Digital storytelling and hopeful last chance tourism experiences

Abstract

Last chance tourism, which can be described as the practice of tourism in environmentally damaged or threatened spaces, is an emerging trend that has been considered problematic due to the pressure that it places on already fragile environments. This article explores the possibilities of turning last chance tourism experiences into hopeful tourism experiences, by creating emotionally driven last chance tourism experiences in controlled and safe environments through digital storytelling. We draw on literature on transformative, hopeful and flourishing tourism to argue that last chance experiences provide unique opportunities for eliciting reflection among tourists and promote a greater environmental awareness if they are driven by emotionally engaging narratives. Our study explores the outcomes of an experiment conducted at the Ajuda Botanical Garden (Lisbon, Portugal) with a futuristic mixed-reality game that places users as members of a scientific expedition looking for plants that have become extinct in the twenty-second century. The results of this study show how the game’s last chance narrative generated contradictory, mixed feelings among the participants, which ultimately led to hopeful existential reflection about nature conservation action. With this in mind, we reflect on the potential of transformative last chance tourism experiences guided by digital narratives.