Take the Bus! Good for the Environment, Your Wallet, and Your Wanderlust

And now for something a bit different!

We’ve been writing a lot in the past few weeks about life as a graduate student or some of the things we are learning while on our respective doctoral journeys.  However, if you will recall, we also love to go on journeys in general.  Meridith and I have always been avid travelers.  We have visited numerous other countries together (South Africa, Costa Rica, Panama, England, Aruba…) and separately (Kenya, Argentina, Ireland, Thailand...).  While traveling overseas is, literally, one of the best things ever, one of my favorite bar questions to ask people is, “What are the top 5 locations you want to visit in the United States?”  I think we spend a lot of time fantasizing about getting to far-off, exotic locations, and that can cause us to overlook the beauty in our own backyard (so to speak). (Editor’s Note: This is so true! One of my big epiphanies from my summer traveling Europe - by bus and train! - was that I had totally under appreciated all there is to see in the good ol’ U S of A.)  And while I might get to visit friends or make new friends when traveling overseas, getting a co-conspirator for your State side adventuring is a bit easier.

As Mer is one of my all time favorite partners in crime, she and I have always made a point to visit one another regularly.  Our college roommates (and often an all-star cast of their amazing boyfriends/girlfriends/partners/pals/siblings) make a point of gathering for New Years Eve.  That’s always a treat, and usually involves doing a multi-city flight out of California, to home, to the NYE destination (Boston 2015!), and then back to California.  While well worth it, that gets expensive.  If you add onto that a trip home during the summer and plane travel really starts to take a bite out of your budget.  So, what’s a budget-conscious, environmentally-minded person with a severe case of wanderlust to do?  Well, you can hop on the Greyhound and get to a regional destination with little money, hassle, and C02 wasted.  When I was living in Long Beach and Meridith was in Las Cruces, we were frequenting the Greyhound route between Long Beach and El Paso on a semesterly basis!

NYE 2014 Crew

“Whoa, whoa, whoa, Rachel.  Take the bus? I have a car!”  Yeah? Then find a bunch of friends and pile into the car.  Carpooling is great, and sometimes it is the most logical option.  But, maybe you have a more flexible schedule, you’re traveling solo, or you really want to cut your carbon emissions.  In that case, you should really be looking up the local Greyhound and Megabus schedules.  I’ve written about my internal conflict concerning the environmental impacts of travel here, and I’d suggest you check it out.  For those unwilling to read my previous ramblings, my conclusions are simply that bus travel is the most cost effective and environmentally friendly way to transit regionally.  Since writing that post over a year ago, I’ve had numerous conversations with people who just can’t seem to get over their bus hang-ups.  Maybe this isn’t the most glamorous way to move about the world, but if you are a reasonable traveler who keeps their wits about them, you have very little about which to worry.

Maybe you’re willing to give it a try?  I’ll give you a few tips from my numerous Greyhound adventures and misadventures to make your first bus trip a breeze.                     

Guest Blog: Ecologist on the Appalachian Trail

This is my little sister, Sara!!!!

Note from Rachel:  I'm really excited today to have the very first guest post of this blog's (short) history!  Allow me to introduce my kid sister, Sara.  When I describe her to people I usually give these stats:  she's a scientist, she plays competitive roller derby, she's way smarter than me, and she's one of the coolest people you could ever meet.  She just graduated with a BS in Biology with a concentration in Ecology and Wildlife Management from my alma mater Western Kentucky University.  In college, she had some pretty amazing adventures and some really cool scientific experiences.  Check out this write-up of her long-term internship with the National Parks Service and this article about an African wildlife management course she participated in last summer (here is a video about the course...she's basically the star).  After her graduation and the completion of her honor's thesis this spring (she examined song bird use of restored old-fields), she decided to take a much deserved break from the world.  And what better way to get away from it all  than to go hiking, right?  

