National Park After Dark - The Last Tourist with Bruce Poon Tip

Episode Date: July 11, 2022

Today we sit down with Bruce Poon Tip, the Executive Producer of the 2022 documentary, The Last Tourist. This episode will inspire you to see the world and discusses how to be a more responsible and compassionate traveler.Watch The Last Tourist on Apple TV, Hulu, and more.For the latest NPAD updates, group travel details, merch and more, follow us on npadpodcast.com and our socials at:Instagram: @‌nationalparkafterdarkTikTok: @‌nationalparkafterdarkSupport the show by becoming an Outsider and receive ad free listening, bonus content and more on Patreon or Apple Podcasts. Want to see our faces? Catch full episodes on our YouTube Page!Thank you to this week’s partners!Feals: Use our link and become a member to get 50% off your first order plus free shipping. Prose: Use our link for a free in-depth hair consultation and 15% off your first order.First Leaf: Use our link and get your first 6 bottles for $39.95 plus free shipping.Athletic Greens: Use our link and get a free 1 year supply of immune-supporting Vitamin D and 5 free travel packs with your first purchase.For a full list of our sources, visit http://npadpodcast.com/episodes Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Hello, everybody. Welcome back to National Park After Dark. We are so excited for this week because we are formatting this episode a little bit different than we normally do. Yeah, today we are doing another interview, kind of like a people of the parks, but it's a little different. Today we are focusing on a broader aspect, and that is travel. Travel. Everything that we love to do, and is pretty much the basis behind this whole show, is just that we love to travel. We're really passionate about it, and there's a right way to do it.

Yes, and of course, we'll get into all of that, so we're not going to have a big discussion about it right this second. But like Cassie said, you know, every episode we do has to do with travel in some way, shape, or form. Usually we focus on national park travel. However, this conversation that we're going to have today and that you'll hear has to do about values while traveling, how to be a more responsible traveler. It doesn't matter if you're going to Yosemite or if you're going somewhere abroad. The way you travel matters. And this conversation really highlighted that. And of course, this conversation you'll see has to do with a film that we both watched and

absolutely loved and we'll touch upon it a lot during the conversation, but it's called the last tourist. Yeah, this documentary was really compelling because it highlighted a lot of things that I knew about, but didn't necessarily put a ton of thought into all the time. But essentially, we're looking at travel in a different way because we all love it so much. We're so inspired by it. And I think a lot of us care about the world. We care about the environment. But we don't necessarily know all of the times when we're doing something that might be disruptive. And especially right now with geotagging, with social media, with all of these mass tourist destinations that are going on, there are things that happen that aren't necessarily a positive thing to have all of these

thousands of people heading to this one direction. So we are going to really touch upon that today, which is a little bit different than we've touched on in the past, but we're so excited for this. Yeah, kind of the sentiment of or the question of, are we loving some of our favorite places to death, you know, with how frequently we travel there in huge masses of people. And let's just, let's introduce Bruce. Because we're going to, we're going to butcher, you know, everything that we want to touch by. He's the expert. He's the expert. We are so, so excited because today we are talking to Bruce Poon-Tip.

Bruce Poontip is an entrepreneur, leader, and philanthropist who has spent his career focusing on the impact traveling has on tourist destinations, how to connect travelers with the local people of the countries they visit, and how to put money back into the community. With a passion about the power of travel and its ability to change the world for the better, Bruce has become a global leader in social entrepreneurship, leadership, immersive travel, and innovation. He has addressed the United Nations and spoken at headquarters such as Apple and Google and has given speech. beaches at TED events around the world. In 1990, he founded GeoVentures, which is a tour operated company designed to put money back into the communities people are traveling to while immersing travelers with the locals. Today, it is the world's largest small group adventure travel company. Bruce is also the executive producer of the documentary we mentioned. It was produced in 2022, The Last Tourist. This newly released documentary focuses on the important issue.

that tourism and traveling are facing. Tourists are traveling with the best of intentions to see the world, but in the same breath, they are destroying the very places that they are coming to see. Over tourism is happening more and more as more and more people are traveling and visiting the same areas in record numbers. They're impacting the environment, wildlife, and vulnerable communities around the globe. This documentary encourages travel and highlights ways that we can all be better travelers by making sure that we are spending our money in a way that will benefit the communities we are visiting. Over three years, this documentary traveled to 14 different countries where they were able to interview dozens of travel experts and tour operators and speak to people about how tourism

is affecting their countries. This documentary features Bruce Poon Tip himself, primatologist and anthropologist Jane Goodall, and so many more. So that is why we are so excited to be welcoming Bruce Poon Tip to this podcast to talk to you all about travel. We just wanted to say thank you so much, Bruce, for coming on to the podcast. We're so excited to talk to you. We both watched The Last Tourist, and we just love the entire concept of it. And I think our audience is really going to be excited to watch it as well. So thank you so much for taking the time to talk to us today.

