Our obsession with avocado toast has gotten some Latin American populations into a real pickle – but there’s still hope for your favorite high-fat snack.

In the Apurimac region of Peru, villagers have learned to capitalize on our obsession with the fruit to cultivate high-margin, sustainable avocados and eke out a living for themselves in the process.

The Avocado Dilemma

Avocado has usurped kale as the top trendy health food in America – and that’s not necessarily a good thing. In Mexico, where about 40 percent of the world’s avocados are produced, growers have been cutting down acres worth of natural forests (the Independent notes that deforestation is growing at a pace of 2.5 percent per year) to keep up with the demand for avocado toast, avocado boats, and avocado everything else.

It’s no surprise that this mass deforestation has led to a number of problems, including a lack of biodiversity in the region, fumigation that has wrecked havoc on the health of locals, who are experiencing more and more breathing and stomach problems, according to the Independent, and even increased narcoterrorism linked to the money-making crop.

While these issues are certainly dire in Mexico, shoppers who opt for another provenance aren’t necessarily off the hook.

“The fact of the matter is that we know pitifully little about the environmental and working conditions of faceless people in faraway places who grow fruit for our tables,” reports the Guardian.

Some opt, instead, to buy local, but while California is rising to the occasion, producing  164,000 tons of the fruit (over 80 percent of total production in the U.S.), the effect of this crop on the already dry state is not the most environmentally friendly, and recent drought conditions have even led to an avocado shortage.

There are two solutions to this very real problem. The first is to cut back on avocado consumption, for example by subbing a tasty pea mash in for your regular avocado toast.

But cutting back doesn’t mean that we have to say goodbye to avocados forever — it just means that when we do choose the fruit, we need to choose fair trade avocados from reliable sources.

Choosing Sustainable Avocado Toast

Candelaria Pillaca hails from Apurimac, a region of south-central Peru. She had long been cultivating traditional regional crops such as corn, kiwicha, and beans when she learned about World Neighbors, a savings and credit program that not only would allow her to take out small loans to purchase and plant avocado trees but would also provide her with instruction in organic fertilization, water conservation, and basic accounting.

Five years later, Pillaca is supporting her family with her avocado plantation, adding $3,000 to her yearly income, a substantial amount that allows her to help support two of her children who attend university.

By adding avocados to her small, one-and-a-half hectare farm, Pillaca has created a sustainable way to produce the in-demand fruit. She is a strong proponent of agro ecology, incorporating drip irrigation and crop diversification into her farm and using organic fertilizers produced on her own land from animal waste and compost.

Perhaps most importantly, Pillaca is not contributing to widespread deforestation problems, but rather integrating avocados into an already diverse farm.

“The problem of deforestation may happen when practicing large scale of avocado planting and not integrating them with other tropical fruits,” says Pillaca.

“I didn’t have to cut down trees to plant avocados.”

Related on EcoSalon
3 Environmental Benefits of Farming You Probably Didn’t Realize
Care About Sustainable Food? Start Thinking About Soil: Foodie Underground
Growing the Cold Chain: An Essential Key to Reducing Food Waste

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Plastic waste is building up all around the world. And now, in some countries, it’s being used as a currency of sorts.

It’s a pretty brilliant concept: offer people useful services and products for plastic waste they collect from the streets and beaches in the developing world and bring into regional “plastic banks.”

The idea is the brainchild of Vancouver entrepreneur David Katz who created the organization Plastic Bank.

“If we can reveal the value in the things around us, then we can give people the opportunity to make a better life with that,” he told Fast Company.

Here’s how it’s going to work in Peru, where the first Plastic Bank is set to open this spring: Plastic waste “pickers” will be able to visit the Plastic Bank and trade in their collection of mixed plastics for food, shoes and other necessities. And, according to Fast Company, they can even use the bank’s 3D printing facilities to make items they may need. “Perhaps they’re working with waste from a gas station and the mechanics need components they can print on site. It gives them an opportunity to take the waste out of the environment and make something worth $5, $10, or $20,” Katz says.