Never really known for moderation, my sister doesn't just decided to go camping for a few weeks.  No, no.  She decides to hike about 600 miles of the Appalachian Trail.  And, because I think a big portion of this blog should always be dedicated to enjoying nature, I've asked her to write a few guest posts along the way.  So here you go.  Two girls, two hammocks, one dog, and about a million trees.  What could go wrong?  

LIT to KY Pt. 2: Adventures in the Sunny South

What?  You’re writing a low impact travel post that begins with a plane ride?  Yes I am.  Please see Pt. 1 for a little more information on my thoughts and rationale regarding this issue.

Day One: In Transit

As is my general practice in life, I took the spring quarter down to the wire.  I had a paper due at 5:00 pm on Tuesday which I turned in, literally at 5:00 pm.  I have trouble letting things go.  I just like to mess with them till the last possible second… Then I had a lab meeting on Wednesday, and class on Thursday, and BBQ on Thursday, and a date night on Friday.  Things got busy and all of a sudden it was Saturday, and I needed to leave the house at 4 pm and I hadn't packed, scooped the kitty litter, or anything!  Lucky for me, at this point I’m very good at packing and my boyfriend is very good at keeping up with the laundry. 

Is this real life?  An empty
middle seat?  Praise be.

I was able to quickly zip up my suitcase and my backpack (with minimal work stuff actually, which was nice), made sure to grab my reusable mug, my water bottle, and some airport snacks, and we were out the door.  We had just enough time to stop by the Co-op on our way out of town so I could grab some coffee and a few more snacks.  I’m sort of obsessed with our local foods co-op.  They have an amazing section of bulk foods and, as luck would have it, one of their awesome bulk trail mixes was on sale.  Score.  I've written before about the importance of bringing snacks with you when you travel.  When you are trying to have a small impact, being able to source the products you consume is very important.  It’s a lot easier to do this when you make your purchases from sources you know and trust than when you are rushed and hangry (hungry plus angry) at the airport.  Bonus points, when you plan ahead, you can make sure the snacks you choose come with minimal unnecessary packaging.  I put my trail mix in a little paper bag and my coffee in my to-go mug and we were on our way.

LIT to KY Pt 1: Planes, trains, and moral conflict

My Greyhound view on the 20hr trek between NM and CA.

As a preface, this is part one of a two part post about my recent trip home to Kentucky.  Part two will take the more traditional form of my other Low Impact Travel (LIT) posts where I discuss my adventures and the little ways I try to alter my travel behaviors to reduce my ecological impact.  However, I wanted to take some time and space to talk about an issue which often troubles me, how and why we choose our means of transportation.  Please note that while this post does contain some science, it's mostly my own opinions and rational.  It should be taken as neither fact or prescription, and is simply the conversation I have been having with myself for the past 4 years, converted into essay form.  

Low Impact Travel: Snow Mt. Wilderness

Preamble: I feel some of these "Low Impact Travel" posts are going to get a little repetitive in their environmental action content.  Unless I have a striking new tip or experience, I'll just include ways I generally lower my impact into the narrative and sum up at the end.  As I do more different kinds of travel this summer (travel for conferences, going home to Kentucky, or driving for work) I'll write more posts with more specific tips.  As suggested in the comments, I'll bold some of the basic tips/suggestions throughout the post.

****

I wrote on Wednesday that I needed to re-up my commitment to make time for nature before the month ended and I inadvertently killed my 2013 streak of monthly nature outings.  In the middle of writing that post, I sent an email out to a group of my friends about organizing a hiking trip or adventuring some other adventure.  I got a reply from two of these pals about a potential camping trip already in the works with a few mutual friends.  I'm super duper shy and was a little nervous about spending the weekend with numerous people I don't consistently spend time with (but I did know almost all of them...super duper shy).  But, my friend A (who I went to the snow with) and another friend J were going to be there, and honestly I knew everyone else going was fun and nice, so I decided to get over my irrational reservations and do what I wanted to do:  go camping!


