Abstract
Tourism exploring rivers became popular after restoration of independence of Lithuania. During the last decade there were many studies made, related to the development of inner water routes’ tourism: many districts created water tourism development strategies, many projects were made concerning development of infrastructure, recreational potential was analysed, the opinion and needs of society were tested. Nevertheless, it did not solve essential problems arising in this subject. Present infrastructure of tourism and the use of recreational resources often do not correspond to the water tourism scale and travelers’ needs. Tourism infrastructure of rivers not always is used according to its original mission. Travelers enjoy more those places that are not meant to be used for recreation and tourism. What influences it? From one side – territories planned for recreation and leisure are designed following legal, nature protection and other compulsory requirements that may not correspond to the anthropo-comfort conditions of society needs or the amount of cultural objects of interest. On the other hand, river tourist routes on high season are used most often for sports, and nearby existing attractive cultural heritage objects often are not part of traveling program. This way, cultural cognitive tourism, using water traveling, absolutely loses its interest and sense. The purpose of the authors of the article is to investigate possibilities of using present infrastructure of river tourist routes and recreational potential, and their adoption for the needs of cultural cognitive tourism. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5755/j01.sace.6.1.4925
Highlights
The length of inland water routes in the Republic of Lithuania is about 930.8 km
The analysis of legal documents showed that the main laws as valid in Lithuania can be classified according to the nature of legal regulation: organization of tourism activity, regulation of the usage of recreational resources, regulation of protection of natural territories, establishment of landscape spatial regulation measures
The laws define the essential concepts related to water tourism and regulate the behaviour on the banks of rivers in the limits of protected areas, the territories of cultural heritage
Summary
The length of inland water routes in the Republic of Lithuania is about 930.8 km. Routes of national importance constitute 827.8 km, local water routes make up 68 km, and 35 km are ascribed to perspective water routes. Many of the Lithuanian rivers suitable for tourism are not listed as inland water route categorized objects. Following recommendations of international river tourism, there is a typology having direct influence upon the formation of tourist routes of rivers: hydrological elements, special formation, biological/nature elements, management and tourism supply/demand factors (River tourism, 2009). To these general factors, antropocomfort conditions, cultural and nature resources, social/cultural conditions have much importance for the formation of tourism routes. Object of investigation: Tourism infrastructure and recreational resources (cultural and nature heritage) of Lithuanian tourist routes of rivers (river valleys and approaches) at different types of landscape. Method of investigation – analysis of archive data, oriented to the legal regulation and analysis of practical examples of inland water tourism infrastructure and tourism potential
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