green routes destination

Whiteley Creek Bed and Breakfast has completed a rigorous in-depth application process and has been approved to be a Green Routes destination! Green Routes maps tourist sites to make it easy for you to plan a getaway to destinations that aren't your typical "tourist traps". Instead, they guide you to businesses that give you insight into a community and its people who live there. In the August 2007 issue of Midwest Living, the editor profoundly stated, "To know a community is to know its pie." Dick and I can so relate to that because, as we criss-cross the country, we are in continual search for the tastiest pie. In order to sniff it out, we must get off the interstate and detour onto the backroads where we can ask the locals, especially the guys who hang each morning with their coffee buddies. The very best way one can get to know a community is to talk to the people who live there. That's what Green Routes is all about. It's searching out businesses hidden from the strip of chain restaurants and mega stores. Green Routes has paved the road... or, more accurately, unpaved and added gravel to the road leading to a more authentic destination.

How are Green Routes destinations selected? Green Routes businesses are selected by regional advisory groups made up of business owners, community leaders, and community-based organizations. Each advisory group reviews applications and decides which to include based upon how each business meets the following criteria:

1)       Contributes to the local economy by employing local residents, using local products and growers, and supporting local businesses.

2)       Conserves and/or enhances our natural resource base (e.g. through use of renewable energy, recycling, green building techniques, wildlife habitat protection)

3)       Uses sustainably produced or organically grown products.

4)       Engages customers and visitors through active, personal, and meaningful participation in nature, people, places, history, and/or cultures.

Tread Lightly, written by Rachel Hutton in the February 2007 issue of Minnesota Monthly Magazine, is an insightful article providing an overview of the Renewing the Countryside/Green Routes initiative founded by husband and wife duo Jan Joannides and Brett Olson.