Other countries are being targeted for Plastic Banks as well, including the Philippines, Colombia and Indonesia, where plastic is a problem, and an opportunity.

According to Katz, Plastic Banks will also be providing on-site training to the waste collectors so they can expand their skill sets and perhaps even start their own recycling facilities to boost their revenue and take some of the ick factor out of collecting waste.

There is so much plastic floating in our oceans right now that it’s the equivalent of thousands of giant blue whales, the largest creatures on the planet. And it’s not doing the oceanic ecosystems any good. So even as minuscule as collecting a trash bag’s worth of plastic bottles from a beach may seem, it’s no small effort. In fact, it may be way more important than many of us realize.

So, what happens with all the plastic delivered to the banks?

A “major corporation” is going to take the collected plastic waste and turn it into new products, Katz told Fast Company. “Knowing that the plastic came from a waterway and that it helps people out of poverty through its collection and reuse—that’s a strong story.”

Find Jill on Twitter @jillettinger

Related on EcoSalon

Plastic Bags Be Gone: EU Passes Historic Reduction Plan

4 Ways to Upcycle Plastic Bottles

The Great Pacific Garbage Patch: Nothing Short of a ‘Plastic Paradise’

Plastic bottle image via Shutterstock

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These 5 fashion collections honor the beauty and skill of Peruvian artisans and native materials.

Peru, known for the Incan culture and sights such as Machu Picchu, Lake Titicaca and the Amazon, also has a rich heritage of textile creation going back nearly 10,00 years. In fact, Peru has the longest continuous history of textile creation of any country in the world, which was invented around the same time as humans started agriculture. Lucky for us, many of the textile traditions that sprung from these early times are still practiced by Peruvian artisans today, as has been discovered by several modern fashion designers and textile enthusiasts. The 5 brands and designers we’ve showcased here are seeking out underprivileged artisans in Peru and having them create gorgeous handmade fashion collections out of local fibers such as alpaca and cotton. Check them out to find your special piece of ‘Made in Peru’.

1. Alternative Apparel
Alternative Apparel recently launched its Made in Peru campaign, which comprises a behind-the-scenes film series documenting the collaboration between Alternative’s design team and their Peruvian partners. During their fall 2013 visit to Peru, Alternative created proprietary fabrics and dyeing techniques featured in a third of the Spring 2014 collection.  The label is committed to using certified organic and Fair Trade cotton sourced from Peru, featuring a thinner, lighter and softer organic cotton yarn for its spring collection.

2. Awamaki
Awamaki is an organization that supports a cooperative of weavers and apparel makers in the Andes of Peru. The organization brings together the traditional weavers, visiting designers, and local seamstresses to create stylish clothing with a distinctive Peruvian touch. You can shop these items at Awamaki’s online store, but what’s even better is that you can actually visit the community of weavers and makers through workshops, home stays and volunteer programs organized by Awamaki.

3. Indigenous
Indigenous offers a collection of men’s and women’s basics and hand knit sweaters and shawls made out of the finest Peruvian cotton and wool. The label strongly believes in Fair Trade principles and organic textiles, with a mission “to elevate artisans in the poorest regions of South America to world renowned status in the handicraft market while preserving the rich cultural heritage.”

4. Killa Knits
Gorgeous, stylish and incredibly soft, all Killa Knits items are made out of responsibly sourced, Peruvian alpaca wool. All items are hand made by native artisans dwelling in villages along the Peruvian coast and in the Andes with traditional techniques passed down from generation to generation.

5. Mamacha

Based in the UK, Mamacha offers a range of hand knit alpaca wool basics like hats, jumpers, gloves, shawls, socks and legwarmers made by Peruvian artisans. Committed to providing employment for women living in impoverished parts of Peru, the brand makes sure to sell a certain amount of products each season to ensure ongoing work for their Peruvian crafters. Each item comes with a tag sporting the name of its worker, sharing a small bit of their story and pride with each garment.

