Staying Healthy on the Road: Eco-Conscious Habits for Global Travelers

Traveling is a privilege, and it opens the door to opportunities and perspective changes that can stick with you for life. That’s especially true for those who travel the world and experience different cultures. Everything from the people you meet and sights you see to the food you eat can leave a big mark on you.

However, this sometimes involves eating less healthily and being less eco-conscious than you would be at home. That can take a toll, especially if you travel a lot and spend a lot of time on the road. After all, you won’t have access to all your favorite clean foods and your local gym.

This doesn’t mean that you’re doomed to make unhealthy choices on the road. It means that you must go out of your way to take care of yourself and the environment around you. Follow along as we explore the importance of staying healthy on the road and highlight the best ways to do so.

5 Healthy and Sustainable Travel Habits 

As a world traveler, you probably have an innate curiosity about the world around you. Today, many of the most adventurous world travelers are also quite eco-friendly and health-conscious. Many of these curious people will take what they’ve learned on their travels and apply it to their lives and even their profession.

Traveling and broadening your horizon are essential if you want to enter a field centered around health, nutrition, or ecology. Eating clean and supporting health-conscious businesses while traveling can help you learn how to become a healthy policy analyst or nutrition program coordinator.

Whether you want to be a nutrition program coordinator or the head chef at an eco-lodge, you can learn a lot from eco-conscious travel. However, staying healthy and reducing your carbon footprint on the road may take some trial and error. That said, both are possible if you prioritize a few health and sustainability tips, including:

1. Eat Clean

Eating clean on the road is sometimes easier said than done. After all, depending on where you are on your journey, fast food may be your only option. However, the type of restaurants and businesses you support while traveling is just as important as the food you eat.

Naturally, supporting local restaurants with ethically-sourced foods and supplies is both healthy and eco-friendly. This isn’t always as easy as checking the signs along the highway or searching “food near me” on Google. You may have to do a little bit of homework, but you’ll be glad that you ate clean and supported an eco-friendly business.

That said, you must be careful about eating exotic foods you aren’t familiar with. Do some research if you’re unfamiliar with something and want to avoid adverse reactions. Many global travelers have horror stories of experimental meals gone wrong, and it’s not worth the risk.

2. Minimize Waste

It’s easy to rest on your laurels and try to make things as simple as possible while traveling. This sometimes involves buying lots of disposable items, like water bottles and plastic utensils for quick meals. However, there’s nothing eco-conscious about single-use plastics, no matter how convenient they are.

If possible, bring some reusable water bottles, plates, bowls, and utensils if you plan to prepare food for yourself on the road. Not only does this help minimize waste, but it can also ensure you know what condition the kitchenware you use is in. Trusting plates and utensils that were washed by others can be difficult, but that’s not a factor if you bring and wash your own dishes.

Of course, you must also bring some environmentally friendly dish soap and cleaning supplies in this case. Using disposable items doesn’t save as much time as you may think, and reducing waste is worth every second.

3. Stay in a Green Hotel

It’s no secret that many hotels are quite wasteful. After all, some hotels host millions of guests per year, many of whom use plenty of disposable items and consume a lot of energy. Hotels have huge carbon footprints, as they have extensive HVAC systems, kitchen equipment, and lighting systems.

Today, global travelers can opt out of traditional, wasteful hotels and stay in green hotels. Green hotels embrace and embody sustainability, with solar panels, ethically sourced food, and water conservation efforts. They make eating clean much easier than traditional hotels, which can help you stay healthy on the road.

The reusable water bottles, dishes, and toiletries they offer can help guests enjoy their stay without widening their carbon footprint. Green hotels are often in remote areas, where you can feel more connected to nature. The healthy food you’ll enjoy, paired with the remote areas you can navigate, will help you stay healthy.

4. Walk as Much as Possible

Driving through places you’ve never been before makes it hard to absorb your surroundings. Walking as much as possible can help you create new memories in beautiful locations you’ve never experienced. Doing so can also help you minimize waste and get some much-needed exercise after so much time on the road or on an airplane.

Today, you can find fun walking trails and national parks more easily than ever. You can also filter your searches to find trails that suit your experience level and physical abilities. At the very least, it can help you burn some calories after splurging on great meals on the road.

5. Embrace Public Transportation

Public transportation is convenient, affordable, and more sustainable than it may seem. Sure, the bus may run on fossil fuels, but the people riding them are foregoing vehicles that would also leave a carbon footprint. In that way, public transportation can at least reduce emissions in areas where people would otherwise have to drive.

Riding trains, taking boat rides, and boarding a bus can also help you soak in your surroundings. It’s a great way to meet locals and experience the culture in your current destination.

Eco-Conscious Travel is Easier Than it Seems

What’s good for the environment is typically also good for you, your stomach, and your heart. Everything you can do to reduce your carbon footprint on the road should also help you stay healthy. Support eco-friendly stores, restaurants, and hotels whenever possible throughout your journey. The type of businesses you support is just as important as the food you put into your body. As a world traveler, you can emphasize the importance of healthy, clean, and green businesses by supporting them.