Eco Holidays

posted by Catherine on Sep 22

If your kids are always asking how long until we get home – think on your feet!

There is plenty going on in the countryside even when it all looks a bit bleak – maybe not noticable to us adults who are just thinking about the weather and the route back to the car.

But to the kids; the autumn cold weather and wildlife is nothing but one huge adventure!

So here are a few things that might inspire you to think about the fun side of things. Maybe walk less distance and do more things – that way you can keep the kids happy rather than constantly making them catch you up!

Don’t Leave The Leaves:
Plan to gather up all the leaves you can find that have fallen from trees into one great big pile – and then run through them kicking them up in the air! This game is so easy to play over and over again!

Autumn Gathering:
Why not use the opportunity to search the woodland floor for branches and twigs to build a secret den? There are no wildflowers in the way; just leaves, moss and building materials!

photo credit: Steve-h

Counting Conkers:
Depending on the woods – there should be plenty of conkers for you to collect – still in their spikey shells! Once you have a winner (and some string) you can set up your own tournament!

Searching For Seeds:
It’s not just conkers you will find – there are hazelnuts, acorns, berries and even helicopters! Why not try to guess which ones need to be eaten by animals and which ones float in the wind!

Puddles And Painting:
Find some different coloured berries, grasses and muds and mix up your own paint pot to make your own autumn scene – using real leaves and twigs if you want!

Get Lost!
Why not set up a treaure trail using chalk marks, wooden arrows and leaf designs. Follow the clues through the woods to the treasure – hopefully a nice picnic!

And – it doesn’t cost a penny or require any great planning!

posted by Catherine on Jul 21

Why buy one car to suit all your needs – chop and change whenever you can!

Just like buying that house with a spare room just incase a friend comes to stay, or keeping that extensive wine cellar just incase you throw a party – or even buying that hat for just one wedding – why do we need to buy something so short term?

To help save resources and to make sure that you always have exactly what you need only when you need it – hire it instead – and that is a very eco friendly choice, wouldn’t you say?

Well, the same can be said of cars; why have a variety of vehicles for the family that you have to use for everything that you need, when you could hire a more suitable car when you need it.

Flexible Hire Cars:
We all still need our family car for shopping and school runs, but do we need the spare ‘nice’ car when we want something less ‘family’. And why compromise on a more economical vehicle in luie of those odd holidays; I mean why drive around in a spacious 7-seater every day just so that during the school holidays you can get the scooters and suitcases in the boot!

Hiring cars is no longer such a hoo-haa, and there are varying prices, vehicles and hire periods these days that can help you make the most of different vehicles for your changing needs.

So if you are looking for long term car hire – why not consider all the options – and get the exact car you need whenever you need one.

Why Change?
Well, a sports car doesn’t do the same thing as a camper van. One is perfect for that romantic fast-paced get-a-way but isn’t really suitable for pulling over in a field and making a bacon sandwich! However the other is perfect for that impromtu lunch and life at a slower pace.

Yet you wouldn’t want both sitting on your drive all year waiting for that break!

So just like hiring your wedding dress, a holiday cottage or even a carpet cleaner – hiring a car to suit your needs is the perfect eco friendly alternative – and why not?

photo credit: Land Rover Our Planet

We can’t all afford a minibus, 2-seater or off-roader – yet these might be the perfect vehicle for our short-term needs. And if driven properly and to full capacity, they could be the most eco friendly choice for your needs.

So if you need a vehicle for more than a month and for a specific purpose – consider a hire vehicle which fits the bill perfectly and make the most of your trip or business needs.

No need to stretch your family car to the limit doing something it’s not suited to!

posted by Catherine on Jul 9

We all know Cod is seriously threatened across nearly all of its range – so why are we still eating it?

Cod and Chips and Cod Fish Fingers: we can’t get enough – but it’s not healthy for the cod.