Related on EcoSalon

DIY Peruvian Craft Tour with Annie Millican

40 Gorgeous Photos of Latin America

THREADED: The Awamaki Lab Places Peruvian Handwoven Textiles Front & Center

Images: Alternative Apparel, Awamaki, Indigenous, Killa Knits, Mamacha

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The surge of Western interest in the potent South American psychedelic brew called ayahuasca is bringing great healing and controversy.

The healing path is an onerous one. Whether fighting off or recovering from a physical illness, or working through mental or emotional issues, healing is most often a long process, and a heavy one at that. For some, it can lead back to religion, or the guidance of spiritual teachers. Some may seek solace in yoga or meditation practices, art, hobbies, or traditional therapies, while others seek the help of a different kind: the South American jungle medicine called ayahuasca.

It’s difficult to describe the powerful encounter ayahuasca delivers, even to those who have experience with other psychedelics more common in the U.S. such as mushrooms or LSD. Ayahuasca contains DMT (N,N-Dimethyltryptamine) and is considered the most potent hallucinogenic on the planet. But it’s more than that; it’s described often as “Grandmother”—as in a spirit who becomes present within you, guiding you through brutally raw self-reflection and healing. It is not a party drug, nor is it therapy in any traditional sense. But it is something unforgettable and often life-changing.

In recent years, ayahuasca has become quite popular with Americans, no doubt a result of our disconnected lifestyles, our back-and-forth states of physical and mental health. We oscillate between binging on junk foods, drinking too much alcohol, trading gym night for Game of Thrones. In retribution, we may switch to chugging down shots of wheatgrass, ditching empty calories, and being first in the yoga class queue. But neither of these lifestyles are the ideal; it’s a healthy balance we seek, one where playfulness, and sometimes even reckless behaviors, are brought into alignment with rigidity, discipline and a commitment to doing the right thing for our bodies and spirits. It’s no wonder we also have some of the highest anxiety and depression rates in the world.

Or, perhaps it’s a little bit of our First World boredom that sends us clamoring into buggy jungles in hopes of shamanic encounters and realignments on the ethereal plain. And there’s no question that a trip into the South American rainforest will be life-changing—psychedelic in its own right. But have we romanticized the culture and the medicine into dangerous territory?

A recent Men’s Journal article told the story of a young American seeker who went to Peru to drink ayahuasca after viewing a documentary film on the subject. What happened to Kyle Nolan is every parent’s worst nightmare: The 18-year-old reportedly died after an ayahuasca session and his body buried in the jungle by the shaman. It’s believed Nolan did not receive “pure” ayahuasca, and it was the inclusion of another powerful herb called toé that may have caused his death. And while ayahuasca-related deaths are in fact rare, the cases of faux shamans taking advantage of Westerners are becoming less so. Rapes, molestations, extortion and other behaviors we’d sooner attribute to unstable Americans are now commonplace in ayahuasca tourism regions. Westerners unable to handled the medicine or improperly guided by shamans during the ceremonies have inflicted wounds on themselves, become mentally deranged and even committed suicide in the aftermath of sessions. Should we be shocked?

One of the common (mis)conceptions about tribal cultures is their absolute purity and innocence—a belief that their simpler, shamanic ways of living somehow also equal immunity from greed and negligence. But it’s simply not true. Native Americans, for example, were slaughtering each other long before British settlers arrived and added to the bloodshed. And tribal wars have been common throughout history, all over the planet, including the beloved jungles of the Amazon. Still, we dub these cultures as quaint, which has erroneously come to mean infallible.

Do we travel to the jungles for healing because we must or, simply because we can? While our interest in ayahuasca is certainly an economic boon to low-income communities in countries including Peru, Colombia and Brazil, what do we really know about the long-term impact of the medicine on non-native people? Healing of any kind is a process. And when working with a potent psychedelic, the reverberations of a single session can be felt for months, even years after. It’s not exactly something that can be fully understood overnight. And it’s this desire to understand the experience that can send Westerners back to the jungle repeatedly to try and find the answers.

