Luxury Adventure

At the height of the Industrial Revolution, New York’s wealthy elite—J.P. Morgan, William Whitney, John Rockefeller, and Alfred Vanderbilt—bought large tracts of lands in the remoteness of the Adirondacks and built themselves “Great Camps,” sprawling collections of handsome log buildings with massive stone fireplaces. Six of these Great Camps still exist on the shores of Upper Saranac Lake, including Rockefeller’s camp, The Point, now one of the most exclusive lodgings in the country at $1250 to $2500 a night per couple, all meals included. The finest activity at the resorts is to jump into a canoe and paddle the placid waters of Upper Saranac, backed by the slopes of Ampersand Mountain. 
 

Inkaterra Reserva Amazonica sits in the heart of the Peruvian Amazon in a 40-square-mile private ecological reserve. In 2005, it opened to the public with 35 cabanas and an amazing treetop canopy walkway, a 1,135-foot-long complex of seven hanging bridges. Financed by the National Geographic Society and the World Bank, the walkway allows visitors access to the rare plant and animal species of the delicate treetop ecosystem. However, the highlight is sure to be the new Treetop Suite, connected to the walkway and standing 90-feet above the bush. Wake up and your morning coffee will be served with toucans.

Those of you who like their adventure lathered in luxury will want to know about the latest property unveiled by exclusive Singapore-based hotelier Amanresorts. Last week, Amangiri made its debut near Grand Staircase–Escalante National Monument in southern Utah’s canyon country. The 34-suite lodge blends into the surrounding desert landscape with natural hues and indigenous materials. Wake up with morning yoga, then spend the day hiking in the canyons with a naturalist, boating on Lake Powell, or staring in awe at the Vermillion Cliffs. Afterwards, reward yourself with an outdoor spa treatment.
 

Continuing with the sybaritic theme this week, I want to tell you about the addition of the new Viceroy Snowmass. Eight miles down the road from Aspen, Snowmass has always sat in the shadows of its far more opulent neighbor. Not anymore. The Viceroy, known for their beachfront locales in Anguilla, the Yucatan, and Miami, is opening a boutique hotel in the mountains on November 25th. This is the first hotel to open in Snowmass in over 20 years and is located in the new Snowmass Base Village. Enter the lobby and you’ll immediately spot the 90 foot high glass bar, soon to be quite the après-ski scene, along with an outdoor pool area where a ski lift runs directly above. Sounds like the prefect place to rejuvenate after a day on the slopes.
 

Those of you biking around Tuscany or enjoying the Palio horse races in Siena next year will want to know about the debut of Castel Monastero. Set in the heart of Chianti, a mere 20-minute drive from Siena, the boutique resort is perched on a hilltop, surrounded by olive groves and vineyards. The 76 rooms and suites are nestled within the walls of an 11th-century medieval village. Inside you’ll also find the first Italian restaurant opened by British chef Gordon Ramsay, the madman behind Hell’s Kitchen. For Castel Monastero, he has wisely scoured the countryside taking the finest Italian offerings—pecorino from Fossa, lamb from Zeri, onions from Certaldo, and the highly touted Chianina beef—to create a tantalizing menu. It doesn’t hurt that the restaurant overlooks a 15th-century piazza and the barrel vaulted wine cellar downstairs dates from the 13th-century. An added bonus is the ten treatment rooms in the spa and three outdoor pools.
 

Continuing with this week’s theme of new upscale lodgings around the globe, I want to introduce you to Dakota Mountain Lodge. Located at the base of The Canyons Resort in Park City, Utah, the Dakota is the latest offering from the Waldorf Astoria Collection, owned by Hilton. The 175 suites range from one to four-bedrooms, ideal for families. There’s also a new Golden Door Spa, featuring over a dozen treatment rooms to rub that weary body after days of skiing. Also on premises is the first outpost of San Francisco’s Spruce restaurants, which Esquire named one of the best new restaurants in 2008. So it looks like it offers the full package.
 

If your upcoming travel plans include hiking the Atlas Mountains or camel-trekking in the Sahara next spring, consider spending several nights in Marrakech. A former estate owned by King Mohamed VI inside the medina walls of the old city has been converted into The Royal Mansour Marrakech. Opening around April 2010, it sounds like the King hasn’t spared any expense. The resort is split into 53 individual riads or rooms, ranging in size from 1,400 to over 19,000 square feet. He hired the top craftsmen in the country to design the mosaic covered floors and wood furniture. He also persuaded 3-star Michelin chef Yannick Aleno of Paris’ Le Meurice to take the helm of the restaurant on-property. It’s all part of King Mohamed’s “Vision 2010,” an initiative to bring ten million visitors to the country next year to bolster the hospitality sector.
 