Thank you. I'm happy to be here. Perfect. So as far as the film goes, get into that. But first, we wanted to ask you, can you tell us a little bit about yourself and where you're from, what sparked your whole interest in travel to begin with? Yeah, sure. Well, I founded G-Adventures with the largest small group adventure holiday company in the world. We started in 1990. I started G-Adventures when I was probably your age and 32 years ago. And we become the largest adventure

holiday company in the world. We, you know, and over the years we've evolved into a kind of responsible slash sustainable, but we really pioneered the idea of community tourism and what community tourism is. And that's, you know, that's kind of reflected five years ago when we decided we wanted to make a film about our message about how tourism can be more of a trans, more transformational industry. And so we embarked on this amazing documentary and then COVID hit and it made even more sense. So everything kind of worked in our favor. Yeah, I mean, that's awesome. And we really resonated with the whole concept of the last tourist. What made you get so interested in this and what made you realize that there was this huge issue happening in tourism around the world? Well, Gadventures has always been at the forefront of that kind of community tourism is kind of the idea of anti-main mainstream tourism, I guess, where local communities benefit.

It's more organic two-way experience for the customer and for travelers. Because right now the way tourism is set up, it's not really set up to be a two-way experience. It's, you know, people buy capacity on cruise ships or compound resorts. And they are just buying capacity. There's it there it's we've tourism has gone in in a direction of kind of commoditizing experience and so you know we've always been that messes that travel should be more authentic travel should be more real it should be more purposeful and meaningful for travelers and they shouldn't be you know but trying to book these luxury holidays with all the comforts of home and so you feel like you never left home like travel should be you should be should be should leave your comfort zone when you decide to travel yeah and you shouldn't be looking for 10. different foods of restaurants, Broadway shows, indoor surfing, you know, zip lining, you know, thread counts on sheets, all of these things that they sell you. amenities have become more important than destinations.

Right. There's a line in the film that it says they say something like the cruise ship in general is kind of just a transfer of environments. Like you're not really going many, you're not going to the Caribbean if you're getting Italian. you know, for dinner every night. And I really, you know, when you take a step back and look at it that way, it is, it's so true. And it's going more and more towards that where, you know, hotels, now these luxury hotels are trying to create an equal experience no matter where you are. Like the Oman Hotel chain wants you to go to Bali or wants you go to Singapore or want you to go to South America and feel like

you're in the same hotel. That should be, that's the absolute opposite of what travel should be. Like travel should make you feel like your experience other culture, seeing other parts of the world and, you know, having an open heart and open mind to to learn about other cultures and how other people share this planet together with all, you know, with us. And I think just before COVID, the destination was no longer irrelevant. People didn't care where they went. I mean, you see people that go on these cruises or these compounds and their pictures never show the destination. It usually shows their food, people who kind of take pictures of what they eat, which I think is very strange. It's just like you just see food a lot of times. It's not even food from the countries that they're or like from the cultures that are there.

It's like, oh, we found a McDonald's in the middle of France or something like that. It just doesn't make sense to where they are. No. And there's a culture of that, right? Like there's a culture of, you know, the big message of the film, the last tourist is, you know, we're born explorers. We talk about, you know, humans are born to explore and born to be curious. But society makes us tourists.

Somewhere along the way, we've become. tourists and we, you know, feel that we can buy experience. Like we pay this money and I don't want to be uncomfortable. I want all the, I want all my comforts of home and I want you just to transfer me into a Western environment into another country and do as much as possible to make me feel like I never left home. It's just the complete opposite of what travel should be. This episode is brought to you by Prime. Obsession is in session. And this summer, Prime Originals have everything you want. Steamy romance. irresistible love stories and the book to screen favorites you've already read twice.

Off campus, L, every year after, the love hypothesis, Sterling Point, and more. Slow burns, second chances, chemistry you can feel through the screen. Your next obsession is waiting. Watch only on Prime. Yeah, and there's another line in the film, or a statistic, rather, that really stuck out to us being from, are we millennials? I don't know what we are. I think you are. You look like millennials.

Yeah. You're millennials. You're millennial. Yeah. So as far as the kind of like new generation of travelers, there's a statistic in the film that said 29% of millennial travelers would not travel to a destination if they couldn't post a photo of it on Instagram. Yeah.

And that number's growing. And that number is growing like. fast. It really is funny because we are, we're, we're in a culture of, of, you know, we're, you know, we're looking at where other people are. Like, it's even like social media is just documenting time where people are in that moment and more and more people want to share those moments. I mean, I'm trying to, I try and understand this generation because it is about sharing. It's not about bragging. It's about sharing with your friends because you care about them that much. I've learned that from, I have two daughters. I'm trying to learn how they,

how they communicate with their friends. But at the same time, it creates this environment where people, you know, are chasing the same images that they're, they wanted to be in the same places. And then you're right, the scary statistic that's growing that says that, oh, I wouldn't go there if I couldn't tell my friends or if I couldn't post about it. That's just an example where the destination is no longer important to that person. They're actually searching a photo or they're searching acceptance from their community

or it's everything but what, you know, traveling should be, which is exploring and learning about other cultures. Well, I was talking to Danielle the other day about it because when I was a kid, I think I was 13 or 14. I went to Italy and I went to see the leaning tower of Pisa. And this was before there was the pictures of holding the tower really up and it wasn't a thing. And I remember going and I had such a lovely time. You know, you could sit on the grass in front of it, eat your food, hang out.

