Green Holidays

How Practical Is It For Me To Live Without A Car?

I recently went a month without a car to find out what the real problems were with public transport, whether not having a car is a valid option for people like me, and whether green travel really is a practical option.

My circumstances are the following:
Part time job in the countryside working around 3 days a week.
Volunteering for several local charities and eco organisations.
Member of many national organisations (NT/WWT/EH/CAT/RSPB,etc)

Public Transport:
I love public transport in towns and will always use it when appropriate – but using it to get out of town is a challenge!

There is normally a bus running to every little village in the UK – but sometimes they go about the houses to get there – as I found out!  The bus to my work from close to my house travels around 50 miles to get me from A to B and takes 2 hours!

If I catch the train first (25 minutes), I get a choice of 2 buses: 1 takes me straight there every 35 minutes (after 10.30) but only in the holidays or at weekends, and the other is a 10 minutes walk from the train station, 25 minute drive and then a 30 minute walk from the bus stop and only goes once an hour.

So door to door public transport (if all goes perfectly to time) is: Option A = just over 2 hours; B = just over an hour; and C = 1.5 hours.

A car from home would go at any time and take less than 30 minutes door to door!

My Car:
Ironically, it is the people who go out of town who are the most likely to travel alone in their car as not many other people ‘go their way’ so car sharing isn’t really an option.

Working in (or visiting) out of town places usually involves lots of extra stuff too – like wet-weather gear, equipment, lunch and drinks (as not many shops about) and plenty of other bits too – and we don’t really want to carry them on our backs all the time!

Therefore, people like me tend to drive a lot by ourselves – sometimes for miles and miles as we really don’t have a choice!

Trains are stuck on rails, and country buses don’t really cater for outdoor loving people with their restricted timetables and reliance on ‘office’ hours.

I know there might not be many people travelling on these buses, but if they don’t start until 10am and finish by 4pm – then countryside volunteers and walkers aren’t ever going to be able to use them!

A Practical Option?
In summary – No.  I don’t think that public transport for me this month is really a very ‘alternative’ option.

Not only did it cost me around £150 in 4 weeks to work a total of 60 hours – but it also took me an additional 30 hours in travel time!

And in those 4 weeks – I couldn’t do anything else I really love doing either unless I convinced a friend or family member to come with me! 

Without my own wheels, I had to forfeit visiting any local attractions, I had to walk an extra hour each way to get to the countryside from my home, I needed to walk to the superstore everyday to buy just a small amount of shopping each time and avoid buying anything too big or too heavy as I couldn’t get it all home on my own, and I couldn’t just nip over to a friends house or visit any family – they all had to come to me!

And I had to cancel any volunteering I had planned that I couldn’t get a lift to – and by the end of the month, I was really fed up with scrounging lifts of people to everything.

It’s alright me trying to survive without a car – but it only works if I have to rely on other peoples cars. And then I’m not really avoiding the use of private cars am I – I’m just using other peoples cars to spew out the carbon for me!

Maybe living and working in a town with no outdoor ambitions would suit a car-free life – but not my life!

Looking for an alternative way to travel to Europe for your short break just got easier!

There has been a lot of talk about taking less flights to help reduce your carbon footprint, or stopping them altogether – but you still want a holiday, right?

So, use the train from Ashford International Station

There is a huge train network right across Europe with trains taking you to all number of destinations.  These include Paris, Istanbul, Rome, Madrid and even out further to Moscow and even China – although you can’t pop there for just the weekend!

I know everyone is talking about different modes of transport, but people still think that the train is ‘slow’ so they don’t even consider it for continental travel.  But you should.

The UK now has an amazing International train terminal in Ashford, Kent, with over 2000 car parking spaces, one of the largest shopping centres in Europe and it is only an hour from the continent!

A quick visit to their helpful website will give you all the details you need for planning your journey through Ashford International, including links to other rail and coach networks across the UK. 

For example, a trip from Leeds to Paris for a long weekend over the new year with your partner will take less than 6 hours – where you can watch the British countryside pass by and a new country appear! 

Just For The Record:
It could take you around 7 hours just to get to Weymouth for the same weekend.  I know where I would rather go!

And even more suprisingly – there was very little in it costwise either, they were virtually the same price!

Obviously you don’t have to just visit Paris or Brussels, you could use Ashford Railway Station as your rail link to start your next longer holiday or overseas adventure! 

Just by stepping on a train at your local station, you could travel the world without a carbon chugging plane in sight! 

And Eurostar journeys are now completely carbon neutral – at no extra cost to you!!

So before you cancel your holidays overseas – check out the train.

Imagine living on a train for nearly 3 weeks - watching the most expansive and amazing landscape pass you by.

That is just what you can do on-board a Trans-Siberian Railway, traveling from St Petersburg in western Russia across one of the most remote places on earth and through to Beijing in far eastern China.

Travelling by train is known to be one of the most environmentally friendly methods of transport – emitting low levels of carbon emissions per passenger than cars and planes – so why not give it a try?

It is also in line with the new thinking that the journey should be part of the holiday itself, rather than something to be endured until you arrive at your destination. And this is certainly one of the best ways to try out this new way of thinking.

Why does it take so long?
Well you are travelling over 10,000 kilometers, through 3 massive countries and 7 different time zones – so unless you want to just sit on the train day and night for about 6 days without getting off or seeing anything along the way – then it’s at least 2 weeks worth of train ride!

Generally, your ticket will allow you to get off and on again at many stops along the way to enjoy the culture or to stay in local hotels or home-stays along the route, and there are several different train companies that follow the route across country.

Many people stop over at Ulaan Baatar to sample nomadic life in the ‘gers’ or ‘yurts’, or to teach English in schools, before completing the journey to China, and Real GAP and STA travel offer these options as part of their packages to Mongolia, as booking the St Petersburg to Beijing route means a change of trains in Mongolia’s capital – Ulaan Baatar. Perfect for those volunteer packages!

Train fares can be as little as £250 single, but as much as £1300 if you go as part of a package – which usually includes travelling with a loose group of people along the route. Great for having a fun time, but maybe a bit limiting – I mean if you are speaking to people in your own language – when will you practice your Russian or Chinese?

Going it alone can often mean that you get more stops and take a little longer on the journey – and are more likely to mix with the locals along the way – making the experience a whole lot more enjoyable!

Responsible Travel offer this route – taking 18 days to explore the areas, and only costing just under £1200 – plus your local payments. Needless to say this trip is one of the most sustainable and ethical versions of the trip – using local services and foods throughout – although you could equal this by travelling independently and researching each destination in advance.

The Return Journey.
However, if you are taking the most eco-friendly route there – how can you match it apart from using the same train to some home? That’s at least a 5 week trek even before you have really dome anything!

If you are planning to travel all the way the the far east – then you may as well make the most of it. Why not set up a much longer tour of the whole region, taking in Japan or south to Vietnam and Indonesia. And if you have ever fancied Australia – why not take the bus and a short boat ride across the the great continent and take a month or so to explore!

I know it all sounds a bit expensive – but many of these tour companies can offer paid positions all the way down and even in Australia and New Zealand. Why not look into some of these when you are planning your great green train ride adventure!