Category Archives: travel

Last week, the Eco Women reviewed their eco goals for 2010 and how successful (or not) they were in meeting  them.  One of Recycla’s goals for the year was to have 40-50 No Drive Days — days in which she and her husband did not drive their cars for an entire day and instead relied on their feet, bikes, and public transportation.

A bit of background:  Recycla and her family (husband, two daughters) live in a small college town.  Their home is near downtown, so they are close to many of the places they need to go, including the library and stores.  Recycla’s husband bikes to work most days — an 8.5 mile round trip — so he only uses a car a couple days a week.  Recycla works at home, so she does not need to drive most days.  And, as of this past fall, both of Recycla’s daughters take the bus to school.  In short, not driving should be an easy thing for the family to do.

However, it turns out that not driving was not always easy — in particular, the girls’ extracurricular activities involved that use of a car three week days and every Saturday.  Beyond that, however, there were days when Recycla’s husband had to drive to work because of off-site meetings or other appointments and Recycla herself also had other days when the use of a car was necessary.  While the family wasn’t trying to go car-free, they were surprised at how dependent on four wheels they were.

Recycla’s favorite running shoes, which enable her to run and walk around town almost daily.

One thing that did help the Recycla family move toward their goal of 40-50 car-freedays was the inordinate amount of snow their home state of Virginia got in 2010.  From Christmas 2009 to the end of February 2010, 60 inches — 10 times the norm — of the white stuff fell, which allowed the family to build up a dozen No Drive Days with no difficulty in the first two months of the year.

Another thing that Recycla and her family started doing more of was walking or biking some of their errands — instead of automatically hopping into a car to go to the library, farmers’ market, and other places, they instead laced up their sneakers or put on their bike helmets.  In fact, just yesterday, Recycla grabbed her backpack and then walked to the bank, library, and the market for a few veggies.  Her total distance was 4.25 miles and she got in a great workout.  Eco-friendly exercise at its finest!

Recycla’s bike Bubbles, which she loves to ride on around town.

Recycla’s family also has a tandem bike in their fleet of two-wheelers, which they used in various combinations to get to the farmers’ market, to work and school, and even on date nights.  You’d be amazed at how much fun it is to ride a tandem bike with your Special Someone.

The family’s tandem bike.

The bottom line to all this is that from January 1-December 31, 2010, Recycla and her family had 51 No Drive Days!

But what about you?  Can you park your car on occasion and not drive?  That depends a lot on where you live and work and what your lifestyle is.  While it might not be possible for you to have one No Drive Day per week, could you manage to squeeze in one or two per month?

The important thing overall is to look at your driving habits and see where you can make changes.  Instead of taking your car out for multiple errands, can you bundle them into one trip?  Can you carpool?  Do you have convenient public transportation?

For 2011, Recycla and her family have not decided how many No Drive Days they will have.  For now, they’ll just continue to keep track of how many days they go car-free and see where things lead.  As of today, the fourth day of the new year, they’ve had one No Drive Day and are planning for this coming Friday and Sunday to also be car-free.

Tell the Eco Women:  How reliant are you on your car?  Do you ever walk or bike places or take public transportation?

Recycla and her family recently went on vacation. Since she has written before about making travel more earth-friendly, she thought she’d report in on how her family did.

Before leaving home, Recycla and her husband turned up the house’s AC so that it wouldn’t cool empty rooms while they were gone. They also unplugged various appliances and the computers. And, they turned off the water. As it turned out, the temperatures in Virginia soared to 100 while they were gone and the local electric company had to ask people to cut back on their usage during peak hours, so Recycla was glad that she wasn’t adding much to the grid’s burden.

As for the trip itself, the family was driving from Virginia to Philadelphia to Maine and then to Quebec City. That’s a LOT of driving — over 2,000 miles! Before leaving town, Recycla’s husband had the family vehicle checked out and then, while driving, used various gas-saving techniques.

Whenever Recycla and her family visited with family and friends during their trip, they brought hostess gifts — Eco Women tote bags filled with bottles of local Virginia wines and other Virginia treats.

Recycla is pleased to announce that her family ate ZERO McCrap on their trip — they packed snacks for the car and sought out local markets and restaurants along the way.  The photo to the right is of poutine, which is a local specialty in Quebec City.  It might not look appetizing, but it actually turned out to be quite tasty.

Once in Quebec City, the family parked their car for several days and got around by foot, which not only enabled them to thoroughly explore the city, but also added more “no drive days” to Recycla’s tally for the year.  (The family is up to 23 for the first 6.5 months of 2010 and they are on track to reach 40 without too much difficulty.)

When staying in hotels, the family tried to reuse their towels as much as possible, instead of having them replaced daily; however, this was difficult to do when so many of the hotels did not offer adequate hanging space for wet towels.  Most hotel bathrooms had skimpy towel rods for two towels and certainly not enough for a family of four.

Speaking of hotels, the family packed their own toiletries and did not use the soaps and shampoos provided for guests.  Recycla was disappointed to see that every single American hotel she stayed in offered shampoos with parabens in them.  On the other hand, the hotel in Quebec City offered soaps, shampoos, and more that were paraben-free.

Recycling was another challenge the family encountered.  Very few hotels offered recycling, but the family was usually able to find bins on city streets.  The one shown on the left was seen in Philadelphia — the City of Brotherly Love offered recycling bins on nearly every street corner.

One final thing that Recycla is pleased about is the fact that her children did not ask for any cheap plastic souvenirs.  In fact, the family did very little shopping — with the exception of a planned stop at the L.L. Bean store in Freeport, Maine to do some back-to-school shopping, some postcards for family, and one bottle of Canadian maple syrup, the family bought only food and gas on this trip.  They took lots of photos and made many memories, which are the best trip mementos of all.

Tell the Eco Women:  Are you traveling anywhere this summer?  If so, where?  What steps will you take to make your trip a bit more eco?