The Natural Adventure was founded by people who love hiking and cycling in wild and wonderful places. Places that we want to keep that way. Rural tourism has, therefore, been at the heart of what we do since the get go.
Responsible, sustainable, ethical or regenerative tourism, call it what you will – tracks and trails are more our thing than terminology. Our thing is also to respect and work with the main pillars of responsible tourism on these trails. We call these pillars the four Ps of people, profit, place and philanthropy – and we walk the talk whenever we can.
“For me, responsible tourism is all about respect. When you hike, you are in someone else’s garden. When you cycle, you’re following in the slipstream of local people’s lives. And when you buy your picnic from the local market, you are sustaining someone’s family.” – Alex Pazderski, Chief Adventure Officer and Co-founder, The Natural Adventure
People
Working closely with local partners, from hoteliers to hikers, we create holidays that are immersed in cultural heritage, where you meet local people and have plenty of time to engage fully with them too. The Natural Adventure is a slow adventure, so that you can savour and learn from new cultures on your travels. From meeting traditional cheese makers in Romania’s Carpathian Mountains to vintners in the Rahovec Valley of Kosovo, we keep your journeys real. This is why most of our holidays are self-guided so that you can chat with people in those real communities ‘til the cows come home. For example, you can read more in a new blog series about our hotel heroes.
“We thoroughly enjoyed our adventure in the Tusheti region of Georgia. It was remote, beautiful and we experienced a way of life forgotten in much of Europe. Our luggage was transported by horse and we stayed in individual family run guesthouses, each different but all hospitable. The Albano Pass lived up to its nerve wracking reputation but we felt safe with our local driver.” – P. Jones on our Transcaucasian Trail holiday
Profit
The majority of our walking and cycling holidays are in remote parts of the world from Bulgaria’s Rhodope Mountains to Ireland’s Beara Peninsula, where tourism is a vital source of income and the money we spend on beds, brekkies or booze goes a long way.
Using small, independently-owned hotels, depending on the itineraries, is rule number one for us. Encouraging our guests to engage with conscious consumption, use local markets and buy locally-produced food is rule number two (although we appreciate this isn’t always easy. And using local transfer companies or guides is always of prime importance.
So if, for example, we direct you to the local market to buy a picnic for your pannier before heading off into the Tatras in Poland, or to a particular valley on Cape Verde’s Santo Antão Island so that you can sample the best local grog en route, then we are scratching beneath the surface of respectful tourism. And rest assured, we will keep scratching that itch.
Place
On our natural adventures, we promote and protect our precious rural landscapes. It’s why we were founded in 2009, creating adventure itineraries that take you into the natural heritage of Balkan countries. By highlighting the likes of Bulgaria or Bosnia-Herzegovina for walking holidays, for example, we engage with local people committed to conservation. We also help reinforce a pride of place for local communities, and we aim to support people who live in some of the planet’s most pristine and remote locations, by providing income and incentives for them to do so.
We now operate in over 50 countries, showing people that they can have a superb holiday by walking or cycling, going gently and graciously. In terms of the bigger picture and the climate crisis, we promote public transport within our destinations, we rarely use car rentals and we recommend getting to places without flying when possible. We do this by highlighting all adventures that are reachable by rail in our holiday search filters, and also by creating a library of rail resources in our blogs.
“Particularly welcoming was the Nderlysa guesthouse experience – talking to the family via their younger daughter. Their hospitality, eating inside their house, being entertained by a visiting musician and their local food was exceptionally good. Hotel Dini food was also special. All local people were helpful and attentive and we did exchange conversations in a very friendly manner -sometimes by signing and laughing! Basically we had a really wide-ranging, fascinating experience of a country and people. Thank you for all your care.” – Linda and Bob on our Hiking in the Albanian Alps holiday
Philanthropy
We are very mindful of the fact that, while so many of us are enjoying the freedom of travel again, our friends in Ukraine have suffered the exact opposite. Russia’s war in their country has been the most horrific happening in Europe in recent times, and we continue to stand in solidarity with Ukrainians during this time. We also continue to offer a way for you to support them by buying a virtual tour of their beloved Carpathians, or else by donating directly to our chosen charity there.
