Who walks, where and why? Practitioners’ observations and perspectives on recreational walkers at UK tourist destinations

Hiking Tourism in Spain: Origins, Issues and Transformations

“…Some of the most frequently researched aspects are those related with the role played by hiking in the sustainable development and dynamization of rural territories [18], the environmental impact of the use of hiking paths on for example the terrain, the vegetation or the fauna [38,39], the conflicts that may arise between hiking and other activities as a consequence of the use of paths which are typically multifunctional [40,41], the behavior of hikers or the reasons why tourists choose hiking as a vacation activity [42][43][44][45]. Other interesting themes include the management of hiking paths [46][47][48][49] and theoretical and conceptual reflections regarding the different types of paths [50,51].…”

“…The need to improve the competitiveness of hiking tourism products has led to the segmentation of the market into much more specific, homogeneous subgroups (niches) [54]. The objective of this hypersegmentation has been to adapt better to the needs of the different profiles of the consumers of this kind of tourism products [20,42,[55][56][57]. In this way, the differential characteristics of the demand for hiking tourism have become increasingly important in the layout and design of hiking routes.…”

Analysing adventure: a leisure lifepsychle?

“…Adventure practitioners with a serious-leisure mindset behave differently to those with a casual-leisure mindset (Davies 2016). The former behave more like career athletes and sportspersons, who train despite pain.…”

“…It is this implicit valuation that drives adoption of serious leisure approaches. Individuals build a leisure career, where they spend time and money for social and psychological reward, in parallel to their work career where they trade time and expertise for financial reward (Davies 2016;Veal 2017). There is thus a kind of transfer value, from time spent and money earned at work, to time and money allocated to reward through leisure.…”

“…The former behave more like career athletes and sportspersons, who train despite pain. Serious hikers in the UK continue to hike, rain or shine; and some serious seakayakers prefer stormy seas to calm oceans (Davies 2016). Part of this distinction is simply that they have the equipment, fitness and expertise to deal with adverse weather conditions safely and comfortably, in contrast to novices who are unskilled and poorly equipped.…”