Curious Tourism: Responsible Travel Podcast

Voluntourism, missionary work, and other forms of aid often carry colonial and racist undertones. Is there a way to volunteer time while traveling, that is ethical? Is the aid sector entirely bad?   Claire Travers joins us on the podcast to discuss. She has worked in humanitarian aid for the past 8 years, on deployment around South East Asia, Sub Saharan Africa and West Africa in response to natur...

What do you consider to be an "adventure"? In this episode we’re chatting with an incredible adventurer Mario Rigby who completed a two year long trek across the continent of Africa and more recently spent a month kayaking the full length of Lake Ontario... alone.  Mario’s adventuring involves tons of logistical planning, and training - both physical, and mental, and he takes on adventures and cha...

Part of the pressures that women feel to have a “beach body”, especially during their travels, are due to a problematic standard of thin-ness - but also because of many stereotypes. In this episode, Erin chats with the women behind the travel community, "Fat Girls Travel, Too!", who's goal is to empower plus-size women to explore the world, and crush stereotypes. --- Guests: Ashley Wall - @simplyc...

These days, it seems like there’s more and more pets appearing in Instagram photos, adventuring around the world with their humans. But what are the logistics of bringing your pet adventuring? Do cats and dogs and other animals actually enjoy it? Is it safe for them?  In this episode JJ Yosh joins us to explore whether or not, animals should travel too. ---- Guest: JJ Yosh TV HOST  |  ADVENTURE FI...

Amanda Kendle of The Thoughtful Travel Podcast joins Erin to discuss responsible travel and their mutual obsessions. The Thoughtful Travel Podcast with Amanda Kendle is a show for travel lovers. Each episode is packed with travel stories from fellow travel addicts on topics like using foreign languages, meeting the locals, getting lost and what we learn from our travels. P.S, We're looking for mor...

Back in March this year, Coronavirus halted travel as we know it. And while we might not be able to actually get out there and see the world, we can dream, we can reminisce, and well, we can talk about it! Don’t worry -  this season of Curious Tourism won’t be all about Coronavirus, I promise.  What it will be about is the intersections of travel and identity and privilege. This season will explor...

In the old days, around the year 2014, a "travel influencer" was usually a blogger, who earned a decent amount of hits on their website, and some social media followers. But since then, travel influencing has changed alot, and now, there are more travel influencers than ever before. So what goes into being a "travel influencer", and why does the concept sometimes leave a sour taste in our mouths?...

Do you consider yourself to be a budget traveler? There’s an entire industry built around the idea of budget travel, and I get why - travel is expensive. In this episode, we're joined by Kate McCully and Danielle Desir in discussing all things budget travel.  How does mooching happen? How can we travel cheaply and also give back to the communities we visit? How can you make saving for travel reali...

How do you know if something you’re doing, or wearing, is cultural appropriation? What is cultural appropriation? And is it bad? These seem like questions that would have straight-forward answers. But they don’t.  That’s because cultural appropriation is full of nuance, and it’s this nuance that we’re unpacking. In this episode, we're joined by Melissa Chan, discussing the history of C.A., its poi...

Instead of releasing a new episode, we’re dedicating this week to revisiting episodes that are essential listening, especially right now. Each of these episodes centres the voice of a Black creator, or traveler, or activist. The travel community and industry is overwhelmingly white. It’s about time we talk about this, so we are chatting with black travel consultant, Martinique Lewis.  Her work str...

Instead of releasing a new episode, we’re dedicating this week to revisiting episodes that are essential listening, especially right now. Each of these episodes centres the voice of a Black creator, or traveler, or activist. How many travelers do you see posting “poverty porn” to their social accounts, and, is this okay? Erin chats with Wendy and Olivia from @NoWhiteSaviors about voluntourism, the...

Instead of releasing a new episode, we’re dedicating this week to revisiting episodes that are essential listening, especially right now. Each of these episodes centres the voice of a Black creator, or traveler, or activist. According to a US transgender survey from 2015, nearly half of those who flew in 2014 experienced problems relating to being transgender. In this episode, Erin is joined by th...

