Our Favourite Eco Friendly Travel Products & Packing List!

Sustainable travel is a lot easier with a little help from eco friendly travel products! Here are our tried and tested favourite eco friendly travel products and ultimate packing list for eco friendly travel – Staying sustainable on the road has never been easier!

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Our Packing Guide + Favourite Eco Friendly Travel Products

This packing list is full of the best eco friendly travel products to help minimise the impact of your trip as much as possible. We’ve put in all of the products we use, love and recommend from our trips, as well as new ideas we’ve received from friends and fellow conscious travellers along the way.

When it comes to travelling with minimal impact (we know that travel can never be 100% sustainable), we find that fore-warned is fore-armed. Many of our go to places on our travels (street food, public transport anyone) are ironically the situations where you might get most stuck. Longing for some fresh coconut water but the vendor only has plastic straws? On a long train journey and running out of water? We know from personal experience, the plastic water bottles for sale start to look tempting. A few simple “accessories” can go a long way to avoid the need of ever having to buy single-use plastic products.

If it seems like an investment to buy so many products ahead of travel, it’s worth remembering how much many of these products save in the long run – both environmentally and economically. An investment into a water filter bottle will quickly pay itself back with money saved on buying bottled water.

Last but not least, we want to spell out that it’s not about being “perfect”. We know we’ve certainly had moments where we’ve had to resort to buying something in plastic because we were really hungry, forgot our metal straws, etc. Those moments are bound to happen. The point is that with a little preparation, we will be able to avoid 90%+ waste that can often be incurred with travel – which is a huge! 🙂

The Best Eco Friendly Travel Products

To help make this packing list as easy to use as possible we’ve divided it into several categories. Happy packing!

  • The Essentials
  • Eating and Drinking
  • Toiletries
  • Travel Accessories
  • Luggage & Travel Bags
  • Clothing
  • Should you offset your carbon?
Everything you need for sustainable travel with this packing list! We cover the best sustainable travel products, clothing, toiletries and luggage! #packinglist #sustianabletravel #traveltips

Sustainable Travel Essentials

In a hurry or only want to take a few things with you? In our humble opinions, the following sustainable travel products are game changers and should be part of anyone’s sustainable travel kit!

Eco Friendly Travel Products for Eating & Drinking

Much of the single use plastic we use on our travels comes in the form of plastic straws, shopping bags, and take-out drinks containers / plastic cutlery. By taking re-usable products with us (and keeping them in our day bag) we cut out the need to consume these completely!

plastic free toiletries for travel
Skip the plastic packaging with bars vs bottles of soap

Eco Friendly Toiletries

There are so many wonderful eco-friendly cosmetic and toiletry brands to choose from these days, it can be a little overwhelming! Our suggestion for travel in general is to opt for solid products vs liquid ones where possible (e.g. shampoo bars, soaps instead of body wash, stick deodorant, etc). Choosing these means a lighter load, you won’t be carrying around 90% water, and you can take more with you – great if you’re going on a longer trip! We suggest sharing products between couples / family members if you can!

We specifically don’t recommend LUSH products here. We’ve seen them recommended on many an eco-friendly travel blog (and we’ve even used them ourselves too) but we have found that far from being eco-friendly, they are actually full of harsh chemicals. The shampoo bar made our scalps dry and itchy, and LUSH has recently got into a lot of hot water with advertising standards for their products not being as natural as they may seem…

  • Non-Toxic Stick Deodorant
  • Raw Coconut Oil (we use this instead of taking after-sun and different moisturisers as Coconut Oil does the job perfectly!). Make sure to buy raw rather than the processed stuff!
  • Essential Oils – if you’re prone to dry skin, mould in humid climates or other skin conditions, find the best essential oil for you and take with you. Tea Tree & Lavender are both great for skin irritation and fungal skin infections, while peppermint is one of the best natural air fresheners around! Make sure to buy organic ones!
  • Linen turkish towels / facecloths. Lightweight, absorbent, natural and easily washable – we like this one or check out House of Jude if you’re in Canada.

Depending on where you live, we have a few different favourite eco-friendly brands for toiletries. If you live in the UK, we love Guiltless Skin for their face oils and serums which have kept our skin hydrated on the road. In Canada, we love the Great Canadian Hemp Company.

Eco Friendly Travel Accessories

Here are some of our favourite sustainable travel accessories from our trips:

Eco Friendly Luggage & Travel Bags

Perhaps the most important part – what we put all of our favourite eco travel products in! Luckily there are some great eco friendly bags on the market.

We love our Osprey backpacks – we’ve been using our Osprey Farpoint 40 for many a trip and it’s still going strong. For those who prefer their luggage with wheels, we are fans of Samsonite’s new Eco Nu range – an entire range of suitcases that are made out of recycled plastic bottles!

Eco-Friendly Clothing for Travel

Sustainable fashion is a topic in its own right, but here are a few of our favourite ethical / sustainable accessories we like to take with us:

Should you Offset your Carbon?

We don’t believe that carbon offsetting is a solution to making travel more sustainable – rather the change in behaviour and creating less impact when we travel has to come from the tourism industry, travel providers, and us as travellers.

Paying someone else to offset our carbon is not enough. That said, we do encourage people to look into the option of offsetting  in addition to travelling more consciously. Read more about Carbon Offsetting here.

What are your favourite eco friendly travel products? What should we add to our packing lists? Let us know in the comments below!

Read more about travelling mindfully on Soul Travel:

The Best Travel Water Filters

Zero Waste Travel – How to travel Plastic-Free

Airline Sustainability – Which Airlines are the Best (and Worst)?

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Everything you need for eco friendly travel with this eco friendly packing list! We cover the best sustainable travel products, clothing, toiletries and luggage! #packinglist #sustianabletravel #traveltips

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6 thoughts on “Our Favourite Eco Friendly Travel Products & Packing List!”

  1. A reusable water bottle is #1 essential when travelling. My main travel essential – a water bottle with a built-in filter! I travel mainly around Asia and it’s a lifesaver here since the tap water is not safe for drinking. Though, in many places now they have water coolers, where you can refill your bottle. Absolutely love this!
    But then my filter-bottle is perfect for travelling to rural areas. I use the LifeStraw bottle when I go trekking and hikes or hiking. I can easily take water from the river and drink it right away. While others have to wait until we reach a guesthouse to buy water, or they have to use purification tablets, which make the water smell and taste like swimming pool.

    Reply
  2. Hi there! We’re so happy to have found your work/blog! We couldn’t be any more supportive of everything you’re doing, especially with providing everyone a list of sustainable products for travel. Keep up the amazing work!

    Reply

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