It's not just Iceland. My wife and I typically travel for the outdoors and we are extremely impact conscious. I've noticed a significant growth in outdoor activity in the last ten years or so. Along with the that growth I've noticed more trash, more people going off established trails when they shouldn't (I'm not 100% anti off-trail travel), more disrespect for others who are trying to escape into nature, more people who are unprepared for somewhat serious activities (particularly rock climbing in remote locations, I've had to do a few rescues at this point), more trail braiding and erosion, and to get away from the people getting away, one must go deeper and farther into the backcountry.
Iceland was beautiful, but the best places on the island (imho) were often places we explored that were relatively unknown. It's a tough issue that many people in the outdoor community are scratching heads over how to deal with. I want to think that it's a solvable problem, but the cynic in me says it's a societal issue manifesting itself in this form and can't be easily fixed.
Iceland tire of tourists trashing their nature
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Re: Iceland tire of tourists trashing their nature
#162Those causing the problem should pay the price. So a small tax on the tourists to clean up after them should be in order.
Re: Iceland tire of tourists trashing their nature
#163“The relatively new trouble with mass society is perhaps even more serious, but not because of the masses themselves, but because this society is essentially a consumers’ society where leisure time is used no longer for self-perfection or acquisition of more social status, but for more and more consumption and more and more entertainment… To believe that such a society will become more “cultured” as time goes on and…
I find that the root issue is individualism. There are immaculately clean cities in east asia whos parent societies would definitely qualify as highly "consumerist." It's not consumption that's the problem but the parameters within which that consumption is allowed to proceed. As well, in individualist societies we seem far more comfortable to discard our trash wherever and just forget about it. A more collectivist a…
I don't find "individualism" to be mutually exclusive to "collectivism" in this way. They may counter balance each other to some degree, but I have serious doubts that there is any issue that can be elevated to "root issue".
Especially with concepts as ambiguous as "individualism".
Re: Iceland tire of tourists trashing their nature
#164Iceland should make up its mind. Flights to Iceland (from pretty much anywhere) are extremely cheap, presumably due to some sort of Icelandic tourism-board subsidy. This attracts people who choose vacation destination based on price... who might not be the most motivated to nurture (or even pay attention to) the local character of the place they visit.
Re: Iceland tire of tourists trashing their nature
#165I call this the 'Disney World' effect of nature tourism. Self-involved, entitled people who treat national parks and the wilderness like an amusement park that has been set aside for their entertainment. They expect the natural world to cater to their whims the same way a Disney world employee does, and they just do not understand that's not how the world works.
Our whole society is based on trying to make things easy and convenient. So it shouldn’t come as a surprise that people have the same attitude towards traveling and nature. Iceland could fix this easily by making places less accessible but then the tourist money would stop flowing. In the end they have to make a choice. Limit accessibility or number of tourists and lose some money or accept the negative consequences…
Maybe they should just forbid or discourage tourists from countries that cause the most problems, such as Britain and the US. I'm sure Japanese tourists never litter there.
Re: Iceland tire of tourists trashing their nature
#166Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Let's hope the future learns people that most of these instagram shots are basically digital waste. That's very condescending of you. Lots of people like having real visual memories of places they've been.
I like having visual memories too. But are my memories triggered by a self-made almost identical photo of a specific glacier or tree at a touristic attraction? In the last couple of years I've not taken photographs of things from which I was sure already tens of thousands of photos exist. In my opinion people forget the importance of the experience itself. It seems as if there must always be some form of evidence to…
In my experience, my own picture does trigger a different response than a basically identical photo from somebody else. I have a wall dedicated to pictures of my various hiking trips, and replacing them with professional photos doesn't have the same effect. I've tried.
I also don't think taking a picture and being present in the moment are mutually exclusive at all. It takes five seconds for me to snap a quick photo. It's really not that big of a deal.
Re: Iceland tire of tourists trashing their nature
#167Tourists: people that would be better off elsewhere in a place that would be better off without them.
Re: Iceland tire of tourists trashing their nature
#168Iceland should make up its mind. Flights to Iceland (from pretty much anywhere) are extremely cheap, presumably due to some sort of Icelandic tourism-board subsidy. This attracts people who choose vacation destination based on price... who might not be the most motivated to nurture (or even pay attention to) the local character of the place they visit.
That’s a pretty classist thing to say. Rich people aren’t more respectful of nature than people on a budget.
Re: Iceland tire of tourists trashing their nature
#169I call this the 'Disney World' effect of nature tourism. Self-involved, entitled people who treat national parks and the wilderness like an amusement park that has been set aside for their entertainment. They expect the natural world to cater to their whims the same way a Disney world employee does, and they just do not understand that's not how the world works.
The first time I experienced this in nature was last year in Yosemite. So many people were climbing over barriers and walking in places where they shouldn't, it was horrible. I've experienced this a lot in Amsterdam too, however. Tourists are treating Amsterdam like it isn't a real city. Especially the British seem to have no respect and treat Amsterdam like it's Vegas, but with less American cops.
Yosemite has always had tourists doing the things you mention. Like you say, it's horrible. The focus on "influencers" in this article is contrived; the issue is that some people behave in baffling ways in nature parks.
Re: Iceland tire of tourists trashing their nature
#170This quote from the article baffles me: > The good instagrammers try to show different ways of enjoying nature. We don't tag places that are off the beaten path that we want to protect as long as possible. Some places have become "insta-famous" without ever mentioning where they are but eventually they become known to everyone. Wait, what? So you take a picture. Put it on instagram (because you are an 'instagrammer')…
Is it more or less digital waste than hacker news comments?