Green Living

5 top destinations for eco tourists

Are you a conscientious traveller? Try these vacations that involve doing good in a glamorous location.

• Cousine Island, Seychelles
  
  Having a tame green turtle follow you along the shore, to the accompaniment of Cousine’s colony of endangered birds, certainly spices up sunbathing. Older and much lower key than neighbouring eco-resort North Island, this sumptuous Seychelles’ hideaway offers a beach holiday with a difference.
  
  You fly in by helicopter (so that nothing else does) and so share the island only with its natural inhabitants. Days are filled with bird watching, walks and snorkelling (guided or otherwise) and there are always conservation programs to join in with — from tree planting to turtle monitoring.
  
  A maximum of ten can stay in the four, chic villas at any one time and all profits are used to maintain the unspoilt natural idyll.
  
  You can book villas from HK$12,400 a night for two people, with Global Artichoke, www.globalartichoke.com.
  

• Hudson Bay, Canada
  
  Picture yourself snorkelling with a family of narwhals or imagine sharing an ice floe with a polar bear. This 15-day Arctic adventure brings you into direct contact with nature’s extremes, whether you’d rather admire the view from the top of a bird cliff you’ve just climbed, or encounter a 2-tonne walrus on its home turf.
  
  Running in the nicest periods of arctic weather with near endless daylight and temperatures ranging from zero into the mid teens (Celsius), this is an intimate encounter with one of nature’s last unspoiled frontiers. The expedition boat takes groups of six to eight to where the ice shelf ends and the open ocean beings, to the feeding ground of the polar bear and the walrus.
  
  You’ll rest up in classic, Arctic, tented camps or simple, local hotel accommodation and raise funds for the Scott Polar Research Institute along the way. HK$163,533 per person, Discovery Initiatives, www.discoveryinitiatives.co.uk.
  

• Governor’s Camp Group Lodge, Rwanda
  If you want to get up close and personal with a muscular chest-beating gorilla this is the trip for you. The daily trek through Volcanoes National Park is a real adventure, at the end of which you get to stay in the splendid Governor’s Camp Group Lodge.
  
  The land and lodge are the property of a community trust that benefits 5,000 local families.
  
  A five-day, four-night safari costs HK$30,869 per person, including gorilla-tracking permits. Book with World Primate Safaris, www.worldprimatesafaris.com.
  

• Cabanas Caleta Gonzalo, Patagonia
  
  In 1991, North Face clothing entrepreneur Douglas Tompkins bought the Reñihué Ranch with the idea to protect 42,000 acres of virgin rainforest from possible exploitation. In the intervening years The Conservation Land Trust has added another 700,000 acres in nearly contiguous parcels to comprise the Pumalin Park, now a government-approved nature sanctuary.
  
  Visitor facilities include hiking trails, campgrounds, cafés, cabanas, boat excursions and the like. Small farms involved in animal husbandry, cheese-making, eco-tourism, wool handicrafts and organic gardening are simultaneously park stations and visitor information centres.
  
  You stay in comfortable Andean-style cabanas on the shores of crystal-clear lakes, where Patagonian sea lions group and penguins chatter. From HK$702 per person a night, www.pumalinpark.org.
  

• Anant Van, India
  
  Madhaya Pradesh, in the heart of India, is home to one fifth of the world’s tiger population. And at Anant Van, part wildlife camp and part ashram-style retreat, you are at the very centre of Bandhavgarh National Park — 170 square miles of tiger-watching country.
  
  Just a brief walk from a friendly village where almost everyone is employed by the lodge, groups of eight sleep in comfortable tents or mud cottages with five-star views.
  
  Added to this, there’s daily yoga, lectures and the opportunity to become part of the rituals and rhythms of village life. A seven-night itinerary costs from HK$33,106 per person, with Cazenove+Loyd, www.cazloyd.com.
  

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