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Wednesday, July 21, 2010

Green Travel

The next couple of months will mark the time that Nova Scotian’s travel and visit areas of our own Province. Like any other consumer item, travel comes with many choices which may include ecologically friendly and/or green travel. As public concerns regarding global warming increase, travel companies and tourist attractions are trying to embrace environmentally friendly practices to accommodate the growing number of tourists that are making “greener” travel choices.

The first stop for most visitors to our Province is the Nova Scotia Visitor Information Centre at the border of Nova Scotia and New Brunswick. This is the true “Gateway” to the Province.
I encourage residents of the County to visit this Centre and the friendly staff who can answer any of your questions about the Province, including environmental matters. While at the Centre you should visit their flower garden. The garden itself is huge and holds many types of flowers and plants. Behind the Centre is the site of the Acadian Village “Beaubasin” and the former Fort Lawrence.

Current green-travel initiatives have grown out of ecotourism, sustainable tourism and nature tourism. Ecotourism is in fact growing at three times the rate of traditional tourism. In the past the Department of Tourism for Nova Scotia has put out an ecotourism guide for the Glooscap Trail which begins in Amherst and follows the trail through Advocate and Parrsboro and on to Truro. There is a complete description of the ecology of each area you would be travelling through and some of the attractions along the way. You could request this guide from the Department of Tourism or check the visitor centres.

To be able to visit places that are environmentally friendly you need to make careful choices and be able to ask many questions regarding green initiatives. You may want to hold off and travel during the off-season to avoid over-crowding of natural sites and the depletion of natural resources; you should try to eat in locally owned restaurants and see if these restaurants serve locally harvested food; and leave excess packaging of store bought travel articles at home where you know they can be recycled;

Some other ideas to make your travel more environmentally friendly include: Unplugging some of your appliances at home to save energy while you are away. When visiting a park area, never leave your own paths and do not disrupt or remove anything. Leave everything exactly how you found it so that others may enjoy the park in the future. If you are camping, please leave the park better than you found it. Carry all trash out with you, do not burn or bury your trash, and double check the campsite to make sure that nothing gets left behind.

If anyone in the local area wants to highlight their travel environmental or ecological practices to the readers of the Amherst Daily News, please feel free to contact me at the e-mail address below. I hope everyone enjoys their summer travels.

Lisa Emery, B.A. is currently living in Amherst. Lisa invites comments to her columns. You can contact Lisa at: emeryvine@gmail.com. Follow her on her website at: http://emeryvine.webs.com or view her blog at http://emeryvinegrapevine.blogspot.com

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