Conscious Travel Guide is an online travel guide for the conscious urban traveller. Conscious travellers love to travel and explore other cultures. You are open-minded and have a great sense of awareness. You live a comfortable lifestyle, but understand that parts of this lifestyle can have a (negative) impact on their surroundings. Therefore you are looking for opportunities to decrease this impact, without having to significantly decrease your comfort. The choices you, as a conscious traveller, make are highly personal, but with respect for the world you live in.
With Conscious Travel Guide we want to inform and educate you, the conscious urban traveller.
And let you make your own conscious decisions, wherever and whenever.
No one is 100% conscious and neither are we
Conscious Travel Guide is not 100% conscious, because neither are we and neither are you. And you are who we focus on. You are aware that a modern lifestyle and the comfort that goes with it, can have a negative impact on the environment, for instance. Therefore we recommend, promote and give transparent information on conscious, social, sustainable and organic companies and activities for a city you don’t know. Based on this information you have a choice – or better said: you can MAKE a CONSCIOUS decision.
Defining your own conscious framework
You define the framework for your own life. Within this framework you set your own priorities and make your own choices. You also define this framework for the ‘conscious’ part of your lifestyle. Maybe you focus more on your health and that of the planet, while others focus more on humanitarian aspects or on animal welfare. Everyone has his or her own ideas on what is good or important. We understand and appreciate this, because everyone is different. But we do believe that being a little bit conscious is better than not caring at all!
Suckers for great service
Yes, we are – just like you – suckers for great service.
That’s why the businesses that we recommend, first of all have to fit the criteria that they offer great service. Whether they are conscious in one way or another, is the additional layer of assessment that we apply to our recommendations. We make this additional layer visible through our Conscious Travel Rating.
Some of the conscious choices we make
– We use green energy and our website is hosted by a green services provider.
– We eat organic meat and sustainably caught fish for about 95% of the time – and we eat vegetarian regularly.
– We eat organic and/or sustainably produced vegetables as much as possible.
– When flying we compensate for our CO₂ footprint.
– We mostly cycle or take public transport (but yes we have a car which we use on average about once every 2 weeks. It is a fuel-efficient “eco” model though).
– We recycle plastic, glass and paper.
Are you curious how conscious we are in a particular area? Don’t hesitate to contact us.
Joshua Spijker
Travelling, discovering new cities, new cultures, innovations that make our world a better place: these are a few things that I am passionate about. My passion also includes living a conscious lifestyle; almost as if it is fun game to live as conscious as possible. The downside of this is that I feel guilty when – for whatever reason – I (have to) compromise on making a conscious decision. I like to share my passion with like-minded people. Conscious Travel Guide gives me the opportunity to do this.
Still learning how to live a conscious lifestyle
I am still learning every day – within the comforts of my modern day life – how I can reduce the negative impact that parts of my lifestyle have on this planet. How I can live a good life, without exploiting the earth, people or animals. And the more I learn, the more I find out that there is still a lot more to learn – and do.
A conscious lifestyle, to me, comes down to respect
To me it all comes down to respect; to show respect to yourself, to other people, animals, nature, the environment, and life in general. I believe that we can and may use what our planet has to offer, but we should not exploit, abuse or rape it at any cost. A conscious lifestyle is a sustainable lifestyle and ideally even a ‘circular economy lifestyle’ is something we should be striving for.
Conflicts I feel, living my comfortable lifestyle
I recognise that being conscious, sometimes conflicts with the lifestyle that we want to live. I like to travel to many (far away) places, but flying is not very environmentally friendly; I believe that we humans are omnivores, but I don’t want an animal to suffer his/her whole life for us; I want to eat organic food, but my budget only stretches so far; I want to buy Fair Trade clothes, but availability – though growing – is limited. You probably recognise most of these conflicting feelings.
By setting up Conscious Travel Guide I hope that we can reduce this conflict when you – the conscious urban traveller – are visiting a (world) city, by providing you with the information you need to easily make a conscious decision, when on a city trip. I also hope that later on we will even be able to seduce people that are not directly aware, to choose for conscious options when they travel.
Mail: Contact Joshua
LinkedIn: Joshua Spijker
Charles Cassar
As I have travelled, had adventures, and grown, I have become aware of my impact on the world and what is important to me in life. With this has come a growing sense of responsibility to the world around me. And this translates to the things I do, the places I go and the businesses I support. My desire to share these experiences and promote businesses that support a conscious lifestyle is why I am so passionate about Conscious Travel Guide.
Every conscious decision contributes to a better world
I have been fortunate to retain my sense of wonder for the world, to appreciate the little things in life, but I also understand that little things can have a big impact. Decisions that we make regarding the things we eat, the businesses we support, the products we buy and the experiences we have can have significant consequences for our world. I am conscious of these decisions and prefer to choose (where possible) for organic options, for businesses that consciously minimise their impact on the environment, for organisations that support humanitarian causes and for those that support animal welfare. And I believe that by sharing my knowledge on these things, I can contribute to building a movement, where more and more people, making more and more conscious decisions can have an even bigger, more positive impact on the world.
An urban dweller who loves to discover new things
I have always been a city boy, an urban dweller, who loves cities. I love their intensity, their energy, and the sense that they are full of possibilities. And this includes possibilities for positive change. I am an avid cyclist and love that more and more cities are embracing cycling as a key transportation option and are building infrastructure to encourage people getting on their bikes! It is not only better for the environment but also for our health. It is wonderful to see more and more businesses becoming conscious of their responsibility to the environment – and acting on it! I love trying out new restaurants (my cycling helps compensate for some of my culinary adventures!), going to museums, experiencing cultural events, whether they are in my (adopted) home of Amsterdam or anywhere I should find myself across the globe. And when I do, I try to seek out those things, which support my conscious lifestyle.
Conscious of the challenges of a conscious lifestyle
I do love to travel, and lets be honest, some forms of travel are less environmentally friendly than others. I am no saint in that regard. I understand how challenging it can be to strike a balance between one’s desire to live a full and exciting life, and to minimise one’s footprint on the earth. I think it is very important for people to have the knowledge to make informed decisions. With Conscious Travel Guide I hope to contribute to this knowledge, to help build awareness and help people make informed “conscious” decisions wherever they are in the world. I really hope that Conscious Travel Guide helps to inspire you to a have a more conscious lifestyle.
Mail: Contact Charles
LinkedIn: Charles Cassar