website of your local public transportation, the planning phase will have to be more thorough than if you were going to just hop into your SUV and roam until you found the perfect museum for your day’s adventure. Ecologically-minded travel always requires a bit of forethought, so as to make sure you can arrive at your destination without burning much fuel but still with enough time to enjoy the activity you have planned. Public transportation can be very time-consuming, depending on where you are trying to go, so it pays to research various options of how to travel. Many public transportation websites have “trip planners” that can help you find the most efficient means of public transportation to your destination.
The Ethic of “Leave No Trace”
On your day trip, you can put the environmentalist ethic of Leave No Trace into practice. The Wilderness Act of 1964 created a legal definition of wilderness and legal protections for wilderness areas. In the 1970s and 1980s, environmental advocates devised a set of principles collectively entitled “Leave No Trace” in order to promote low-impact outdoor recreation without limiting access to wilderness areas, since limited access could have potentially jeopardized popular support for the Wilderness Act. For further information on Leave No Trace, just check out the Wikipedia article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leave_no_trace and the website of the Leave No Trace Center for Outdoor Ethics http://www.lnt.org/, the organization that is officially in charge of the principles of Leave No Trace. The ethic of Leave No Trace, while most often applied in wilderness settings, can also be applied in other travel situations by those who wish to minimize the footprint they leave as they journey.
The first principle of Leave No Trace is that one should plan ahead and be well-prepared. In a wilderness situation, this can mean staying on the trail so as not to compact forest soils; in an urban setting, it can mean planning ahead so as to generate as little trash as possible. The other principles of Leave No Trace that can readily be applied to urban, rural, and wilderness settings include: dispose of waste properly, leave what you find, respect wildlife, and be considerate of others. The Leave No Trace ethic is often summarized by the statement: Take only photos, leave only footprints. In urban areas, it may sometimes be appropriate to take souvenirs in addition to photos, but the general ethic of Leave No Trace is applicable in all travel settings and is helpful to keep in mind.
Activity suggestions
If you live in a rural area, try checking out a local farm, an organic farm, or a pick-your-own operation. Most farmers are all too happy to share their experiences and missions with you, and many offer tours and agro-tourism activities, such as hay rides and strawberry picking. Also, 800 million people around the world participate in urban agriculture, so even you city dwellers may be able to find an urban farm near you to tour for the day. Many urban farms have educational components and may have websites with tour schedules and information. A word of caution to the wise: Do contact the farm you wish to visit before the day of your trip. Some farms do not update their websites or other promotional materials regularly, and it is possible that a farm that looks great on its website in fact no longer exists.
If you’re up for stretching your legs and forging out on a little adventure for the day, you could go hiking as the day’s activity. If you do your research ahead of time, you will most likely discover that there are public access trails in your area. Walking is a healthy, sociable and pleasurable pastime. Research shows that frequent, moderate exercise is best for heart health and mental health. Walking as recreation is on the rise, becoming increasingly popular among both sexes and all age groups. If you live in an urban area, you may be able to find an eco-tour or a walking tour, which many cities now have.
If you’re interested in promoting your children’s love of animals or your own, horseback riding may by the perfect eco-day trip activity for you. If you’ve never been horseback riding before, never fear! This activity is commonly enjoyed by beginners as well as experts, by children as well as adults. If you need help finding a horse stable near you, just consult the “Horseback Riding Stables and Horse Rentals” website, which has a state-by-state directory of horseback riding facilities around the United States (http://www.horserentals.com/).
Boating is also a popular activity among outdoor enthusiasts, many of whom tend to be environmentalists like you! Boating, like hiking and taking eco-tours, gives one an enhanced appreciation of nature. There’s nothing like sailing through a lake, feeling the power of the wind, or canoeing down a river, looking up at the blue sky and trees. There are many types of boating available for recreation. Kayaking, canoeing, rafting, and sailing are among the most common. For a directory of some great boating destinations, check out the “Discover Boating” website (http://www.discoverboating.com/boating/destinations.aspx). If none of these destinations are close enough to you for a day trip, just take a look at the Boating Links Directory (http://www.boatinglinks.com/) for some boating organizations near you.
If you are the adventurous type, why not try rock climbing for your day’s outing? It may seem a bit daunting at first, but one only gets better with practice, and then climbing up cliffs can become quite exhilarating. Remember that, as Dorothy Thomson, an influential American journalist, once said, “Only when we are no longer afraid do we begin to live” (www.bookbrowse.com). For more information on rock climbing and for help planning a route near you, check out http://www.rockclimbing.com/.
For more ideas of outdoor recreational activities for your day trip, please consult: http://gorp.away.com/index.html.
When exploring a new part of a town or city, it may be helpful to plan ahead of time to be in an area where there are a variety of different attractions nearby. If there are several options of things to do just up or down the street, then the eco-day tripper will have less need to switch locations throughout the day, further minimizing the impact of his or her transportation.
Tips for the Eco-Day Tripper
• Opt for the stairs rather than the elevator. The amount of energy that you save with this simple practice may be relatively small, but if you make a habit of using as little energy as possible while you travel, your efforts will add up. Think of all those little bits of heart-healthy exercise you’ll be adding up too!
• Use cold water to wash your hands in public restrooms. This is another energy-saving move whose benefits can also add up over time. Also, be mindful of how many paper towels you really need to dry your hands.
• If you are hiking long distances, periodically remove little critters (bugs) and seeds that may accumulate on your boots. In doing so, you can personally help prevent the spread of invasive species (species that are not native to an area and may be harmful to native species).
• Don’t forget to ask about the origins of your food and any other products you purchase.
• Protect suffering shellfish populations by making sure that any seafood you eat was harvested in a way that did not deplete the shellfish population or degrade their habitat.
• Reduce your meat consumption on your day trip. Meat production takes more natural resources and much more energy than does vegetable production.
• Make sure you turned off your computer and lights before leaving the house! Did you know that, if you always leave your computer on, you could be causing the release of as much as 1,500 pounds of CO2 into the environment in one year? Make sure to unplug all appliances you won’t be using as well, as this also will save energy you didn’t even realize you were using.
• Don’t take brochures or business cards if you don’t need them. Saving paper really equates to saving energy as well, because it takes energy to make paper, even if it’s made from recycled materials.
Resources:
The Ramblers Association http://www.ramblers.org.uk/
The Nature Conservancy- The Everyday Environmentalist http://www.nature.org/activities/everydayenv.html
Local Harvest http://www.localharvest.org/
Wikipedia article on the principles of Leave No Trace http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leave_no_trace
The Leave No Trace Center for Outdoor Ethics http://www.lnt.org/
Horseback Riding Stables and Horse Rentals http://www.horserentals.com/
Discover Boating http://www.discoverboating.com/boating/destinations.aspx
Boating Links Directory http://www.boatinglinks.com/
Information on rock climbing http://www.rockclimbing.com/
Outdoor recreational activity Information http://gorp.away.com/index.html