We are some of the many podcasters who are uniting to condemn the tragic murders of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor and many many others at the hands of police.  This is a continuation of the systemic racism pervasive in the United States, and Canada since their inceptions. We are committed to standing against racism in all its forms. We believe that to be silent is to be complicit. We believe tha...

Traveling blind means adapting and experiencing travel through touch, sound, smell, and human support. Erin chats with Sassy Wyatt from Blind Girl Adventures about what it is like to live with blindness, at home and while traveling. She explains the stereotypes that blind people face, and the ways that we can all do better in accommodating blind people at work, in public, and in tourism.  We’...

The travel community and industry is overwhelmingly white. It’s about time we talk about this, so we are chatting with black travel consultant, Martinique Lewis. Her work strives to change the existing narratives of travel by advocating for travelers that represent different demographics across multiple platforms. What is the Black Travel Movement? How important is representation in travel media?...

The pandemic has brought worldwide travel to a complete halt, leaving many of us wondering when we'll be able to travel again, and what travel will be like post-pandemic. Join us as we chat with travel writers and influencers from the UK, Hong Kong, the US, Europe, and Canada.  In this episode, they share the stories of how they repatriated, what the lockdown looks like in their current locations,...

For most of us, “where we are from” in the geographical sense, is a big part of our identity. ⁠So how does a relationship to homeland impact “travel”? Travel Blogger, Lily Wunders, joins us in this episode to tackle this complex theme of identity and belonging as an American Born Chinese (ABC) woman living in Hong Kong. She shares what it feels like to travel to a place that feels both familiar an...

In November 2019, The Guardian published a headline reading,“Concerns over rise in dark tourism in Syria as war enters ninth year.” The piece argued that there’s been a rise of western tourists heading to Syria, and that they’ve been met with criticism from locals. Tourists headed to Saudi Arabia and to Afghanistan have been met with similar criticism. After our chat with Andrew Drury about extrem...

We wanted to quickly check in with you and let you know how things are going during these wild times - what's happening with production, and what you can expect in the future. We'll give you a mental picture though of our current states in the meantime: Erin has been binge watching Trailer Park Boys and going up and down her staircase every day for "excercise". She's been snuggling her cats 24/7 a...

We're looking at sustainable travel at ground level. We're back with Earth Wanderess, Evelina Utterdahl, and this time Greg Hill to discuss our earth-bound travel habits and how we can do better.⁠ We dissect what it really means to be a sustainable traveler. For decades, nature has provided Greg the opportunity to adventure in the forest and mountains. But in recent years, he developed a sense of...

According to a consumer report released this week, out of about 18.2 million adult Canadians planning on taking a vacation, 20% said that they are now avoiding travel, and 32% are making changes to their vacation. About 10 million adult Canadians – due to COVID-19.  Emily Scott, nurse and travel blogger at Two Dusty Travelers, joined us on the podcast on March 12th 2020 to discuss the recent COVID...

Did you know that in Sweden, flying is NOT something to be proud of? The notion that you should feel guilty every time you board a plane is a feeling plaguing Scandinavia.  In this first part of our two part sustainable travel series, we're joined by Evelina Utterdahl, an environmentalist, climate activist, and sustainable traveler who publically pledged to stop flying entirely. We discuss what im...

Last season we did an episode where Erin chatted with her partner Lucas and you seemed to really enjoy it. This time, we asked Chris and Bri from TravelingMitch and the podcast Rick Steves Over Brunch to join us in discussing #travelcouples and dissecting what travel instagrammers are really selling. We also discuss culture shock and what it means to experience it and how to deal with it. Maybe we...

How many travelers do you see posting “poverty porn” to their social accounts, and, is this okay? Erin chats with Wendy and Olivia from @NoWhiteSaviors about voluntourism, the white savior complex, and how white travelers, celebrities, and influencers can do better when traveling in Africa.  The tagline of the @NoWhiteSaviors Instagram account reads, “We never said no to white people. We just know...

Around the world, from Nicaragua to Morocco, women’s surf camps are popping up. It seems clear that in countries with traditional views of gender, surfing has emerged as hobby for women. But it’s also an expression of freedom, and sometimes protest. Karam Masri joins Erin to discuss her experience at surf camps around the world, and how her identity as a plus-sized, brown woman has influenced her...