Today I glanced through the 24 Hour newspaper-esque publication that gets brandished at me when I enter the SkyTrain station.  The “Lifestyles” section contained an article called “The best green vacations“.  Alright.  I thought, “this should be interesting”!  Vacationing has to be one of the most harmful environmental practises that there is.  Don’t try to kid yourself: a vacation is for relaxing, being slothful, wasteful and gluttonous.  If you can accept that, you will have a good time.  If you cannot accept this fact, then you probably are the kind of person who buys the Nestle Eco Bottle because you think that by consuming a different unecessary, wasteful product, that just happens to use “30% less plastic” than a regular water bottle, you are doing this fragile planet a service.

While I can appreciate that these businesses may legitimately trying to reduce the damage that they are doing to the environment, while pursuing their goals, it’s silly to think that expensive vacations actually help the environment.

1) YES.  That’s right.  There is the transportation issue

2) Have you ever been to a hotel? Have you seen how much food is wasted?  It may be composted in the end, but a lot of energy is required to prepare that food, only for it to end up wherever.  How about the plates, the dinnerware, the tablecloths, the napkins, and everything else that goes into the process of allowing you to induldge?  These have to be manufactured, packaged, imported, and then maintained [cleaned, generally by some sort of machine] and replaced.  I didn’t visit all of these “eco-tels”‘ websites, but the websites I did visit did not advise me about their dining practises.

3) BEDDING! Let me ask you again: Have you ever been  to a hotel?  Hotels are places that are meant to pamper your goddamn lazy ass. Even the beds I sleep in at Motel 6’s are comfier and have comfier pillows than mine.  My bed is acceptable, but I don’t have 95 pillows on it, and I don’t launder my blankets daily.

I don’t have a problem with vacationing; I travel frequently.  I do have a problem with delusional freaks who refer to looking out for the planet as “thinking green”, and just blurt out catch phrases, have an organic vegetable garden adjacent to a tarry parking lot for a few hundred cars,  and think they are all of a sudden Captain Planet and/or the Planeteers.

GOING BIRDWATCHING IN LIEU OF DRIVING AROUND IN TAXI, AFTER PARTICIPATING IN THE ABOVE ACTIVITIES DOES NOT MAKE YOU ECO-FRIENDLY, YOU SILLY YUPPIE.

Having said that, these places look nice enough to visit.  I’d go if I could afford it.