Tel Aviv Carmel Market. Above image via esme Visitors to Israel’s best fruit and vegetable markets already know the country’s two most famous landmarks: The Carmel Market in Tel Aviv, which winds down from trendy Sheinkin Street right down the Mediterranean the Sea. And Jerusalem’s Machane Yehuda market, which anthropologically speaking, is most interesting on […]
Prior to the installation of an asphalt highway connecting the once peaceful region of Bahariya to Cairo, the oasis was mostly hidden from the greater world. Then archaeologists re-discovered the Valley of the Golden Mummies and tourism in Egypt soared, generating valuable income for the local community. However, the influx also comes with a considerable environmental cost.
Bikes, beer and maybe even babes part of EcoBike: bringing eco-friendly cycling tours to a whole new demographic – the beer lover. Cycling, as fellow Green Prophet Karin has pointed out, has become very popular in Israel. Despite the dangers of braving streets shared with temperamental Middle Eastern drivers, cycling has evolved to fulfill a […]
You can lose your life cycling on the roads in Israel. Almost once a month, a cyclist gets killed by a car by a drunk or negligent driver. Despite the risks, the sport is catching on like wildfire. Bonnie Eshel, president of the Israel Cycling Federation says biking in Israel today is super-dangerous: “We live […]
Jonathan Gilben, co-founder of GoEco, talks about his passion for eco-tourism. (Jonathan pictured at the center of this photograph and in the video clip below.) A few weeks ago we wrote about GoEco, an organization founded by Jonathan Gilben and Jonathan Tal in 2005 that has pioneered bringing the concept of volunteer eco-tourism to Israel. […]
Kibbutz Sde Elihuya, home to organic agriculture in Israel. Mario Levi brought the idea of manure for compost from Italy
The zimmerbuses in Ezuz drive the concept of eco-tourism home. Beep beep! Eco-tourism is a broad term and can encompass a wide range of green vacations. For some, it may mean experiencing life in an eco village, for others it may mean volunteering to make a positive green impact on a community. And for certain […]
Loving wild places gives us the impetus to protect them Before I started writing about green building and eco-tourism in Israel and the Middle East, I was a tour guide in North America. For three years I taught foreigners about camping, ecology, geography, and history in National Parks throughout the lower 48, Alaska, and Canada. […]
Be an alternative tourist with one of GoEco‘s volunteer eco-tourism programs this summer. Earlier this week we wrote about an alternative to the normal ways of spending the summer, in the form of an eco-touristic organic goat cheese farm in northern Israel. Good for your tummy and good for the environment, that’s definitely one of […]
Considered the most polluted river in Israel, the Kishon River struggles with water quality. But now, cormorants on the river can eat the fish they catch. The Kishon River, a 75 km long stream that begins in the Western Galilee and ends when emptying into Haifa Bay at the Mediterranean Sea in Israel, was until recently […]
In 2008, the Israeli government announced a 20 million shekel (around $6 million US) plan to revamp cycling tourism. Upping the ante, the government wants to put about $30 million into making Israel a cycling destination hotspot. Cycling tourism is worth billions of dollars in Europe, where lodges and facilities are set up for the […]
Get Your Green On in The Dmit Valley Ecovillages are slowly sprouting in the Middle East. There’s Kramim in Israel’s Negev Desert, as well as the well-known Kibbutz Lotan, and now the first of its kind in Lebanon. Called simply EcoVillage, this project was grown from the ground by Karim al Khatib and a group […]
Dutch native Theo van de Laar exposes the eco secrets and paradise he entertains through The Aqaba House, an eco-friendly guest house he runs in Jordan. A while back Tafline featured the eco-cool guest house The Aqaba House, near the Read Sea port of Aqaba, Jordan. Today we feature a short interview with Theo, the […]
Worried about the impact of the tourism industry on the world’s resources? Want to know whether tourism sustains or destroys local communities and ecology in the developing world? Then this is the book for you. ‘The Final Call’ is a thoroughly good read and I had to remember that I was actually meant to be […]
Despite its impressive shoreline, Alexandria – the self-proclaimed “Capital of Arab Tourism” – seems to be a city in decline. (Hint: watch out pedestrians). When the Green Prophet’s editor heard I’d be stopping in Alexandria en route to the MENASOL solar energy conference in Cairo next week, she asked (implored) me to write a post from […]