Granted, great healings do occur under the guidance of legitimate shamans. But they can also happen under less exotic setting, too. It is perhaps our reasons for seeking healing in the first place that will influence the experiences we ultimately receive. That’s not to say innocent people like Kevin Nolan deserve to die, but it can explain why we’re seeing a greater number of incidences like that occur; romantic impulses to venture thousands of miles into harsh environments for something that’s reportedly going to heal us, is not exactly the definition of responsible.

In our efforts to unAmericanize ourselves, we’re, in true American fashion, co-opting something that doesn’t really belong to us. Still, just like eating chocolate or drinking coffee isn’t necessarily a bad thing, despite our losing sight of  their exotic origins, ayahuasca clearly has benefits most of the time. But do we want that relationship to be like the exploitative practices and sugar-laden junk-filled candy the world’s top chocolate makers are known for? Or, can we adopt a Fair Trade, organic approach to shamanic medicine and usher in healthier connections? One thing is certain: no matter what your ultimate goal is, venturing into dark and dangerous jungles is always best approached with extreme caution.

Keep in touch with Jill on Twitter @jillettinger

Image: Howard G. Charing

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Annie Millican invites you to join a DIY craft tour that will take you to the heart of the vibrant crafting culture in the Sacred Valley of Peru. 

Be one of 10 participants to travel across the Peruvian Andes this May on a collaborative crafting expedition that will introduce you to the amazing indigenous craft culture of the area. The tour, organized by online DIY platform Kollabora, will be a total cultural immersion that will expand your horizons and tap deep into your inner adventurer. Living with a Peruvian host family, visiting an alpaca farm, dyeing yarns with local natural dyes, learning how to use a back strap loom and visiting the sacred site of Machu Picchu are all part of this unique and enriching experience.

Tour organizer Annie Millican first immersed herself in the rich crafting heritage of Ollantaytambo, Peru in 2009, leading her to establish a product development initiative called Awamaki Lab. The four-year project brought (and still brings) designers to Peru to work alongside local artisans to create beautiful products for international sale, creating a sustainable and accessible way to share the gorgeous craft heritage of the region. She’s now teamed up with Kollabora for this tour in order to provide more designers and crafters with the experience of working alongside local artisans and establishing meaningful relationships through the art of making. We caught up with Annie to hear more about what this exciting adventure has in store for its crafty participants.

Leena Oijala: How did you decide that a tour would be the next step after Awamaki for sharing the Peruvian craft heritage?

Annie Millican: I wanted to figure out how to concentrate the benefits of the Awamaki Lab experience and open up the opportunity to other designers/makers/knitters.  The greatest benefit of Awamaki Lab was fostering meaningful connections between skilled designers and artisans and so I was interested in creating a similar model that speaks to the Kollabora crafter.  The tour is really a cultural immersion program and pairs designers with local artisans in mini, non-competitive teams.

The idea is that these teams will come up with their own unique solution to a pattern challenge, making it a very hands-on experience. The tour will be a journey into discovering every step along the way of how the product is made; we’ll visit an alpaca farm, we’ll study hand spinning on a local drop spindle, and we’ll learn about design and the back strap loom under local weavers.

LO: Who would you say this tour is meant for?

AM: Anyone who has an adventurous spirit, who wants to disconnect from the daily grind in a beautiful, idyllic Andean town and collaborate with crafting counterparts across the globe. It’s for someone who is excited about a rustic, cultural immersion that involves living with a host family, eating traditional Peruvian cuisine and experiencing how traditional crafts have been maintained in more rural areas.

LO: How strong do participants’ craft skills need to be?

AM: Having basic knitting skills will help a lot. We’ll be working with a chunky, handspun alpaca yarn, which will be easier for beginners, as the yarn knits up quickly and is easier to handle.

