Before the Crash
What the Islander Way is doing now to protect the future of our island
Not so long ago, “travel inspo” came from dog eared guidebooks, stories swapped over kitchen tables, or a grainy photo pinned to a noticeboard. Today, it arrives in our pockets. Perfectly framed, algorithm boosted, and shared millions of times over.
A single image can change the fate of a place.
When the whitewashed cliffs of Santorini began circulating endlessly on Instagram, visitation surged far beyond what the island’s infrastructure was ever designed to carry. Narrow lanes meant for locals became choke points. Water systems strained. Waste piled up. What had once been a lived in community increasingly felt like a backdrop. Beautiful, but brittle.
In Thailand, Maya Bay became globally famous after appearing in the film The Beach, starring Leonardo DiCaprio, and later exploding across social media. The result was devastating. Coral systems collapsed. Marine life disappeared. The beach was ultimately closed for years to allow nature to recover. Tourism did not stop because people stopped loving the place. It stopped because the place itself was breaking.
Closer to home
Right here in Tasmania, Maria Island is now asking similar questions. Visitor caps and limits are being actively discussed as a way of protecting fragile ecosystems and the experience itself. This is not about shutting people out. It is about recognising thresholds before they are crossed.
The Faroe Islands faced a similar crossroads. Dramatic landscapes, once known mostly to locals and the occasional adventurous traveller, suddenly became must see Instagram destinations. Instead of letting demand dictate the future, the Faroese community paused. They asked a different question.
What does tourism need to look like if we want this place to still be here, and still be ours, in 50 years?
Their answer was not anti tourism.
It was pro future.
That same question sits at the heart of the Islander Way.
We are not working against visitors. We welcome them. Visitors bring curiosity, connection, income, and energy. They keep our small businesses alive, sustain essential services, and create opportunities that remote places like ours often struggle to access. Tourism matters here. Deeply.
But the way tourism is growing globally is not resilient by default.
Social media rewards volume, speed, and visual impact. It does not reward water security, housing availability, volunteer burnout, waste management, or the quiet unglamorous work of keeping a community functioning. Left unchecked, those pressures land first, and hardest, on small islands and remote communities like ours.
The Islander Way exists because we can see what happens if we do not act early.
We are choosing to plan before the crash. Before housing shortages deepen. Before volunteer fatigue becomes failure. Before infrastructure is pushed past its limits. Before community goodwill is quietly eroded. We are choosing to shape tourism so it strengthens the island rather than hollowing it out.
That means shifting the story…..
From more to better.
From passive consumption to participation.
From extraction to contribution.
From short term popularity to long term resilience.
It means inviting visitors to understand that this is not a product. It is a place. A place with people, systems, limits, and care woven through it. A place that asks something back.
The Islander Way is about future proofing community life in a world where attention travels faster than planning a holiday ever has. It is about ensuring that when people arrive because they saw something beautiful online, they leave having supported the very things that make this island beautiful in real life.
Tourism is not the enemy.
Fragility is.
And resilience, built now, together, and with care, is how we make sure this place does not just trend, but endures.