There wasn't a ton of people there. and then I went back a couple years ago. And there were hundreds of people standing, posing, trying to take the, I'm holding the leaning tower of Pisa photo. And then all of the lawns blocked off now because there's so many people in the area. You can't sit down there and eat your lunch. There's that right angle of the Eiffel Tower where people want to put their finger on the top. Yeah.

So it's one place in the park that everyone's searching for that exact same place to have that exact same experience. And really that's, you know, people want to identify with each other. And it's, and social media is about people relating to each other in some ways. So we have to better understand the human interaction of that. But at the same time, try and return people to why we should travel, like why you want to travel? Like, why do you feel like you have to travel? We have an innate curiosity and a carnal need to explore and travel. But somewhere along the way, we get distorted into being a tourist where we are after that, you know, that magical shot. Yeah.

And or, you know, or paying for a luxury holiday demanding services where, you know, you do everything in your power to stay away from local people. You'll, you know, it's everything but what travel should be is our view in the last tourists. And but at the same time, you know, I want to make sure that people know, know, the last tourist is supposed to be a message of hope. The travel can be, even though it shows some harsh realities, we want people to know that travel can be one of the most, the greatest gifts to the planet where communities can benefit. We can have a greater understanding of where we come from when we venture out of our comfort zone.

You come home with the greater understanding of, you know, where you come from and who you're sharing this planet with. I mean, and that can only create good vibes, right, for, you know, future generations. When you care about other people on the planet, there's just so much division and, right now in politics and in life where people are fear-based and they want people to, when you fear something, you look at it as separate from you, as opposed to building communities

by traveling and realizing, you know, we're all kind of just hanging out on this big rock. We're all here. And we're all like, we're all linked somehow, right? And I keep saying that the coronavirus was after five years of six years of division and politics and populism and Brexit and everything that kind of went on, the breaking of trade agreements, you know, what brought us together as a planet was the pandemic.

It brought everyone together. It brought all countries together. And we realized we all have to work together to get out of it. It brought everyone together through something so horrible, which is shut down. I mean, the entire world was connected when that happened. Yeah.

And then we realized that, you know, it's not going to help if just, if just, you know, United States or Europe gets out of very, it like because it'll just keep spreading like everyone has to take part and it's very rare that we've had anything in our in our in our in your lifetime or my lifetime that has brought the whole world together and unfortunately it was a pandemic that brought us all together to find a solution

and you know share global data share kind of the information in the science behind it and and even though every country handle it very different I think early on we all realized that we needed each other to get out of it. Absolutely. When the world feels like such a huge place, but then something like this happens and it shows you how small and connected the entire world really is and how we really do all have to work together in aspects. And you did mention something very briefly earlier that I wanted to touch upon because there's this common misconception in traveling that in tourism that when you go there, you're bringing money to the community. that you're traveling in. And the last tourist highlighted a lot of ways that locals are not

benefiting from today's travel models. Can you tell us a little bit of why that is? Yeah. I mean, tourism is a massive industry. It's one in ten jobs in the world. It's headed towards a 10 trillion dollar industry. So it's a economic engine for the world. And we're going to the 40 poorest countries in the world. We're buying luxury holidays in the poorest country. So if done right where that money is actually, you know, creates revenue in economies, travel can be this amazing source of wealth distribution by going on holidays. You could be actually benefiting communities. What better calling card is that for the travel industry than saying, you know, to people?

Imagine going on holidays could be your form of giving back because we're going to the most in need countries in the world. But there's leakage because, you know, there's this because most of the travel companies are public companies that have to do. deliver profits to shareholders and there's this infinite push for growth that we have to continue to grow so there's constantly being built more capacity being pushed in the industry there's more there's bigger ships every day there's 20 or 30 ships being built right now they're all bigger than the last bigger compound resorts and isolating people from local people and those businesses are motivated by profitability and their main goal is to drive revenue back to the ship drive revenue back to And that money doesn't stay in the country.

That's called leakage. And we talk about it in the last tourist where, you know, we can easily stop leakage. But when these big compound resorts, for instance, they do all their shopping centrally. And they bring the food in. So they're not even buying things there. When you get off a port on a cruise ship, all the stores and all the shopping is owned by the cruise ship. And it's driving revenue right back to the ship. You take an excursion.

You pay $100. $50 goes back to the ship and $50. So it's constantly driving money back because there's this infinite need to grow. We're in an economy in tourism because they have to, they have to infinitely deliver profit to shareholders, right? So they're caught. I mean, it's not just travel. It's all industries where, you know, we can't infinitely grow on this planet. And the travel industry is an example of that where there's a constant push from more and more capacity.

