not flying - am I the only one with a hairshirt?

[greenwitch]

Dear fellow greenies

I haven't flown in 2.5 years. Pre-baby I've been to Scotland, Paris, Italy on the train (overnight sleeper from Paris - lovely journey). With child and husband we've been to to Scotland a few times and memorablt to Geneva - that was quite a trying journey.

But what I want to know is - is it worth it? Is anyone else trying not to fly? Should I bother, or have 1 or 2 guilt free flights a year? It would make life easier, as my in-laws are 500 miles away in Scotland.

Love to hear from you
Green witch

No, you are not the only one. We have decided to avoid flying and have turned down a couple of very tempting holidays in my parents exotic timeshare flat

I must admit, though, that I'm having one, one-way flight when I go to Scotland for a special event in a few weeks time. The return train fares were terrifying and it was so much cheaper to do train one way and fly home. Weird.

I am justifying it to myself that it really is, genuinely a one-off special event and I haven't flown for 14 years now, so it is probably my turn to take the hairshirt off for an hour or so!

(Am also interested to hear what others think, because we have family in Scotland as well and a time will come when a quick weekend up there with the DCs will become very tempting. Am hoping that we can stick to our principles and do it on the train, but the prices are truly eye-watering unless you are lucky with special offers. We could do with some decent financial incentives to carry on doing the "right" thing).

Usually limit ourselves to one short haul a year. However missing this year as next year are doing a longhaul for the first (and quite possibly last)time.
Would love to travel across Europe by train though.

It is worth it. We have friends who gave up flying for a year for whom I have the greatest admiration.

We cannot give it up completely. DH must fly for work, and my elderly in-laws live in Germany and the costs of travelling by train are prohibitive. But we have managed to reduce the number of flights we take for non-business purposes.

But I also think you shouldn't beat yourself up about not-flying. There will be times when it is the only practical option and you should not feel guilty.

I think we should all aim to fly less, but giving flying up completely isn't really going to be an option for most people.

Haven't flown for three years now. It's such a bloody hassle these days if nothing else.

Also we now have kids and so it seems like a horrible thing to contemplate. We take ferries and trains and things. But then my folks are only 30 miles away (although my inlaws are thankfully a lot further away).

It is much more expensive though.

I seem to fly once about every two years. I went to Bulgaria from Brussels in 2005 and then didn't fly again until I went to Istanbul from Brussels in 2007.

When I come back to the UK I either use the Eurostar and then take the train down to the West Country, or more recently, drive and take a ferry and then drive some more. Car runs on LPG, so it's cheaper.

I may fly to Venice this year, or Rome the next with dh on a business trip. DH flies for work but as he is military and has to get to places rapidly for meetings and then return, he has little option.

However, I can now fly as from this month from Brussels to Exeter, thus obviating the need to take the car, if I am just going back to look at the house, and it costs roughly the same as the fuel for the car and the ferry tickets, so I may consider it for short trips, rather than the going to Waitrose and M&S trips which means we need the car for all my shopping!

I don't fly, I have an aversion to sweaty, packed airports and I hate sitting there feeling like so much herded cattle.
We tend to use either the Eurostar or the ferry, I find them both preferable (more expensive, certainly but nonetheless better) to flying.

We try not to fly but don't totally suceed - have cut down massively though from 2 or 3 flying foreign holidays a year to one in the last 3 years.

I find it really difficult as I love travel and hot places and exotic places. And with 3 small children and limited holidays the overland routes just don't sound feasible - was looking into going overland to Italy but I think it would be extremely trying, with my children.

It's about the hardest "green" thing for me.

For trains to Scotland, have you checked out First ScotRail's bargain berths? While I was pg, DH and I went from Euston to Fort William, sleeper both ways, for £19 each each way! Of course you need to book well in advance, and it helps if you can be a bit flexible on dates, but decent prices can occasionally be had.

