Arguably, all tourists are looking to fulfil dreams that involve some sense of a 'utopian' ideal, whether that be in the 'arms' of an ancient civilisation or relaxing on a beach, free of work-a-day worries. Similarly, the growth of ecotourism and adventure tourism represents touristic attempts to fulfil utopian dreams denied the urban resident. For most tourists, these utopian dreams are played out in the time capsule of the year's annual holiday. There are also tourists who move beyond the confines of this time capsule because they have no intention of going 'home' - their 'escape attempts' become a whole way of life.

This lecture brings together the sociology of tourism, of alternative lifestyles and a utopian subculture, long-term ocean yacht cruising. While by most academic tourism definitions, these people are tourists, in relation to other sociological concepts they are a utopian community which espouses not only an explicit social critique but also utopian lifestyle goals.

These travellers take small yachts and wander over the oceans of the world. Some have no destination goal in mind and others have very clear ideas of where they are going. Many of these people have been ocean cruising for up to twenty years. Of the thousands of people who make ocean passages on their own sail boats, only a few see cruising as a whole way of life that they will pursue indefinitely, a life of hardship and insecurity counterbalanced by powerful intrinsic rewards. This is cruising - tourists pursuing a utopian dream. Such sailors are not the only mobile and self-contained tourists but are 'joined' on the 'road' by yachties on short trips, by RV'ers and by seasonal travellers, for example 'snowbirds' in North America and 'loopies' in Australia. But, cruisers are different from most of these in their time frame; it is years (not months) they spend away from home (base).

The purpose of this website is to provide the illustrations to a lecture in the Unit TOU102 Introduction to Tourism, coordinated by Jim Macbeth who also prepared this website information. The photos are used as background illustrations when the lecture is delivered to internal students but are provided here primarily for external students listening to the lecture on audio tape. I hope that you find the illustrations useful in your study of the lecture and the nature of tourism.

Following the introductory discussion of tourism and utopian concepts, the lecture discusses this type of tourism under 6 headings, with the photos used to visually illustrate the text. The lecture concludes with further discussion of cruisers' utopian ideal.

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