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In the last years, many people talked about “responsible traveling”. Agencies and local operators start to offer eco-friendly tours, transformational experiences that involve meet locals and take care of the environment we are visiting.

What makes you a responsible traveler?

There is a difference between being a tourist and a traveler. A tourist will often engage in big-group tours, will buy souvenirs on big brands shops that don’t care much about the local economies, and probably will want to be just with the people he or she has traveled with.

None of these things has to do with being a traveler, and even less, a responsible one. Nowadays it’s almost a common habit to take care of the environment. Nature has recently shown us that we do not have much more time to start behaving with our planet. So we are currently familiarized with things like: 

•  Don’t use single-use plastic bottles
• Don’t make waste in parks and natural reserves
• Recycle each time you can
• Try to use non-pollutant-means of transport (like a nice bike..)

Practicing responsible traveling is, apart from doing all these things, more about the kind of choices we make each time we visited a news destination and culture.

What a responsible traveler will do on vacations 

First of all, if you are a responsible traveler, you’ll be very respectful of the monuments, the landscapes, and the culture that is hosting you. That’s to say, an educated human being.

Focusing on the places most people won’t regularly go, is a way not only to live a truly local experience but also a transformative adventure. What if you have visited that little fisherman village instead of going on a big boat tour? Or if you have asked your host where you can find the best local meal in town and mingle with true locals? 

Start asking yourself these sorts of questions and you’ll soon realize that any journey can turn from just a vacation into a life experience. Again, it’s up to you! You’ll be having a responsible travel experience when:

• You find yourself wandering a neighborhood that wasn’t marked on your “How to see 100 places in a day” travel guide. In this way, you’ll be fighting the over-tourism that many places (like Rome, Paris, the Eiffel Tower) started to suffer.
  
  
• Choose to take a tour with a local community or agency. In this way, all the money you’ll spend will go directly into the pockets of locals. As they know their hometown better than anyone, you’ll have more chances to live a sustainable experience, because these people are especially preoccupied with taking care of their environment and traditions. Plus, young people who choose to leave their little villages, though they have cultural and natural heritage, will find more job opportunities and stay to preserve their way of living.
  
  
•  Lodge in a guesthouse instead of a big chain hotel. Many locals are glad to interact with their hosts, and if you let yourself go, you may even make some friends for life, or learn a new language.
  
  
• Use your social networks in a responsible way to help to promote a local place and NOT TO PROMOTE IT if you think that local balance will be damaged.