Geotourism

-- Random Penasco photo! -- Two easy rules to beach peace - no fireworks, and no ATVs

Geotourism is one of those widely used, hard-to-pin-down phrases that often gets tossed in with other similar terms like 'sustainability' and 'eco-friendly' when people start describing the concept.

Wikipedia.org defines geotourism as:

...the study of travel and tourism as an industry, as a human activity, and especially as a place-based experience. From a geographical point of view, tourism consists of the places of tourist origin (or tourist generating areas), tourist destinations (or places of tourism supply), and the relationship (connections) between origin and destination places, which includes transportation routes, business relationships, and traveler motivations.

Personally, I think I've always tied the concept into a broader sense of appreciating your surroundings - i.e. making sure that your visit helps keep it the place worth visiting again.

Geotourism and Puerto Penasco

I've said it before and I'll say it again: Puerto Penasco sits in the middle of some of the most interesting lands in the world. Draw a 200-mile circle around Puerto Penasco on the map and you're looking at some of the most diverse and interesting regions and climates that encompasses, just to name a few:

The lush, plentiful, and protected Sea Of Cortez

Pinacate Crator and barren desert lands,

Sacred tribal and indian lands

The 'sky islands' of the Southwest

Fishing zones, estuaries, oyster beds

Vibrant farmland and wine country

Puerto Penasco's on it's way up on a number of fronts, and along with this rise in tourism, popularity, and growth, there has been increasing attention and efforts on both sides of the border to develop and promote geotourism and throughout the area, with the hopes of promoting and preserving all of these gems I've mentioned above.

There's a lot happening on a number of geotourism-related fronts, so we're started this page to highlight them here. If you have questions or comments, please send them my way.

Geotourism Links of note:

CEDO, the longest standing, most well-respected name in geo- and eco-anything in Puerto Penasco

http://www.sonorandesertgeotourism.org - home of the GeoTourism Mapguide

National Geographic's GeoTourism Mapguide for the Arizona-Sonora Region

azmc.org - The Arizona-Mexico Commission has been working on the policy front with some eco- and geo-tourism friendly initiatives.

La Ruta De Sonora - La Ruta de Sonora Ecotourism Association gives some pretty incredible looking eco-based tours of the region.

sonoran.org - 'promotes community decisions that respects the land and people of the west'.

Planeta.com's 'Exploring Puerto Penasco'. (See also Sonora)

skyislandalliance.org - dedicated to the preservation and restoration of native biological diversity in the sky islands of the southwestern United States and northwestern Mexico.

PANGAS.arizona.edu, an interdisciplinary, integrative project for ecosystem-based research and management of coastal fisheries.

   Johnathan Is Alive Today Because Of His Mother's Kidney

---

( Find an error on this page? Have a comment? Want something added here? Drop us an email! )