7 Ways to Enjoy Sustainable Travel on Amelia Island, Florida *

There are plenty of ways to enjoy sustainable travel on Amelia Island! With such an abundance of natural beauty, the community strives to follow sustainable practices to protect our beloved beaches and wildlife. The Amelia Island Convention & Visitors Bureau (CVB) was recently recognized as a Leader in Sustainable Tourism. It was acknowledged for its collaborative efforts that aim “to protect the island’s pristine beaches, sea turtles and other wildlife through community education, awareness efforts, and legislation.” Here are some of our favorite ways to embrace a sustainable lifestyle while vacationing on Amelia Island.

Check Out Our Locally Sourced Produce

We love shopping at the Fernandina Beach Market Place for locally sourced fruits and vegetables. Every Saturday, we head to the farmers market to stock up on the seasonal ingredients we need to create our wholesome, made-from-scratch breakfasts we prepare fresh daily for our guests. We encourage our inn visitors to peruse the weekly farmers market themselves. Besides selling fresh produce, a variety of vendors sell freshly baked breads and pastries (a sweet treat now!) and jams, sauces, honey, and plants (great local souvenirs to take home).

Spend Time Relaxing in Our Courtyard

Our lush gardens in the courtyard and landscaping in the front of the property remind guests of Amelia Island’s beautiful native plants and flowers. We work hard to preserve the natural landscape in our little corner of Amelia Island, providing our guests and our neighbors with a lovely visual treat.

Philip Standifer, landscape architect and owner of Rockstar Gardens, strives to stick to an organic or as simple and clean as possible nutrition process. For nitrogen, we use quick release blood meal and Milorganite for slow-release nitrogen to stimulate overall strong green foliar growth. Magnesium sulfate (Epsom salts) is added regularly during the warmer months to ensure healthy root and tissue growth. Magnesium sulfate strengthens the cell wall of plants allowing nutrition to enter and promote overall vigor and growth. Our soil amendment where needed is Mushroom Compost, a Vegan soil conditioner for binding sandy soil and added nutrition. Our weed killer is a Pure-Gro product called Weed Crush, an organic essential oil liquid spray. Insect and disease are limited in our healthy, vigorous landscape; however, when apparent, they are removed or treated with natural essential oils in Young Living’s Thieves Household Cleaner.

The plants are a mix of locally successful subtropical plants that can be utilized for botanical art displays in rooms or vases in the common areas. We have planted lemongrass along the sidewalk in front of the inn. It has mild insect repellent qualities, is aromatic, and can be used for teas and recipes or ground for an organic addition for a calming therapeutic bath. All of our decisions are carefully considered for the environmental impact, especially runoff into our freshwater, as well as the effect on local wildlife, including shrimp and oysters harvested locally.

Spend the Afternoon Biking Around Town

This is our favorite way to embrace sustainable travel on Amelia Island! One of the wonderful things about our area is how easy it is to get around! Not only can you walk to almost anywhere you might want to go, but hopping on a bike is also a fun way to explore Fernandina. Lucky for you, our inn provides complimentary bikes that you are free to use for a relaxing bike ride through the historic district, to the beach, and wherever else your heart desires!

Donate Gently-Used Goods to Charities

You can rest assured that the items you use at our inn won’t go to waste. We try to find a good home for some of the inn’s gently used items by partnering with a few local charities in Fernandina Beach. For example, we donate household goods to Second Chance Resale, which benefits the Nassau County Humane Society. We also give gently used sheets and towels to Purple Dove Resale Center to help Micah’s Place, our local domestic violence survivor shelter.

Additionally, when we replace our old appliances with more energy-efficient ones, we donate the old to Nassau Habitat for Humanity. Ditto for when we upgrade our fixtures! Besides keeping materials out of the landfill, we support the excellent work of our community organizations. No matter where you travel across the world, it never hurts to search for lodging that shows a little extra love to the planet and the local community!

Reduce Single-Use Paper and Plastics

We take small steps, too, as every little eco-friendly practice makes a difference. We serve coffee in our inn’s beautiful ceramic coffee mugs rather than cardboard to-go cups. We don’t use plastic straws at the inn and instead serve our social hour beverages in elegant glassware. We also use cloth napkins instead of paper, which provide both an aesthetic appeal and an eco-friendly benefit. Later this spring, we’ll replace the plastic water bottles we put in guest rooms with more eco-friendly insulated water bottles. This will enable our guests to avoid single-use plastics while they explore the island. Instead of throwing away a one-and-done plastic bottle, guests can grab their insulated water bottles and refill them throughout their stay to keep hydrated. These efforts will reduce the waste that gets sent to the landfill and help maintain our coastal environment and marine life.

Install energy-efficient lighting

We’ve left the traditional, energy-draining incandescent bulbs behind and switch to the more energy-efficient LED bulbs. This will allow you to vacation with ease, knowing that we have already taken steps to reduce our carbon footprints.

We Encourage Recycling

As you walk throughout our bed and breakfast, you’ll notice that we place recycle bins in all the guest rooms, laundry room, dining room, and kitchen. This encourages and our guests to recycle the paper, plastic, aluminum, cardboard, and glass items used at the inn. With hundreds of guests staying at The Addison every year, the amount of materials we regularly recycle genuinely makes a difference!

Commit to Green Lodging Practices

Here at The Addison on Amelia Island, we proudly join with the community’s efforts to minimize our negative impact on the environment. In fact, our “going green” initiative is evident throughout our property as we incorporate eco-friendly solutions. We strive to balance the needs of our guests with the wellbeing of our environment. We aim to deliver exceptional comfort to our guests as we incorporate newer products and eco-friendly “green lodging” practices that ensure the health and safety of our guests. Our commitment to be an environmentally friendly bed and breakfast means that we can help preserve the natural beauty of Amelia Island for future generations.

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