Great to Be Here Would Like to Thank the Organisers the Centre for Responsible Tourism

Great to be here .Would like to thank the organisers the Centre for Responsible tourism and the Green Hospitality sector for this opportunity to speak about our eco tourism business, a

Leave no Trace experience ,deep in the heart of the Blackstairs Mountains.

It is good to see all the industry interests here and operators from all over Ireland.

I am here to tell my story of a small eco tourism business set up in 2011 and what it is like to run a sustainable eco tourism venture

So what are Blackstairs Ecotrails who runs them? And what do we do?

We set up slow walking in the Blackstairs to show our guests, the incredible biodiversity of

South Carlow. We are not Killarney or Wicklow neither do we have the drama of the great seaboards of the West.

This is Carlow, South Carlow with lovely peaty hills, the mighty River Barrow, small green lanes and old drovers tracks all waiting to be explored and when we finish our walk, we serve up scrumptious organic food prepared from our own vegetables and fruit.

We run Eco Trails three times a week, host a monthly long hike over the hills and we run workshops on Foraging, Wild Herbs, Fungi, School tours Children’s trails and Fun in the Wild.

We are currently renovating our Barn which will have serious eco credentials. A PhD qualification in green building. Eco cement, organic paint, geothermal heating, rain water harvesting and insulation of the highest environmental standards. In as far as practicable, we have sourced all our equipment from ethical sources.

Why are we doing this and what exactly is eco tourism? Firstly, we are at heart, deeply committed environmentalists living and working to support the environment. Our trails and workshops are not adventure tourism taking place in a remote or exotic landscapes neither do they involve high levels of arduous activity. This is eco tourism at its low impact best.

To give it it’s correct definition from the International Eco Tourism Society

It is responsible travel to natural areas that conserves the environment and improves the well being of local people.

An equally good definition is one from the Global Sustainable Tourism Council

Eco Tourism 2

“ a set of common guidelines created with the input of experts, groups and companies from around the planet defining sustainable tourism in that it is actionable, measurable and credible setting a minimum standard of sustainability for tourism businesses across the globe

We give our visitors a unique insight into the secret life of Dragonflies and Damselflies, how to locate Kingfishers on the river Barrow and to close their eyes and listen to the sweet delicious cadence of the Willow Warbler.

Visitors who are concerned about the effects of mass tourism are seeking a quality eco tourism product which matches those concerns and even more importantly their expectations of what eco tourism should be.

We try to push out the environmental boat so that an experience that is not,run of the mill, can be factored into their holiday.

Slow walks, examining the spores on the back of ferns, marvelling at the soaring thermal flying of a Buzzard or the indescribable blue of a Water Forget me Not. Its simple, it’s slow, we use our eyes, ears and sense of taste and we walk everywhere.

It is said the great composer Rossini only cried three times in is life.

Once when his first opera was hissed off stage

Secondly when he heard an air by Paganini

And thirdly when the family turkey fell of its platter rolled down a pontoon and into Lake

Garda.

Well, if he was alive today he would have wept a fourth and final time at what we have done to this poor country of ours in terms of unsustainable development, ghost estates and naff tourism projects.

But Ireland is changing and we have been taught a lesson that has impacted on us all - that greed is unsustainable. The economist Schumacher was right. Small is beautiful and in terms of Eco Tourism that is our mantra. As a keen birdwatcher and having spent my honeymoon in the freezing Shetland Islands watching Arctic Skuas and looking for Snowy Owls I remember the great Bobby Tulloch a marvellous birdwatcher who led small groups of people, bird watching in Shetland. He was the original Eco Tourism guide. He wrote in his biography how he lead a small group on a bird watching trip and as he headed round a rock , to his 3 astonishment discovered a pair of Snowy Owls who were breeding. He at once turned round to the group and led them off in the opposite direction. Why? Because Snowy Owls had never bred before in Britain he knew that the birds, if they had been discovered, would have left the nest and probably never bred. As it happened, snowy owls are now regular breeders in the British Isles.

Good sense and care for the Owl established a sustainable breeding policy.

