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probability of a plane crash-before or since September 11. By and large, such travelers are determined to continue doing what they love, says Betsey Stevenson, analyst for Forrester Research, which collects consumer data about technology's links to the travel industry. But can their hard-core loyalty help navigate the industry through rough waters? That's anybody's guess. Stevenson says the good news is that people who take adventure-based trips spend much more than other travelers, and it's not merely a matter of socioeconomics; it's a matter of preference. "Adventure travelers have, on average, 15 percent higher incomes than other travelers, but they spend 60 percent more on travel," Stevenson says. "These people consider it part of their lifestyle." Nonetheless, it's going to be a long, hard winter for the industry, she predicts, and only the strong (and innovative) will survive. Once springtime arrives, she and several other analysts believe numbers will reach levels clos- er to normal-"that is, assuming that (Attorney General John) Ashcroft's warn- ings about future terrorism don't come to fruition." Which brings up a multitude of X factors that don't fit any known equation. All of today's data is based on the assumption that we won't have another catastrophic event, or that the war in Afghanistan won't spill into other countries. Barring a scenario that nobody wants to contemplate, many adven- turous travelers are still planning trips for 2002, albeit to destinations that seem safer at the moment. "We've seen that people who want to travel now might switch over to South America or Antarctica or parts of Africa-places where they don't feel there is a reason to be fearful," says Nicholas Ballard at Geographic Expeditions. As the traveler takes a wait-and-see attitude about future far- flung travels, his/her surfing excursion in Indonesia this year might become a surf of Hawaii, Southern California or South America. And climbing in Kashmir might be far less alluring than, say, climbing in the Canadian Rockies or Europe. "My guess is that even someone interested in very rigorous outdoor mountain travel is not going to try the Hindu Kush next week," says Malcolm A. Noden, senior lecturer in management, marketing and tourism at Cornell University. Clearly, the big outfitters are monitoring travel in the Middle East, Pakistan, Indonesia, and parts of southwest Central Asia. And in some cases, they've shelved expedi- tions in those regions until further notice. "We've put our operations on hold in Indonesia and Pakistan," says Ballard at Geo Ex. "There have been announcements by some of the funda- mentalist groups in Indonesia saying they're going to target Americans, and our local guides have said this is cause for concern. That sort of statement we just can't brush off." Conversely, nondomestic destinations that are seeing a spike in interest-given the context of an overall drop in travel-include South America and the Galapagos Islands, Canada, China, sub-Saharan Africa and the Pacific Rim. Domestic travel for the next few months is a natural, but again, only when compared to the overall figures, which show large numbers of traditional travelers staying close to home as political events unfold. But Bangs makes a keen point about the effects of this sort of isolationism sug- gesting that "if we had had more adventure travelers in Afghanistan, it might have been more difficult for the extremist to paint us as an evil group of people." Adventure travel really can be a diplomatic mission that helps improve, repair and enhance understanding on a global basis. When you talk to solo or nonpackage travelers in particular, you find heightened degrees of that philosophy. Jeff Ragsdale, a Texas-based traveler who explores cultures as well as countries, says he didn't seriously consider canceling his trip to the Annapurna last 28 spring when things heated up with Maoist attacks in rural Nepal. The same applies in light of September 11, he says. "It doesn't affect my desire to travel, period. It's certainly going to affect the destinations I pick. But does it make me want to stay put, not go out, lock the doors? No. Not at all." Ragsdale also says he wouldn't balk right now at the idea of climbing Kilimanjaro, which he did a year and a half ago. (Tanzania is 33 percent Muslim, he points out.) In terms of travel's affordability, with all of the refocusing and potential consoli- dation on the industry's horizon, two possibilities are emerging. In one, we could see deep dis- counts to places otherwise out of our financial reach. The second is that the general price of travel could increase because of rising costs due to insur- ance and added security. Or we could have both scenar- ios simultaneously. Then there is another, murkier issue. One has to wonder about the ramifications of promoting "If we had had more adventure travelers in Afghanistan, it might have been more difficult for the extremist to paint us as an evil group of people." travel in particularly dicey areas. Obviously, the big outfits stake their reputations on keeping their flocks secure, but what about the smaller companies? Will they now be more accountable than ever to ensure their clients' safety? "There are very serious ethical and legal questions," says Cornell's Professor Noden. "Any agent who sells a product to a customer without clearly warn- ing them of the risks-both in the activity and in terms of choice of destination-is being foolish in the extreme. Every agent has a moral and certainly a legal responsibility to warn the customer that, 'Look you're going to a dangerous country.' People now are much more aware of that responsibility , and we're a lot more cautious about asking for good information." Finally, one has to consider an element that's been somewhat overlooked since September 11: The fact that travel stats were already sluggish. As Tom Ziegler, a producer at CNN Financial News, points out, "r think for a lot of people, the issue is not the current war (and fear of more terrorism) as much as the fear of a recession. I mean, leisure travel was falling off before the events of September 11 because of a drop in the economy. If we do see a reces- sion, people are going to be saving their money-and leisure travel will be one of the first things to go." Still, in an existential and also a very real way, adventurous travel does dovetail with the times. "This is a time of disorientation and questioning of our entire cosmology-and what we thought was real may no longer be real," Bangs observes. "Adventure travel can give you very clear values, a very strong compass, a sense of purpose-the purposes of survival and getting along with fellow human beings. And all of these propositions can be very life asserting. You can find courage, you can find community, you can find clarity." To paraphrase a number of great minds, adventure travel is about movement, moving on, moving forward. And now more than ever, that may indeed be just the tonic.