Personal emotional journeys associated with
adventure activities on packaged
mountaineering holidays
Gill Pomfret, Senior Lecturer in Tourism
“Meanings, markets and magic” 2012 Adventure Conference
Presentation themes
• Research context & questions
• Previous work on emotional
journeys of adventure
participants
• Fieldwork research in Chamonix,
French Alps
• Key findings
 perceptions of risk
 contrasting emotions
 “other world” feelings
• Conclusion
Research Context
• Growing interest in experiences
of adventure tourists
• Growth in packaged adventure
holidays & adventure tourists
• Limited research on experiences
of tourists on packaged
adventure holidays
• Considerable understanding of
experiences of recreational
mountaineers
Research Context
• All consuming & challenging nature of adventure
• Conflicting emotions within the adventure
experience
• Emotional journeys during adventure activity
participation
• Emotional journeys during packaged adventure
activity participation
Research questions
• To investigate the character of the emotional journeys of
tourists associated with adventure activities engaged in as
part of their packaged mountaineering holidays.
• To evaluate whether the adventure activities within these
holidays provide experiences that tourists consider to be
adventurous.
Emotional journeys of
adventure participants
Risk taking
•
Risk is integral to the adventure
experience (Ewert, 1985; Martin & Priest,
1986; Robinson, 1992)
•
Risk is a non-essential, secondary
ingredient of adventure (Kane &
Tucker, 2004; Varley, 2006; Walle, 1997)
•
Differing perceptions of risk held
by adventure activity
participants
Emotional journeys of
adventure participants
Contrasting emotions
• Waves of ‘terror and elation, joy and despair, anxiety
and pleasure …’ (Swarbrooke et al, 2003, p.14)
• Flow & adventure
 ‘A sense of exhilaration, a deep sense of enjoyment that is long
cherished and that becomes a landmark in memory for what life
should be like’ (Csikszentmihalyi, 1992, p.3).
 The challenge-skills dimension
Emotional journeys of
adventure participants
“Other world” feelings
• ‘The ordinary world and
everyday concerns are left
behind’ (Swarbrooke et al, 2003, p.113)
• Adventure’s core elements &
flow dimensions
• Influence of the natural
environment (Curtin, 2009; Frederickson
& Anderson, 1999; Vespestad & Lindberg,
2011)
Fieldwork research
• Qualitative approach
• Data collection in Chamonix
region
 tourists on packaged mountaineering
holidays
• 38 semi-structured interviews
 carried out during or at end of
holiday
• Respondent profile
Findings - perceptions of risk
Not feeling “at risk”
• Lack of risk perceived during
mountaineering participation
• Guide’s role in packaged
adventure activity experiences
(Kane & Tucker, 2004; Fletcher, 2010)
• The importance of challenge to
respondents’ experiences
‘The course allows for more
challenges in a safer
environment because you’ve
always got the guide there with
you. It’s a totally different
experience with a guide. On
your own, you need more selfreliance so you have to think
for yourself more.’
Findings - perceptions of risk
‘I had a big backpack on while
walking down these foot wide
paths with a drop off, and I
found that although it wasn’t
technically challenging, that’s
where the adrenalin maybe
flowed the most for me because
I got the feeling of “if you slip,
you’re going to die”.’
Feeling “at risk”
• Did respondents face truly
hazardous situations?
• Mountaineering organisations
cannot pledge 100% safety for
their clients
Findings - contrasting emotions
• Intense emotional peaks &
troughs
 ranged from feelings of abject
misery to total euphoria
• Experiences of flow or a
flow-like state
 perceived positive challenge-skill
balance
 the ultimate reward for many
respondents
Findings - contrasting emotions
‘There were all these different points
when I thought “I’m not really
convinced I’m going to be able to do
this”. … We got to the top and we were
completely exhausted and we still had
10km to get back down again. … The
top was awesome! It was absolutely
exhilarating and we’d been building up
to it for two and a half years.’
Findings - contrasting emotions
• Pushing beyond the
“comfort zone”
• Participants in
commodified adventure
activities ‘play with
their fears’ (Cater, 2006, p.321).
• Felt safe in the presence
of the guide
‘It was a challenge on the ridge
climb as there were often sheer
drops on either side and I have a
fear of heights! Part of the
challenge was to see if I could
just deal with it. I had to push
myself mentally to do things out
of my comfort zone, but I did it
and I felt on a real high
afterwards.’
Findings - contrasting emotions
• Experiences of flow or flowlike states both during &
after completing
mountaineering activities
‘It was just a horrible slog and
you’re cold and trying to keep warm,
and the way the altitude affects
your brain, you don’t seem to think
properly. … Once I reached the top,
I felt great but I still had to get
down. It was only later that I felt a
deep satisfaction which I find hard
to achieve any other way.’
Findings - “other world” feelings
‘in a
zone’
‘in a
trance’
‘on a
different
planet’
• Presence of flow
dimensions
 action-awareness merging
 concentration on the task
in hand
 transformation of time
(Jackson & Csikszentmihalyi, 1999)
‘You are in an altered state anyway
because of the altitude. I had nothing
else to worry about. … It was just one
activity that was happening at one
point in time. ... You’ve got to
completely concentrate on what you
are doing, otherwise things might go
wrong.’
Findings – “other world” feelings
• Influence of the natural
mountain environment
 euphoric feelings
 less demanding activities
• Natural environment
induces emotionally
charged “highs” (Curtin,
2009; Frederickson & Anderson, 1999;
Vespestad & Lindberg, 2011)
‘When we were walking through
the trees, every so often we’d get
a great view and I just kept
thinking “oh, it’s brilliant to be
here.” … When I watched the sun
go down it made me feel like I was
on top of the world.’
Conclusion
• Character of the emotional journeys of tourists on packaged
mountaineering holidays:
 Perceived risk not integral to emotional journeys
 Intense emotional peaks and troughs
 “Other world” feelings
• Do the adventure activities within these holidays provide
experiences that tourists consider to be adventurous?
 Genuine adventures experienced yet tourists were not exposed to
completely unadulterated adventure
References
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