ANDREW LIMBONG, HOST:
Summer is peak travel season, with tourists heading to far-flung destinations. But how does all of that tourism shape local communities and ecosystems, both positively and negatively? That's the question at the heart of WHYY's podcast Peak Travel, which takes listeners to a new destination in each episode. Host Tariro Mzezewa joins us now to talk about it. Hey, Tariro.
TARIRO MZEZEWA, BYLINE: Hey, Andrew. Thanks for having me on.
LIMBONG: All right, so first, what are some of these hotspot destinations around the world that you've talked about, and what were some of the issues you heard from locals?
MZEZEWA: Oh, my gosh. We have been all over the world, talking about all kinds of issues. For example, in Mexico City, we looked at how Airbnb is leading to gentrification. In Barcelona, we looked at how the city feels like it's becoming a bit of a theme park that's essentially built for the convenience of tourists rather than for daily life for locals.
LIMBONG: Yeah. And I hear you guys did a whole piece on Antarctica - right? - which, as I understand it, in 2023, more than 100,000 tourists visited the continent, and it's becoming more accessible than ever. So how does a person actually get to Antarctica?
MZEZEWA: (Laughter) It's not an easy trip. So typically, people fly to the southern tip of Argentina, to Ushuaia, and then they get on a cruise ship. It's, like, a couple-of-days-long journey, and you go through what's called the Drake Passage, which is a pretty intense journey - huge waves, lots of people getting seasick. It's a huge effort, but everyone we talked to for this episode said that it was totally worth it when they got to the other side of the Drake Passage. There's nothing like it. I think the word a lot of people used to tell me about it was otherworldly.
LIMBONG: So I get that - right? - just wanting to explore this new place that not many other people have been to. Scientists who study the continent say that, like, people have complicated feelings about the tourism.
MZEZEWA: They do. A lot of scientists feel like people should only be able to go to this really difficult place to get to, that has, you know, all this nature that hasn't been exposed to the rest of the world ever, only for research. So that's, like, a common thing that you hear. Marilyn Raphael is a scientist at UCLA. She studies climate change in the Antarctic region there, and she first visited back in 2011 for part of her research. But one of the most interesting things about this is that Marilyn actually doesn't go back. She - as much as she loved it, as life-altering as the experience of going to Antarctica was for her, she actually does her research from home looking at satellite data because she just feels like it's too fragile of a place to keep going back to, and she's a person who really has reason to go for her work.
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MARILYN RAPHAEL: We risk introducing nonnative species. There's a problem with managing the waste that comes with tourism. It's inevitable. You can be as careful as you want. Once you set foot on land or in the water around, we bring those problems. If we want that Antarctica that we have now to remain as it is, then we have to exert more control.
LIMBONG: Exert more control on tourism - that's an interesting phrase. But in places like Antarctica, I suspect that's a lot easier said than done, right?
MZEZEWA: It's definitely easier said than done. A lot of different countries are involved in deciding what happens in Antarctica. Decades ago, they came together and made this thing, essentially an international treaty, called the Antarctic Treaty. And through the Antarctic Treaty, governments have had some successes on things like banning commercial mining and passing regulations on waste and marine pollution. But it's really hard for them to actually do too much more because they meet once a year, and on top of that, if they pass a regulation, they also need to take it home and pass it in their domestic legislature, which is very complicated.
LIMBONG: That sounds like a bear to deal with, right? Your podcast isn't advocating, like, stopping tourism altogether, but what have you learned throughout hosting this podcast that you might advise people on how to be conscious travelers?
MZEZEWA: Oh, my gosh. I think so much of the responsibility lies on us as the ones going to other places. So in the case of Antarctica, it starts when you're at the very beginning of your journey, before you've even booked a trip. You look at all of these different tour companies offering different kinds of trips. And if you see that one is really emphasizing luxury and not necessarily, like, education and not talking about their environmental impact, I think that's a red flag, right? And I think that's something to consider everywhere you're going.
If you want to stay at a really fancy hotel, maybe look at what they're doing within their community. What are they doing in terms of who they're hiring? What kind of experiences are they offering? And one of the biggest questions I ask myself, because I spend entirely too much time looking at other people's trips on social media, is, like, is that a place I really want to go, or do I want to go there because I've seen a million photos of it, and it looks really cool and everybody's going there?
LIMBONG: Yeah, so don't go for the 'gram.
MZEZEWA: Exactly.
LIMBONG: Yeah. That was Tariro Mzezewa, host of WHYY's podcast Peak Travel. You can listen to it wherever you get your podcasts. Tariro, thank you so much.
MZEZEWA: Thank you.
(SOUNDBITE OF SZA SONG, "SATURN") Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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