The World's Best Geotourism Operators

You may have heard of the term geotourism but might not be sure exactly what it means and what its relationship to sustainable tourism is. Geotourism can be considered an arm of sustainable tourism that "sustains or enhances the geographical character of a place — its environment, culture, aesthetics, heritage and the well-being of its residents." National Geographic state that geotravellers are primarily interested in going local. "They patronise locally owned businesses and guides; they buy from local craftspeople and eat at restaurants serving regional cuisine; they seek out traditional music and dance; and, as a result, the money they spend helps local people earn a living and preserves the place's authenticity". In other words, geotourism has all the elements you would want from sustainable tourism but with a focus on "place," to emphasise the distinctiveness of different and unique places and communities around the world...as opposed to an individual eco-attraction or resort, for example.

National Geographic are strong supporters of geotourism and have helped form the Center for Sustainable Destinations to foster and promote geotourism. One of their high profile initiatives is to hold a yearly Geotourism summit and to award the most innovative and successful geotourism operators from around the world. This year there were three Geotourism Challenge winners — Nature Air (Costa Rica), PEPY (Cambodia), and Wikiloc Community Maps (Spain). National Geographic describes how these companies and the other seven finalists enhance geotourism:

• Nature Air, the 100 percent carbon-neutral airline in Costa Rica, offsets 100 percent of its greenhouse gas emissions to encourage reforestation of tropical forests in Costa Rica's Osa Peninsula.

• PEPY (“Protect the Earth, Protect Yourself”) is Cambodia’s Educational Volunteer Tourism Program, providing adventure bike tours and on-site volunteer projects, like building rainwater collection units.

• Wikiloc Community Maps, based in Girona, Spain, created by a software engineer with a passion for travel, is built on maps, photos and video submitted to offer honest impressions about numerous destinations.

• Ger to Ger Foundation, Mongolia, links visitors with genuine nomadic families.

• Evergreen Brick Works of Toronto, Canada, is an adaptive re-use of the heritage structures at the Don Valley Brick Works.

• Virgin Islands Youth Heritage Exchange Farm Excursions, St. Croix, U.S. Virgin Islands, focuses on food as the basis of youth identity and education.

• Context Travel, based in Philadelphia, offers walking seminars with Ph.D.s in major European cities, encouraging sustainable ways to visit urban destinations.

• RiverIndia.com’s Bamboo Eco-Lodge River Trips, Arunachal Pradesh, India, help protect India’s Siang River habitats through locally guided expeditions.

• Trout Point Lodge, Nova Scotia, a Five Green Key-designated nature retreat in Canada, has revitalized backwoods and Acadian French cultural tourism.

• Reality Tour Viagens e Turismo Ltda’s Route of Freedom, Rua Bom Jesus, Brazil, commemorates the African Diaspora in Brazil.

For more details about the innovative work of all 10 finalists, you can go to the Changemakers website.

Now that you've got a feel for what a successful geotourism operation is all about, why not then go to the fantastic Center for Sustainable Development impact map, which takes you around the world to show you where to find the Center's most highly rated sustainable destinations, many of which are considered valuable geotourism "places" as well.

How to Find Free Guilt-Free Travel

About half way through writing Sustainable Australian Travel For Dummies, I realised that many of the natural and cultural attractions I was listing around Australia are free to visit. That is the beauty of sustainable travel - much of your travel experience can be done on the cheap - whether it be visiting many of the free galleries and museums on offer, bushwalking, watching the world go by in the park, or simply window shopping or visiting a local market. Maybe I should have included an icon that provided people with an indication as to whether something was free to visit or not, because it appears that "free travel" is something that an increasing number of people are interested in doing as a way of gaining a more intimate feel of the community they are visiting (and saving some money as well, of course).

