Traveling without consuming animal products sounds like it could be a challenge, but in fact exploring the world can be easy and much more fun as a vegan. What? Are you crazy?

Traveling as a vegan gives us a reason to discover new places, experience new things, and meet kind and compassionate people. All over the world, we can find a wide variety of cuisines, accommodations, events, and entertainment to indulge in. When we travel just to sight-see, we sometimes feel like just observers and not participants. But if we have a mission in mind our expeditions become more like scavenger hunts where we have interesting reasons to visit and discover unique things.

There are many vegan restaurant finders online and smartphone apps to help find food fun and simple and to support vegan restaurants. Seeking and eating international foods made from cruelty-free ingredients is the most ethical way to experience local cuisine, may lead us to other like-minded travelers, and makes it easy to open conversations with locals. It often creates an opportunity to educate others about kindness to animals, especially in areas of the world where vegan values haven't yet taken root. For example, if there aren't any vegan restaurant around, it's usually simple to order from the menu and ask for the item without any animal products. Fortunately, staples like fruit, vegetables, rice, and beans are typically available anywhere between the four corners of the earth, so the chances of going hungry as a vegan nomad are slim to none. Just remember, sometimes, the restaurant may cook with lard, or butter, ghee or other animal ingredients, just ask and converse with the owner, manager or chef to see what they use.

There are a growing number of hotels, resorts, retreats, and even cruises around the world offering all-vegan experiences where you can enjoy your travels with other like-minded and compassionate people. You can also connect with other vegans via social media, join vegan Meetups wherever your destination is, and seek out vegan events.

Some of the top world cities are known to be vegan-friendly with restaurants and other accommodations. These include Berlin, Chicago, Detroit, Las Vegas, London, Los Angeles, Miami, Nashville, New York City, Portland, San Diego, San Francisco Bay Area, Seattle, Singapore, Taipei, Tel Aviv, Toronto, and Warsaw. Why not make one of those a future destination and search for vegan events, friends, and food?

There are lots of sneaky ninja tricks we can use to travel like pros as a vegan. By bringing our own snacks and condiments, we can always ensure we have a little stash in case we ever end up on an abandoned food desert island. Fruit is one of the best backups to carry, as they are usually fairly durable, inexpensive, and available all over the world. It can also be helpful to learn about the local cuisine, ingredients, and common food-related phrases in the local language. Packing vegan personal care items like toothpaste, lotions, deodorants, shampoos, or fragrances (if you use those things, vegans don't need much) can also go a long way. It can be helpful to follow vegan travel blogs to gain insight on vegan related travel information and to hear personal experiences from others who are enjoying their adventures as ethical wanderers.

A few websites can make traveling more interesting and unique as a vegan. For example, Airbnb allows people to host guests in their homes (with options for our own private space) where a kitchen is often available to prepare our own version of the local specialties. CouchSurfing is a site where hosts offer parts of their home for people to stay for free, and WorkAway is home to international opportunities to trade a few hours of volunteer work for room and board. These are more personalized ways to travel open up opportunities to connect with local people and get involved on a completely different level. By using the search term "vegan," you can narrow your search to accommodations with people you know will hold peaceful values of kindness and compassion who can introduce you to the ethical ways of living in their particular part of the world.

When we seek a noble path, our journeys can become beautiful and bountiful with mouth-watering fruits, vegetables, and other plant foods. We are naturally drawn to energetic and caring people to enrich our experiences, introduce us to other vegans and vegan opportunities, and who we can instantly connect with, and better trust as their baseline set of values involves peace, respect, and love.

Visit the forum and the Vegan Directory for traveling connections. Safe travels and don't forget there's no excuse for animal abuse!