“The world we live in is an exciting place” (p. 1). That is how these three West Australian authors start their book, and their enthusiasm shows throughout the volume. Their central theme is “how to manage tourism in natural areas in a sustainable way while at the time providing tourists with a high quality experience”, and they argue that “natural area tourism is an appropriate vehicle for achieving deeper understanding of the environment in a way that other forms of tourism are not” (backcover).
These themes are addressed in six steps. After a scene-setting introduction, Chapter 2 provides a basic introduction to ecological patterns and processes, with examples relevant to tourism. There are Australian case studies, such as the spread of dieback fungus through Stirling Range in Western Australia (Box 2.3, p. 48), but these are balanced by examples from elsewhere. Figure 2.1, for example, shows ostrich and giraffe rather than emu and kangaroo. The impact of tourists on wildlife receives special mention (pp. 72–77), with examples from Antarctica, Gibraltar, and Peru.