Analysing Push and Pull Motives for Volcano Tourism at Mount Pinatubo, Philippines

This paper investigates the motivations of visitors undertaking a volcano tour at Mount Pinatubo in the Philippines. The study identifies push and pull motives for visiting a non-erupting active volcano; tests the influence of age, gender and prior experience of volcanic tourism on visitors; and examines differences in motivations for domestic versus international visitors. A total of 174 survey responses were collected and analysed. The results reveal four push motives, namely escape and relaxation, novelty-seeking, volcano knowledge-seeking and socialisation, and two pull motives, namely disaster and cultural heritage-induced and volcanic and geological attribute-driven. Novelty-seeking was found as the strongest motive for visiting volcanic sites. Domestic visitors display higher escape and relaxation and socialisation motives compared to international visitors. The findings provide implications for developing and marketing volcanobased geotourism and for diversifying the Philippines’ tourism products. This study makes a valuable contribution to the under-researched understanding of geotourism at volcanic sites

Unified Container Environments for Scientific Cluster Scenarios

Providing runtime dependencies for computational workflows in shared environments, like HPC clusters, requires appropriate management efforts from users and administrators. Users of a cluster define the software stack required for a workflow to execute successfully, while administrators maintain the mechanisms to offer libraries and applications in different versions and combinations for the users to have maximum flexibility. The Environment Modules system is the tool of choice on bwForCluster BinAC for this purpose. In this paper, we present a solution to execute a workflow which relies on a software stack not available via Environment Modules on BinAC. The paper describes the usage of a containerized, user-defined software stack for this particular problem using the Singularity and Docker container platforms. Additionally, we present a solution for the reproducible provisioning of identical software stacks across HPC and non-HPC environments. The approach uses a Docker image as the basis for a Singularity container. This allows users to define arbitrary software stacks giving them the ability to execute their workflows across different environments, from local workstations to HPC clusters. This approach provides identical versions of software and libraries across all environments

Family perspectives on social hospitality dimensions while on holiday

This article focuses on neglected social hospitality dimensions of food and accommodation on family holidays. Holidays signify concentrated periods of family time not only allowing for more shared food experiences but also necessitating more confined living spaces compared to home. A whole-family methodology was used as a critical and holistic approach to understand the holiday experiences of 10 families. Positive and negative memories of hospitality encounters for different family members are illustrated through the emotive concepts of commensality and spatiality highlighting their embodied, visible and interactive aspects. Family meals take on symbolic and publicly celebrated characteristics, whereas shared accommodation space is privately contested. The theoretical implications of the antithetical nature of family hospitality dimensions are further discussed and the family tourism research agenda is further developed

Swimming with captive dolphins: current debates and post-experience dissonance

Dolphins have widespread contemporary appeal and anthropomorphic social representations of dolphins have fuelled a growing desire in tourist populations to seek interaction with them. This paper is concerned with the staged performance of swim-with-dolphin interaction programmes in aquaria. Qualitative interviews with tourists who have swum with captive dolphins identified their immediate recollections and stressed the grace, size and power of dolphins, but also a belief that the experience was too staged, too short and too expensive. Post-purchase dissonance focused on concerns with the size of enclosures and about captivity, too many tricks, limited interpretation and unfulfilled expectations of a quality interaction