Responsible Travel with Australian Walking Tours

We believe in responsible tourism and believe that companies and travellers involved in tourism should act responsibly to help generate positive outcomes for local communities, businesses, cultural groups, flora and fauna and the environment.

This is more than just a feel good statement - it is a core belief of our business. By helping look after local communities, culture and the environment, we are helping create sustainable businesses, lifestyles and a diverse and sustainable planet. This isn't just our business, actually it's all of our business.  

What we do and what you can do to help

• we support local communities wherever we conduct our walking tours. We use local accommodation providers to provide food and accommodation and this in turn helps put money back into local communities. By far our biggest expenses are catering and accommodation and you can be assured the majority of your trip fee will find its way into the local community you are visiting
• we use local shuttle providers on our self guided walking tours
• we partner with like minded businesses who source their food and wine locally wherever possible. We love this idea for a whole bunch of reasons: it reduces food miles; it creates diverse seasonal menus which highlight local produce; it creates interest for you the traveller and may create awareness of a product you have never seen or tasted before; it supports local growers and assists them in showcasing their product to a wider market audience
• we believe in the value of eco certification and to belonging to a nationally and internationally recognised organisation such as Ecotourism Australia. We ensure all our walking product achieves advanced ecotourism certification. This reinforces our belief that we are providing a best practice product and provides you with the reassurance that you are walking with a fully certified, accredited and environmentally responsible tourism business
• cultural interpretation - we have a policy of not involving non indigenous non trained non local guides in the interpretation of Aboriginal culture - this is in line with the Iga Warta Statement - we seek out trained local indigenous guides to provide authentic cultural interpretation of indigenous culture and beliefs and we pay them responsibly. We have recently undertaken to provide such interpretation on our Great Ocean Walks and Fabulous Flinders walking tours
• we make positive contributions to the environment and are constantly seeking to improve our practice in the small things as well as the bigger picture issues. This means everything from adopting principles of reusing, recycling and reducing in our office and guided walks alike to sponsoring both local and national envioronmental organisations
• groups we currently support include Birds Australia, Australian Wildlife Conservancy, Australian Koala Foundation, Friends of Otway National Park, Australian Living Atlas and Friends of the Flinders Ranges National Park
• we encourage you our guests and supporters to get actively involved in conservation - from making donations - to joining us with a rake hoe and secateurs in mainating walking trails
• we assist with scientific research in a number of ways - we seek the assistance of scientists in specialised fields in the training and education of our guides - and our guides pass this knowledge onto you our guests - through our guides we enable you to be involved in scientific research such as contributing to sightings registers and koala density counts and habitat research
• we support minimal impact and leave no trace principles of responsible walking - our guides will ensure these principles of walkihg are conveyed to you on tour if you don't already know them - thereby ensuring you are walking responsibly and lightly
• when researching new walking areas - particularly in sensitive wilderness areas - we consult widely and thoroughly. This sometimes involves consultation with national wildlife experts who we bring in to examine the location and issues and to help us resolve any concerns. Prior to marketing the new product we confirm our protocols with Ecotourism Australia and land management authorities to ensure we are bringing a responsible and best product product to the walking public. This often means we exceed the requirements of advanced Ecoturism certification
• we pay our guides generously - our guides are our link to you our guests and supporters and we believe they have the most important role in our organisation - as such we seek to attract only the best, the most experienced and the most friendly guides to ensure your walking holiday is safe, informative and fun - in other words - so you are safe, learn stuff and have some fun too. In order to do this and to have our guides continue to want to work for us - we pay them well. We think it's only fair though too often in this industry the reverse actually happens
• we support conservation and the preservation of threatened and endangered species. In areas we visit where species are threatened or endangered we actively seek out ways in which we can help preserve the species, fund research, assist in conducting research and educate and inform our guests. Examples of such species currently under threat include hooded plovers (Great Otway National Park), yellow footed rock wallabies (Flinders Ranges) and white bellied sea eagles (Kangaroo Island, South Australia).
• where species are not threatened but where real environmental issues appear to exist - we assist by forming links with relevant wildlife conservation organisations and assisting them in the collection of raw data. This is currently happening in the Great Otway National Park where our guides and guests are assisting in the collection of raw data to address the problem of eucalypt die back as it involves the local population of koalas. Here we are assisting the Australian Koala Federation in the collection of data which will assist their scientists in identifying preferred the grazing habitat and koala density in the research area along the Great Ocean Walk in the Cape Otway region