And so once we get off that train and we actually invest in why we want to travel, like, and be meaningful and have meaningful experiences and be purposeful on why you want to travel. You should be a reason why you want to see a certain country. It should be relevant. The destination should be relevant to you. I don't know. Maybe I'm just, I'm not alone. No, it makes sense. But why do people go on these trips and the destination? They don't even care where it goes as long as they can eat Italian every night and get French one night and sushi one night and have a Broadway show, ziplining, you know, whatever. The thread counts on sheets. All of these things become important to what? Chasing what? It's not memorable. You're just

comfortable too. And then we showed in the last tourist when you go out on the ship, they give you recommendations of places to shop. And that's because those are the shops that they own. And then they start using local people against you by saying, don't go to the other shops because they'll rip you off or, you know, these other shops, they'll, they'll rip you off or don't go out of the resort walls because the natives are restless. The truth is they are, they are angry because you're taking up all their coastal lands. They're not benefiting from you being there. and you're consuming mass amounts of natural resources

in these massive compounds that hold thousands of people and just on the other side of those walls, there's not access to clean drinking water or medical care for families. And of course, there's going to be resentment, right? So it's just a vicious cycle that's created. And it's unfortunate because tourism should be one of the most, you know, beautiful and transformational.

You know, they say travels the best education. It can be all those things. but it's not by transporting people into, you know, different Western environments around the world. Yeah. I've been on a couple cruises when I was younger with my family, and I can specifically remember going into their little lobby and then handing me a packet being like,

these are the excursions you can buy. These are the shops you should shop at. And then I also remember exclusively being like, yeah, go out onto the beach for the day, then come back here for dinner. So it was always exactly what. what you're saying. It was always bringing money back into the ships. And I can remember going further out like in the Bahamas or Bermuda or something and going further out onto the islands

and seeing all the poverty that was there, which was so crazy because there were thousands of people right there spending so much money. And you could see how it wasn't going back into the communities. Yeah. And it even becomes worse when this cultural impact. Imagine when you go to Anguilla where the population of Anguilla is 9,000 people. A ship comes in with 6,000 people. And they, you know, they come in for eight hours and could possibly spend $100,000 in eight hours on that island, doubling, you know, almost doubling the population for eight-hour period.

And so if those ships start coming Monday, Wednesday, Friday, shortly after that, kids aren't going to school on those days, right? They're, they're, everyone's trying to make their piece of that spend, of those tourists coming off the ship. And so suddenly schools just closed down on those days of ship days. And then they start making crafts and start missing school because they're making things to sell. It's just a vicious circle. And that's when you have massive cultural impact.

And now tourism is being very destructive when it's not looked at how it impacts communities. And that's why we refer to it in the last tourists as this one-way experience. we kind of say, okay, I'm paying a gross amount of money for a luxury holiday. I know my thread counts on my sheets. I know I'm going to be able to eat every kind of food that I want that's familiar to me. I'm paying for it. And then I go with this mindset that when I arrive in another country, I demand service. Like now deliver to me what you promised me in service.

And that mindset is just so unfortunate when you go into the country and you're holding them to the standards of where you come from as opposed to allowing them to show you where they come from, which is what the beauty of travel should be. Absolutely. I know we are kind of touching on all of the problems, although you did say the film is one of hope. And as far as the other problems, just there's one compelling subject that is highlighted in the film.

And Jane Goodall speaks on it about the issue with wildlife attractions while traveling. Animal encounters. Yeah. Yes. I mean, that's just, I mean, it's a, age is what's, you know, what's, what's happening and how we accept it. And but, you know, and there's some harsh realities, I guess, with the last two words that you see it. But in every film that I've watched with audiences, I always go back when people say that, I said, did you really

learn anything? Or is it just that you saw it that upset you? Because you know that elephant is not trained to hold you on its back or that, you know, there was that, that picture, there was that one scene of the bear doing a handstand. Yes. You know, bear doing, walking on his hands. In order for animals to do that, you know, in order to be trained to do that. They're tortured. And I don't think anyone doesn't know that, but when you actually see it, you realize, holy cow, like, how many dolphins died for you to have this dolphin encounter where you get to go in a pool with a dolphin and pet it? Well, there's true statistic is about 80 dolphins die before one, they're able to break the spirit of one who will go docile and allow you to pet it or swim with it. Just hard for a day. So they just, yeah. And so,

and though, you know, elephants will, you know, elephants will always. is they don't die. They just beat them until they break the spirit of the elephant. Every elephant eventually breaks. They don't die. And that goes on. It just goes on and on and on, whether that if you go into SeaWorld or where you go into dolphin encounters,

where you're going to elephant riding, where you go into bullfighting, where you go into all of these things, even hotels that have zoos on premises, like these makeshift zoos that people have. It's just, it's unnecessary. It's unnecessary part of travel. Why do you want to take a picture with a tiger in Cancun?

