Tour specific travel advice to cut carbon emissions – for your tour in Val Stura
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, net emissions from club tours (after offsetting) are about 280 tonnes/year. (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:
- 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;
- 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 nearest railway station to the start/end point of your tour, Cuneo, from London.
Train. Cuneo is 11-12 hours from London St Pancras via Paris and Turin. For train times see www.bahn.co.uk – just enter origin London, or your local GB station, and your final destination, pretty much anywhere in Europe.
Eurostar does not offer through tickets for this trip. You can buy a ticket to Paris on www.eurostar.com, and another onwards from Paris to Turin at the French railways page www.oui.sncf.com or the Italian page www.trenitalia.com (note that some trains are operated by French railways, and some by Italian, and it can be cheaper to book the Italian trains on the Italian page and vice versa). Booked well ahead Eurostar charge around £60 for a single from London to Paris and SNCF charge as little as €29 from Paris to Turin.
Eurostar and Trenitalia 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.
Bus. If you are committed, you can travel by bus from London to Turin in under 24 hours for around £60. You can look at times and prices at www.flixbus.co.uk
Car. The Michelin route planner www.viamichelin.com suggests a drive time from London to Stuben of 13-14 hours, a distance of 1200 km/750 miles and tolls of €173 one way. It also calculates fuel costs for your car, though not Euroshuttle.
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 Amsterdam-Newcastle or Hull-Zeebrugge ferry may alternatives to Euroshuttle (although ferries emit much carbon per km). By train, it is possible to return as far north as Edinburgh in one day from the western Alps (Moutiers or Zurich, for example), though more difficult on the outward due to the time difference.