You won't see America the same way after this travel experience

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Travelers don’t have to go far to experience a completely different culture.

“There are 574 (federally recognized) tribes across the nation and our Native Hawaiians, all unique and diverse in their own right,” said Sherry Rupert, CEO of the nonprofit American Indian Alaska Native Tourism Association (AIANTA), which partners with tribes and Indigenous-led tourism businesses around the country.

“We're connected to the land,” said Rupert, who is Paiute and Washoe. “And I think when people come to Indian country, they get a feeling of that because we have tribal tour guides who can tell these stories that have been passed on for generations to them.”

Seeing the land from an Indigenous perspective can change the way travelers see other things, too.

Relearning history

For Juli Thorson, of Troy, Idaho, that began right in her backyard.

“I have lived in the heart of Nez Perce country for most of my adult life, and I've always been very, very interested in it,” she said of the Idaho-based tribe.

But Thorson said she didn’t have a doorway in until 2019 when she took the first of several trips with Nez Perce Tourism, a Native-owned and tribe-certified company.

“Like a typical American going to school in the ‘60s and the ‘70s, I learned all kinds of history, but it was from the colonial standpoint,” Thorson said. “You know, Lewis and Clark discovered, for instance, the part of America that I live in now, and yet it had been inhabited by people for tens of thousands of years.”

Visiting a memorial battlefield and Nez Perce-Clearwater National Forests, she learned about the tribe’s long-standing connection to land, its relationship to its resources, and its perspective on being pushed off the land generations ago.

“That switch from how the invaders saw to how the people saw it, who lived here in the first place, was really a big one,” she said. She said experiencing the land from a Nez Perce point of view changed a lot of things for her. “It put a focus on where I took my vacations, how I spent my recreational funds, what I did with my learning time … you name it.”

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Reconnecting with roots

Native perspectives weren’t entirely new to Jeremy Spence, a tribal member of Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma, the third-largest Native American tribe in the U.S.

He was introduced to Choctaw history in his early years. “We actually utilized tribal services, and that was part of that immersion of history. You were taught a lot of these things through just even their health service programs.”

But after moving away when he was young and returning a few years ago, “it really was as an adult that I've been able to connect to the impact and the real story behind a lot of these things that I just casually had heard about.”

One place that has helped him reconnect is the Choctaw Cultural Center in Durant, Oklahoma, where Spence now manages the Durant Area Chamber of Commerce. The center offers interactive exhibits and experiences ranging from a living village to a cafe that serves traditional Choctaw foods.

“They've been so mindful and thoughtful of allowing people to be a part of the learning experience,” he said. “Like: ‘Come and do this. It's OK that you don't know. We're OK with that.'”

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Caring for the land

Ramiro Leon, of Riverside, California, likes to visit Hawaii a couple of times a year, but he hadn’t really learned much about Native Hawaiian culture until a trip with Hoʻomau Oʻahu Tours, a Native Hawaiian-owned company whose mission is to “cultivate, educate, and perpetuate our history and culture to all who inhabit and visit these islands.”

“When I would travel, prior, to Hawaii, it was more as a tourist, doing the stuff that's at the hotel, at the resort, and this time was more actually understanding,” Leon said.

On a circle tour of the island, he and his family learned about the history and cultural significance of various places. On a separate hands-on Malama experience at a kalo or Hawaiian taro patch, they learned about the root’s importance and how it’s traditionally and sustainably farmed.

“Actually being able to see it being made, tasting it fresh, you're able to appreciate what it does, what they use it for,” he said. Kalo is used to make poi, a staple dish.

In Hawaiian, malama means to care for, preserve or protect, and Leon said he was struck by the way Native Hawaiians cared for the land and “how they use the resources of the land to make ends meet, for the longest time.”

He’s already planning his next trip back and said he was looking forward to other Native-led travel experiences.

“Most people have been to the Grand Canyon or to these other iconic places, but they've not yet experienced tribal communities near those parks or in the great outdoors,” said Rupert, from the American Indian Alaska Native Tourism Association. “They have the opportunity to do that and to really have an experience that can transform the way that they see culture, the way that they see nature, really the way that they see life.

"They can have those life-changing experiences in Indian country. “

Travelers can find specific experiences broken down by region on the association’s consumer website, NativeAmerica.travel.

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This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Native-operated tourism gives visitors new perspective on the land