South Africa Eco-Friendly Accommodations

Booking eco-friendly accom­mod­a­tion in South Africa doesn’t mean you have to sac­ri­fice on com­fort (though South Africa does offer a num­ber of camp­ing options should you want to "rough it").

More and more estab­lish­ments in South Africa are adopt­ing eco-friendly prin­ciples on vary­ing scales. Whether sub­scrib­ing to “green val­ues”, “sus­tain­able or respons­ible tour­ism” or going the whole “eco-tourism” hog, you can sup­port accom­mod­a­tion estab­lish­ments that are try­ing to make a dif­fer­ence here in South Africa. Continued

Eco-Friendly Activities in Cape Town and the Western Cape

We start our eco-tour of South Africa in Cape Town, voted one of the world's top 10 green cit­ies — the US think tank Ethisphere Institute (http://ethisphere.com/) named Cape Town as a centre of global sus­tain­ab­il­ity. The "Mother City", so blessed with nat­ural beauty, offers a mul­ti­tude of out­door activ­it­ies which can be enjoyed guilt-free. Hike Table Mountain, enjoy the Cape's beaches, or go shop­ping. Yes, I did say shop­ping in an art­icle about eco-tourism … Continued

Are you a "Responsible" Traveller?

Eco-Tourism

Are you a respons­ible trav­el­ler? Believe in trav­el­ling green?
When trav­el­ling in South Africa, you can travel respons­ibly, travel green and give back to com­munit­ies, by choos­ing pro­viders who sub­scribe to the ethos of eco-tourism (see: What is Eco-Tourism?).

How to Travel Green:

• book eco-friendly accom­mod­a­tions
• get around responsibly
  • trains offer eco­nom­ical travel with a lower car­bon foot­print than a plane or car ... Continued

What is Eco-Tourism?

Ecological tour­ism or eco-tourism is a highly pop­u­lar term and pos­sibly one of the most mis­used in the travel industry. It should describe travel to fra­gile areas where the fauna, flora and cul­tural her­it­age are the main reas­ons for travel.

Essentially eco-tourism pro­tects and empowers local people and nat­ural areas, and at the same time provides vis­it­ors with a unique, but low impact experience.

The Ecotourism Society defines eco-tourism as 'respons­ible travel to nat­ural areas, which con­serves the envir­on­ment and improves the wel­fare of the local people'. Essentially eco-tourism should unite con­ser­va­tion, com­munit­ies and sus­tain­able travel.

However, it can get a little con­fus­ing. There are a hand­ful of sim­ilar terms used to describe this type of travel, like 'adven­ture travel', 'sus­tain­able tour­ism', 'respons­ible tour­ism', and 'green travel'. Continued

Green is the new Black ...

Leave only footprints

Green is the new black. No, really; we’re recyc­ling, driv­ing hybrid cars and gen­er­ally try­ing to be intel­li­gent enough not to melt the polar ice caps or widen the hole in the ozone layer. So why not travel green as well?

Eco-tourism is low impact travel, usu­ally to pro­tec­ted areas in which flora, fauna and cul­tural her­it­age are the main attrac­tions. Its focus is on edu­cat­ing the eco­lo­gic­ally con­scious trav­el­ler and min­im­ising the neg­at­ive aspects of con­ven­tional tour­ism, while provid­ing fund­ing for con­ser­va­tion ini­ti­at­ives and eco­nomic oppor­tun­it­ies for local communities.

Of course, it’s not all ser­i­ous… mostly eco-tourism is about hav­ing a good old bush­whack­ing fun time in nature. And with South Africa’s picture-perfect land­scapes and status as the third most bio-diverse coun­try in the world, it’s fast becom­ing one hot des­tin­a­tion for eco-tourists. And with good reason … Continued