Greta Thunberg wraps up 15-day carbon-free voyage to New York City

Teen climate sensation Greta Thunberg has made it to New York City after her 15-day voyage by yacht from Plymouth, England.

After disembarking to a cheering crowd in lower Manhattan, Thunberg opened a press conference saying, “Well all of this is overwhelming.”

“The trip was surprisingly good. I did not feel sea sick once,” Thunberg said.

Thunberg made the trip across the Atlantic to attend a United Nations climate summit taking place in September — and she did it without leaving a carbon footprint. She traveled aboard the Malizia II, which has its own solar panels and hydro-generators to power the yacht. (Her journey did spark some criticism for the emissions associated with it because others will fly to New York to bring the yacht back to Europe, although those flights will reportedly be offset.)

Sixteen-year-old Thunberg has incited students across the globe to strike for the climate. She started skipping school to protest climate inaction outside Swedish Parliament in August 2018. Since then, tens of thousands of young people have joined in on the movement, walking out of class on coordinated “Fridays for the Future.”

Thunberg has become a leading figure among young activists concerned that they will bear the brunt of the climate crisis created by generations before them. Realizing the future ahead of her, Thunberg told the crowd gathered in Manhattan that she became depressed at 11 years old. “I got out of that depression by promising that I’m going to do everything I can to change things. I started going to marches and demonstrations,” Thunberg said.

Thunberg said that she will miss the “peace and quiet” she had sailing across the Atlantic, but is looking forward to being dry, and eating food that isn’t freeze-dried after two weeks at sea. She has another journey ahead of her later this year: traveling to Santiago, Chile by bus, train, and boat for another United Nations climate conference in December.

In the meantime, she’ll be gearing up for the UN summit in New York in September. She told the gathered crowd that she planned to “make sure that world leaders have all eyes on them during this conference — so they cannot continue to ignore this.”