Intentional adventures start with knowing who we are, our destination and our guests. Authentic adventures happen at the intersection where our motivations and those of our guests align with our destination’s sense of place.
In this section, we’ll take a look at the elements that need to align for an adventure to be authentic.
So, what makes an adventure authentic? Authenticity happens when we are being true to ourselves. Unlike the experience, which comes from within the guest, authenticity comes from the operator, the destination, the guides and the partners involved in the delivery of the experience.
We ask ourselves three questions when we develop new adventures.
Why us?
How does the adventure align with our goal to inspire our guests to play outside and help them experience their adventure so that they can discover the culture, people and natural beauty of the region?
Why here?
How does the adventure showcase our region’s natural beauty, the culture of outdoor adventures and the people who make it special?
Why are guests joining us?
How does the adventure help them experience the region? What made them choose to go with a guide, instead of doing it on their own?
Authenticity is a fairly simple concept when you look at it this way. It means being true to one’s own character: the things we say and the things we do are what we actually believe.
Finding Out More
We’ll go into more detail about how we answer these questions in the Facilitating Authentic Adventures course. Defining who we are, our guest’s journey and our destination’s sense of place takes a lot of upfront work, but it pays off in the long run.
To get started, have a look at the Authentic Adventures document which provides an overview of what we consider to be authentic for us at Nordegg Adventures.
