Tour specific travel advice to cut carbon emissions – for your tour starting in Sta Maria (Grisons)
The Eagles now has a target to emit net zero carbon from its activities within two full seasons, by cutting emissions by swapping from air to train, for example; and by offsetting. At the moment, annual net emissions from club tours are 280 tonnes. (To keep global temperature rise below 2 degrees by 2100, each person should emit on average no more than 1.5 tonnes per year.) If you would like to help reach the club’s target, there are two main things you can do:
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Choose lower emission mode(s) of transport for all or part of your trip. (Taking a direct flight from say Edinburgh to Munich then continuing to Innsbruck by train, instead of taking connecting flights, will still cut emissions. Or travel by train in one direction and plane the other.) And/or;
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Offset your travel (by whatever mode) by buying from the Club’s emissions offset scheme at a cost of around £3.50 for an average return flight within Europe and less for other modes.
Per passenger, the rough CO2 emissions for a return from London to Geneva are as follows
Direct flight, Economy Class 400kg
Large car, 4 passengers 160kg
Small car, 4 passengers 80kg
Coach 50kg
Train (e.g. Eurostar ) 25kg
(Source of data: here)
This document gives a few tips on booking lower carbon travel to the start/end point of your tour, Sta Maria (Grisons), from London.
Train. Sta Maria (Grisons) is around 13 hours by train from London St Pancras, with changes in Paris (from Gare du Nord to Gare du Lyon, using one fast metro line; tickets are sold at the Eurostar buffet car), Zurich, and then various smaller towns in Switzerland. For train (and in Germany, Austria and Switzerland also local bus) times see www.bahn.co.uk – just enter origin London, or your local GB station, and your final destination (here, Sta. Maria Val Müstair, posta).
Eurostar does not offer through London-Zurich tickets. You can buy a ticket to Paris on www.eurostar.com, and another onwards from Paris to Zurich at the French railways page www.oui.sncf.com. To be on the safe side allow 60 minutes in Paris if you don’t have a through ticket. Booked well ahead Eurostar charge around £60 for a single from London to Paris and SNCF charge as little as €29 from Paris to Zurich. From Zurich to Sta Maria is 42CHF one way, bought on the day at www.sbb.ch. - cheaper if booked in advance
Eurostar and German Rail (DB) tickets go on sale 6 months in advance and SNCF 4 months. More train travel info at https://www.eagleskiclub.org.uk/plan-your-trip/low-carbon-travel/train-travel-tips-and-hints – including the latest about axes on Eurostar.
Car. The Michelin route planner www.viamichelin.com suggests a drive time from London to Sta Maria of around 13-14 hours, a distance of 1150 km/740 miles and tolls of €36 one way, plus Swiss vignette 40 CHF (lasts a year). It also calculates fuel costs for your car, though not Euroshuttle. A motorway payment tag can be convenient – see www.bipgo.com
Carshare. Blablacar is a carsharing app, heavily used in continental Europe. You pay for a lift – www.blablacar.com. If driving, register to offer lifts and make money - €70 Lyon-Calais, for example.
Travelling from outside London? Apologies if this info all seems a bit London-centric but pretty much all rail and bus travel from the UK to the continent is via London, though when driving, the Hull-Zeebrugge or Newcastle Amsterdam ferries may be good (though still carbon intensive) alternatives to Euroshuttle. By train, it is possible to return as far north as Edinburgh in one day from some stations in the western Alps (Modane, for example; or from Zurich), though more difficult on the outward due to the time difference. See www.bahn.co.uk