“There are some who have crossed deserts, floated on ice caps, and cut their way through jungles but whose souls we would search in vain for evidence of what they have witnessed.” — Alain de Botton.

Aunty Kehau’s dark eyes lit up as she ushered my 10-year old son Nikko and I through the chain-linked enclosure. She threw back her long salt and pepper hair, pulled Nikko close, thanking him for volunteering at O’ahu’s Loko ia Pa’aiau, one of Pearl Harbor’s ancient royal fishponds. Nikko slipped his small fingers into mine and whispered, “What are we doing here? I want to swim. It’s so hot.”

This was our first time meeting Aunty Kehau, a middle-aged Native Hawaiian with a warm smile, who explained that she hopes to bring this ancient fishpond back to its former glory. She thanked us for volunteering to help her. A textbook example of a doer, Aunty Kehau saw a problem and set out to fix it. 500 years ago, Pearl Harbor housed 22 active fishponds, which is basically the equivalent of an ancient Hawaiian fish monger. Today, only three are still active on Oahu’s southwest shore. This one, Loko ia Pa’aiau, is missing half a wall and isn’t yet functional. But she’d rallied the community, the military and visitors like us to help.

Nikko and I had journeyed to Hawaii on a reporting trip for the San Francisco Chronicle. My aim was to see if I could create a truly regenerative trip to the islands in the only US state (and really the only massive tourism market in the world) adopting regenerative travel as the standard for tourism.

The tourism industry (which makes up 10% of the global economy and offers jobs to over 10% of the planet’s humans) is beginning to reckon with their role in our climate crisis and has been flirting with changing their impact. So far, it’s been baby steps like labeling themselves green if they don’t change your linens every day, calling their hotel sustainable if they have EV chargers and source microgreens from a local farm.

Regenerative travel is the next rung. Where sustainable travel inspires us to leave a place like it was when we arrived (not forcing us to truly face the impact of our flight, drive, water use, landfill additions), regenerative travel says that travelers can be a force for good, if we allow the local community tell us how to have a positive impact. In this way, our aim as visitors is to leave the destination better for our visit.

That’s why I dragged my tween out of the ocean to help restore a fishpond that might never directly impact our lives.

I’ve been a travel journalist since 2006. I’ve watched the impact of my words change a place, and not always for the better. But I’m a mom, a climate activist, and someone who has been inspired by our planet. I can’t keep expecting the Earth to sustain my footprint without doing something.

This summer, many of us are reckoning with how we travel (flights are both expensive and put us at an environmental deficit for any journey). What if we traveled not just for us, but also for the benefit of the places we visit? How would that change not just where we visited, but how?

Regenerative travel in Hawaii

Throughout my years of reporting on the Aloha State’s evolution from a traditional extractive tourism model to a regenerative one, I’d met many Hawaiians like Aunty Kehau. People reconstructing fishponds to feed elders, educating young people, and salvaging lost arts like hula chants and regenerative agriculture.

Like most Hawaiian kids, Aunty Kehau grew up fishing on these kiawe-shaded shores. In the name of progress, this once abundant shoreline fell into decay. Almost a decade earlier, while walking along the shoreline of McGrew Point (a military housing subdivision), she recalled the ancient Hawaiian creation chant, Kumulipo which began with a tiny coral polyp that nourished the honu (turtles) floating in the turquoise water, the coastal ironwood and ulu trees, the ti plants protecting each house, the forest hala shrubs, the nene birds, the wild boars, us. As the silty sea spread before her, her purpose became clear. She’d help regenerate a land in need of tending.

Once all the volunteers had gathered in a circle, Aunty Kehau winked at Nikko shifting in his water shoes and said, “We always ask permission to enter the space.” She motioned to Robert, a Hawaiian studying at UC Davis, to lead the welcome chant. Robert spread his broad shoulders as his deep voice lifted to the kiawe tree. His chant rumbled toward the sun sparkling over the pond, the egret stalking the mangrove mudflats, the lehua blossoms lining the walkway, the palm-thatched hale in the distance.

