8 Over-the-top, Sexy Hotels

I've never been a fan of the cold. As a kid, my favorite part of skiing was the hot chocolate, and I relished blizzards for the snow days, not the snowball fights. So when I booked a trip to the Icehotel in northern Sweden, my family and friends were amused—and a bit concerned, especially when I got sick days before my flight. "You can't go to the Arctic with a cold!" my mother admonished. But I had good reason for wanting to sleep in a glorified freezer: As an environmental reporter, I was curious to see a place where people have turned snow and ice into a moneymaker, one that's spawned copycats in frigid spots from Canada to Romania. Conceived by Yngve Bergqvist, a river-rafting guide who wanted to lure visitors to the Arctic north during the winter, the Icehotel started out in 1990 as nothing more than a crude igloo. Now, it's a fanci­ful ice castle that's rebuilt every November with an unparalleled level of artistry—which explains why each winter 16,000 guests pay hundreds of dollars a night to sleep on a slab of ice and thousands more make the trek just to tour the rooms for the day. The 30 most elaborate suites are the handiwork of a team of artists—sculptors, painters, architects, even comic book illustrators—many of whom have never worked with ice before. Wielding chain saws and chisels, they spend weeks crafting frozen furniture while electricians install lights to provide an ethereal glow. Surreal? Exceedingly. This winter, German furniture maker Jens Paulus and American industrial designer Joshua Space created a space-station room straight out of Star Trek, with giant carvings of the sun and moon on opposing walls and twinkling lights in the ceiling. British decorator Ben Rousseau and graffiti artist Insa devised the Getting Cold Feet suite, with oversize high-heeled ice shoes beside the bed. Twenty-nine unadorned snow caves offer a somewhat less pricey and more purist experience. Since no hotel would be complete without a bar, the artists also sculpt a chic space where guests can warm their innards with an Icebar Jukkasjärvi, a mix of vodka, blueberry liqueur, blue curaçao syrup, and elderflower juice, sipped from a cube-shaped ice glass. Then there's the chapel, where designs etched into the ice walls resemble stained glass. About 150 couples tie the knot here each year, some brides bundled in snowsuits, others dressed in white wedding gowns, their teeth chattering as they recite their vows. When I arrive in Sweden, I'm surprised to find that the guests actually spend a lot of time in a pair of heated chalets that look like life-size gingerbread houses. The shower and bathroom are located in the one nearest the hotel—because, really, who wants to sit on a frozen throne? And the other contains the restaurant, where chef Richard Näslin dreams up such intriguing dishes as arctic char ice cream, which has a slightly salty, smoky flavor and is much more delicious than it sounds. After my dinner, wrapped in several layers of fleece and down, I waddle out to a tepee for a folk concert by native Laplander Yana Mangi. At the end of each song, the crowd responds with a uniquely Arctic ovation: muffled mitten clapping. My suite has a nautical theme, with walls curved into a frozen wave and an oval bed of bluish ice set beneath a clam-shaped headboard. Topped with a mattress and a reindeer skin, the setup looks snug. Almost. The temperature is a brisk 23 degrees Fahrenheit, and I'm still petrified I'll lose a finger to hypothermia, even in my head-to-toe winter wardrobe. I climb under the furry blanket, making sure not an inch of skin is exposed. Then I gaze through the slits in my microfleece face mask and marvel at the stillness. My breath comes in shallow white puffs. Soon, I'm fast asleep. The next thing I know, a hotel attendant is standing beside me with a cup of steaming lingonberry juice—my wake-up call. Amazingly, I slept through the night, giving new meaning to the expression "out cold." I wiggle my fingers and toes—they're tingly, but all there. Then I do what any sane person would: sprint to the chalet to thaw out in the shower and sauna. Most guests stay only one night, but I opt for a second. It's not to prove my mettle; I feel as if I've done that. Rather, I find my frosty alcove incredibly restful and therapeutic. Maybe the hotel should add an ice yoga studio next? Jukkasjärvi, 11 miles from Kiruna, 011-46/980-66-800, icehotel.com, from $400 for a snow room, from $535 for an art suite, both include breakfast and sauna. GETTING THERE A round-trip flight between New York and Stockholm on SAS costs about $700 in midwinter (flysas.com). From Stockholm, take a 16-hour train ride to Kiruna (from $44 round trip). The Icehotel is a $13 bus ride away. WHEN TO GO The hotel opens every year in early December and closes at the end of April. You have a chance of spotting the northern lights in December and January, but those are the coldest months—temperatures can dip to 45 below. WHAT TO PACK Think wool and fleece layers; avoid cotton, which can trap moisture and make you colder. The hotel supplies boots and hats. For details, see icehotel.com/winter/adventure/dress. WHERE TO SPLURGE Don't miss the guided hotel tour ($37 per person). And how about an ice-sculpting lesson ($75 per person)? Or a six-hour snow­mobile safari to see moose at their winter feeding grounds ($400 per person)? WHERE TO SAVE Tour the Icehotel by day, and then spend the night at Hotel Kebne in Kiruna (011-46/980-68-180, hotellkebne.com, from $100).

