What we do

After running Camino Art Hostel for a few years now, we realized that we don’t need to save the whole world. It is enough to make a little change at once, and the best way is education and showing a good example.

Here is what we do to make a better world.

Selective Garbage

We separate plastic, metal, paper and glass garbage. If we pay a good attention on the selection we have very small amount of regular waste left. Starting from 15th January 2019, we have a special program: we are not collecting the trash from the guests. They need to take care of their own garbage and take it away when they check out. The purpose of this program is to raise awareness of the trash situation in general.

We don’t use garbage bags. We prefer to carry the garbage to the large containers in a separate bag that we clean time to time. The bins are also cleaned often.

Compost

We separate raw leftover or not usable food to make our own compost in the garden.

Shopping/NON-shopping

We offer bags/re-usable plastic bags for our guests to do their shopping. We keep these bags to use them again and again. We try not to buy trash: avoid those items in the store that end up in the containers just after you arrive home from shopping.

Recycling

We recycle almost everything we find thrown out by the garbage containers: old furniture, wood, glass bottles, boxes, palettes, etc. We use these materials to make seating or fun areas on the land, or turn them into an art piece.

Natural soap

We use chemical free soap for laundry. Since we use the washing machine a lot, it is important to avoid chemicals and artificial materials.

Cleaning liquid

We use vinegar, sodium bicarbonate and lemon to clean the kitchen and the bathrooms. The lemon usually comes from our own land.

Beach Cleaning

Time to time we organize beach cleaning on the island. It is not only cleaning up, it is also having fun together and playing, swimming and enjoying.

Drinking water

We use the traditional water filter made of lime stone. This is a very practical and natural way of cleaning the water. Please fill up your water bottle from our filtered water deposit. If you don’t have a water bottle please ask for one!

Your little trashy things –aka– meet your wake up call

We really try our best to make you happy. We serve you. We cheer you up. We put you into bed. We clean after you (and before you). We listen to you. We do love you and … we collect your trash.

Days after days we collect your trash, we separate them, we put them in a bag to carry them to the containers. We do all these with our hands.

trash
Plastic trash

Since October 2018 we don’t use garbage bags at Camino Art Hostel. It is just nonsense to buy plastic bags, to throw them out – at least 5 of them daily. Instead, we collect the garbage in little containers and carry them to the selective bin containers in a large shopping bag that we clean afterwards. But wait a minute. What does this whole thing mean? It means that we, the staff of Camino Art Hostel are conscious of the garbage issue. But we kindly invite you too to be part of the conscious trash culture.

Starting from 15th of January we are NOT COLLECTING your trash!

When you check into Camino Art Hostel you will receive a decomposing plastic bag with your name. This will be your personal trash storage. We kindly ask you to collect all your trash in your personal bag and take it with you when you check out.

You won’t find garbage bins at the hostel (except the one in the bathroom for the toilet paper and other small things) neither ashtrays.

No, we don’t do this to upset you. We would just like to raise awareness on the topic. We truly hope you will pay more attention to the trash situation in the hostel, and maybe later in your daily life.

The trash situation is fatal on the planet. We need to make definite steps, and we need radical change. WE MUST STOP PRODUCING TRASH! We need to learn how to exist without SPENDING MONEY ON TRASH! This is the first step. When we have learned this, we can start the cleaning up.

What can you do?

– you can leave your trash in the hostel anyway – we understand that you might get upset because we deprived you of the comfort of collecting your personal garbage. It is ok. We WILL CLEAN AFTER YOU
– you can collect your garbage in the bag provided and put all of it in the general waste container just in front of our building (the green container by the bus stop)
– you can collect your garbage, take it with you, and put them separately into the selective garbage containers on your way to your next location

This project will find people who highly disagree with the idea of collecting personal trash. But we truly hope that there will be more, who will understand the main purpose of the idea and will actually take it as an experiment: how much garbage they produce in a few days.

We will keep collecting the compost which will be a big help for you (just for the record: we produce about 20 litres of compost, about 5 litres of general waste, 20 litres of glasses and papers, and about 40 litres of plastic and metal garbage A DAY in our little 22-bed hostel. when we are more or less 70% full.

We are looking forward to sharing this unique experience with you, and we hope to see you co-operate and use this experiment for your moral growth.