The other nice thing about tagging along on someone else's adventure is that I had to do very little planning.  The ring leader of the operation, M, had us all over to her house for dinner on Friday night where she made us delicious food and we worked out the details.  A had already picked out a great spot, the Snow Mountain Wilderness in the Mendocino National Forest.  I do my work along the coast in salt marshes, where there aren't really any trees and even less mountain action, so I love exploring in areas like this.  There were nine of us leaving together on Saturday morning and planning to return early Sunday evening, with another person meeting us up later on Saturday night.  So, we split up meal/beer duties and decided that we only needed two cars.  Everyone would sit close, but we would use way less gas, which, in a group of ecologists, is a prime concern.


I headed from the lovely dinner straight to the Co-op to get food for my meal, Saturday dinner.  I was going to make burritos with guacamole and my dinner counterpart planned to make roasted vegetable packs to put in the burritos or eat on the side.  I got my supplies and went home with the best of intentions intentions to make everything for my food contribution that night.  Instead, I went to my room and set my alarm for early...I'd do all that stuff in the morning.  We were planning to leave at 8am, and I didn't roll out of bed till 7:20.  I hadn't packed a single thing.  Oops.  Lucky for me I keep most of my camping gear in a single location and this was only an overnight trip.  I quickly threw all my stuff together in my backpack, went downstairs and threw all my food in a bag.  No coffee yet, ugh, but I rolled up to M's house only 15ish minutes late, just as everyone was bringing their stuff outside to pack in the cars.  Perfect timing actually.  And M had coffee.  A good woman.

We blew a tire on the way to the campsite,
but with our powers combined overcame

We piled into the two cars and began our caravan out to the Ranger's Station closest to our end destination.   Meridith wrote last summer about how we love to talk to park rangers and get their recommendation on what to do in the area.  We planned to ask this ranger where she thought we should camp, and we needed to get a campfire permit.  I actually didn't know that, in CA, when you are camping outside of designated camp grounds you must have a campfire permit to start a fire or use a camp stove.  It's a cool practice because they go through a bit of basic fire safety with you and make you state (cross your heart) that you will abide by certain cations to minimize fire risk.  If we want to keep enjoying the wilderness, we need to make sure and follow the rules.  Fire permit in hand, we headed to the recommended Summit Springs Trailhead.  Along the way we drove through the remnants of a forest fire, which A (a forest ecologist who studies fire!) told me happened in 2009.  We pitched our tents at the informal site along a flat about a quarter mile short of the trailhead.

The light green looking clearing in the center is a
serpentine outcrop

Serpentine

After an awesome lunch, we headed to the trailhead around 2:45 for a 4 hour hike about the wilderness.  We saw tons of really cool native flora and some awesome vistas.  One set of really cool ecological features we saw were the serpentine outcropings.  These unique geologic formations result in the very unique serpentine soils.  These soils are the result of the erosion of metamorphic rocks which contain high levels of iron and magnesium.  Due in part to the unique mineralogy of these rocks (and in part to some other ecological characteristics about which I am certainly not an expert), this soil has very characteristic properties and supports a specific group of native plants.  The really cool thing about serpentine outcrops is that they represent small discreet patches of habitat for theses specialized communities.  As a result, these soils and their associated flora and fauna have been used to study many ecological theories (island biogeography, meta-population structure, meta-community theory, just to name a few).  Plus, these are just really pretty rocks.

Forest Frisbee

Old Forest Fire

We arrived at an open glade around 5:00 pm, and everyone was pretty ready to turn around and head back for dinner prep before we lost the light.  A little game of frisbee broke out, and a few of us wandered a little past the open area, and around a meadow to attempt to get another good view.  Meadows are really cool ecosystems as well.  A lot like wetlands, they are periodically wet and walking through them can cause subtle changes in elevation, which alter hydrology and can impact the native species.  Public service announcement:  when you are hiking, always walk around a meadow.  We found our final view, which was a great glimpse of the valley and part of the Coast Range, and we also passed through another, older (according to A) forest fire.  Seeing all the burned trees standing there, stark white, with little saplings popping up underneath was really cool and moving for me.  Seeing the natural cycles of nature, and feeling like I understand even a small part of what is going on is humbling and exciting.  We headed back to camp, made an epic dinner, had an killer bonfire, drank some adult beverages, and ate (at least I did) one too many s'mores.  As the night wound down, we dowsed our fire with a substantial amount of water, stirred the embers, and headed to bed.