My little brother and I are in Ecuador to celebrate a historic date: This year, he's exactly half my age. Joseph, my father's son from a second marriage, was born when I was a senior in high school, and now he's a senior in high school. He's 17, a star chemistry student and punk rock drummer in Arkansas. I'm a novelist in San Francisco and the old man at 34. I'm excited to introduce Joseph to the thing I love most in the world—travel—with no dad along playing the mother hen. But here we are in the capital city of Quito, and I'm turning into a mother hen myself: My inclination is to make sure Ecuador is tinted, filtered, and cooled down before it hits him. This clearly can't last. Our plan is to hike El Altar, one of three volcanoes in Sangay National Park, a nearly 1,000-square-mile preserve in the Andes. The other two, Tungurahua and Sangay, are constantly erupting. (We like a challenging hike, but we don't dodge lava.) El Altar is extinct, and amateurs can scale it to a certain height without the use of hard-core gear like cables or crampons. Plus, it's June, so the weather should be dry. Known as Capac Urcu, or Almighty Mountain, in the local Quechua language, our volcano has nine jagged peaks rising between 16,500 and 17,500 feet that are arrayed like guard towers around a mile-wide crater lake. The Spanish, who ruled the country for almost 300 years, thought the mountain resembled a cathedral—hence its name. Among its peaks are Bishop, Great Nun, Devout Friar, and Tabernacle. There won't be any summiting for us—only pro climbers get that far. We're shooting for the lake, which (at about 14,000 feet) is no stroll around the block. It's almost as high as Mount Whitney, the tallest peak in the contiguous U.S. The main trick to any high climb is acclimatization, the $5 word for getting used to not having enough oxygen. Luckily, the cities of the Andes are so elevated that just sitting in them does the job. Joseph and I poke around Quito for a couple of days, happily exploring the jacaranda-shaded plazas and 16th-century churches of the colonial Old Town. In the evenings, we tap our feet to live jazz bands and sip caipirinhas at El Pobre Diablo. (Dad, if you're reading this, Joseph had only one drink, I swear.) We definitely feel the effects of the altitude: Even on small hills, we get winded and have to stop to catch our breath. Each time, I wonder how we're ever going to make it up the volcano. On our third day, Joseph and I take a bus south to the town of Riobamba, our launchpad for the hike. At Café Concert El Delirio, a restaurant in a stucco house where the revolutionary Simón Bolívar wrote a famous poem, we share a wonderful traditional Ecuadoran dish called arroz con camarónes (shrimp and rice cooked in a flavorful sofrito and served with avocado slices). Then it's back to our hotel, La Estación—clean and quiet, if not terribly memorable—for a 10-hour pre-trek rest. I wake up without feeling I need a shot of oxygen from an inhaler. Taking this as a positive sign, we hire Napoleon, the hotel owner, to drive us to Hacienda Releche, a guest ranch 15 miles away, where the trail to El Altar begins. Napoleon is short and thickly built like his namesake, and he's all smiles in his Levi's and blue baseball cap. He thinks it's just great that two American brothers are exploring Ecuador together. And he's so excited to be our impromptu guide that before we know it, we've taken at least 10 interesting detours. We see where lava from the 2006 eruption of Tungurahua mangled a bridge. We stand under a century-old avocado tree and meet a group of octogenarian potato farmers. Napoleon notices that my brother is feeling sick (although he doesn't realize it's due to his driving) and whisks us off to his weekend home, where he yanks a weed and boils it into a soothing tea. He quizzes us about our family, complains about corruption in Ecuadoran politics, gives us two pounds of raw cane sugar, and finally delivers us to Hacienda Releche, in the town of Candelaria, at about 1 p.m. The hike up is supposed to take two days: one to get to El Refugio, a set of five cabins owned by the hacienda that sit just below the crater, the second to reach the lake. According to Napoleon and our guidebooks, we should be able to make it to the cabins in four to five hours, meaning we'd arrive by 5 p.m. or 6 p.m. if we left right away. Or we could stay the night at the ranch and set out in the morning. I could read War and Peace on the veranda. My brother could go for a walk. We could play cards by the fire and get some sweet country sleep. We gaze up at the mist pouring off the surreally green mountains and the impossibly steep farms, which look like Nebraska