We don't fly, and don't run a car. But I will confess that we do tend to hire cars for visiting relatives and going on breaks, which i do feel guilty about. I just can't seem to get round the luggage problem - DD is still of an age where we need a travel cot, and buggy on top of our luggage. I'm hoping that once we've ditched the travel cot we can start holidaying by train again.

you aren't alone. I do sometimes feel a bit like we're missing out, esp the dcs. But I went to a course at the Centre for Alternative tchnology, and they said in terms of carbon, if you continue to fly, all your other efforst are more or less worthless. OTOH, if yu gve up flying, you can drive with a clear conscience. We don't dive much (lucky to work/study near home) but it does make me feel better about what we do do. Helps that I am v old, and can remember atime when flyimg simply wasn'tpart of most people's experience or expectations. i remember the astonishment when a child at primary school went to Spain for a holiday. we didn't feel hard done by. I think we just all have to adjust our expectations.

I don't claim to know all the ins and outs of this, but DH (who works in transport related type industry) says "ha, if they really looked into the environmental impact of trains they would all be sadly discpointed" and this "21% of your carbon emissions is local drives in your car" (he then confessed to not knowing the acact figure, but thinks its about 21). His point being that plane travel is a much smaller part, so whilst its a good thing not to fly if possible (or actually travel where possible, by rail, car. boat or plane), there are other bigger things that can be done. Of course, its good to do as many of the 'good' things as possible though, I think.

I have looked into carbon impact of trains and cars, so have most of the non-flyers I know. It's not really comparable to flying. Which is just much higher in impact. I could do a link probably to an article which came out a few weeks ago on it.

We have cut down car use and ownership massively but haven't found that very traumatic, we like cycling and walking and public transport and don't particularly like spending a lot of time in a car. That was OK.

Washable nappies and not having a tumble dryer and cutting down on food miles have all been pretty painless too. But I really do miss those foreign holidays.... And I do feel a bit sorry that my children aren't going abroad much, one of the things I really wanted for them was to learn foreign languages young. We have friends in various suitable countries we can visit for bilingual holidays, but the not flying makes it almost impossible.

My dh is from California: so we do about one long-haul flight a year. There's no getting round it. If I had known about carbon emissions when I met him, would I have decided not to start a relationship with him?.. I really can't answer that question. But if we hadn't all got into travel and flying so much, maybe I never would have met him, as it was in Turkey that we met. And obviously I flew there.

So when I think about the ehtical dilemma of flying it always leads me onto wider questions of our lives would be better or worse with less international travel. I would hate to think of my life without dh, who I consider myself to be very lucky to have met, but in some ways life would be less stressful if we all stayed near our extended families and didn't meet people from far away.

Sorry for the ramble!

More rambling. I know our flights to California render my efforts to recycle, not throw things away, not use bleach or parabens, eat organic etc somewhat pointless, and yet I still do them and I don't feel they're pointless.

It might not have a huge impact, but when I think about landfill, I can't just chuck things away. Hence I have a leaky kettle and an uneven toaster, but can't justify buying new ones. And grey dishcloths.

I havent flown at all for 7 years, and wont fly again (short of a family emergency). We campervan in UK for hols (using bikes for transport once we've arrived). May go over to France in the future by ferry, but currently in love with West of England.

It's very admirable to give up something like this. In the UK air travel accounts for 6% of emissions govt link here Globally it is something like 3%. It is an easier thing to target rather than big business, but it's not the main offender. Yes we should think about it and consider carefully before flying, but in context of considering all of our outputs, car travel, the actual production of cars and other goods, landfill, recycling etc... If all the other things on save on during the year are offset by flying, then I'm ok with that.

I save on

i don't because i can't afford it and it's a pain in the arse with all that security at airports.

i haven't flown in 7 years.

I've been on two foreign holidays since DS1 was born (4y4m) and will be going on a brief one this year.

The first one was a family holiday I didn't really want to go on but thought possibly last chance to holiday with PILs as they are old so we went. The next year they were still well enough to join us on holiday in Cornwall which was my choice and a whole lot better for so many reasons.

Last year we went to Stockholm as my DH had a conference there and it made it cheap enough. We had to change at Amsterdam and on the way back - by myself with a one year old and a 3.5 yr old and excruciating pain from an undiagnosed tumour - we were delayed by eight hours. I remembered why I hated flying.

And then we got invited to a wedding in the South of France and because of my treatment I can't go for long enough to go by car.

So I'm not really doing as well as I want.

Give me Dorset, Devon or Cornwall any day .