Plastics in the EU – Paris Edition
This is a blog I wrote two years ago whilst travelling across Europe on my 7-month long adventure. I thought it was time to dig it out of the archives and share it with you all. So here, you are… Before setting out on my trip, I knew that Europe had commited to quite all…
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Dolphin Dude’s Life Update – I’m Back!
Tonight I suddenly felt compelled to write – something I haven’t had the time/inspiration to do in ~6mths and so I thought ‘carpe diem’, sieze the moment, ride the wave of inspiration and dive back into posting. So, here I am, almost half a year later. Here we all are, half a year later. And…
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Part 4: COVID-19 and the Economy
Welcome to the 4th and final chapter of our debate and thank you for sticking around until the end! Quick recap: I’m discussing the differences between action taken on the Coronavirus epidemic and action taken (or not taken) on the climate emergency. So far we’ve looked at (1) the imminent fear of death, (2) how…
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Part 3: the media in crisis situations
To bring you up to date, we’re discussing the world’s response to Coronavirus vs the response to the climate emergency. In the previous two posts we discussed the imminent fear of death (Part 1) and how ‘current’ each of the threats were (Part 2). Now for my favourite part in the debate, Part 3: The…
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COVID-19 vs the Climate Emergency: Part 2
Welcome to Part 2 (of 4) of the debate between COVID-19 and the climate emergency. If you missed Part 1, go back and read it before you begin. Let’s have a quick recap: I’m comparing the way the world has responded to COVID-19 vs the climate emergency. While the debate over climate change has continued…
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COVID-19 vs the Climate Emergency: why act on one and not the other?
Part 1 This week I wanted to write something that delved a little more into the differences between Coronavirus (COVID-19) and the climate emergency, as (potentially) two of the biggest health threats of the 21st Century. This first blog will be part of a 4-part blog series that I’ll be releasing all week! So you…
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How is the COVID-19 outbreak affecting air pollution?
Scrolling through my newsfeed, every second post pays some reference to the Coronavirus outbreak, whether it be a meme, a media scare, or an article. It seemed only fitting to get amongst the action and write about it too. COVID-19 has spread globally, and fast. The death toll in Italy has just cracked the thousands,…
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Update: Who’s Involved with Adani?
You may have seen the headline of the recent Guardian article: ‘Greyhound cuts ties with Adani mine after backlash from climate activists’ and thought ‘Hooray!’ So which ties, exactly, have been severed? Originally Greyhound signed a 3-month contract with Adani, with possibility of extension. What has been severed is this ‘possibility of extension’. So, the…
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Greyhound Throws Our Climate Under the Bus
Skimming through my newsfeed this week I noticed a stream of posts involving ‘Greyhound’ and ‘Adani’. So, what’s the story behind them all? I was just about to publish my next blog: ‘A Guide to Not Flying (Australia)’, which featured a large section on sustainable bus, train and hire-care companies in Australia, with a huge…
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7 Amazing Things to Make out of Your Kitchen Scraps
Hi this is Daisy, Bella’s sister! In this post we wanted to move away from the commonly known examples of using scraps (such as composting and making stocks), and talk about some really fun recipes that I have compiled over the past few years. Here’s the shortlist and keep reading for more details. Vitamin C…
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Ferry or Fly? Travelling Helsinki to Stockholm by Boat
When planning my route from city to city, checking for flights is my last resort. First I check for trains, buses, share cars and ferries. I assumed that all these forms of transport would surely be better than flying. I recently discovered this may not always be the case. Recently Daisy (my sister), Corey (my…
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5 Resolutions for a Sustainable 2020
1. Improve your knowledgeThink media not social media. Start with books, scientific journals, news (from reliable sources) & magazines. One of the hardest parts about the fight against climate change is answering those hard-hitting questions from deniers. The best thing to do is arm yourself…with knowledge. Here’s a list of authors, books, journals and magazines/newspapers…
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The Jazz Bar (Krakow)
The streets of Krakow are mesmerising, especially at Christmas time when twinkling blue lights are draped between stone buildings and horse-drawn carriages roam the streets. But, after sundown in mid-December these streets can be treacherous for the un-acclimatised Australian. Corey and I weren’t yet ready for bed, so we wondered the streets in search of…
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Beautiful Turkey, Troublesome Tourists
