Tourists visiting Copenhagen this summer are encouraged to participate in unusual kinds of vacation fun, including plucking floating trash from the Danish capital’s waterways, cycling to museums instead of going by car, or volunteering at an urban garden.
All these activities are part of a new, four-week pilot project called CopenPay that rewards tourists for “climate-friendly actions.”
“We must turn tourism from being an environmental burden into a force for positive change,” said Mikkel Aarø-Hansen, the CEO of tourist board Wonderful Copenhagen, which runs the scheme.
“We want visitors to make conscious, green choices and hopefully end up getting even better experiences while they visit,” Aarø-Hansen said in a statement earlier this month.
Among the over 20 attractions participating in the project is the environmental non-profit organization GreenKayak which offers water tours for tourist volunteers. They can paddle through Copenhagen’s 17th-century waterways aboard green-colored kayaks, plucking floating trash from the water. The reward? A free two-hour litter-picking cruise. One main sailing lane heads out to the Baltic Sea.
“When you are in the ocean, you get invested in the ocean. So, I hope that that will keep inspiring people to not leave trash in the ocean,” Elisabeth Friis Larsen, a spokeswoman for GreenKayak, told The Associated Press.
Elsewhere, tourists can trim flower beds, harvest coriander or feed chickens at Oens Have urban garden, then stay for a complimentary lunch. Or get free ice cream if they cycle or take public transport to the country’s National Museum instead of going by taxi or rental car to reduce emissions.
Visitors to SMK, Denmark’s National Gallery, can attend workshops where they’re taught how to transform plastic waste into jellyfish sculptures.
“The whole idea was that people should bring their own plastic waste. And out of that, the children will build a jellyfish,” explained workshop leader, artist Susanne Brigitte Lund.
Copenhagen’s climate-friendly vacationers’ project — which began on July 15 and is set to wrap up on August 11 — comes as the world’s top destinations are grappling with the burdens of mass tourism. Copenhagen also gets its fair share of tourists with more than 12 million overnight stays last year. Amid demonstrations and…
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