The Way We Travel
We have never been very good at labels. "Sustainable," "green," and "eco-friendly" can mean different things to different people. We would rather tell you how we travel and let our actions speak for themselves.
Long before anyone talked about sustainable tourism, my Scoutmaster, Burt Ames of Troop 84 in Gainesville, taught us to think responsibly about camping, hiking and community projects. What I took from him was simple: minimize our impact while maximizing what we learned and understood. That philosophy stayed with me, and it has influenced how Pedalers has designed and operated trips since 1987.
For us, responsible travel is not a separate program added to a tour. Much of it is simply part of designing a better trip.
Small Groups, Bigger Local Impact
Our scheduled trips are limited to 8 or 12 guests and depart with as few as two.
Small groups let us use family-run inns, independent restaurants and local experiences that larger tour groups often cannot. They also give us the flexibility to spend more time in smaller towns and rural areas, away from the busiest tourism centers.
We have even stopped operating in destinations when the concentration of organized tour groups began to detract from the experience.
Keep It Local
The people running your trip live there.
Our guides, drivers and support crews are local, as are the companies providing vehicles and specialist activities. Some of those relationships in Thailand, Bhutan and Alaska go back more than 20 years.
We follow the same approach with lodging and other services, choosing locally owned businesses wherever the trip takes us. Nearly all of the money Pedalers spends to operate a tour stays with locally based people and businesses.
Bikes That Already Live There
We don't ship a global bicycle fleet from country to country.
The bikes used on our tours are owned, maintained and serviced locally. When our own bikes eventually leave tour service, they are sold locally and continue being ridden rather than being treated as disposable equipment.
It reduces unnecessary freight while supporting local cycling businesses and mechanics.
Eat Where You Are
Food is one of the best ways to understand a place.
Regional cuisine, independently owned restaurants, markets, cafes and local specialties have been part of Pedalers trips from the beginning. Our guides know where to eat and have the freedom to change plans when they know somewhere better.
Eating locally keeps money in the destination, but there is an even simpler reason we do it: it makes for a better trip.
Travel Lightly
Cycling, walking and paddling may be lower-impact ways to explore, but that does not make the rest of a trip impact-free.
We try to reduce unnecessary vehicle use, keep support vehicles parked with engines off between support points, use refillable drinking-water systems wherever practical, minimize disposable packaging and reuse equipment where it makes sense.
The details vary by destination. What works in Japan may not be practical in Bhutan or rural Thailand, so we prefer sensible local solutions to one universal checklist.
Travel With Respect
Understanding where you are is just as important as seeing it.
Our local guides help guests understand customs, appropriate behavior and cultural differences as they travel. Wildlife guidance is equally destination-specific, whether that means viewing birds from a canoe, joining a naturalist on an Indian wildlife drive or knowing what to do if a cyclist encounters a bear or bison in Alaska.
The idea is simple: we are guests in someone else's home.
Reduce What We Can Actually Control
Carbon credits don't remove the emissions produced by your flight or our support vehicles. We would rather put our attention into reducing the impacts we can actually control than pay to claim those emissions have been balanced somewhere else.
Our guides and crews already live in the destinations. Our bicycles already live there too. Support vehicles minimize unnecessary mileage, and we avoid itineraries built around excessive transfers and shuttles.
When practical lower-impact options become available and genuinely work, we are happy to use them. We would rather tell you what we have actually done than take credit today for something we promise to do years from now.
What We Ask of You
Responsible travel also involves the traveler.
We ask guests to respect local laws, customs and cultures, follow guide directions concerning the environment, wildlife and safety, respect local communities and fellow travelers, and arrive prepared for the trip they have chosen.
And please bring your water bottle.
There Is Always Room to Do Better
Many of these practices have been part of Pedalers since our earliest tours. Others have evolved as better ideas, equipment and infrastructure became available.
We continue to listen to our guides and partners, learn from the places where we travel and make practical improvements when we find a better way.
We don't claim that travel has no impact. We simply believe there is a more responsible way to do it.
Want to dig deeper? Read Our Responsible Travel Practices for more about how these ideas are put into practice on Pedalers trips.