Athens glimpses of home: Going green: Local family transforms vacations into opportunity

"Who will raise up the new generation of conservationists?" This is a question often posed by The Sierra Club, America's oldest environmental organization.

Athens residents Jeff and Sherri Wilson have strived to answer this question by modeling an eco-friendly lifestyle for their two daughters to emulate. Last summer's Sierra Club article about the certain death of family summer vacations gave the Wilsons further motivation: to better their annual tradition for the sake of the earth.

Typically, as winter's chill descends, Jeff and Sherri Wilson, along with daughters Winter and Sylvie, start planning more extensively for their annual summer-long vacation.

"My family lives on the West Coast, so this is time for the kids to reunite with family - that is the only time I see them," says Sherri. "Our professions both have flexible schedules. If we work really hard in the winter, we can have that time in the summer."

The last leaves may now be falling, but summer is still very much on their minds. Not only are they starting to plan for next summer's trip; they are revisiting and editing videos, journals, blogs and tidying the mileage log from last summer's trip.

"This was a trip we were going to take anyway, but we just like the idea of being able to change what we did and then tell that story," says Jeff. "It really was an experiment to see if it was possible."

That idea proved possible.

"Green Family Summer," the title of their story, turned out to be more than just a vacation and desire to educate their children and the public; it turned into a job.

Two months before departure, it wasn't just the skyrocketing gas prices or the uncertain future of the economy that made the Wilsons re-evaluate their goals - it was also their inevitable carbon footprint and their impact on the environment. Though the experience of travel was important, they agreed certain aspects needed to be changed.

Wanting to increase their gas mileage in an eco-friendly way, they sought ways to replace their old, heavy camper and full-size, gas-powered truck. "Six or seven weeks before we left," says Jeff, "I had an idea that it sounded like a good story. We thought there must be solutions, so we embarked on this experiment."

He researched automakers, carbon offsets and alternative energies. No stranger to telling newsworthy stories, Jeff used his contacts and knowledge as a host on HGTV, Do-It-Yourself networks and as spokesman for Thompson's Water Seal. Jeff explained the couple's goals to a few select companies and received immediate positive response. The deal? Exchange of product for a feature in their story - told through a Web site, blog, video clips, and interviews in magazines and on various local TV news stations.  

"We didn't sign any written contracts and there were no verbal contracts with any of the companies that we dealt with," says Jeff. "This is our story, and what we offered was the chance to be involved."

The new digs: Columbia Northwest provided a lightweight, low-profile Aliner Ease camper; Chevrolet loaned a 2008 Tahoe Hybrid (for the trip only); Talco Electronics offered solar panels and a wind generator; Garmin donated a GPS; Mountainsmith and GSI-Outdoors gave recycled-material outdoor gear backpacks; the Better World Club provided passes to the national parks; and Terrapass eased their minds with third-party audited carbon offsets - balancing the carbon they produced by funding clean energy and efficiency projects. Looking at the map, they decided to also visit nature preserves along the way, giving press to the Nature Conservancy's environmental agenda.

Ten weeks of "Green Family Summer" would become an invaluable experiment in family bonding and education, with a valuable environmental message. The nearly 13,000 visits on their Web site (greenfamilysummer.com) suggests everyone's investment was worth it.

"Everybody has been very positive; they are glad they invested in the project," says Jeff. "We worked really hard and will continue to work at it. We wanted them to feel like the amount of work exchanged for the product they gave was at least equal or better."

Gas mileage was increased from 11 miles per gallon to 19. Cameras and laptop were kept charged through solar and wind power. They met and spoke with countless people, taking less-traveled roads and visiting local farmers markets and small-town diners to teach the girls about every part of their country. "The best source for local information are locals," says Sherri, smiling.

Visiting three Nature Conservancy sites (Flint Hills Tallgrass Prairie Preserve in Kansas, Ball Creek Ranch Preserve in the Kootenai Valley in Idaho, and Yellow Island on the San Juan Islands in Washington) taught them to slow down and study landscape details displayed by knowledgeable and passionate employees.

The girls also took part in the Junior Rangers program, designed to teach kids to search and learn in the national parks and earn badges of achievement. "They take a pledge at the very end to preserve the land and protect the park," says Sherri. "Often they will have to collect litter, or report graffiti, and they learn lots."

The Wilsons believe this and other trips they have taken discourage provincialism and encourage tolerance. Jeff insists, "Teaching kids a wider view of the world, exposing kids to nature, getting along with other people, why places are unique - traveling anywhere is important for anybody."

Adds Sherri, "It's a special time with the kids that I wouldn't trade for any amount of money in the world."

Leaving their snug 1,000-square-foot home for the small space within a camper, conflicts naturally arise, but it is considered part of the work to get along. "We all have a job to do," says Sherri. "If conflicts do arise, we have to resolve our conflicts to make things work." They wash their clothes (without soap) in the stream and hang them up to dry, and go many days without showers, often taking a dip in the creek. Sherri says that living this way, upon every homecoming, their small house looks huge, and she purges through their possessions.

The Wilsons by nature have strived to live "green" in every aspect of their life since before they were married. They quit corporate jobs to travel and explore nature at its best. Self-described "Walden"-ites, now, with kids, their outlook hasn't changed.

"We realized that this is a great road map for how to lead your life," says Jeff. "If you want ‘stuff' you can have it, but it comes with a cost." He adds, "We have tried to keep our consumption way down. We have worked out our lives very carefully - any purchase we make, we look not at the sticker price, but what it will cost us in the long run."

This attitude is exemplified by their purchasing of 10 acres of farmland through the Conservation Reserve Program. "You take acreage out of production of crops, plant trees, and manage the trees until they grow up," Jeff says. "It's an investment of our money and time, but it's also something that we can see improve over time."

Adds Sherri, "We work on taking out invasive species. We spend a lot of weekends out there just tromping through."

Until the city of Athens started accepting green glass for recycling, this "waste" spurred Sherri's idea for reclamation wine-bottle art - tumblers, vases, tables and light fixtures are constructed from trash into something lasting. Collecting bottles from neighbors and area restaurants, she saves hundreds of bottles from the trash each week. Her works are currently on display at the Athens Public Library on Home Street in Athens, or can be viewed on her Web site at bluemoonbottles.com.   

Though the Wilsons love travel, they adore Athens. "A huge part of why we live here is because our daily living is so simplified," says Sherri.

Coming from the West Coast, they find the pace is refreshing. "You don't have to get in your car to drive, so the problem of health care is reduced," says Jeff. "You are out walking in the open air, getting some exercise."

Out on the road, they saw the "vanillification" of America, Jeff calls it. He says, "Everything is the same." But this summer in particular, more people were driving slower, and there were less "big rigs." In fact, rangers in parks were frustrated with the amount of violations of basic park rules and an increase in campers who had purchased tents but didn't know proper set-up - all in the name of saving money in a troubled economy.

The Wilsons are pleased with the way the story turned out. "I imagine people will say, ‘Who can afford a new Tahoe and a new camper?'" says Jeff. "That is expensive, but long-term costs, if we could make a big change, it would be getting people out of the gas and into the hybrids."

"One thing I wish Americans would agree to," says Jeff, "is that our issues with the economy, energy, climate and health care, they are all tied together and they require us to sacrifice something. I think of America as the people that when an issue arises, you roll up your sleeves and get the job done."

Jeff says our patriotic duty and security of the world is based on a few simple solutions. "For the future of the country - look for solutions that are greener, but will help to stimulate parts of the economy that are important, like green and renewable technologies."