At the lava rock ahu (shrine), Robert added a lei to the fruit and bread offerings before crossing onto the fishpond’s trail. Nikko whispered something about needing more donuts. And before I could answer, Robert threw a pair of gloves at my kid and said: “There’s a lot of work to do. Today we’re going to remove the invasive pickleweed.” A weed that sells at Whole Foods for eight bucks a pound. Robert jumped into the muck and yanked on a dark green stalk. Mud suctioned his plastic work-boots as he explained how to extract not just the weed, but also the root. I glanced at Nikko, now bouncing on his toes, sure I was about to have to extract myself from this work to tend to a bored child, but he jumped into the mud, grabbed a weed and with too-big gloves, pulled out an intact root. “I did it,” he hollered.

After a free lunch and a brief demonstration of the ancient art of making tapa cloth by a local legend, even though I said we could go jump in the sea and cool off, my kid still didn’t want to leave. Aunty Kehau explained it best, saying that people want to feel like we’re doing good.

When we travel, we rarely see the impacts, positive and negative of our journeys. What happens when we deliberately chart a course to offer our best selves to the places we visit? What if we strive to ensure that our grandkids will also have access to the best versions of these fragile places?

How to build a regenerative trip

In many cases, a regenerative vacation is expensive. In Hawaii, the two carbon negative hotels Alohilani and Westin Hapuna Beach) are both out of my price range unless one of my magazine clients is paying the bill. In fact, I spent more than I made reporting the piece just to pay to physically plant trees in Hawai’i to (hopefully) offset the long term impact of my overseas flight — I know offsets are a complicated issue, one I will touch on in another piece. Restaurants that serve locally grown produce are almost always more expensive than places that import their meat and veggies from who knows where.

But when I think of the true cost of my ease and my cheap stay, I am wondering if paying more up front (when and if I can afford it) might be one place to start.

You might start your journey to create a regenerative trip by finding a hotel or B&B that aligns with some of your sustainability goals. Step two might be finding a locally-owned and operated by the indigenous community accommodation. If you’re low on funds, you might camp, or stay with a local family, or simply choose not to stay at a vacation rental, because this is one of the biggest reasons that communities are experience a housing crisis, especially in Hawai’i. Supporting locally-owned businesses whenever possible is a really important foundation too.

Quite possibly the singular most impactful part of any regenerative journey is the element of service. Not the missionary version of service where we tell locals how to do something better. But where the local community shows us how to serve them. One example is the Aloha State’s Mālama Hawai’i program where you earn rewards for volunteering, planting trees, aiding conservation efforts in the community.

You might not want to get your hands dirty while on vacation, and that’s ok too. But think about it like this: When we go to someone’s house for dinner, we don’t show up empty-handed. Maybe you understand social media, or write stories on Medium, or you have a Substack newsletter, why not help a local business by spending a couple hours helping their Instagram or writing a piece about their work?

For us to truly help our planet — and our species — thrive in the future, we need all hands on deck. Travel shapes us. It opens our eyes to new ways of existing. And right now, Hawaii is paving a way forward to understand that we can use travel for good, if we are mindful, humble, and offer ourselves in ways we might never have in the past.

But right now Hawai’i is also deluged with travelers. This piece is not waving a flag to say book your Maui vacay right now. What if instead, you booked in the off season to support locals when crowds thin?

Regenerative trips can also be relaxing, but what if they turn out to be more? What if they are regenerative for your mental health? Your future? Your understanding of how to be of service to the planet right now?

Nikko still talks about the fishpond, asking at least once a month when we can go back and help out. Instead of feeling guilty and shaming others, what if we use models like Hawaii to start building our communities at home into our own regenerative tourism destinations? Or into sustainability hubs? Or into places that place on equal footing the sanctity of the land, the people and the future?

Michele Bigley is an award-winning writer with bylines in the New York Times, Afar, Outside, Hidden Compass, Los Angeles Times and many more. She is writing a book about how taking her sons to meet people stewarding fragile ecosystems taught them how to nurture their community. Subscribe to her monthly newsletter Our Feet on the Ground here. Or sign up on Medium to follow her adventures.