Like one of the number one things with people is a chain drug tiger to take a picture with it in Cancun. And why would and why do you want to teach your children that that's okay? Or acceptable. Yeah. And what what what what what relevance does a tiger have in Cancun? This is this is the thing that you know and just like monkeys and the way they're chained to jump on a shoulder take a picture. I mean, I almost say that you'd want it if you're in a country that has the animal. And maybe even accept it a little more.

Right. If it's a little more. Because at least you're in India and you want a picture of a line or a tiger because you're in India and they have tigers there. But it doesn't make sense when you're in Cancun or a cruise ship or Las Vegas or wherever it is you are. The animal, how animal cruelty is an animal welfare when it comes to tourism is just another example of when people kind of get together in these, you know, and no longer, and throw their values out the window when they travel. Just because you're in another country, why can you suspend your values?

You wouldn't go to Yorkdale and pay someone to take a picture with a tiger. You'd think it's weird and gross in Canada. But you suspend your values somehow when you go on another country. And, you know, it's our hope of Gadventures that there's this tipping point where people realize, you know, I live this way at home, but you should also have those same values when you're in another country. you know yeah you wouldn't pick up you wouldn't walk into a classroom of orphans in in Canada you wouldn't walk into a classroom of orphans who and get them to do a song and dance for you right that would you would get arrested yeah exactly like it's not acceptable somehow it's okay to

somehow it's okay to do that when you're into the country yeah I mean the whole topic of volunteerism was also something that was very eye-opening because I mean as far as the wildlife portion cassie and I are huge advocates against that. It's just something that has been close to our hearts for a very long time. But volunteerism, I think, has a similar undertone as far as this is wrong and why would you do it. But I don't think it's as known as far as the problems that underlie it. So learning about it in the film and seeing it for the issue that it perpetuates was very,

very eye opening because we were talking, you know, when we were in high school, we knew many people who went abroad to do two, three week teaching English, teaching English somewhere for a couple weeks type of thing and to see it, you know, in the film outlined for the issues that, like I said, it can perpetuate. It was a big learning experience. And just like people who go to see tigers or elephants or whatever, I think it was Jane Goodall that said, you know, the people who are paying to do this. are wanting to go to do volunteerism or to go see elephants or ride an elephant in a weird way.

It's because they they care or they want to see an animal or they want to help a child, but we're just going about it the complete wrong way. Yeah. I mean, it becomes it's when you when you decide to market something, there's certain things you can merchandise, like if you want to buy candy, you can put that on shelf and you can make it all glossy and advertise it. But when you want to commoditize experience, like you want to commoditize a volunteer experience, you're trying to manufacture that volunteer experience and also make it meaningful to someone.

Like I'm a big supporter of volunteering, but it has to be meaningful volunteering. Like when there's an actual problem that exists and you need volunteers to come there and help do something, but then you can't build a company around it because problems can't be scheduled, you know? Needs can't be scheduled in, you know, for us like a tour operator. been pressured for years to run volunteer experiences. And we can't think of a way that we can do it where we can schedule it because we buy for our tours, we buy hotels and we plan things years in advance. How can I predict that, you know, next summer when I'm, I'm, we're booked for next year's Europe season already for 2023 Europe season. Our hotels are booked. Our tours are for

sale. How can I do that with people when it comes to teaching and create capacity so you who want to do good. I always believe that the people that are actually going on these trips, they actually want to do good. Right. They think they want to do good. And they say, but I need to plan because my summer is next summer and I want to make sure I can go to Ghana and teach English. But I want it to be meaningful. I want it to, but when you start scheduling stuff like that, it doesn't, those two things, volunteering and tourism can't link together. Volunteering has to be something that's a little bit when there's a need. And so it has to have a different vehicle. It can't be like booking a tour. And I just think And there's just so much, like there's so many statistics, as the last tourist puts out, how, you know, how orphanages are scaling with the increase in tourism.

There's more and more. And now they find, they're having problems filling the orphanages and finding kids. And now as opposed to just hiring kids that, you know, it's kind of their day job to hang out in this orphanage with these volunteers. It's just become, you know, one of the most meaningful lines in the film is that woman who says they were there because I. wanted to be there. Right. When she kind of realized, like she had the most amazing time, but she realized that they wouldn't be here if I didn't want to be here. And when you realize that, there's something fundamentally wrong. Yeah. Like I know so many churches and in South America that have been painted 11 times this year with a different group that's coming to paint the church.