Imagine you have waited in line for 30 minutes to get inside one of the most magnificent buildings in the world: the Hagia Sophia, in Istanbul’s city centre. You’re inside. What’s your first move? For us, our first move was… not to move. We just stood, necks craned upwards and mouths agape, like hungry fish…
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Planes, Trains and Reducing Your Carbon Footprint
Before we left for out 6 months European adventure I made the decision that I would try everything possible not to take any planes whilst in Europe. We flew from Sydney to Paris (we had neither the time nor the money for the 40 day, $8000 freight journey across the ocean), but I wanted to…
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Albania Part 2: hiking the Valbone Pass
There are certain moments when you truly understand the meaning of the words ‘mesmerising’, ‘breathtaking’ and ‘incredible’. For a while, as you float through, they are used fleetingly; in writing they become a cliche, almost too overused to write. But, every now and then you experience the meaning; you feel that definition somewhere within and…
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7 Ways to make your Halloween Spookily Sustainable
Halloween is probably one of my favourite holidays but as I’m trying to live more sustainably, it’s been hard to think how I can enjoy the season without increasing my ecological footprint. Is it possible to have a zero-waste Halloween? Yes! 1. Costumes ‘Fast fashion’ is an infamous industry and Halloween is probably one of…
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Travelling Albania Part 1: People and houses
Although Albania is a small country, I have managed to write pages and pages about it. So, I’ve had to split them into a series of short blogs. This is part 1 of 2 (so far). People Firstly I have to talk about the Albanian people. Their hospitality, kindness, friendliness and smiles are almost unparalleled…
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A Brief History of Albania: Part 1
Albania’s history is probably the most confusing of any country I’ve ever visited, but, for this reason I find it the most fascinating. From the 6th Century until 1992 the country never really experienced true freedom. Putting this into perspective, Albania only opened up its borders to trade 27 years ago. A hostel owner in…
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Friendly Strangers on Samos Island
We sat down for another giant gyros on the streets of Pythegoreio, Samos Island, Greece. Street cats weaved in-between our legs whilst we sipped on local wine and devoured the juicy wraps. The couple next to us dangled a piece of meat in front of one of the cats. The brown and white-patched beauty clawed…
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Plastic Paris
Once you change to a plastic-free mind-set its hard to go back – it’s like staring out of the same window-frame for the rest of your life, except this window frame highlights in bright colour any plastic in your view. You’re senses for plastic become heightened, you’re like a sniffer dog with an eye for…
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The Selkies of Iceland
We drove along just as the sun was beginning to creep up from the snow-capped mountains. I checked my watch: 11:02AM. I couldn’t help but laugh, how could the sun be rising at 11AM? I am from almost as far South as you can get on this planet (Australia) and I was now the furthest…
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Thailand’s Coral Reefs
‘Thailand closes dive sites over coral bleaching crisis’[1] ‘Repeated coral bleaching…Thailand’[2] ‘In 2015…temperatures were 2 degrees above normal’[3] ‘only 5% of Thailand’s coral reefs were in good conditions…80% in damaged conditions, mainly due to the bleaching event in 2010.’[4] ‘The 2010 bleaching event was the most severe, affecting 80% of coral reefs in…’[5] ‘In April…
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Roadtrip scrabbles
When someone asks me what I had for breakfast I pause for minutes, delving into the depths of my brain trying to pull out the image of my most recent meal. That picture of me spreading jam over my toast must be lost, lodged between the memory of last night’s bolognaise and last week’s cereal.…
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10 Ways to Travel Sustainably
Reduce (stop) flying! Planes secrete a crazy amount of CO2 – a return flight from Sydney to London will release up to 6 tonnes of CO2 per passenger. Globally, flying makes up 2-3% of carbon emissions and if global aviation was a country it would rank in the top 10 carbon emitters. By 2030 it’s…
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Our house is on fire
Children dancing on steps, standing in trees, perched on platforms, solemn faces, clutching cardboard signs. ‘this is what democracy looks like! This is what democracy looks like!’ ‘Coal, don’t dig it. Leave it in the ground it’s time to get with it!’ Fists pumping, eyes blazing, mouths wide open calling war cries The noise swarms…
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Sleepy Barcelona
My phone says its 35 degrees but the sweat dripping through my hair, down my forehead and accumulating beneath my 20kg backpack says otherwise. I’ve just stepped off the air-conditioned train into the haze of Barcelona. Steam rises from the rooftops of graffiti-covered buildings, from the rubbish littered footpaths and from cigarettes tucked under white…
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Travelling Without Footprints 