But back to Carlow

Carlow is not the Rift valley, neither do we have a shore line or even a lake. Although

whimsically, Carlow’s name in Irish, Ceathar loca means 4 lakes.

Where are they?

Where have they gone?

Or did they even exist?

It doesn’t matter; we have our lovely Blackstairs Mountains, the mighty Barrow, quaint

tracks to wander and lovely peaty hillsides to walk upon. We also have bio-

diversity second to none. Great bird life, beautiful butterflies at least 25 of the

33. In Ireland, lots of different types of bumblebees and yes there are more than

one, in fact we have 20 in Ireland.

Robert Lloyd Praeger waxed lyrically of the 43 species of wild flower growing on the

slopes of Mount Leinster. They are still there a century on, from when the Way

that I went was written.

Now that’s sustainable.

True environmentalists are as excited about the smallest spores on the ferns of the

rain forest as they are about the gruelling fight of two bull elephants. Delia and

Mark Owens who wrote that in 1997 are absolutely right. It’s not about the

extraordinary but the beauty of the landscape and the variety of species living 4

out their lives quite undisturbed, in this part of South Carlow ,that fascinates

people.

We want to keep it that way.

We want to balance our business with sound conservation practise and good

environmental husbandry.

The environment must not be compromised for financial gain.

Let me tell you a story about a group of people .They were bird watching or twitching

as the rare breed people are called. They drive from Tory Island to Cape Clear

and then to the Aran Islands and Back to the Saltees to get that shot of a rare

bird and tick it off their list. In this case they whooshed the bird off the nest to

get a better photo. Getting that photo is not what it is all about.

What we are about is

Respect for wildlife

Respect for the environment and

Respect for the principles behind our business.

That respect, drives us on!

We are proud to be partners with Leave No Trace "Promoting Responsible Outdoor

Behaviour through Education, Partnerships and Research".

 The Leave No Trace education programme empowers people to enjoy the outdoors

responsibly by focusing on people and the choices they make about outdoor

recreation

 Leave No Trace educates people so that they can enjoy the outdoors responsibly

without impacting their natural environments. 5

 Leave No Trace connects people to the outdoor places they love so they appreciate

how their actions can make positive change.

Leave No Trace believes through educating, recreational users will respect and reduce their impact on Ireland’s natural environment.

I believe that Leave no Trace and Blacktairs Ecotrails is a powerful combination in helping people experience the great outdoors in a responsible and ethical manner. I would like to thank Maura Lyons for her support and the privilege of partnering with Blackstairs Ecotrails.

We are busy too working on our accreditation for EcoTourism Ireland. A big thank you to

Mary Mulvey for all her support and enthusiasm.It is very much appreciated. We are busy, busy people at Blackstairs Ecotrails.

Here’s a recipe you won’t find in the cook books up and down the country but it is a

very important one

There are more individual living organisms in a tablespoon of soil than there are people on

Earth. And almost all of the antibiotics we take to help fight infections were obtained from soil micro-organisms. And it takes nature 100 years to create one inch of trusty topsoil.

Without soil we have No food, No biodiversity ,no great forests, no oxygenating plants no humans ,no life.

It makes you think as we stride the hills or walk our parks ,how important I is us all.

I was in Switzerland a couple of years ago high up in the Alps and staying in a car free village . In the bus shelter were 2 hoardings one on the left, one on the right. Both had a placid looking Swiss cow complete with great bell round its neck and eyes as big as rock pools. She was standing in an Alpine meadow full of rich grass varieties, wild flowers and natural herbs with a background of stunning mountains. The pictures were identical with one difference. The Caption on the left read Wengen 2006 - the one on the right Wengen 2106.

Think about it. That’s sustainable 6

It was Lord Beaverbrook who famously said” I don’t mind people looking at their watches when I’m speaking it’s when they start shaking them to see if they are still going that worries me… so I won’t be long now.

To sum up

All over the world pockets of great sustainable eco tourism projects are springing up. The good ones will last so whether you are black or white, gay or straight, rich or poor, able or disabled eco tourism with its ringing message of protecting local environments, working with local communities and protecting ecosystems

Right for the planet

Right for Ireland,

Right for you

Right Now!

Thank you