Obviously, it isn’t good in the sense that the individual fish get eaten – but the entire species could be seriously theatened by our ‘stereotypes’ and assumed behaviours.

In the same way that we have to have mustard with beef, cranberry with turkey and peanut butter and jelly; we seemingly can’t eat any other fish with our chips!

There are plenty of alternatives out there, but we have just got used to this one – and it is causing some serious problems out on the waves.

Fishing Quotas:
You might think that the recent fishing quotas introduced are helping out a bit. I mean they are limiting the number of cod brought into harbours, factories and then into our local chippies or ‘finger’ factories, aren’t they? Even if they have put the price up a bit…..

But we were all so happy that something was being done to ‘save’ the cod, that we all just carried on eating it anyway; well the cod we eat must have been caught inside the quota, so the oceans are still alive with ‘saved’ cod.

But no – sadly – this wasn’t true.

It only meant that any cod over the quota couldn’t be taken to shore by the ship. But (not so) secretly, they were still catching them.

Fishing nets aren’t species specific, they don’t let cod escape but keep the pollack or coley trapped inside, do they? Fishing nets aren’t even FISH specific, they kill all sorts of crustaceans, jellyfish and mammals as they lay in the water.

But by the time the net is collected, raised and emptied by the trawlers, the cod (and others) are dead, and there is nothing they can do about it.

Taking the cod back to shore could ensure a fine for the captain; staying out at sea until all the cod had been eaten just wouldn’t be cost effective; and so the only option left is for the accidently caught and killed cod to be thrown back into the sea to rot.

Not nice.

photo credit: llamnudds

How You Can Help:
Well, for starters, you can try to reduce the demand for cod by opting for other fish species when shopping or eating out on your travels. And if you end up visiting a traditional Fish & Chip Shop in a town or village on route – then try to order something else with your chips instead.

By choosing different fish, you are letting the shop know that people will pay for other fish, and so will encourage them to order in more alternatives to cod. It may also help them to reduce their cod demands overall and so naturally help wild cod to be less atrractive to the trawlers in the first place.

And, if trawlers don’t need to fish cod all the time to make a profit, then they won’t go over their cod quotas so quickly, and then any cod bycatch can be safely taken to shore to be made into fish fingers!

Visit FishFight.net to see if you can make your local Chippy into a revolutionary Mackeral & Chips outlet!

posted by Catherine on Jun 22

What is the fun in making a whole load of rules about the countryside?

The Countryside code is something that people rarely ever read – and this is for 2 main reasons. Either the people being shown the information are too rude and selfish to consider what might be best for the countryside itself and everyone else sharing in it’s beauty, so they have no interest in being ‘told what to do’.

Or they already know the code inside-out as it is all common sense to the the eco thinker!

I mean how more obvious could it be to anyone that dropping litter isn’t a great way to keep the countryside healthy! If you drop litter here today – what do you expect it to look like tomorrow?

The basic principles of the Countryside code are really just the exact same things as we see everywhere else in our lives – but maybe with sheep instead of hamsters, and oaks instead of rose bushes.

Would you leave the door to your friends hamster cage open after you put something inside? Would you start pulling roses off your neighbours bushes because you wanted a closer look at the leaves? Would you hit your dog waste under a hedge with a stick and into the school playground? While looking around a shop, would you start opening all the doors just to see what’s on the other side?

Strange. Because that is just what people expect to be able to do in the countryside.

How Are They The Same?
Unfortunately, because the countryside (and beaches and woodlands and mountains, moors and marshes) are all free to visit – some people assume that they have no value. And so they treat them as such.

For example, Family A travel to a small village for a visit and decide to wander off up a footpath as it is sunny. As they have not ‘done this before’ they may well ‘lose’ their way, find the path turning the ‘wrong’ way or come across a huge muddy puddle.

photo credit: robertsharp

Rather than thinking that the footpath goes another way for a reason or that the place they want to go might be private anyway – they say to themselves: ‘Well, we can see where we want to go – so if we just jump this fence, we can walk across this dry field and get there anyway’.