would if a giant balled it up like a bedsheet. Now that we're finally here, I want to start climbing immediately. "What do you think?" I ask Joseph. "Let's do it," he says. The woman at the hacienda doesn't think it's a great idea but hands me a ring of keys for El Refugio anyway. I ask her which cabin to sleep in, and she says it doesn't matter because the setup is unstaffed and there are no other guests tonight. Any tricks to getting there? "Todo a la izquierda," she says. Stay to the left. "Do you want mules?" she asks. My brother and I laugh. This is a hike—why would we want mules? Starting out, we notice right away that the trail is actually a cow and mule path, and it's sopping wet. So much for this being the dry season. Footing is unpredictable. Sometimes the thick mud withstands my weight; other times, I get sucked shin-deep into the muck, and the freezing water brims over the tops of my hiking boots. To top it off, our backpacks are weighed down with nonessentials: cameras, extra clothing, War and Peace. After 20 minutes of tough slogging, we reach a marker that says El Refugio is...another seven and a half miles away. Joseph remains in good spirits. He bounds up the foggy hill and laughs when he falls. But several hours later, his pants and boots are soaked and his humor is fraying. I start to think about the things we should have done, like buy rubber boots in Riobamba and leave our big packs at the hacienda. And we should have stayed put for the night, maybe gotten to know the mules a little better. We break for a lunch of sweet rolls, apples, and a fresh, salty cheese called Andino that tastes a bit like feta. Resting on giant rocks, we try a Zen approach: El Refugio is where it is, and we'll get there when we get there. With new pep, we set off, marveling at the gorgeous canyon far below us and—in the occasional clearing of fog—the solitary cows on the hillsides. We pass a cowherd bouncing down the trail bareback on a mule. And every so often we hear the rumble of Tungurahua clearing its throat. If only I'd bought those rubber boots.... The refrain keeps going through my head. Hours later, my legs are caked with mud, and we haven't caught a single glimpse of El Altar. I know we didn't take a wrong turn, because there are no turns—just the same trail, zigzagging through the hills like a saw blade. Even though it's only 5 p.m., the light seems to be waning; I expected us to have at least a couple more hours of daylight. Feeling nervous, I take the lead and set an unforgiving pace. Joseph lags behind. And then he takes off his backpack and heaves it onto the trail. "You don't want your bag to get all wet," I scold him. "It's too heavy," he replies. We sit down to nibble on some of Napoleon's sugar. Suddenly, as if a switch is thrown, the fog lifts and the blue sky and bright sun glisten. We look out on the vast riverbed below us and then up through the steaming valley at an austere snowcapped ridge. "Capac Urcu," I say, awestruck. My brother snaps photos like crazy. "Would we call this volcano almighty?" he asks. "I think that qualifies," I say. He puts down the camera. "But it doesn't look very close." Ecuador, of course, is on the equator, where the days and nights are roughly equal in length. That means sun­down is not at 8 p.m. or even 7 p.m.—it's at 6:30 p.m. I can add another item to the list of stupid mistakes I've made today. "I've got an idea," I say, trying to sound cheery. In truth, my heart is racing. "Let's drop our big packs here and go find the cabins. We can come back and get them." I calmly put a few cookies and bananas into my day pack and tuck some bread and yogurt in my cargo pants. There's no way we're coming back for these bags tonight. We may never see them again. Soon it's pitch-black, and I wonder if this is what disaster is like: anxiety (are we doomed?) accompanied by mundanity (the sound of our boots plopping through the mud). I can see the headlines: "Older Brother to Blame in Puma Attack!" or "Mummies Really Dead Americans!" We keep seeing what we think are cabins on the hills in front of us, but when we get closer, we realize they're boulders. A light rain begins, and we stop to rest in the shelter of a tall, flat rock. "This wouldn't be the worst place to sleep," I say. Joseph is no longer speaking. But on we march. And on and on, until out of the darkness, a cluster of handsome little wooden houses appears right next to us. El Refugio. It's a surprisingly well-built camp. Even though our cabin lacks electricity and sheets—thankfully, we didn't ditch our sleeping bags—it has a kitchen, two fireplaces, and even hot water. We take showers, build a fire, and prepare a big spaghetti