Traditionally, destinations are regarded as well-defined geographical areas, such as countries, island or towns. However, destinations are often artificially divided by geographical and political barriers, which fail to take into consideration consumer preferences or tourism industry functions (Buhalis, 2000). The evidence of this can be found in much cross-border tourism literature, which acknowledges that tourists consume attractions from both sides of the border. Thus, the true consumption area is in fact an overlapping space spreading out in both sides of the borderline, and do not correspond to the current destinations in each side. Boundaries of a destination are hard to define, as they are being constantly produced and reproduced through complex practices and discourses. Destinations may appear totally different in terms of shape, content and relationships, depending on the point of view from which they are experienced (tourists, tourism companies, destination managers and local people). In this paper, we focus in tourists, since they are essential in the process of defining a tourism destination.

Introducing the tourist’s point of view, Lew & McKercher (2006) consider a local destination as the area containing products and activities that could normally be consumed in a daytrip from the heart of the destination. This definition suggests a reinterpretation of what is considered a tourism destination. When defining tourism destinations, it should be considered that, they actually operate as functional areas in terms of mobility of tourists for the consumption of attractions and services (Russo, 2008).