In the spirit of Summer and all things green, Green By Design is taking brief look at Eco-Tourism.

Since the beginning of civilization, people have been taking respites from the chaos of the city and experiencing the tranquility of the wilderness. But, here we are, in 2009, and gone are the days of wastefulness in the name of convenience. There are a lot of really simple ways to go camping, have fun, and still leave the site exactly as you found it.

Have you ever participated in a videoconference and thought it was a poor substitute for the real thing? Weird time delays. Fuzzy images. Herky-jerky motion. And for all that poor quality, it was complicated and took forever to set up.

Finland is not on most Americans’ short list of travel destinations. But it should be. Wandering Helsinki’s streets during White Nights is a dreamy pleasure. In this part of the world in midsummer, the sun doesn’t wane until the early morning hours.

I had no idea how much of a buzzword “ecotourism” had become until I had to explain to a visitor what we do here at the Nolalu Eco Centre. Five minutes into my spiel about the many and various ways we had gone green here in northern Ontario, her eyes still looked glazed over.

On the outskirts of Dodoma, the capital of Tanzania, microenterprise is making a difference in the lives of rural villagers. Since 1987, Village Enterprise Fund (VEF), a non-profit based in San Carlos, California, has helped fund more than 16,000 small businesses.

Canada was wrapped deep in the cold dark heart of Old Man Winter, Although not long home after two months away, I started thinking of what I could do to escape the inevitable frost-bite or busted back from too much snow removal.

On the flight from West Palm Beach to Marsh Harbour, Abaco, Bahamas, I was seated next to an experienced Bahamian visitor who was incredulous when I explained that we planned to eat only the fish we caught for our main meals.

Directly east of Jackson, Wyoming, in the Bridger-Teton National Forest, within the greater Yellowstone Ecosystem, lies the Gros Ventre Wilderness. The Gros Ventre is a mystical Eden of fertile riverbed, big pines, cottonwoods and ranging herds of elk, moose, mule deer and bighorn sheep.