dinner. The beds are so much more comfortable than that rock would have been. Outside the front door in the morning, we finally can see where we are. The boggy dreamscape of the Collanes Valley is at our feet, and waterfalls tumble down mountain ridges on either side of us, forming dozens of creeks. Cows meander, chewing grass. The air smells as if it's been scrubbed clean. There aren't any other people up here today, and if it weren't for these cabins, I'd wonder if we were the first to ever make it this far. After a breakfast of bananas, yogurt, and instant coffee, we set off, plenty early this time, hopping over streams and spooking the cows. The crater looks close, but the walk across the meadow feels endless—it's an enchanted carpet that keeps extending before us. We stick to the left, as advised, and after about an hour reach the trailhead for the steep scramble up to the lake. In no time, we've climbed about 1,000 feet in elevation, stopping every few minutes to breathe and admire the amazing views. From this vantage point, El Refugio looks miniscule and the valley shoots out behind it like a green slide, twisting for miles all the way back to the Hacienda Releche at the bottom. Finally, huffing and puffing, we arrive at the crater rim, 14,000 feet above sea level, and look down into Laguna Amarilla, or Yellow Lake, which is actually more of a gray-green giant. We try to count El Altar's snow-covered peaks and identify the Great Nun, Tabernacle, and Bishop, but we can't see all of them in the swirling fog. Wind blows out of the crater with the roar of a jet engine. Joseph isn't given to spontaneous displays of excitement, but he reaches over and gives me an enthusiastic high five. "We made it!" he cries. He then carefully clambers down the slope to feel the ice-cold water with his fingers, and I sit on a boulder in a field of wildflowers to take in the craggy mountains encircling the lake. Every mud-filled step has definitely been worth it. Not only does my brother seem to agree, he's speaking to me again. GETTING THERE A round-trip flight between Miami and Quito in March costs about $450 on LAN (lan.com). The four-hour bus trip from Quito to Riobamba is $3.75 one way. WHEN TO GO Ecuador's dry season runs from about May to September. Although the skies are usually clear, be prepared for any kind of weather in the mountains. WHAT TO PACK A sleeping bag, hiking boots, waterproof pants, and a parka are musts. Rubber boots are definitely a good idea and are sold in Riobamba for $8. TOUR OPERATORS Julio Verne, a Riobamba-based company, leads three-day trips up El Altar with horses, equipment, meals, and English-speaking guides (Calle El Espectador 22-25 at Ave. Daniel Léon Borja, 011-593/3-296-3436, julioverne-travel.com, $240 per person). SOUVENIR A llama figurine carved from a tagua nut, the seed of a palm prolific in Ecuador. WHERE TO SPLURGE Celebrate completing the trek with a salt and volcanic ash exfoliation at the spa resort Luna Runtun in Baños de Agua Santa, a one-and-a-half-hour bus ride from Riobamba (Caserio Runtun Km. 6, 011-593/3-274-0882, lunaruntun.com, rooms from $207, exfoliation $55). LODGING La Estación Unidad Nacional 29-15 at Carabobo Rd., Riobamba, 011-593/3-295-5226, $15, includes breakfast Hacienda Releche and El Refugio Candelaria, 011-593/3-294-9761 or 3-296-0848, $12 per person. Meals are included at Hacienda Releche, but not at El Refugio—you must bring your own provisions. Reservations recommended FOOD Café Concert El Delirio Primera Constituyente 28-16 at Rocafuerte, Riobamba, 011-593/3-296-6441 ACTIVITIES Sangay National Park parquesangay.org.ec, $10 NIGHTLIFE El Pobre Diablo Isabel La Católica E12-03 at Galavis, Quito, 011-593/2-223-5194, elpobrediablo.com, cover from $5

There are sports fans, and then there are soccer fans. Every four years, when the best soccer teams on the planet go cleat-to-cleat in the World Cup, legions of their frenzied followers, decked out in wigs, wacky costumes, and clown makeup, turn the stands into a rollicking carnival. "The atmosphere is absolutely electric," says Jim Doykos, a snowboarding instructor who traveled to Massachusetts and New Jersey for games when the World Cup was held stateside in 1994. "Everyone's singing and waving flags." Doykos is no newbie to major sports events—he's been to the Super Bowl, the World Series, and the NBA Finals. "None of them," he says, "match the unbridled enthusiasm, the craziness that I experienced watching soccer." When the 2010 World Cup kicks off in Johannesburg, it will be blazing uncharted territory: Never before has the tournament been held in Africa. Not surprisingly, South Africans are beyond thrilled to be hosting