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Against the backdrop of the United Nations' Sustainable Development Goal 3, good health and wellbeing, this paper reports on a study that examined how outdoor guides perceive their role in facilitating the psychological wellbeing of tourists who consume slow adventure experiences. These experiences, such as canoeing, stargazing or foraging, are characterised by a slower passage of time, immersion in the natural world and a sense of belonging to small social groups. Grounded in research on wellbeing from a positive psychology perspective, the study utilised semi-structured, in-depth, interviews with ten outdoor adventure guides in the Scottish Highlands and Islands. Following a hermeneutic interpretive approach to analyse the interview transcripts, the findings revealed how perceptions of time, meaningful moments and a sense of togetherness are choreographed by slow adventure guides to shape tourists' psychological wellbeing through immersive guided experiences, ultimately helping tourists to re-establish a much-yearned-for connection with nature. The study adds to tourism, wellbeing and sustainability literature by providing new perspectives on psychological wellbeing through guided slow adventures. In particular the findings contribute to positive tourism, or tourism and positive psychology field of research, by revealing how mindful and eudaimonic visitor experiences are organised by adventure tour guides in natural settings.

Hospitality in wild places. Abstract We contribute to the hospitality work research agenda by reconsidering the role of outdoor adventure guides as agents of hospitality, set against a conceptual backdrop of deepening ontological insecurity in industrialised societies. We argue that the concepts of dwelling, communitas and hygge have much to offer in the delivery of outdoor hospitality in general, and in outdoor adventure tourism scenarios in particular. Although originating from the Danes and their ideas of 'cosy indoor life', the concept of hygge has recently gained global attention in the debates around creating comfortable atmospheres at home, and in fostering people's emotional well-being on holiday. Moving the concept along, we suggest the stimulation of hygge in the outdoors, along with provision of the space to dwell and the stage management of the communal effervescence of communitas as part of the crucial skill set for the outdoor guide.We opine that such conceptualisation can greatly inform our understanding of both the role of the outdoor guide and of the dynamics of deliverable hospitable experience more generally.

Numerous medical studies have shown the positive effects of forests on different aspects of human health. This study deals with the content of major terpenes in dominant coniferous species in Tara National Park, Serbia, in order to explore the potential for the development of a novel health tourism programme based on forest therapy. Main terpenes were analysed using a headspace-sampling technique coupled with gas-chromatography-mass spectrometry (Head-space-GC/MS). Needles of fir and spruce growing in the vicinity of hiking trails were investigated for possibilities to perform such therapy. Major detected terpenes were α-cadinol and spathulenol previously described as antiviral, antitumor, antimicrobial and immunomodulatory agents. The results of the study were favourable and worked well with the existing walking infrastructure in the observed area of the Tara Mountain, as they act as invaluable resources for designing the structured forest bathing walks. The study not only adds to the knowledge in the environmental and public health realm but also to tourism and sustainability studies.

The necessity for humans inhabiting the 21st century to slow down and take time to carry out daily practices frames the discourse of this research note. We suggest reconceptualising tourist wellbeing through the concept of slow adventure, as a response to the cult of speed and as a vehicle for engaging in deep, immersive and more meaningful experiences during journeys in the outdoors. We suggest that slow adventure has the potential to improve people’s general health and wellbeing through mindful enjoyment and consumption of the outdoor experience and thus bring people back to a state of mental and physical equilibrium. In so doing, we argue that extending the concept to include discussions around the psychological and social aspects of slow adventure is needed.