Since the pandemic, Madison has observed an uptick in high-net-worth people reserving out total expeditions. “One client bought a whole trip to climb Mount Vinson in Antarctica for $200,000 last year,” he says. “It’s the latest trend: billionaires wanting their own private adventure with friends; they fly to Antarctica in a private jet. It’s next-level.”

Although his mountain expeditions are high-end, Madison says they arrive with minimal consolation. The biggest luxurious he provides, he provides, is at Everest base camp: Warm showers, yoga classes, and a eating tent with a film display are among the many facilities on the $75,000 tour. “The guys that come on my adventures ultimately want to suffer a little bit—that’s how they feel alive. Otherwise, they’d be staying at a Four Seasons five-star resort somewhere.”

However, a cottage trade of luxurious excessive tourism additionally exists. White Desert Antarctica provides premium lodging close to the South Pole for $15,000 an evening, replete with heated, opulently furnished pods and personal cooks. Harding had additionally executed that journey. “Hamish has been a true friend to White Desert for many years,” founder Patrick Woodhead stated in an announcement. “He has traveled with us to Antarctica a number of times, including with astronaut Buzz Aldrin when he visited.”

With these excessive tourism firms, security typically comes with a excessive price ticket. Madison says his service provides networks of knowledgeable guides and logistical know-how, in addition to Western and Sherpa groups that coach, help, and lead adventurers 8,000 meters above sea degree. Extra oxygen, good meals, and enhanced communications are additionally offered. “But you can do Everest cheaply and climb with your own tent and without a guide,” says Mountain. “There are plenty of operators that offer a rudimentary service—and that’s when it can get really dangerous. You’re left on your own.”

OceanGate seems to have had its ft in each camps. As the only vacationer operator offering journeys to see the Titanic—and Titan one in every of solely a handful of manned submersibles able to reaching 12,500-foot depths—tickets weren’t low-cost. At the identical time, circumstances contained in the sub had been removed from luxurious, and the dive carried appreciable dangers. OceanGate’s waiver not solely mentions death three times on page one, Titan was bolted from the surface—leaving these inside to outlive on a finite quantity of oxygen and depend on exterior assist to get out of the sub, even after surfacing. The vessel was additionally managed by a modified online game controller. “No one going on board would have been under any illusions that it was safe,” says Mountain. “That’s part of the appeal: The wreck is incredibly inaccessible, dangerous to visit, and steeped in mythology. And very few people have done it.”

Grace Lordan, affiliate professor in behavioral science on the London School of Economics, says these harmful expeditions have outdated luxurious objects for thrill-seeking entrepreneurs. “Pleasure and purpose tend to determine happiness, and it used to be about material purchases and philanthropy. Over time, redistributing wealth still provides purpose, but pleasure is harder to attain.”