Responsible Travel extends beyond the ground operations, accommodation and community. It also includes you!
The difference between a typical tourist and an Enchanting Travels guest is mindset: by traveling with us you are open and respectful in your behavior and actions.
10% of the world’s population rely on your vacation.
We’ve been blessed over the years with discerning guests who are curious and sympathetic, and who appreciate the fact that the world is like a patchwork quilt: different and beautiful in its many guises, and woven together with good intentions. Every vacation is different and we do not intend to impose our thinking on you, however we do have our Top Tips for Responsible Travelers Guide that we ask all our guests to read prior to departure.
READ: TOP TIPS FOR RESPONSIBLE TRAVELERS
If you wish to be involved in more specific responsible travel experiences that have not been mentioned then we encourage you to speak with your Travel Consultant or Trip Coordinator. There are many ways you can be involved, and a few examples are below.
I. Going Beyond the Guidebook
While we appreciate the desire to witness the must-sees of a destination and the wonders of the world, we encourage you to also venture off-site. We take genuine care to listen to your needs and wishes and always do our best to understand the type of experiences that match your personality. We never recommend an activity that we do not feel fits you or our own values.
II. Embracing People
Regardless of whether we are based in Denver, Munich, Nairobi, Bangalore, Buenos Aires, Cape Town or Delhi, we are a global family of passionate travelers that thrive on sharing the joy of travel with others. When we travel, we witness the interconnected-ness between people and strive towards being better, not just to the neighbors that we see, but those far away too.
We encourage you to engage with communities positively who you otherwise wouldn’t have the opportunity to meet and is the closest way to truly understanding it.
Developing these community connections in which you feel inspired, and show genuine interest in culture and the natural world, is your gift to a destination: you are helping to create custodians of the land for many generations to come. Discovering and embracing kindred spirits. Isn’t that what travel is truly about?
III. Your Feedback
As we continue to strive and grow, our team remain incredibly open to any feedback you have about your journey. Not only do we want to know how your vacation matched up to your expectations, but we wish to know how responsible you felt your trip was, and how responsible you feel we are as a company. The more information you share with us, the more we can learn and continually improve.
Inspiring Encounters
Many of our guests are an inspiration, filled with spirit, soul and determination to make a positive impact on their global travels. Whether they were inspired during their Enchanting Travels experience, or come with an intention to be forces of good, we celebrate and appreciate them all.
Nature and Wildlife Conservation
We always recommend considerate lodges that actively support the natural environment, and we encourage you to ask questions about your accommodation so you know what to expect. The key to a good wildlife tour is preparation. Safari experiences can be private, but it is more usual to join other guests in a jeep. The smaller the camp, often the more intimate the safari.
For example, look out for our partner TOFTigers PUG Marks, an accreditation scheme in India for wilderness lodges and resort. This scheme recognizes lodges that support the local economy, community and culture, minimize pollution, work to revitalize the natural habitat and heritage conservation and undertake sustainable ecological practices.
In India and Nepal, you can become informed and read the Good Wildlife Guide. Upload your photos and share your tiger sighting information with Tiger Nation, which can then recognize the unique markings of specific tigers from its massive database.
Pack for a Purpose
As an Enchanting Travels guest, you can use your luggage allowance smartly to benefit local communities. This is ideal if you are going on safari and have a greater airline baggage allowance on your international flight than is permitted on your transfer flight. By tying up with sensitive lodges and hotels around the world and putting them in touch with local children’s groups and non-profits, Pack for a Purpose allows travelers to pack strategically to meet the needs of communities that they are visiting. The luggage is then delivered directly to the participating lodge.
The brainchild behind Pack for a Purpose is American traveling enthusiast Rebecca Rothney, who noticed that many business travel guests were often traveling light with half-empty suitcases.
“I believe that people want to help if they can find an effective and meaningful way to do so. I was also brought up with the expectation that you always bring a hostess gift to say thank you for someone’s hospitality. When you Pack for a Purpose, it will enrich your travel experience and the community you choose to visit. A stethoscope weighs less than 1 kilo and can touch 10,000 hearts!”
Get involved
Many of our accommodation partners are involved with Pack for a Purpose, and you can log onto the website to see what items have been requested from local charitable projects. Here is a list of common (and merely indicative) items that are requested by Pack for Purpose partners. Before you start digging these items out, remember to check if your lodge is a partner to Pack for a Purpose first!
- Soccer balls
- Medical supplies
- Donations for school books and textbooks
- School supplies: crayons etc.
- Clothing
- Educational CDs
- Bath towels and bed linens
- Wall charts
- Musical instruments
- Games
Responsible Travel Tips
Responsible Travel is a journey, not a destination, but you can create lighter footprints and share in some smiles if you follow our top tips.
Carbon Offset with Atmosfair
Every vacation provides you with an opportunity to tread more lightly. We are partnered with Atmosfair, a climate protection organization that we feel walk the talk in delivering project that provide genuine solutions for climate change mitigation. As we are aware and appreciate that carbon offsetting is considered a grey area in the green sphere, rather than automatically add a small carbon offsetting fee to all our trips, we provide our guests the option to choose whether they wish to offset some or all of their flight’s emissions.
How you can get involved
Simply log on to the Atmosfair website and you will be given the fulling options:
- Offsetting your flight
- Offsetting your cruise
- Offset a desired CO2 value
- Donate directly
Our Drastic Plastic Pledge
We have been working with partners to remove single-use plastic from their properties and in our vehicles and, as awareness grows, small successes are being made.