Now if you went around your friends house for a visit, walked to the end of their garden and saw a beautiful lake across someone else’s garden – you wouldn’t just bunk over your friends fence and trample your family across somone else’s garden to get to the private lake, would you?

So what makes it OK when it is just a farmers field?

All Are Welcome:
The countryside is usually ‘free’ to enter as many charities and private owners alike want people to experience to wonder and amazing character of the open countryside.

They do this by opening up for private business, extending their existing footpath and bridleway network to allow great freedom of the visitors and by making their land as easy to access and walk through as possible.

However, at any time they can revert to the bare minimum of access for walkers and riders. And repreated trespassing and vandalism will only bring this about sooner.

For example, shops that find large numbers of children encourage thefts restrict the number of children they allow in to their stores. Private Houses and Gardens open to the public often put barriers around precious items, flower beds and lawns and even close of certain rooms – usually due to past visitors damaging or breaking something with their carelessness.

The same could be true for your favourite areas of the countryside.

Imagine if all footpaths were fenced in; Open Access land was restricted back to the by-ways and gardens and houses were closed of?

Imagine also that due to the cost of repairs and alterations due to damage by visitors was placed on future visitors.

I remember a whole host of places that used to have ‘free parking’ or ‘free entry’ all year round – and churches that were left open all day.

That is not always the case anymore. More and more landowners, farmers, clergymen and charities are finding that unquestioning hospitality and generosity just are not traits that keep things ticking over.

Times are changing, but hopefully people can too!

Please pass on the Countryside Code to whoever you take out with you on your eco adventures. Pass on the reasons – not the rules – and hopefully you can change a few yourself.

posted by Catherine on May 24

As part of the ‘Making Wildlife Watching Easy’ series: Swifts, Swallows and Martins

These summer arrivals in Northern Europe offer a great aerial spectacle! Hardly landing anywhere, they glide, swoop and screech over our heads across the summer sky picking out all the little insects floating past!

But with them so high in the sky – usually in silhouette as the sun shines in your face added to their fast flying – how can you tell them apart?

Well the answer is ‘easily if you know what to look for’.

So, what is the difference between swifts, swallows and martins? It’s all down to the shape of their wings and tail to start, then you can use their colour if you are close enough.

The pictures in this article aren’t the best – but this shows how tricky they are a catch a glimpse of visually – that’s why their key features and their flying habits are so important.

The most easy to spot in the sky without any problems is the swift with its long curved-back wings – so it looks a bit like it has a boomerang strapped to it’s back!

photo credit: Michael Woodruff

Once you can spot this – that is the swift out of the way – then it’s down to the swallow and the different martins.

Visually, there are key things to look out for and can easily be seen on a photo – but in flight, this is easier said than done!

If we start with the swallow, then at least we can eliminate it from the list early on with 1 key feature: long tail ‘ribbons’.

In flight, these birds have a clear pair of much longer tail feathers coming off each fork of their tail. These aren’t so clear from a distance or in juvenile swallows – but if you can see them – then you know you have a swallow not a martin or swift!

photo credit: Mostly Dans

Swallows also have a white body in flight – as do the martins – but if they are close enough to you or perched, you can clearly see their reddish chin and blue neck-band.

However, the 2 most common martins in Europe are the sand and house – and are a bit tricky to tell apart in flight unless they obligingly fly close by you and you can see their colouring clearly: the house martin is blue with a noticable white rump (as shown below); and the sand martin is brown without the white rump.

photo credit: ahisgett

I know this sound obvious in writing, but observing it as the birds flip and flap around the swarm of insects they are feeding on is a little tricky!