LO: How did you come to work with Kollabora for the tour?

AM: I’ve known the Kollabora folks since they started burdastyle and have maintained a friendship with them ever since. They reached out to me last year inquiring about tour opportunities and I responded with an idea for a concentrated design experience.

It’s great to work with an online community that connects DIY makers across the world to a skill sharing board. The platform allows individual crafters to go online the post their own DIY projects, network with like-minded crafters and find inspiration, materials and tutorials for new projects. The tour personifies this, as its really about relationship building and capturing the Kollabora essence by taking the online community offline and into a hands-on experience.

LO: What are your goals for this tour?

AM: The goal is to introduce crafters from around the world to crafters in Ollantaytambo and foster relationships that tour participants and local crafters can maintain by their own volition.

We’re  working with the Asociacion Virgen de Carmento, a self-organized artisan association from an outlying community called Rumira. So the tour will support their organization tremendously and will be feeding back into the community by supporting the women we’ll be visiting and working with.

LO: How do you hope to see the project evolve?

AM: If the tour is successful there will be another tour in November, which we have scheduled around the local ramie harvest season.

LO: Collaboration is a key concept in a lot of the work you’ve done. How important do you think collaboration is in creating a sustainable textile and fashion industry?

AM: I think collaboration nurtures relationships and those relationships support increased transparency.  All links across the value chain in the production of retail goods ultimately rely on the relationships that people build with one another. This process is underscored by clear and open communication between different members of a process. In terms of design, cross-cultural collaboration is an area that should be explored more because it really fosters mutually beneficial skill-sharing.  There are such incredible high art traditions in some of the most remote corners of the world that can both inform and benefit designer interfacing.

LO: Will we see more artisan work in the mainstream during the next 10-20 years?

AM: I hope so! I think there are a lot of logistical constraints to insuring that artisan groups can fulfill deadline situations that brands have. So there is still a lot of infrastructural support that needs to be established to make that working relationship more realistic.

However, there is a renewed interest in seeing a greater story embedded in the clothing and other items that people buy and own. Seeing the meticulous handiwork in an item that you own creates a very meaningful connection.

The tour dates are May 25th to June 2nd, 2013 at a total cost of $1,799 excluding flights. Check out Kollabora’s website for a full itinerary  and fill out a brief questionnaire for registration. This is an amazing opportunity for a completely unique and engaging experience, so get on board quick to secure one of the last 5 spots!

Images: Kate Reeder

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Local craft and cacti meet in Laura Siegel’s NYFW Spring/Summer 2013 collection.

After months voyaging through Peru, Bolivia and India, Canadian designer Laura Siegel uncovered the indigenous crafts of remote villages and local artisans. She also discovered cacti—the succulents that caught her eye and inspired an entire Spring/Summer 2013 collection.

“It was amazing to me how something so bright and colorful as the cacti flowers could grow in such dry, muted deserts,” Siegel tells EcoSalon. From South America to Asia she explored life in the desert and the beauty that exists within it—like the re-purposed black tea waste in Kerala, India used to dye pieces within her collection, or the hand block printing renowned in this region. Farther north, in Delhi, she partnered with a leather smith to stitch her bags into finished pieces. In Peru, she partnered with a group of natural dyers called Eco Tintes, who softly colored the organic cotton and tencel fibers used to crochet pants (below) and knit shirts and sweaters.

From cacti to indigenous crafts, in her third season, Siegel shows range as a designer—fashioning jewelry, designing handbags and creating a complete collection omitting only shoes from her repertoire—a “future dream,” she tells us. With the free flowing nature of Siegel’s compilation, we’d be happy to tromp barefoot through the desert and all. And that’s how she wants you to feel when you wear her designs. “Happy,” she says. “Just happy.”

Designer Laura Siegel modeling her epynomous collection.