Informative Sign

The next morning after breakfast, we packed up our camp and headed back down the road.  We wanted to get another short hike in, but weren't sure where we wanted to go.  One of our party had a really poor night's sleep and another had long standing knee issues.  After a full day of hiking the day before, we were looking for something low key.  Luckily, on the way out, we passed a sign for Letts Lake.  We snacked by the shore then took a short, hour long hike all the way around the shores of the lake.  I, naturally, poked all around at the edge of the water and took a picture of the lake from every angle.  I love ecology in general, but when you add water to it, I'm in my element.  I saw some cool dragonfly exuvia on the emergent vegetation and a pretty interesting informative sign.  I wish there had been a little more information as I could infer a lot from this sign, but I think the general public would have been interested in a  bit more information.

Letts Lake

And that was that.  Adventure success.  And, despite my initial shy-girl reservations, I had a great time with this group of people and think I will hang with them again in the future.  It's hard for me, but I always feel so great after making new connections or expanding on ones that are already in place.  I'm excited to see what will happen in June as that will be the half way point for this new year's resolution.

Last Word:  After feeling sort of despondent after a few weeks of pretty intense work, getting out into nature totally recharged my batteries.  As usual when traveling, I tried to make sure we took as few cars as possible.  We brought and cooked almost all our own food (we stopped at a little Mexican joint on the way back out of the woods) and were careful to LNT (leave no trace) when we packed up our campsite.  We also were very careful about our use of fire in the woods and made sure to get the proper permits.  I also took lots of pictures and made sure to get thoroughly wow-ed by the natural splendor of the area.  A very successful trip indeed.      

This is me, glorying.

What do you think?  Do you get nervous going on trips with people who you don't know super well?  What are some of the best nature facts you've learned on the trail?  Any awesome "wow, this is beautiful and makes me feel small, which is AWESOME!" moments to share?   

Low Impact Travel: Going to the Snow

My feet in my snowshoes!

I think, a lot of times, people perceive a ecology-centered lifestyle (or green...I'm never really sure what terminology to use) as being restrictive.  It's not an outlandish conclusion to come to, really.  Essentially, when making decisions in an ecosystem context, you're thinking not just about yourself, but the system in which you live.  In that framework, sometimes the easiest, most convenient, or even funnest option isn't the very best choice.  This can seem like, well, a bummer.  However, I think you will find that with a little effort and proper prior planning you can still enjoy the activities you love!  I'll give you an example of an adventure I went on with some lady-ecologists this past weekend.

Not like the snow was deep or anything

One of my friends in graduate school, A, is from Florida originally, and since winter has rolled in she has been jonesing to get to the snow!  Lucky for her, I am always game for an outdoor adventure, and we quickly found a few co-conspirators.  With a little quick research, A found that we could rent snow shoes from the campus outdoor club for 10 dollars for the whole weekend.  Renting or borrowing equipment that you will only use occasionally is one excellent way to lessen the impact of your adventures.  You can think of it as reusing on the social level!  So, on Friday, after my TA meeting, I tottered on down to the outdoor adventure accessorizer, and rented my snowshoes.  Easy peasie.  I also borrowed a pair of gaiters from one of the other girls coming along because I lack proper snow-playing  gear (I'd been living in SoCal for 3 years).

