The Thoughtful Travel Podcast
The Thoughtful Travel Podcast
The Thoughtful Travel Podcast with Amanda Kendle - established 2016 - is a weekly show which helps travellers think about how our travels can be good for us and good for the world. We talk about how to make ethical decisions on our trips, sustainable and regenerative tourism, bringing back what we learn from the people and cultures we meet to improve our lives back home, and share the most memorab…Follow the podcast:
381 Elephants, Tigers and Responsible Animal Tourism
Various statistics suggest that more than half of travellers want to see animals when they travel: that's why we keep returning to the topic of animal tourism and how we can do this in ways that both keep humans interested in caring for animals but without doing too much harm - and while bearing in…
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380 Pandemic Travel and Big Life Changes
It's (somehow!) six years ago that we started to learn about this new virus and then find ourselves caught up in a global pandemic. While there were some truly tragic parts to that crisis, it turns out there were also some good results, too. Quite by chance recently, two guests in the space of a co…
25:25
379 Overtourism and What We Can Do About It
Can you imagine that we didn't used to talk about overtourism? It's really only a decade since this word entered common usage but it seems we hear about it constantly now. In this episode I chat with two guests who have great perspectives to add on this issue, and I also share some tips on how we c…
25:42
378 Seoul Trip Report: Spontaneous Budget Travel to South Korea
I last saw South Korea's fabulous capital Seoul way back in 2002, so when my 15-year-old son spotted a great flight price in November I was very keen to take him there! This podcast episode reports back on our week in Seoul, and I even persuaded my son to come on and chat about our trip, too. I'm…
27:28
377 Overlooked Perspectives on Travel
How often do we go somewhere with a preconceived idea and find it hard to really see other perspectives ... well, speaking for myself, pretty often! In this episode I share three stories which highlight ways to learn about and understand different perspectives - but are also just great stories on t…
26:57
Book Club 23: The Geography of Bliss by Eric Weiner
This special episode is the audio of the Facebook Livestream of the December 2025 meeting of the Thoughtful Travellers Book Club, chatting about book "The Geography of Bliss" by Eric Weiner - https://amzn.to/47KtLea If you'd like to join the Thoughtful Travellers Book Club, sign up for our update…
42:33
376 All Aboard for 2026 Travels!
The end of 2025 is imminent and it's time to look back on our discussions and travels and then get ready for a thoughtful and fun 2026! In this episode I'll tell you which episodes were the most downloaded during 2025 and share some other podcast highlights. And then it'll be crystal ball time: wh…
23:44
375 Chris Christensen: Deep Dive into Travel Podcasting
Chris Christensen had the foresight to start a travel podcast before almost anyone had even heard of podcasts - way back in 2005. The Amateur Traveler podcast is still going strong - and is approaching its one thousandth episode. Chris and I chatted about the evolution of podcasting in general an…
29:25
374 Cultural Intelligence for Travellers
When I learnt that past guest Renae Ninneman runs a business providing cultural intelligence assessments and intercultural training I was immediately fascinated. And when Renae offered to guide me through a CQ - cultural intelligence - assessment complete with a debrief, and was happy to record it …
24:09
373 Dangerous Animals on our Travels
Travelling to observe animals in the wild is a huge reason that we move around the world. The best case scenario is that we can see them without disturbing their environments or habits, perhaps take some photos, and head home. The worst case scenario is that something goes wrong and these animals b…
29:33