And it's not needed. It's just people want to be there. Yeah. It's like, okay, well, we're going to paint. You're volunteering your time, so here we go. Yeah, and they're trying to schedule volunteering. It just can't be done. So like volunteering has to be like, if you want a volunteer trip, you should be looking now for something to do this summer where there's an actual need. And there's tons of websites and people say, you know, I know of a community that needs trails built in Costa Rica. They need it done right now. They didn't know it last year. Right. To come to us and say, and so if you, if you're a student who's finished in school around April or May or June, whatever you're in school, and you start looking for a,

great volunteer experience where they really need you. That's how volunteering should work. It can't work within the tour operator experience where we're trying to sell you. And it shouldn't be blurred with the idea of tourism because volunteerism and, you know, animal welfare, you know, indigenous community, all of these things that, you know, create experience can't be commercialized, can't be merchandised. That's when we have problems with just before COVID, with the idea of overtourism and locals, you know, talking about tourist-tourist infestations. They're using really harsh language because there was, there's this, you know,

it becomes a negative impact. Sure. So I've seen a lot of volunteerism websites and things that you can sign up for. And one of the big things, of course, there's teaching English as a foreign language and going to orphanages and things like that. There's also a huge portion of conservation effort. So you can go to Sri Lanka. and you can help with the turtles or you can go somewhere in Kenya and you can help with

the elephants. Is that something that you think is also damaging? Is there a better way to do it? No, there is a right and there's a wrong way to do it and we try and show it. But you just have to be more like people are smart and like that and you just have to ask questions and be curious, right? We just ask, that's all we ask. And we say that last question. We're not asking for the traveler. to know. But we are asking them to be responsible in when they decide they want to travel, to ask the right questions. You can scratch the surface on anything and realize it's a sham pretty quick. Right. What would be some things to look out for that would be like this is just a moneymaker? Well, the first thing is when it comes to animals, there's a difference between rehabilitation centers,

rehabilitating animals and animal orphanages. Like those are two very different things. There's many a rehabilitation centers for animals where you can go because there's massive issues like for instance in Indonesia with orangutans there's massive loss of habitats and there's tons of orangutan groups they're trying to either stop the palm oil industry or to save habitat or deal with orphaned orangutans so when you kind of go to those kind of you know when you do when you do the work on what they're doing it's very it's very very easy to find up you just have to ask questions right When you're going to an orphanage, you're teaching English, you have no prior English experience. And you realize, you know, you're buying a week and there's another volunteer going to be in your room the next week.

You know, that's a, that's a, that's a, that's a, that's a, that's a, that's an amusement park. That's no longer volunteering. Yeah. You know, when you build, you know, there's lots of habitat for humanity, building wells. Like, when you're actually, there's, like, there's a lot of, like, nonprofits that build water wells. And you actually, you're actually part of building a water well. You're going into a community that doesn't have water and they're scheduled. There's like I know a lot of these water well companies, they have a list of 500 villages that need water.

And they're just looking for volunteers to kind of go and install water wells. And that's real work because you see a village that has no water. You come in with your group and you do your work and you create, you bring water to that community. That's meaningful. That's meaningful. I know there's so many good ones. There's one in Cambodia I know that there's so many landmine victims from the Cambodian War and the Vietnam War. And they don't have wheelchairs.

And our customers can go buy and pay for a wheelchair. There's a list of people that are waiting for wheelchairs. You can pay $200 for a wheelchair. You can hand deliver it to the person who needs it and help them assemble it in their house. Like that's a real experience. Like how meaningful is that? You know, that's amazing. So there's tons of experiences like that.

We have the mass like cook stove. We have over thousands of families that are using wood stoves in the mass imar, wood stoves in their houses. So their kids have eye infections and they have respiratory issues. And we have this cookstove program with all of our groups. Every group that goes with the adventures, we actually, it's at the start of the finish of our tour. It's a big cement, heavy thing that's on the truck. And our group ends by going into a home, cleaning out their wood burning stove and building a proper ventilated brick stove in their house as a part of this.

And we do it. And not just a one day experience. It's part of our tour. But we've installed thousands of properly ventilated ovens in these houses. And we have thousands more on the waiting list. that's meaningful work where you go and you see the wood burning stove, you see the kids, you go into this, and all of our groups,

every group that kind of installs one as part of our experience. But there's a thousand, there's a thousand like that, real volunteer experience that need help. You just have to look. But when you look at it as a vacation and you go and you book it like you want to book a holiday, those are two different things. I just don't think that volunteering and holidays should be the things that should be together.

Like there's so many, I know so many communities that, you know, they do cleanups on beaches and plastics is a big issue. And they'll take volunteers to go clean up areas. And there's just, there is so many good volunteer, you just have to ask and just look. And if you're painting a church, it looks like it was painted last Thursday. Maybe.

Maybe you're in the wrong area. Yeah. Yeah. And there's also a fine line between child welfare and, community entertainment. Like if they're, if you're, if, if the families are, you know, these schools are somehow trained to perform it, sing and dance, songs and dance for you to entertain you. Like there's a good chance. It's just, it's just to entertain you. Yeah. It sounds like it's more for you than it is for them. And that's, and that's a huge issue in

Australia with the Aboriginal communities who want meaningful work in tourism. But they create these Aboriginal stage shows where buses pull up, Aboriginal communities get up and dance up on stage. You have a meal and you say that that's a experience, that's a local experience, but it really isn't. You know, we have, we have an Aboriginal experience where you go fishing for the day with the community, spearfishing, you have a spear, and you catch the fish,

and then you bring it back to the women of the community, and you have a cooking class, and you cook your dinner. Like, that's a meaningful, that's a meaningful experience. And they're getting paid for doing that because they've created a tourism experience for you. You know, it's a meal program. It's an experience with the community. And we've trained them to, you know, to create a whole day activity with you having dinner with the community, which you've cooked yourself because you've spearfish during the day.