Lake Tahoe from afar

Originally, A and I had planned to head up to Lake Tahoe on Saturday night with a full car of friends and stay at a fellow student's parent's cabin, and another group planned to drive up Sunday morning early and meet us for the day.  However, around 3:30 Saturday afternoon, due to a number of circumstances, the volume of passengers in the car dropped to just A and myself.  We regrouped and called the Sunday morning crew.  Did they all want to carpool together on Sunday morning?  The deal was done, and we all had more time to do work (oh joy).  Carpooling is an extremely important part of lessening the impacts of your adventures.  If your schedule is flexible, taking the train or bus are also great options!  I used this carbon footprint calculator to estimate the emissions from our trip.  With 4 of us in the car, I estimate we emitted 0.09 metric tons of CO2.  That's only 0.023 metric tons of CO2 each as opposed to 0.04 if we had stuck with the original plan and driven in pairs.  Additionally, considering the vehicle you choose to drive is key.  If I can avoid it, I never take my car on adventures unless it will be FULL of gear, surfboards, or people because the gas millage is not the best.

You have rented, you have carpooled, and now you are on your adventure!  Time to have a blast and/or marvel at nature (depending on the brand of adventure you have chosen).  Make sure you pack your own food and water to the greatest extent possible to reduce the unnecessary plastic wrapping associated with buying food on the go.  I go into some examples of the types of foods I like on the go here.  On this adventure, I had a few granola bars (weird composite wrapping, too bad) and lots of fruit!



Lower Echo Lake

How long could we have resisted?

After this weekend, I would highly recommend that everyone go on a winter adventure ASAP.  As we discussed on our hike, the deep snow makes LNT (leave no trace) hiking super easy.  You don't have to worry about messing up trails, damaging vegetation, or contributing to erosion because...you're just walking on top of the snow!  It was also wonderful to get out into nature as it really helped me to decompress.  I'm never sure how much to write about it here, but being a graduate student is really stressful.  I'm busy a lot, and that's why my posting here isn't super regular.  However, when I spend time on non-academic things on purpose, I'm much more productive during my week.  And running around this winter wonderland was a great use of my time!

Really guys, don't even try and park here.

Last Word:  Adventuring while living an environmentally conscious life is possible!  All you need is a little bit of creativity and desire to make a good plan.  Knowing I put in just that little extra effort makes me feel even more excited about my current/future endeavors   Over the last weekend, my major green decisions were to rent/barrow gear, carpool, and pack lots of snacks!  Next time you long for an adventure, try to implement at least one (maybe two!) of these strategies, and try to find a way to measure the results.  I love looking at the numbers and seeing the impacts of my decisions.

 What do you think?  Are there things you could do to make your adventures easier on the planet?  Any tips for low impact travel that I haven't mentioned in this post?  I would love to hear them!     

Low Impact Travel: Thanksgiving 2012

I am back from my Thanksgiving travels.  I’m still pretty tired, and have a ton of school stuff to catch up on, as usual I suppose.  This year, travel was especially crazy because ticket prices were so high (ouch), so I took a red-eye flight on Wednesday which got me into Nashville around 5am CST.  I then flew out of Nashville on Saturday at 7am CST.  Quick turn around, and a few very early mornings!  I thought I might reflect on my wanderings and talk about small things we can do to make our travel footprint a little smaller. 

WEDNESDAY:

I did some school work in the morning and early afternoon.  The usual.  The boyfriend (hereafter D Lo) picked me up from school right after class, and I went straight away to making brownies for my roomies and my rideshare buddy.  I went through my fridge and tried to pick out the veggies that would go bad before I got home.  I juiced up a carrot, cucumber, chopped a sort of mealy apple, and threw all that in  the blender with some kale, frozen raspberries, and bananas.  D Lo usually avoids my “salad smoothies,” but I think he was counting on missing me, so he drank up, and it was proclaimed “not that bad.”  My lab mate and her boyfriend swung by to pick me up just as the brownies were done and the smoothies were in our bellies.  My lab mate is from the Bay Area, so she just dropped me off at a train station near her house.  I jammed out to podcasts all the way to the airport.  Once there, I got real hungry, and got another smoothie (this one in a plastic container).  A quick jaunt from SFO to LAX, a speedy veggie burger and fries from Burger King (I really love to eat while I travel) and I was on a plane again and on my way to the southern homeland!

Green smoothies are one of my fave snacks.

