Join Us In Rocky Mountain National Park

In celebration of the collective energy created by all the Moments shared on the Meet the Moment site, we are happy to announce CLIF Bar’s Day of Action on October 1st. As part of CLIF Bar’s Day of Action, the Center will be hosting a trail building day in Rocky Mountain National Park in Colorado.

We invite and encourage you, your family and your friends to come out and join our CLIF Bar’s Day of Action event. Enjoy a great day with other adventurers as we work to protect the places we play. Please email dean@LNT.org to register for our CLIF Bar’s Day of Action Event.

If you haven’t created a moment yet it’s not too late. Go to www.MeettheMoment.com. Remember when you upload your first photo, CLIF Bar donates $5 to the Leave No Trace Center for Outdoor Ethics.

Partnership Highlight: CLIF BAR GreenNotes

What is it?

From the makers of the natural and organic CLIF energy bar, CLIF BAR GreenNotes is a program that marries the power of music with a passion for the environment in the interest of protecting the places we play for our and future generations. Proceeds from their benefit album, titled “Protect the Places We Play”, go to relevant nonprofit organizations including Leave No Trace whose missions fulfill this goal.

What GreenNotes does for the community:

GreenNotes supports emerging musicians - passionate about the environment in their own right – who may not yet have the resources, expertise, or funds to integrate environmentally friendly touring practices. By helping artists reduce the environmental impact of their tours – and sharing their experience with audiences along the way - we hope music fans will be inspired to take action in their own lives and communities.

What GreenNotes does for the environment:

GreenNotes provides artists with the resources and the technical assistance required to integrate several eco-friendly touring practices. These include: fueling their buses with biodiesel, printing on recycled paper using soy-based ink, selling organic cotton t-shirts at shows, working to provide locally and organically grown foods backstage, and buying renewable wind energy credits to offset their remaining carbon dioxide emissions (CO2, a greenhouse gas, is the major cause of global warming).

How can you get more involved:

Take Action! Check out some simple steps you can take to reduce your own footprint and help protect the places where we all like to play.

While you’re at it, check out some free music! You can get two free tracks from the “Protect the Places We Play” album by visiting the GreenNotes site. Artists featured on the album include: Martin Sexton, Michael Franti, John Butler Trio, Brett Dennen and Missy Higgins. Proceeds from the sale of the entire album on iTunes go to benefit environmental nonprofits – including Leave No Trace!

How Green Is Your Grass?

We spent the better part of last week at The Telluride Bluegrass Festival. During the festival, we had the pleasure of running and judging How Green is your Grass? - a creative campsite challenge. This contest encourages Festivarians to raise the bar for sustainable camping by honoring campsites that excel in achieving the highest level of sustainability, cleanliness, and creativity during their stay at the festival. There were daily winners each of the four days that are now finalists for the grand prize. Daily winners enjoyed a prize package that included Chaco gear, Clif Bars, and New Belgium Beer. Stay tuned, the winer of the 2009 How Green is your Grass? competition will be announced on the next "Notes from the Planet" email.

In addition to the campsite challenge, the entire festival embraced sustainable living. For example, Eco Products donated compostable bags that were handed out by camp hosts at each of the campgrounds. The New Community Coalition (TNCC) coordinated stations called CRT (Compost, Recycle, Trash) and they were able to provide trained volunteers the entire four days at each station to direct waste to the proper receptacle. Also, Renewable Choice Energy was able to offset all of the travel the bands did to get there. Each year Planet Bluegrass continues to find new and exciting ways to challenge Festivarians to leave their concert space better than they found it. Hats off to everyone who participated in making this years festival a supreme success in sustainability!

Safe Travels...Kate and Tracy

Protect The Places We Play

Today, Leave No Trace learned that we were chosen as a recipient of proceeds from a benefit album called Protect The Places We Play. The album includes artists Martin Sexton, the John Butler Trio, Michael Franti, Brett Dennen, Missy Higgins, Gomez, Mason Jennings and more. The Places We Play is available today on iTunes.

The skinny on ClIF GreenNotes
CLIF GreenNotes, from the makers of the natural and organic CLIF energy bar, is a program that marries the power of music with a passion for the environment; in the interest of protecting the places we play, for our and future generations.

GreenNotes supports emerging musicians - passionate about the environment in their own right – who may not yet have the resources, expertise, or funds to integrate environmentally friendly touring practices. By helping artists reduce the environmental impact of their tours – and sharing their experience with audiences along the way - we hope music fans will be inspired to take action in their own lives and communities.

GreenNotes provides artists with the resources and the technical assistance required to integrate several eco-friendly touring practices. These include: fueling their buses with biodiesel, printing on recycled paper using soy-based ink, selling organic cotton t-shirts at shows, working to provide locally and organically grown foods backstage, and buying renewable wind energy credits to offset their remaining carbon dioxide emissions (carbon dioxide (CO2)—a greenhouse gas—is the major cause of global warming).

GreenNotes artists appearing on this first ever Protect The Places We Play benefit album include: Martin Sexton, the John Butler Trio, Michael Franti, Brett Dennen, Missy Higgins, Gomez, Mason Jennings and more. Talk about an all star group!

Beyond Mother Earth herself, 100% of the proceeds from the sale of this album go towards organizations that are actively working to protect those natural playgrounds in our backyards, and across our country. Every album purchased will support Leave No Trace, Sierra Club, Surfrider Foundation, and the National Environmental Education Foundation.

So, check out some great tunes, support a great compilation of emerging musicians, and do your part on behalf of the environment all at the same time. Together, and only together, can we bring the change required to protect our planet, and the many places we love to play.

To learn more about the artists, organizations and CLIF GreenNotes check out <http://www.CLIFGreenNotes.com>

On Your Behalf

As if CLIF Bar, longtime Leave No Trace partner that is also infamous for great bars with a taste for social and environmental justice, weren’t generous enough.

Beyond their partnership of Leave No Trace and underwriting the carbon offsets for the Subaru/Leave No Trace Traveling Trainers, the CLIF Bar Family Foundation has just established a new program called “On Your Behalf”. The program benefits the Leave No Trace Center for Outdoor Ethics as well as a selection of grassroots organizations. Here’s what they say about it:

“On Your Behalf grew out of the CLIF Bar Family Foundation's mission to increase exposure and provide essential funding for grassroots groups that we know and respect. The program reflects what we've learned over the years—while our friends love it when we make contributions in their names, they love it even more when they're able to choose a project that resonates deeply with their individual concerns.

On Your Behalf is a gift card program that allows gift card recipients to choose, from a group of 23 grassroots organizations, which nonprofit group(s) they would like to support. These organizations focus on a wide array of social concerns including environmental restoration and conservation, sustainable food systems and agriculture, youth programs, and public health. These groups have won our respect year after year by expanding our understanding of what a few people with innovative ideas, a lot of spirit, and a little help can accomplish.”

Find out more about the program at: http://clifbarfamilyfoundation.org