Monday, July 16, 2007

So you drive a lot, huh?

I love driving! Anybody who knows me will tell you that. Driving coupled with a love for traveling and photography is an enriching hobby. Yet, there is a problem, or a guilt-conscience if you will.

How do I manage to get these thoughts in my mind, and all of a sudden?
I really don't know, but in this case, a probable cause is definitely this:

55555+ kms of travel in 15 months. Reason to celebrate? Read on...

It's the instrument cluster of my car that tells a story of great thrill, fantastic memories, lots of travel... 55569 kms of it, to be precise. Here is a rough indication of the distances covered.

As you can see - most of West Europe...

Places visited...

So, where is the problem?
The money spent? No, the extravagance was definitely worth the experience.

The problem is evidently elsewhere.
It's a constant realization of the fact that modern day pleasures actually change the world for good. 'Huh?' - if that were your reaction, you would not be to blame! Most of us use the environment without even giving it it's due thought.

To cut a long story short - my excitement of having done 55500-odd kms in the last 15 months was soon drowned by thoughts of my "carbon imprint". Yes, 55000 kms in 15 months that don't even include the 2 months spent in India, in the US and in Barcelona when my car was all but parked! Even those months of not using the car involved traveling by air, or on land in the destination countries - in other words, my carbon footprint never lost track of me!

In the next section, I discuss steps on reducing the carbon footprint of road-travel...

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