But saying that – house martins nest on houses and sand martins nest in banks of sand – usually in large groups and on tall banks of around 5-10 meters in height. So if it flies up into the eaves of your roof it won’t be a sand martin, and if it is flying around a steep-sided river bank in groups it probably is a sand martin!

photo credit: zakwitnij

And if you aren’t sure – take a load of pictures; as even if they are distant or blurry you will still be able to see which they are on closer inspection!

Especially true if you are in southern Europe or elsewhere around the globe – as there are around 83 species of birds in this ‘family’ that it could be!

Another days bird-watching done!

posted by Catherine on Apr 27

Would you know what to do if you found an unconscious person while out on a walk?

How about if a friend of yours just suddenly fainted, cut themselves, feels unwell, or had a burn? If you said no – or aren’t sure, then you should think about going on an Emergency First Aid course.

Many people only do a First Aid course because they ‘have to’ for work or volunteering – but why should we be forced to do it? Why haven’t you thought about saving your family and friends in an emergency rather than having to help a random person who happened to visit your shop or office?

Why do we wait to be asked to learn such and important skill – we should be climbing over each other to get on a course!

And it isn’t about what to do with the casualty either – it is about assessing your needs as well as those of the patient. And your actions also affect the emergency services and complete strangers who could be 30 miles away from you.

How? Well think of the larger picture as well as just your little part in it.

Just You:
Before helping anyone in an emergency situation – you should check that you are safe to help in the first place – there is no point you getting injured, electrocuted, trapped, burned or drowned as well as the casualty! And if you do get hurt – who will be there to help you?

Don’t forget that 999/911/122 calls will get routed through to the emergency services even if you are in an area with no mobile coverage – so if in doubt about your safety – call them first for advice.

The Casualty:
If you can get to them safely – then you need to assess them before you call the emergency services – as you will need to know a bit more about them. For example, if they are not breathing at all – then those first few minutes could be vital to their survival, so don’t waste them trying to make a phone call!

And you might find that they are not that seriously hurt or were just sleeping! Needless to say that if you do call out a helicopter or ambulance for someone who ends up telling you that they were just sleeping or drunk – you have wasted a lot of peoples time and resources.

photo credit: Artotem

The Complete Stranger:
He was just in his garden at home when he started getting chest pains – they didn’t go away when he laid down so he struggled to the phone to call an ambulance as he thought he was having a heart attack.

He speaks to the emergency staff and they tell him that they will be there as soon as they can – but they know that their last ambulance is on its way to that collapsed casualty in the woods 15 miles away.

Your casualty turns out to be hung-over while that complete stranger is getting worse! There are a limited number of emergency vehicles in any one area – so make sure that you don’t waste their resources by calling them for a non-emergency.

The Emergency Services:
Obviously if you find an unconscious person anywhere who is not responding to your loud voice or a firm shoulder pat (as they could be deaf) – then you should clear their airways and make sure that they are breathing and then call the emergency services for advice.

However, you must assess their situation first to be of most help to them. They have been trained to save lives and have the equipment to do so – but if they are 20 miles away from the casualty then they can’t do their job.

There are also alternative emergency advice solutions – particularly if the casualty is conscious and not in a life-threatening situation. Taking them to one of the many minor injuries or illness clinics is a great first option, calling NHS Direct (UK only) can answer many of your questions and advise you of the best course of action.

But nothing beats getting your own skills in Emergency First Aid – that way you can help your friends and family immediately – and offer the correct help to others in need.

You’ll never regret taking the course – only not taking it.

posted by Catherine on Apr 3

As part of the ‘Making Wildlife Watching Easy’ series, here’s a nice simple wildbird guide: How to tell the difference between Rooks and Crows.

These 2 large black (and noisy) birds can be seen in both town and countryside. They are both quite heavy-looking and are often seen in groups – usually in trees. But although they look virtually identical from a distance, they have some very different features when you look more closely.

So, what are the key features to help tell them apart?