an estimated half- million visitors, particularly given the isolation the country suffered during apartheid. (South Africa was banned from the World Cup and the Olympics until 1992, after the white-minority government ended apartheid.) After the tournament opens on June 11, 2010, the 32 teams play 48 round-robin games in nine cities—the locations are on the map at left. Then the competition moves into high-stakes mode: The top 16 teams meet in single-elimination matches, followed by the quarterfinals and semifinals. The final will be held on July 11 in Johannesburg in front of an expected crowd of 90,000—and a worldwide television audience of nearly a billion. Of course, you can't join the painted bodies in the stands without a ticket, and obtaining one is not quite as simple as going to Ticketmaster's website. Because of the tremendous demand, as well as concerns about counterfeiting, FIFA (Fédération Internationale de Football Association, the organization that runs the World Cup) is selling tickets in several phases on its website, fifa.com. The first session started February 20 and runs to the end of March; subsequent sale dates had yet to be announced at press time. To order, submit your name, passport number, e-mail address, and the matches you hope to see. Some tickets will be sold on a first-come, first-serve basis; the rest will be doled out through a lottery, and FIFA will notify the winners by e-mail at the end of each sale. If you're lucky, you then pay online, and the various venues in South Africa will hold your tickets until the matches. If your name doesn't come up, you can keep trying in future lotteries—and hope that the soccer gods are on your side. As in all stadium sports, tickets are priced according to desirability. Category 1 and 2 seats, the most expensive at $120 to $160 apiece for the round-robin games, are on the sidelines, where the views are best. Category 3 tickets are behind the goals, a slightly less advantageous place to sit, but close to the field. These are the cheapest passes available to foreigners, running from $80 for the opening round up to $400 for the final game. Only South Africans can buy Category 4 tickets, high in the rafters, starting at a bargain rate of $20. Since most fans traveling all the way to South Africa will want to take in more than one game, FIFA also sells special follow-your-team packages, which include tickets to three opening-round matches and guaranteed admission to at least one elimination game. You don't save by buying the package; the incentive is the certainty of getting a ticket to a later-round match. But the soccer is only part of the experience—the celebrations always carry on into the night. When South Korea upset Spain at home in the 2002 quarterfinals, American Andrew Ullman says he danced in drum circles in the streets and threw back shots of soju until the sun rose. "It felt like I had landed at the biggest party in the world," he says. Teams to Watch Brazil The most celebrated squad in the world: Brazil has won five World Cups—the most of any country—and is home to legendary Pelé and current superstar Ronaldo. Italy Led by talented players like Andrea Pirlo, Gennaro Gattuso, and Daniele De Rossi, Italy surprised many by taking the 2006 World Cup championship, its first title in more than 20 years. France Hovering at the top of the soccer rankings for the past decade, France captured the World Cup in 1998, courtesy of its famous midfielder, Zinedine Zidane. The team finished second to Italy in 2006. GETTING THERE Book airfare as early as possible; prices will rise as the tournament nears. Buses are the cheapest way to travel between cities—you can buy tickets online from Greyhound (greyhound.co.za). Watch your valuables on metropolitan buses and commuter trains; licensed taxis are inexpensive and a safer option. WHAT TO PACK Much of South Africa is at a high altitude, so don't forget to bring sunblock, sunglasses, and a hat. Face paint, rainbow wigs, and noisemakers optional. TOUR OPERATORS FIFA is allowing a few officially sanctioned travel companies to sell World Cup packages that include airfare, hotels, and tickets to games. It will announce a list of vendors at fifa.com in the coming months. SOUVENIR A vuvuzela, a three-foot-long plastic horn that South African soccer fans like to toot ceaselessly during games. It sounds like a foghorn, or, when blown in concert with thousands of others, a stampede of elephants. WHERE TO SAVE The next best thing to being at the games is joining the locals watching them for free at South Africa's public squares where giant screens will be set up. Or head to a pub for $1 Castle Lagers and a whole lot of hooting.