Over 1 billion tourists travel the globe every year vacationing anywhere from Hawaii, to Europe, to China or the Galapagos Islands.  It is important for us to work together to minimize our impact on the natural and culture treasures.  When traveling there are many ways to give back and cut back to make your vacation more green.

A few tips include:

Choose your method wisely.  Those that select motor choach travel cut their carbon footprint nearly in half, compared to even traveling via hybrid car.

Fly non-stop when possible.  Take offs, landings and ground operations produce a lot of carbon, select non-stop flights when possible to reduce your carbon footprint.

Offset your travels. Many companies including TerraPass.com and CarbonOffsets.org allow travelers to purchase carbon offset credits.  Use one of the many carbon calculators easily found online.

Keep showers short while vacationing, and remember to turn off lights, TVs and other electronic devices when leaving your hotel room for the day.

Visit Independent Traveler for more Green Travel Tips.

In honor of Earth Month, and in celebration of Earth Day on April 22, we will be highlighting how you can make your travel more “green”.

Over the next two weeks, we will discover together several ways to help preserve the travel experience for future generations.  On our journey you will also learn about some of the vacation destinations known as “American Icons” that we are working to protect and restore.

By partnering with Tourism Cares™, established by the United States Tour Operators Association (USTOA), we are able to translate the need to help save our world’s treasures into action.

Join us this month as we prepare to take steps to ensure that generations to come can enjoy the experience of travel to all of the world’s wonderful sites.