More looks we love:

Shoes by Love is Mighty

Images: Jennifer Barckley

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In his Chronicles of Peru, Spanish conquistador Pedro Cieza de León marveled,” And to think that God should have permitted something so great to remain hidden from the world for so long in history, unknown to men, and then let it be found, discovered and won all in our own time!”

Latin America continues to inspire shock and awe in voyagers, though now they’re more of the backpacking than the stake-in-the-ground variety. Whether it’s rocky mountains, brilliant beaches, charming colonial towns, or rugged cowboys you’re after, you’re likely to find it in the countries of Central and South America.

(above) Volcan Arenal, Costa Rica

Valles Calchaquíes, Argentina

Soriano, Uruguay

Cartagena, Colombia

Salvador de Bahía, Brazil

Goff’s Caye, Belize

Pacific Coast, Costa Rica

Volcán Mombacho, Nicaragua

Foz do Iguaçu, Brazil

Ruta 40, Chile

Armero, Colombia

Machu Picchu, Peru

Lago Suchitlan, El Salvador

Antigua, Guatemala

Sao Paulo, Brazil

Cordillera Province, Chile

Camino al Monte Roraima, Venezuela

Rio de la Plata, Argentina

Montevideo, Uruguay

Ica, Peru

La Paz, Bolivia

Galapagos Islands, Ecuador

Los Altares, Chubut, Argentina

Perito Moreno, El Calafate, Argentina

Laguna Hedionda, Bolivia

Copacabana Beach, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

Ushuaia, Tierra del Fuego, Chile

Mt. Humboldt, Venezuela

Concón, Chile

Amazonas, Brazil

Tenorio National Park, Costa Rica

Gamboa, Panama

La Colmena, Paraguay

Caye Caulker, Belize

Canchis, Peru

Montevideo, Uruguay

Curitiba, Brazil

Lake Atitlan, Guatemala

Roatan, Honduras

Salar de Uyuni, Bolivia

SEE ALSO:

40 Gorgeous Photos of Europe

40 Gorgeous Photos of North America

25 Photos of Islands Threatened By Climate Change

40 Gorgeous Photos of Asia

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Traveling by train is still one of the best ways to see the country.

Train travel is one of the cleanest, greenest, and often prettiest modes of transport for seeing the world. Less carbon is burned when riding the rails vs. flying or driving alone and thanks to technology, traveling by train has picked up speed over the last hundred or so years. Even train cars are being revamped into a comfortable, if not luxurious experiences, and a re-inspired interest in train travel by tourists has put the pressure on the old school classic train lines to renovate as engineers construct super trains to carry passengers through cleverly curated routes showcasing some visually stunning and historically epic landscape.

I recently boarded the Rocky Mountaineer train with my mother for a mother-daughter adventure. (Trains are low-key, yet still stimulating for that kind of cross-generational adventure.) Together we set out on a journey to conquer a chunk of Canada’s Rockies. We left from poetically rainy Vancouver (where we learned to embrace the constant drizzle), and took in some truly dramatic topography from within the Rocky Mountaineer’s two-level car.

Trekking with their GoldLeaf Service (there’s SilverLeaf and RedLeaf too), we were privy to an adjoining 180-degree glass viewing dome on the upper level, and a ground level dining car with an open-air observation car below. Our two-day passage from Vancouver to Banff, Alberta (with an overnight stop in the quiet and charming Kamloops), follows the original Canadian Pacific line.

What’s uniquely exclusive about the route is that it is inaccessible to cars. It’s just you and your fellow passengers (and the train), plus a collection of seen and unseen black bears, moose, elk, long horn sheep, and other wildlife hanging out trackside. Because of the seclusion, when chugging along the tempestuous Fraser River there’s plenty to see: lush rain forest, majestic mountains with serrated summits, red-rocked desert, and glacier-adorned lakes pass by all within a few hours.

What sets this kind of train travel apart from rail rides on Amtrak and Eurail is that there’s actually hot, gourmet food made-to-order onboard. Breakfast, lunch, and dinner are all local and seasonal. (Think: Sock-eye salmon, caribou and buffalo.)

