When You Return
Travel can have a profound and lasting effect and when you return home, it is likely that you will want to share your experience with as many people as possible. This will help other travelers make sensible choices, but also assist the destination and travel suppliers to implement more sustainable practices. Don't underestimate the power of the travel experience and use it to improve the tourism offering and livelihood of people in the destinations you visit.
Some ideas to take action are:
- How can you make your story known to other travelers?
- Distribute your responsible travel tips as widely as possible
- Share your photos on social media.
- Tell family and friends about the wonderful memories you made.
- Tell them what was easy about being a responsible traveler and tell them what was challenging about traveling sustainably.
- Tell them how much you enjoyed the eco-lodge you stayed at, or the organic wine you drank, or the hike you went on.
- Tell them what a challenge it was to get from one side of the country to the other via public transportation, but in the end it was worth it because of the experiences you had on the way.
- Give constructive feedback to your travel agent, your tour company, your hotel, and excursion operator. Suppliers cannot make changes unless you let them know about your experiences, both positive and negative!
- Get involved with charitable organizations which help to alleviate some of the socio-economic issues affecting the places you have visited.
- Explore more. Traveling is just the start of the learning. Once you return home, continue exploring and get involved to try to remedy some of the problems that captured your attention. Build on your knowledge.
- Connect with the nationals of the places you just visited in your own country. Go to ethnic restaurants, cultural events, or get involved with an organization that pursues a cause which touched your heart.
Mapping your travel lifecycle with responsible travel in mind before you go, while you are there, and when you return, will help you and the places you visit create a more gentle and beneficial type of tourism worldwide.
Authors
Sonya Graci