Well, the main differences are with the beaks, the legs and their habits – the easiest to spot is that the beak of the rook is larger, has 2 colours on it (black tip and cream toward the cheeks) and looks a bit scarier!

photo credit: foxypar4

Once you can spot this – all the other differences aren’t important. However saying that, I still have a bit of trouble getting them to stand still so I can have a look!

And although pictures of them side by side can clearly show you the differences, when they are flapping about or up in the air – it really isn’t that easy first few times, so this is where you can use their behaviour to help you. Rooks are nearly always in large groups and rarely ever alone, whereas crows will often be solitary or in a small family group.

Visually, these are the main differences – and I have written them down only if they are clear differences rather than ‘a slightly rounder tail’, etc. These things should be clearly noticable with or without binoculars:

Rook – Pointy beak that has black tip and is exposed right to the eye.
Rook – Ruffled looking all over with noticable spikey head and untidy leg feathers.

photo credit: foxypar4

Crow – Shorter, more curved beak which stops at the face and with feathers on top.
Crow – Neat rounded head feathers, with neat little ‘trousers’ at the top of the leg.

photo credit: dustpuppy

Obviously there are natural variations to both birds that you can only tell through experience – for example juvenile rooks are lacking the fully exposed beak and therefore they resemble a crow from a distance.

Jackdaws and Ravens are also black and really shouldn’t be confused with crows or rooks! Both are completely different sizes and it won’t take much looking to tell them apart.

Jackdaws are considerably smaller and have an almost silver sheen to their feathers and a clear black forehead that is easy to see when they land. They also have really bright yellow eyes! They are often seen with flocks of rooks so you can compare their size.

photo credit: Maxwell Hamilton

Ravens on the other hand are huge! If you saw a raven on the ground without any scale – it would look just like a crow – however, if seen next to known plants or other birds you won’t mistake them.

They are about the size of a herring gull where as crows aren’t much bigger than a magpie! They have over a meter wingspan in flight and an obvious wedge shape to the tail too.

posted by Catherine on Mar 25

The sun is shining and the lambs are hopping round their field – or are they?

When we see little lambs bouncing around in the sun – we can only think of how cute they are. Out come the cameras and the high pitched voices as we point at them with our friends and children.

But did you know that those little sheep are fighting to keep adonis blue butterflies breeding in southern England?

How? Well, it isn’t like they are waving banners about or stopping urban development in the area – they are just doing what they do best. Eating grass.

An Easy Life:
Basically, these sheep are grazing the hillside landscapes that blanket the south of England as well as other sloping grassy surfaces around the world because that is what they are good at.

Sheep thrive in these niche landscapes due to their breeding – or our manipulation of their breeding – and so they have changed the way things look around them. And as a result of that have helped to create habitats where wild flowers and insects thrive.

But these habitats are man-made (or sheep-made) and a few years of no grazing, and all the plants, insects and birds are at risk of being lost!

Without the sheep mowing the hillsides flat – including shoots from all other plants, bushes and trees – the grass would soon become covered in scrub, brambles and gorse, which in turn would become overgrown and then allow for tree growth.

How You Can Help.
Now that farming is becoming less and less profitable, sheep farmers are limited to the amount of sheep they can keep for this valuable biodiversity control – and so flocks are getting smaller and grasslands are shrinking.

So are wildflower and insect populations.

So, when you local farm invites you inside to watch the lambs, stroke them, hold them and maybe even take a ride around the farm in a tractor – he is really asking you to help make sure that the sheep can stay.

And ultimately, he is asking you to save your local grasslands and your local landscapes.

Could you imagine your local open spaces covered in prickly bramble and spikey gorse bushes instead of fields of soft picnic-inducing grasslands?

All you have to do to help keep them that way – is to pay to go and see some cute lambs; your local species and habitat saving warriors in disguise!

photo credit: Tim Pokorny

posted by Catherine on Mar 17

If you are taking a long eco holiday – why travel alone?

