We’ve found over the years that most experience frameworks are either built for other contexts or based on a narrow definition of the role of the guide, usually focused on safety or technical skills. That’s why we chose to develop our own framework, combining the elements needed for adventures that create connections with the place and people.
The framework is broken down into three sections:
- the elements that must align to create authentic adventures;
- the building blocks that create the adventure itself; and finally
- the constraints we must consider to ensure that the adventure is sustainable.
As guides, we need to be aware of the authentic adventures and responsible tourism sections of the framework. These are addressed at the company level for the most part, but they do impact what type of adventures we facilitate and how we deliver them.
Our personal motivations need to align with those of the organization, our destination and guests in order for us to be successful as adventure guides. That doesn’t mean that we need to find a perfect match but there has to be enough common ground between all involved for adventures to be authentic and sustainable.
The building blocks on the other hand are where we spend most of our time as guides. These are the areas that we need to be able to implement confidently while working with the guests and the skills we spend the most time refining.
The next topics cover each of the sections of the adventure framework in more details.
We built the framework specifically for our approach to adventure tourism. It is inspired by our experience and the work of many, often in fields unrelated to adventure tourism.
We believe that it can be applied to the other contexts we’ve discussed in the last module. The main difference would be the purpose of the adventure itself. While we aim for goosebump moments, other contexts would be aiming for something more aligned with their own goals.