National Geographic have certainly picked up on this free-travel phenomenon by developing a series of free-city guides on their Traveler website. They have listed a variety of cities from around the US and the world that provide a plethora of free travel activities. For example, under art and music they list free concerts being held (many of these are held outdoors in summer); the days in which museums and art galleries are open for free; and any free films and talks being held in universities and libraries. Or under culture they list the many free guided tours often available for historical or culturally significant neighbourhoods, parks and buildings. And under outdoors they list all those parks and beaches that anyone can visit. Reading a site like this certainly opens up a range of travel activity opportunities that you might not have initially considered, especially if you were just relying on your standard travel guide book.

Although National Geographic's free-city guide site provides a great overview of free travel activities, I have found the popular Time Out guides provide the most detailed up-to-date listings of travel activities in the city you might be staying - many of which might be free if you look hard enough. Although their main focus has always been concert and theatre listings, they also have detailed info about anything of cultural importance, including museum and gallery information, sporting events, tourism attractions and the best places to eat and drink. I certainly recommend you pick up a Time Out guide whenever you first land in a city that sells them (check their list of cities here) - you can just about plan the whole week by sifting through all their activity and event listings. Released every week (usually Thursdays) the Guides are produced both in magazine format and online and are not only great for travellers but residents as well - there are so many free things to see and do in my local city Sydney that I just wasn't aware of until I read my local Time Out guide.

Making Tracks All Over Australia

In Sustainable Australian Travel For Dummies, I highlighted the role that Australia's rail network can play in transporting you more sustainably over longer distances, especially compared to flying. I suggested that if you build some train travel time into your itinerary, then trains not only get you to your destination with the lowest carbon impact of any of the transport modes (other than cycling and walking of course - I assume most people don't have THAT much time), it can be an enjoyable and worthwhile travel experience in its own right.

Some people that do have the time might like the idea of travelling comfortably the old fashioned way, seeing much of Australia's vast outback from the comfort of your window seat. If you are one of these people then you should check out the Great Southern Railway (GSR) Web site. The GSR connects Australia’s west coast (Perth) and east coast (Sydney) via the Indian Pacific service over the Nullarbor. Sydney, Adelaide and Darwin are also connected via the Ghan service and Adelaide and Melbourne are connected by The Overland. These services are now marketed and priced so as you can "travel in style". GSR have recently enhanced their reputation by announcing a new luxury rail experience called the Southern Spirit, which provides you with two touring experiences: the Grand Tour and the Coastal Epic. These tours are more than just a train trip - the Southern Spirit escorts you to several iconic attractions along the way (by bus) from Alice Springs to Brisbane via Melbourne and Sydney, including Uluru and Kata Tjuta, Kangaroo Island, Phillip Island, and the Blue Mountains.

You can also use the extensive intrastate rail and connecting rail-bus networks in Queensland, NSW, Victoria and Western Australia. Queensland might be the pick of the state rail systems as it includes the newish Tilt train between Brisbane and Cairns; the older but classic Sunlander, also between Brisbane and Cairns; the Spirit of the Outback between Brisbane and Longreach; the Westlander between Brisbane and Charleville; and the Inlander between Townsville and Mt Isa. And they've also got the beautiful old Kuranda Railway between Cairns and the hinterland town of Kuranda via Barron Gorge.

Western Australia also has some great rail journeys worth taking, including the Prospector between East Perth and Kalgoorlie; the Australind between Perth and Bunbury; and the Avon Link between East Perth and Northam.

All the state railways are supported by an extensive rail-bus network that enables you to connect from the railway to outlying rural communities (most communities were once serviced by railway lines that went just about everywhere but now are just distant memories or used purely for freight purposes). The following state rail agencies are where you'll find out where they travel and how long it will take you to get there:

* NSW CountryLink - www.countrylink.nsw.gov.au
* Victoria V/Line - www.vline.com.au
* Queensland Rail (QR) - www.traveltrain.com.au
* Western Australia Trans WA - www.transwa.wa.gov.au

All aboard!