When heading off on an eco adventure anywhere around the globe – there is no need for you to spend the whole time travelling on your own – why not meet up with other singles along the way?

If you are planning an epic journey or a working holiday covering large distances overland – then where is the harm in finding like-minded people to travel with – or to meet at destinations for a week or 2 along the way.

Infact, I find that this is the best way to meet people with similar ideas and outlooks to yourself. I mean if you are signed up to 6 weeks humanitarian work in Africa and you meet someone there – you know the type of person they are.

Same goes for people helping wildlife, raising money for certain charities, or just teaching overseas. These types of people are the same as you – so why not search them out and make friends?

Where Can I Find Them?
There are many websites, blogs and social network sites which allow you to talk to other people with similar interests, experiences or plans – and you can hop on board with them and their ideas.

You can also find many more companies simply offering great holidays for singles along the same lines – to introduce people and to share travel experiences.

Such companies offer to help match up people on the road, in resorts or during charity work or wildlife expeditions. Maybe after 8 weeks trekking, you want to put your feet up in a beachside bothy or rainforest retreat – and you want to take that time to meet others.

There are plenty of opportunities to find out about these types of organisations and chat to people who have been there already.

photo credit: [casey]

Why A Singles Holiday?
Well, for a start – there won’t be a single supplement for these places – they won’t expect you to pay extra money for an empty bed!

There are also many people who want to travel but are a bit worried about getting on alone – and these holidays can be just the thing needed to kick start your confidence – a great place to start off from.

All the other travellers at these locations are single travellers too, and so are more likely to chat to you too – so instant conversations can spark up – and maybe even long-term friendships.

Alternatively, you might be a seasoned traveller who just wants to be in great company for a few days at a time inbetween long solitary stints. A nice place to relax where you know you will be welcomed – and won’t be feeling the odd one out with other couples or family groups.

Whatever age, whichever country you are in or from and for however long you want to visit – there will always be something for everyone.

posted by Catherine on Mar 9

Does booking an eco holiday really mean you have to pay more for everything?

We all know that you can’t find a great eco holiday package for less than a ‘short hop to the sun’ type holiday, because you are comparing 2 different things: you either want to respect the environment and the people living in it, or you want to spend as little as possible to get somewhere warm.

But if you are planning to find travel deals that can help you to plan a more independent holiday – then you shouldn’t have to pay more to get there and back for example.

If you are planning to spend 3 months travelling across Europe, or spend a year moving around South America – there is no need to pay full price for your transport if you can get it at a reduced price.

I mean why would you offer to pay full price for a train ride from New York to Los Angeles if the person behind you in the queue was only paying a fraction of that cost? There is nothing you can do to stop a company from offering a promotional rate – however you could always refuse the offer and pay full price if you want – but I’m sure nobody would really do that!

Your Long Trip:
So if you are planning a long vacation somewhere – you may still want to search for the best deals on transport, food and accommodation – so that you can travel for longer.

You will of course still have your normal eco standards, like no ‘bush meat’ or no meat at all; no consumer products from giant stores; no hotel chains; etc – but you can find the best vacation discount for whatever it is that you are looking for.

You still need to sleep somewhere, buy products, eat food and travel from A to B – so why not use the Internet to help you find what you are looking for with link-filled sites like TravelFinders.co to help you find specific travel websites that could help you.

People you meet will also have reduced prices to offer you when you arrive somewhere – maybe 1 night free if you stay a week, half price trip if you book another trip through the same agent, etc. Deals are all around us and taking advantage of them doesn’t need to go against your eco thinking.

If you saw 6 free range organic eggs for sale for half the price of another brand of free range organic eggs – I’m sure you wouldn’t opt for the more expensive ones. Same thing with everything in life.

And there may be times when you do need to book a ticket on a plane for those longer journeys or in times of trouble – so why not look for a cheap flights going the same way?

Being eco friendly doesn’t mean you have to pay more – it means you won’t settle for less than what you believe in.