If you wander into the bar at the Mount Kenya Safari Club, you will not see Ernest Hemingway telling tall tales from a day of big-game hunting. Nor will you have to fight pet leopards for a seat at the bar. But in the club’s heyday in the 1960s, these things were commonplace. Hollywood heartthrob William Holden (Bridge Over The River Kwai, Network) and his partners, oil billionaire Ray Ryan and Swiss financier Carl Hirschmann, ran the place as the most elite private members’ club in the world. Membership was by invitation only and included Bing Crosby, David Lean, Charlie Chaplin, Steve McQueen, Conrad Hilton, Winston Churchill and the Maharaja of Jaipur. Holden, who fell in love with Kenya on hunting safaris in the 50s was known for his practical joking in the bar, such as snakes hidden in the bottom of a peanut tin. Yet there is more to this sybaritic retreat in northern Kenya than Hollywood magic dust left behind from years of raucous carousing. It is the sheer beauty of this stretch of land that sits at the base of Africa’s second-highest mountain, 17,057-foot Mount Kenya. Manicured lawns sweep down to a pool, past flower-filled ponds and then on to the slopes, where they climb for miles to the snow-dusted peak, known locally as Kirinyaga. The club is built directly on the equator, its line cutting straight through the main bar, following the curve of the national park before running into the seventh hole of the club’s small nine-hole golf course.

There will be no blogs the week of November 15th since I’ll still be in Africa. I’ll be back on November 22nd. Have a great week, filled with adventure!
 

The Maasai are best known for their mud huts. So it might come as a surprise that these tall warriors of southern Kenya have recently entered the hotel business. They have formed a joint partnership with a private safari company, Nairobi-based Art of Adventures, to open Shompole Game Reserve. Shompole is nestled on 35,000 acres of conservation land near the Nguruman Escarpment in southeastern Kenya. The resort only has six mega-sized guest rooms, which comes with private plunge pool and a sprawling lounge area. The main activity at Shompole is game drives, where guests travel through the bush in open-air Land Rovers accompanied by a Maasai tracker. The more adventurous can also go on game walks, sunset trips to Lake Natron to see the flamingos, or evening picnics in the bush.
 

When people find out that I’m a travel writer, they inevitably ask, “What’s your favorite trip?” It’s silly to distill the past two decades of work down to one locale so I try to evade the question. If they’re persistent, I’ll usually mention the Marquesas. In 1994, I took a 16-day cruise with my wife that ventured 750 miles north from Tahiti to the archipelago most distant from any continent. The only way to visit all six of the inhabited Marquesa islands was aboard the Aranui, an upscale freighter that offers air-conditioned cabins and three French meals daily. The ship’s main function, however, is to transport goods to the local residents. She comes bearing bricks and cement, pipes and tractors, fishing nets, medicines, and food, all the necessities for an isolated existence; and returns to Tahiti with copra, dried coconut meat that is processed into oil, soap, and cosmetics. 

Since there are very few adequate docks in the Marquesas, travelers go ashore in wooden whaleboats to meet the locals. Burly crew members guide passengers on and off these boats quicker than they can toss a sack of rice to each other. Obviously, this is no normal luxury cruise ship. There is no shuffleboard, no stage where entertainment continually bombards you throughout the day, and no dress code for meals.

In its place, you’ll visit the island Nuka Hiva, where a 22-year old sailor named Herman Melville jumped ship and wrote about his experience with cannibals in his first book, Typee. Paul Gauguin’s gravesite rests on the neighboring island of Hiva Oa. Sitting under a plumeria tree on a hillside over the bay, the stone is simply inscribed, “Paul Gauguin, 1903.” A three-hour cruise from Hiva Oa brought us to the verdant island of Fatu Hiva.  Here, you can take a ten mile hike into the stunning Bay of Virgins, the most majestic site of the voyage. Towering, storm-worn basalt rises from the ocean’s depth, forming a v-shaped buttress that’s illuminated by the sun’s yellow-green rays. In the distance, serrated ridges, cloud-piercing peaks and impassable gorges stand as a monument to the centuries of volcanic fires that formed this fantastic landscape. That sight is hard to forget.
 

Seattle-based Zegrahm Expeditions is best known for their naturalist-led small-size expedition cruises that venture to the far corners of the globe, from Antarctica to Iceland, Yap to the Azores. In 2011, the company plans to add active adventures to their excursions, featuring two 14-day land-based treks in Bhutan and Uganda. Scheduled from April 10-23, the Bhutan jaunt will be led by Asian-culture expert, Gary Wintz, and will include a hike to Tiger’s Nest, the most famous monastery in this high-altitude Himalayan kingdom, and Thimpu, Bhutan’s capital and main residence of the king. Uganda is slated for November 30-December 13, 2011, and will be led by Zegrahm field director Jonathan Rossouw. The itinerary includes two days gorilla trekking in the Bwindi Impenetrable Forest, visiting the large community of chimpanzees in Kibale National Park, and white water rafting down the Nile. 
 

Just the name, Abercrombie & Kent, evokes images of a mysterious Africa, a hidden continent where one goes searching deep into the bush to find gorillas and lions, only to be pampered at night in the most luxurious tents you’ve ever seen. Indeed, days of adventure and nights of utmost civilization seems to be a winning combination as A&K continues to attract such luminaries as Prince Charles, Bill Gates, and the Clintons. Not bad for a company Geoffrey Kent and his parents started on the front steps of their Nairobi, Kenya, farmhouse. New in 2011 are 15 Extreme Adventures. Drive your own 4x4 though the high dunes of the Sahara Desert in Morocco, hike on the largest glacier in Europe, Iceland’s Vatnajökull, sea kayak in Mexico’s Sea of Cortes accompanied by dolphins and whales, and climb up to the Everest base camp in Nepal. Other adventures are slated for Mali, Mongolia, Jordan, and Alaska.

(Photo by Marek Wykowski)