Seduced? Here’s a few other interesting train trips to consider boarding around the world in an attempt to lessen your impact on the planet and commune with the beautiful country that surrounds you.

Alaska Railroad

Within Alaska is a half-day sojourn along 114-miles of jaw-dropping coast. The double-decker domed cars of the Alaska Railroad pamper with white tablecloth dining which pairs well with the vistas. Fjords, snow-tipped mountains and the requisite voyeuristic assortment of moose, bears and wolves never get old.

The Orient-Express’s Hiram Bingham Train

The Inca Trail by foot is exhausting just thinking about the 45km hike over four-days to Machu Picchu from Cusco, Peru. Aboard Orient-Express’s Hiram Bingham train, one of the shortest luxury trains in the world at just four hours, the locomotive does all the climbing – nearly 2,500 meters above sea level to reach the ancient Inca ruins. Food and cocktail party fun are background to the staggering views of the majestic Andes – a significantly more glamorous experience from the physically challenging Inca Trail hike.

Via Rail Canada

Finally a train with free onboard Wi-Fi! VIA Rail Canada trumps Amtrak with its technological connectivity. The amenity comes in handy for cross-country riders between Toronto and Vancouver who briefly tire of the dramatic Rocky Mountain landscape outside. Antsy passengers can also stop off at a variety of stops between Sudbury Junction and Lake Winnipeg and catch the return trip as VIA is loose with the whole hop-on-hop-off mentality. They cater to ultimate comfort too with sleeper berth and sleeper cabins complete with private bathrooms so passengers can catch sight of moonlit bears and whatever else creeps out in the night.

Amtrak

All I know of Amtrak is the Northeast Corridor line, which has left many a passenger unhappy. Out West, Amtrak’s lines seem to please more passengers – at least with views. (Tip: Always go for the larger sleeper cars.) There’s the California Zephyr, a long distance train traveling between Chicago, Illinois and Emeryville, California. Although not known for being perfectly pleasant on the inside, many consider the Zephyr to be impressively scenic and one of the best ways to see America. Then there’s the Empire Builder, which hits the northern states between Chicago and Seattle, passing through the Dakotas, Wyoming, and Montana along the way. The Coast Starlight also boasts impressive eye candy as it rides the West Coasts following beaches decorated with deer and other wildlife between Seattle and Los Angeles. www.amtrak.com

Africa’s Rovos Rail

If you can come to terms with the colonial feel of the Rovos Rail’s Pride of Africa while chugging up the continent from Cape Town, South Africa to Cairo, Egypt then this is a rail ride of a lifetime. There are suites vs. cabins so lounging in the room is comfortable. The suites come with a fully stocked bar fridge, en suite bathrooms and hair dryers. The 72-person cap is a nice touch and makes for a more intimate experience.

Sweden’s Green Machine or Gröna Tåget

This one’s about speed and green more than leisurely holiday travel. Appropriately called the Green Train, Sweden’s Gröna Tåget technologically dazzles with a magnetic motor that reaches up to 183 mph and boasts an improved energy consumption of up to 30 percent better than most trains.

Trans Siberian Railway

Russia’s Trans-Siberian Railway is massive, covering 9,000 kilometers. Most passengers ride the Russian rails leisurely to then wander through Moscow, along the Silk Road and explore the Russian Arctic. If time is of an essence, stay on board for the roughly ten days the entire trip takes.

The Maharajas Express

The Maharajas Express in India is ideal for voyeurs who still want a little distance from India’s intense reality and a great position to be in when overwhelmed by traveling through the oft visually assaulting country. Through the train’s gilded looking glass bubble are routes like the 8-day Princely India, which covers Western India from Mumbai and Delhi, to Ranthambore, Jaipur, Udaipur, and without a doubt, the Taj Mahal.

Images: Author Shira Levine, Rocky Mountaineer, Alaska Railroad, will54040404, Orient Express, Ahoy Cargo, flickriver

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