What a memorable experience. Yeah, that's that's meaningful kind of, that's a meaningful experience. Yeah, that's a memory that's going to last a lifetime and it's impactful versus, oh, yeah, I drove up and saw a show once and had a meal. Yeah, yeah. I mean, you go on a cruise ship and I'm with the one we show. I show in the movie is, and it's the most outrageous. I use it. I know I use it as the most extreme is that Alaska Cruise company that put the go cart track, the go car track on a cruise ship. I was saying like who, like, I had a love to have been in that meeting where a bunch of executives came to the conclusion. That was a great idea. Like that was a great idea. Like that was a great idea. You want the real Alaska experience. Let's get on a go cart in the fjords. Yeah, because you're just creating distractions for people. And I just, I keep saying it.

But I just think prior to COVID, travel was just in a very dangerous place where people were no longer connected to where they're going. They were connected to amenities, right? You were being sold amenities. And I think it all kind of stems back to the photos that people get, too, because like the experience you were saying, I mean, when you hear about it and you talk about it, like these are so meaningful, exciting experiences that you can do, but you don't see people posting them building a fire,

like building a stove and a house, they want a picture with a monkey. So it's just like, and it kind of goes back to Instagram where people are kind of, they're robbing their own experiences to try and impress other people with their Instagram photos. Yeah. I don't know.

I don't like to think, like I'm trying to understand the long, the long game of. social media. And I don't like to think people are just showing off. I do like, I believe that people, I believe social media is about sharing. And I really do believe that my daughter share with their friends. Because it horrifies me when my daughters take a picture of where they are and say, like, why are you doing that? Like, you're just bragging that you're at the Vatican and they're not. I don't get it. But they're saying, no, we love our friends. So we all, we want to know what we're doing.

Like we're building, we're sharing where we are because we all do it. You know what I'm saying? And I think that, and I for so long, I had a hard time thinking about that. And that's when social media started. But look where social media is going to go in the next decade, right? When you think of what TikTok's doing now and how it's driving consumer behavior, shopping, influencers. You know, it's best we all kind of understand that. And I just hope that we're not a place where people are using, I think older people use social media to brag about what they have or I got a new car. or I got a new shirt or I'm shopping here, I'm shopping there,

or I'm eating at the best restaurants. But I think the next generation, it's not about that at all. It's about sharing their experience with the people that they care the most about who equally open up their world to them by sharing back. That's what travel really is. When you're going into the country, someone is opening up their home to you to show you how they live. And so I just think there's a correlation there somehow with social media

where within your community, you're just sharing. what you do in your life. And tourism is like that a lot. Of course there's, you know, I think, I think old people, like I have friends my age, and I do think they post to brag. Like they just brag. I'm doing, I'm here and you're not. Like that whole kind of mentality.

But I don't think that that's where the future of social is going. I really believe there's a pure purpose to it. So it's just in a state of constant evolving, you know. And I think one of the things that the last tourist kind of closes out with is that the biggest thing that the tourism industry needs right now is just a paradigm shift because there's so much potential in travel like you mentioned before. And yeah, we did highlight some significant issues, but there's also huge opportunity for positive change if we just harness tourism in a different and meaningful way. And it all begins with us asking the questions, being more responsible and informed travelers and making better decisions. No one's asking us to, you know, I don't think the point of the film or this conversation right now is to everyone just scrap your holiday. You can't have fun. Like, you know, you know, and that's not what it is. It's more of just make the effort to ask some deeper questions instead of instant booking. and go carting next to a glacier and having a tallyan when you could get off the ship and meet some real local people and have some real local experiences. And I think that's, you know, that's the film really ends on a positive note.

And it makes you want to go travel. And that's what we love about it so much. It does it. It's not a depressing. Oh, well, I love to travel, but there's so many issues. It's like, I love to travel and I can be the change that travel. needs. And it's so easy. I mean, let other people benefit with the fact that you're there. That's the whole message of tourism. When you decide you want to travel, you have to realize

what a privilege you have. There's few people in the world. Like when you think of all the people that share this planet of ours, there's very few people that can say, I want to go on a holiday next year. I would, A, don't have disposable income, don't have the means, don't have the holiday time, don't have the job. There's just so many reasons why you can't, right? Yeah. So when you have that privilege to say I want to go on a holiday, realizing for that in that second that it's not a right, it's a privilege. Like you have the privilege to pay and go see other parts of the world, experience other cultures and see other things. What a privilege that is. And if we could just change that mindset of every traveler, the travel is not a right, it's a privilege,

and to go with an open mind to experience another country and, you know, meet its people and benefit from everything, you know, it's going to show you your place in the universe, basically, and give you a greater love and appreciation of where you come from when you come home. That's the beauty of travel. And it's just amazing to me that so many people are trying to move away from that. And I think COVID, because COVID's not going away, we're all kind of pretending it's gone, but it's not, COVID is still there. People are still getting it.

