ecoescape launches!

Yesterday was the official launch day of ecoescape. To mark the occasion the ecoescape bicycle trailer took its maiden voyage to deliver copies of ecoescape around the capital starting in Bethnal Green, East London. Stops along the way included Duke of Cambridge pub and the Britain and London visitor centre taking the Regent's Canal to Islington.















Next to Regent's Canal showing off the ecoescape tee-shirt and the trailer!




















Outside the Britain and London Visitor Centre checking the route back.

Events were then followed by launch drinks (rhubarb bellinis to be precise!) at Acorn House Restaurant, one of the green businesses featured in ecoescape. The restaurant opened in 2006 and follows strict sustainability principles. A delicious menu followed and a great time was had by all (suffering a little bit today mind you).















Acorn House Restaurant, King's Cross, London

Give me an E!

Well the spring bulbs are in bloom and we're pleased to announce that the ecoescape bulbs are starting to come up trumps. From the photos below you can see that we have a perfectly formed 'p' and 'e' but lacking in the rest of the word which has yet to flower. However, we're ever optimistic and sitting tight to capture the long awaited 'ecoesca..' to create our blooming marvellous hillside spectacular in the sprawling conurbation known to locals as Clifton (Notts). The story continues...

Biodegradable mailers

With only a few weeks to go to print, ecoescape has been trawling stationery suppliers across the land for environmentally friendly envelopes in which to distribute the guides. We think we've found the answer - our guides will be packed up and sent off in their very own Eco-Poly Jacket.

How does this work? Aren't plastics meant to take 100s if not 1000s of years to degrade?

The clever part is that this new type of polythene has developed a way to reduce the molecular weight without impairing quality. Due to the reduction, these biodegradable mailers can be consumed by micro organisms found everywhere.

In time, the film will begin to degrade in any normal environment, a process enhanced by daylight or higher temperatures. It does not need a microbial agent to initiate degradation and, in fact, degrades more readily than paper. The eventual products of degradation are water, a small amount of carbon dioxide and biomass which can be composted and used as a fertilizer.

Here is a diagram of the process taken from the website www.ecopolyjacket.com

The good news is that the earthworms have given their seal of approval and if it's good enough for them...

The Busycle

A very clever self propelled bus using renewable energy sources...

eco Sound escape

Andrew Greenman (Soul Jazz Records) has kindly put together the soundtrack to ecoescape, available to preview and buy on itunes. Here's what he has to say about the mix...

"Borrowing the ‘highly original’ concept of dawn to dusk and the seasonal spin-cycle, Ecosoundescape is our little gift. The imix draws on a wide range of genres that float around ecoescape HQ. We start of in the ‘small hours’ with Brit Folk survivor John Martyn, its not sure if this the start of a new day or the continuation of the night before. But we move on over to Japan, sonically not physically, to take in the ‘shinsen’ (or fresh) morning air. Back in the UK, Brian Eno and Max Richter sooth us into the early morning, before Nina Simone heralds in the new day in proper fashion.

The next section features many a natural reference and lots of Vitamin D enhancing sunshine. Merz offers us a paean to a butterfly; Norway’s Todd Terje mixes up the ‘route of the sun’ (Camino del Sol), whilst Sade asks us to Cherish the Day, Horace Andy (also of Massive Attack) covers Bob Marely’s Natural Mystic and Nick Drake invites us to watch the River Man. As we slip into the afternoon we get lost in a Forest, courtesy of Nouvelle Vague’s lounge pop cover of the Cure classic, before Air settle us into a pre-sunset cocktail with ‘le solei est pres de moi’ (the sun is close to me).

Somewhere between day and night, or summer and autumn comes the sounds of the Scottish Highlands finest, with Boards of Canada’s ‘a beautiful place out in the country’ evening and winter encroach Vashti Bunyan reminds us there is warmth in that golden autumnal glow of a rosehip November. Finally Welshman extraordinaire, Gruff Rhys, offers us his beacon in the darkness, before Talk Talk wind things down as its getting late in the evening."

Eco Sound escape is available to preview on itunes with some footnotes:

1. We preferred the original nina simone version of here comes the sun, whereas itunes only carries the Francois Kervokian mix, nothing against FK mind.

2. Winter Music is Roger Eno’s Between Tides Lp, whereas itunes attributes it to Harold Budd? Again nothing against Mr Budd, but be sure to note the song should be attributed to Roger Eno. We found it on the excellent Compounds + Elements: An Introduction To All Saints Records.

me and flying

I was a late starter when it came to flying. My father is a mechanical engineer and would rather not fly than have his fears realised. So our holidays remained strictly on terra firma and my only trips to Heathrow were to watch the Concordes take off. Had passengers looked up at the large departure hall window, they would have seen a small red head looking back at them and occasionally waving, but always in awe of the spectacular flying machines.

My first flight came when I was at the end of my first year at university and the group of 40 students on my Russian course was packed up and sent off to Moscow for a three week learning experience. Judging by looks from my colleagues when they learnt that I was taking my first flight in 2001, a massive 20 years after my birth date, I was alone in my virgin voyage. Nonetheless, the trip signalled a new era and a short lived love affair in my travelling career. I had discovered a new found freedom and I would return from subsequent journeys a slightly different person from when I had left.

However, that feeling as a young child of watching business people and smart(ish) holiday makers shuffling around the sparkling halls at Heathrow will probably remain a distant memory in the past. With a media that jumps on every word from the airports and airline companies dictating the mood in the business and tourist world with such ease, it is little wonder that airports have become a hub of despair and now environmental concern. Shunning the airport altogether is never going to be easy. Shunning cheap flights is easier. As today’s flying culture goes, the experience will never live up to the one I gazed in on during the 1980s, so avoiding it as much as possible to cut down on my carbon footprint does not pose such a major problem. For those to whom flying is a necessity and not a choice, it will inevitably be a bigger challenge. But looking at the alternatives, and turning an ‘escape’ into an eco-adventure, the possibilities are endless.

responsible tourism conference offers free flights to delegates

The 2007 conference of the Institute of Travel Management (ITM) will be taking as its theme Responsible Tourism Management. The annual conference attracts the industry’s biggest movers and shakers and 2007 will see a key note speech from Jonathan Porritt of Forum for the Future, a leading sustainable development think tank.

So why have they got it all wrong?

For the simple reason that all delegates are offered free flights to the Edinburgh based conference courtesy of sponsorship deals with the likes of BMI, FlyBe and British Airways. Is Edinburgh so unreachable by train?

When questioned with this seemingly paradoxical situation, the response from the conference organisers was as follows:

“As some delegates will be travelling from the south of England it may not be feasible time wise for all delegates to travel via train which is why there is an alternative offered to those who will be coming from further a field.”

It would appear that a 4 and a half hour journey from London is just too much for the busy modern executive.

At the moment the tourism industry is willing to preach to consumers about responsible travel but not take on board any of this practice in its working life. When will people realise it's as important HOW you get as what you do while you're there.