Tag: Eco travel

AAA picks 10 best new vehicle technologies, thinks green

Green TravelGreen Auto Blog…..

It’s no secret that automobiles get more technologically advanced every passing year. A good deal of these vehicular innovations have a lot to do with saving gas, reducing emissions, and, more recently, teaching the driver to pilot the vehicle in a more efficient manner. If you feel like you need help in choosing which bits of techno-geekery are the best, AAA has just created a list specifically for you.

Included in AAA’s top 10 tech picks are solar roof panels and “green” driving assistance aids. Rooftop solar panels are pretty self-explanatory and can help keep an vehicle’s battery charged up or help keep the cabin cool in the hot sun. The 2010 Toyota Prius is probably the best-known example of this technology. So, what’s a green driving aid?

Honda’s new 2010 Insight hybrid uses what the automaker calls an Eco Assist dashboard that changes colors from green to blue to teach the driver to be more efficient. Ford uses something similar in the 2010 Fusion Hybrid called the SmartGauge cluster, which uses dual 4.3-inch LCDs and a graphic that shows leaves growing on a tree when you are driving efficiently. We tend to like them, but whether or not these are desirable features is definitely up to each individual driver.

Read the full article thanks to greenautoblog.com

For a free car or campervan, check out transfercar.co.nz for New Zealand or transfercar.com.au for Australia!

Jayride Teams Up with Dunedin City Council in Carpooling Initiative

Jayride, one of New Zealand’s fastest growing car pooling initiatives has just announced it has teamed up with the Dunedin City Council to promote carpooling for the city, starting with Otago Polytechnic and Otago University.

This is a fantastic start to what we hope is a growing trend amongst city councils nationwide and even better, worldwide.

Carpooling, for those of you who aren’t up with the play, is a way to get from A to B fast and hassle free. At the same time you are also doing your bit to save the environment by lowering the number of vehicles on our roads.

Jayride lists all sorts of vehicles such as Transfercar’s free to drive rental vehicles which relocate between major cities nationwide, busses and private vehicles that need to get from A to B and want to share the cost of the journey.

What are the benefits:

  • Less cars on the road (goes without saying why this is a benefit)
  • Shared petrol costs
  • Great company
  • Faster (as you get to use the carpooling lanes)

So spread the word people, this is the new way to get around!

Mini relocation holidays: The new way to travel

Arthurs PassOften relocations (as they are called in New Zealand) or standbys (as they are often called in Australia), are seen as short term travel options that get you from A to B far cheaper than taking on a regular rental deal.

Over the past few months I’ve begun to see the relocating trend change. As the recession has passed and people have become more budget conscious, transferring vehicles have become more popular.

However, instead of Transfercar being a means of securing a quick relocation between towns and cities, the trend is now swinging towards travellers creating their own mini packages from a mixture of free rental deals available online. Continue reading Mini relocation holidays: The new way to travel

Carpooling at a whole new level.

Who would have thought that the humble carpooling idea would emerge into a fully fledged, environmentally conscious transportation alternative.

Meet Jayride: the website that allows vehicle owners to put their spare seats up for rent. Well not so much as rent but short term lease.

With its humble beginnings in Auckland, New Zealand some 2 short years ago, Jayride is now the place to go to find a cheap, spare seat in vehicles travelling between towns and cities all over New Zealand and Australia. Continue reading Carpooling at a whole new level.

Scariest campsite ever!

Here I was looking at an article about the The Death Race (which is part of a circuit of obstacle-course competitions in the US, Canada and the UK known as Spartan Races), thinking, man what a bunch of sadistic people we humans are and also remembering the movie Death Race and Blade Runner and thinking how close we are getting to these movies…OK tangent now… when I saw a link that said “Scariest Campsite Ever!”

I started to imagine campsites with crocodiles, bears or god forbid spiders, but this was so much worse!

Continue reading Scariest campsite ever!

Don’t cancel trips to Christchurch: officials

Tourism officials in Christchurch have urged travellers to not let last week’s earthquake deter visits to the area.

In a statement Christchurch and Canterbury Tourism chief executive Tim Hunter reassured travellers that the damage from the quake last week did not affect buildings or operations in the city’s eastern suburbs.

Read the full article at Travel Blacboard