We're a little bit more protected. So there's going to be inherent risk in the immediate future to travel. So that's the best thing that could happen to us in travel, that it has to be more meaningful to people to travel. For people to travel now, it's going to be different. You know, there's, I mean, in the U.S., I was just in the U.S. last week, and I was amazed when I was in 10. People just pretending this virus didn't even ever begin.

Everyone just walking around like as if nothing ever happened. But not all countries are like that. And there's going to be inherent risk to travel. And so I think that's just a great thing. Because if you're going to travel, it's going to be more meaningful. You're going to have more purpose on why you want to travel. And I think that that's just, that's just the best thing that could happen to travel right now. So we're in a very opportune moment in time.

So as far as everyone learning about everything we've kind of touched upon, I mean, we could talk for hours about it because just every subject that is hit in the film just is so, there's so much to speak on. But as far as the overarching theme is, you know, it is a privilege. You vote with your dollars. if you don't want to see something continue, don't pay for it. Exactly. And just be asked questions. And the main thing is where's your money going? It's very, very easy to follow the money when it comes to tourism.

Like if you're eating in a place that's sanctioned by, you know, the detailed that this is the only place you can eat when you come off the ship, you know there's a kickback flowing back to the ship. Right. And it's just so easy to make the right choices. like when you're traveling that, you know, every different drivers, taxis, tour leaders, restaurants, where you shop, just go where you want and let people benefit because you're there. Yeah. I mean, if you love these places, I would, I personally, I would love to see my money go back

into these places that I'm traveling to because you're there for a reason. It's a beautiful country. It's whatever it is about the place you're going. If it's the culture, if it's the history, whatever it is, there's a reason that you want to be there. And there should be, like, I mean, I don't know how many times I, you know, we get here almost every day. Well, you know, someone who's in their 70s, you know, I once did a book report on Galapagos when I was in grade five. And I've always wanted to go there. That's amazing. That is, that is your purpose right there. You should go to Galapagos. Like, there should be no other place that you should want to go. You shouldn't be attracted by wanting to go because this place is going to allow you to eat Italian, sushi, and French food, give you swim up bars and free drinks and Broadway shows because you'll be able to.

see hairspray while you're on away and you'll be able to go carts and you'll be able to step blind like it's just distractions it's distractions to the destination and travel should be about destinations we should connect to where we go that's the that's if you can get that message out to your to your listeners that's the whole message of of the last tourists you know that and when we do it right it's transformational for everyone everyone benefits from the fact that you decided to go home. You work really hard. We work really hard in the developed world. We earn disposable income. We've got a very good, we've got very good birth rights for where we come from. Just share it. Just let other people benefit when you match your values with how you travel. That's the tipping

point we're hoping for. I think that's a beautiful way to end this because you couldn't have said it any better. So I mean, Cassie and I have seen the film, of course, but to everybody else, it just came out on Hulu. It's streaming on Hulu now. So, and then is there anywhere else people can go to see it? Well, it's on Apple TV. That's where it's like, I mean, where I think we're number two in the documentaries next to Jackass at the moment, which I'm not happy about. Well, let's do something about that. Let's bunk that up. And so, yeah, it's, I believe it's, it's coming on, and now it's on Hulu. And there's a bunch of local streaming, but the Apple and Hulu is the big ones and I think it's coming up now on Amazon Prime is coming up soon as well.

So it's done. It's run for pay-per-view. So now it's stream. It's what they call subscription stream. Who's the first to jump on board? That's for the States. And in Canada, people go listening to Canada, it's streamed on all services in Canada. And we haven't launched in Europe and Australia yet with those launches for coming with the next month. So in North America, Hulu, Apple TV. And it's around. Just look, it's anywhere you can, some local streaming services as well. Lovely. Very cool. Thank you so much, Bruce.

It was such a pleasure. And we are just so excited. We have some upcoming travels ourselves in the next year and just it's going to be, it's going to be a great year. Well, now that you're thinking about, hopefully after you've seen the last tourist, you guys are thinking now, well, how can we do the trips that we want to do and just be a little bit different, right? I'd just be a little bit more mindful.

And like, let's make reservations away from the tourist crowds. Let's go to family-owned restaurants. And feel really proud when you go to a shop where you see the whole family in the background. And you're buying the little trinkety spoon or whatever it is you guys. You're taking home to your parents or whatever it is. The shop glass, whatever it is you're doing. Just be mindful that other people should be part of your story. Like you're creating your memories, but let other people in.

Let other people benefit. Thank you for joining us again this week. If you have a trail tale, you'd like to share. send us an email at NPAD Stories at gmail.com. Follow us on Instagram and Facebook at National Park After Dark and on Twitter at NPAD podcast. Become an outsider by joining our Patreon where you'll gain access to monthly bonus stories and exclusive content. And remember, when you support our partners, you're supporting our show.

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