ABSTRACT
The focus of this chapter is on two texts describing travel experiences in the Shetland Islands. The first narrative is a travel diary of a trip undertaken in 1832 by a young man (Charlton 2007), the second is an online blog of a trip undertaken by a woman in 2002 (Cherny 2006). By analysing these texts, the chapter aims to enhance our understanding of how tourists make their experiences in Shetland meaningful. In addition, I argue that these stories are, in the end, more about the tourists and tourism as a phenomenon than about Shetland per se. While the stories tell about the place the tourists visit, the Shetland landscape and culture only set the scene for the stories. Instead, the stories reflect a genre of travel writing in which the tourists use their travel destination to reflect their own culture and their personality.
