This chapter presents some first-hand insights gained from interviews with Australian volunteer tourists who participated in the Santa Elena Rainforest Reserve (SERR) project in Costa Rica. It provides information from the tourists' own stories and experiences, and constructs the volunteers' views...

In this chapter, the critical issues of motivation and goals are examined, particularly the contrasts inherent in growth and profit-oriented entrepreneurship versus the more prevalent lifestyle and autonomy motivations. Research data from Australia, Canada and Denmark are analysed to examine...

This paper presents the findings from the focus group discussions conducted with volunteers in the Olympic games in Sydney, New South Wales, Australia. These findings suggest that event volunteer managers need to give detailed consideration to the nature of the volunteer experience itself, rather...

This chapter examines tourism and hospitality employers' views of Generation-Y employees and their attempts to engage and motivate these employees. Focus groups of 30 employers were carried out in Coffs Harbour, Cairns, and Port Douglas in 2006 and a series of interviews was also carried out with...

This chapter provides a model of the transformative nature of survival escapist travel particularly in the Australian context. It investigates how reactional trigger events impact upon an individual's motivations for travel to long-haul destinations and how these trigger events affect emotional...

This chapter looks at the profile of garden visitors in the UK, the USA, Australia and New Zealand. Motivators, information sources and enablers in garden tourism are discussed.

The interest and fascination with high mountain regions is explored in this chapter on mountain tourism in Australia. The chapter deepens our understanding of wilderness and what it is that draws tourists to alpine areas, looking at visitor motivation, perceptions and satisfaction in the Snowy...

This chapter investigates which factors affect Australian tourists' (n=1231) decision to cancel or not to cancel when facing a critical unexpected event at the destination of their choice. In particular, it examines whether the nature of the crisis, traveller characteristics and trip...

This chapter discusses key concepts concerning garden tourism, presents an overview of the number of garden visits worldwide, and discusses the motivations for visiting gardens in the UK, US and Australian contexts. Also discussed are the different market segments in garden tourism, the economic...

This chapter presents the findings of a study on community gardens in the cities of Brisbane and Gold Coast (Queensland, Australia) using an urban political ecology approach. The study examines (1) the characteristics of community gardens in the study area; (2) the motivations underpinning garden...