Travel Dos:

#1àDo make sure and use up your food before you leave home.  Waste not, want not as they say.

#2àDo ride share and ride public transit when you can.  SO MUCH less stressful than dealing with holiday traffic.

#3àDo remember to pack your own snacks.  Things you buy at the airport as so over priced, wrapped in plastic, and usually not that good for you (I’m looking at you Burger King).

THURSDAY:

Many many cooks in the kitchen!

I rode in the car SO much today, but in that part of the country, it’s much harder to avoid.  Public transit is just not really well developed in more rural areas.  I also went on every errand with all my siblings.  Really, nothing beats riding in a car, chatting, listening to music on a beautiful fall, country day.  I just love Kentucky.  I had a wonderful Thanksgiving.  I didn’t take that many pictures, but I am so blessed to have such lovely family and friends to spend these times with me.  I did make everyone laugh till they almost cried when I admitted to drinking cabbage juice last year when I was working on my thesis.  I’m a weirdo in a family of weirdoes, and we all like it that way.  My brother even made a fabulous vegan dish for me to enjoy with the Thanksgiving Feast!  We ate, and drank, and played games until the cousins had to head home.  It was a great holiday.     

Post dinner entertainment from my bro and my sister's beau.  

Travel Dos:

#4àDo remember it’s the holidays and you are supposed to play and do things you don’t always do (like eat till you have a little tummy pooch! Yum!! Or ride all around town in a car.)

FRIDAY:

My newest niece puppy who I met Friday.

This was my only full day in Kentucky.  I’m so glad my brother got this day off work so we could all hang out till he and my sister-in-law had to leave at 1pm.  My college roommate was also in for the holiday with the family, he’s an adopted kid to my parents, and he got to stay till lunch time as well!  That evening my best friend and another college roommate stopped by to hang out and chat and eat more food!  I also had some time on Friday to talk Christmas plans with my mom.  She is going to make me some bulk food bags and some reusable face cloths (think a reusable item that will replace cotton balls in the bathroom), more on this later.  I also remembered where I got so many of my good-for-the-earth habits when I watched my mom fix a few Christmas decorations instead of throwing them away and give tons of leftovers to us in reused containers (No, D Lo, that is pie not feta cheese!).  I also had an amazing conversation with my sister about women in science and the impacts of our diet choices.  She is pretty amazing and works for the National Park Service, and her park just got its first female director!

SATURDAY:

On the road again, way way early.  Too too early.  Luckily, this time I had my mom around to fix me tons of snacks.  I wish I had taken a picture of the spread.  I had coffee in my to-go mug, pretzels in a reused container, peanut butter and gram crackers wrapped in tin foil, and raisins.  This kept me from buying any snacks all the way through the airports!  Thanks mom!  I took the train from SFO to within about an hour of my California home and, once again, D Lo and I were able to avoid the stressful airport traffic.  Basically, living in a city where the train is connected to the airport is amazing (…duh…).  We were way too tired to cook that night though, so we ordered in Indian food.

Travel Dos:

#5àMake ahead of time, and freeze, a homemade meal.  You will be too tired to go out or cook when you get home, and your delicious curry will come in a plastic Tupperware.  To the credit of this restaurant, my curry and two small condiments were the only things in plastic.  Pretty cool!

FINAL WORD:  Obviously, this isn’t a post about large scale travel choices (train vs. plane vs. automobile) because this little southern girl has got to get home, and flying is really the only practical way at this point.  Maybe that post will come later.  That said, the holidays are supposed to be fun!  I think that lots of things you can do to make your travel lower impact, also make the whole experience more fun and way less stressful.  Public transit and ridesharing are decidedly less stressful because you spend less and deal with traffic less, always a win.  Spending money on overpriced items *cough*airport snacks *cough* always stresses me out, and I loved not doing that on the way back to CA.  Think about your holiday routine, we’ll all be doing it again in a few weeks, and consider changes you can make. 

What do you think?  Do you have any great green travel tips?  Any tips for avoiding holiday stress?  Favorite on the go snacks?