TOURIST TRAP

Growing up, a quick hop across the channel to a French campsite was the most common holiday among everyone I knew. When my parents were young, even that would have seemed exotic. The beaches of Bournemouth and Margate were their bread and butter. Today however, many of us take two-week jaunts far across the world and there is perhaps a sense of competitiveness attached to our choices as we proudly demonstrate our sense of adventure. As a result, the sudden hiatus of international travel due to the Covid-19 pandemic has been incredibly dramatic. With one in every 11 people employed in the sector, its cessation has been devastating. For many destinations, business-as-usual is now the dream, but as we explore on page 36, business-as-usual has been harming both the planet and its inhabitants for a long time. For tourism to re-boot in a more sustainable way many things need to happen. For starters, we may have to reconnect with the adventures closer to home.

Not everyone is so keen for tourists to return. When Jens Mühling and Justin

Jin donned crampons and trekked the icy surface of Russia’s Lake Baikal (page 18), they met communities convinced that a rise in Chinese tourists threatens the lake and even Russia itself. Surviving in this inhospitable land it seems, means seeing threats everywhere. Meanwhile, on page 50, Antonia Bolingbroke-Kent found a land untouched by visitors. Travelling by rickety motorbike into the hills of the Naga SelfAdministered Zone in Myanmar, she met poverty-stricken communities struggling without modern amenities. Too much attention, or too little – both can spell trouble.