Innholdsfortegnelse for March 2023 - May 2023 i DestinAsian

BAA ATOLL When you overhear guests planning a return visit before they have even checked out, you know a hotel is at the top of its game. And those are just the sort of conversations you’re likely to catch over breakfast at Amilla Maldives Resort and Residences. Is it the cleanlined villas with their spacious decks and azure pools that have won them over? Or the food at Amilla’s seven restaurants? Or the ever-smiling staff who unfailingly greet you by name? The paradisiacal setting? The palm-shrouded spa? All these contribute to the property’s allure, no doubt. But there’s a lot more going on here besides. Situated on its own 23-hectare island in the Baa Atoll, a 35-minute seaplane ride from Male, locally owned Amilla first opened eight years ago. But…

As derring-do adventures go, it’s one thing to blithely sail into the flooded caldera of an active Antarctic volcano, but it’s quite another to then climb into a submersible and drop, Jules Verne–like, to the bottom of that caldera. Yet this is just one of the novelties dreamed up by luxury cruise lines in answer to the age-old question: how do you keep entertained a clutch of well-heeled passengers who have ponied up a small fortune to explore the icy waters of the Antarctic during the southern summer? For cruise junkies, news that Seabourn would be launching its flagship expedition ship, Venture, in mid-2022 with not one but two Cruise Sub 7-300s was greeted with the kind of enthusiasm normally reserved for the drop of a Beyoncé album. Designed and…

Undoubtedly one of the 20th century’s most recognizable buildings, the Sydney Opera House has a backstory with all the twists and turns of a theatrical drama. At first, visionary Danish architect Jørn Utzon struggled to get the sail-like roofs of his competition-winning design off the drawing board. Working closely with British engineering firm Ove Arup and Partners, he made a breakthrough in 1961, four years after construction began: the complex geometry of the 14 “shells” would be derived from cutouts of a sphere. But Utzon’s increasingly difficult relationship with the client — the New South Wales government — led to his resignation, and he quit Australia, never to return. It fell to local architect Peter Hall to finish the job. Fifty years ago this September, the Opera House finally made…

SYDNEY A neoclassical pile in Sydney’s Domain parkland, the Art Gallery of New South Wales has served as one of the country’s top cultural institutions for over a century, its thick sandstone walls enclosing a priceless collection of Australian and international art. But as modern museums go, this one was in need of an overhaul by the time the oughties rolled around. Hence the Sydney Modern (artgallery.nsw.gov.au), a US$246 million expansion that has been hailed as the city’s most significant cultural development since the debut of the Sydney Opera House 50 years ago. Almost doubling the Gallery’s exhibition area, the new structure is a cluster of limestone-faced pavilions by Pritzker-winning Japanese firm SANAA, with a public art garden that connects it to the original building next door. In contrast to…

NORWAY Here’s one for Mission: Impossible fans: Western Norway’s Lysefjord, where the climactic fight scene of the franchise’s Fallout film was shot, has a new trio of architect-designed cabins to check in to. The Bolder StarLodges (thebolder.no; doubles from US$495) join two smaller units set up by entrepreneur Tom Norland on a granite mountainside overlooking one of the country’s most picturesque fjords. The work of Oslo-based practice Snøhetta, the cedar-clad lodges, like their neighbors, are perched on concrete pillars to minimize their environmental impact and give the illusion of floating, an effect enhanced inside by large panoramic windows that look down 600 meters to the water. Cozy as a nest, the minimalist interiors come with midcentury modern furnishings and bathroom and kitchen fittings by Danish design company Vipp.…

Overlooking the Indian Ocean from its dramatic cliff-top perch on the Bukit Peninsula, Alila Villas Uluwatu is one of Bali’s most sustainably designed resorts, with sleek, contemporary architecture that harmonizes with its stunning setting. Tucked among 14 hectares of native gardens are just 67 spacious villas, each boasting its own cabana and pool and replete with recycled wood, bamboo ceilings, and creamy stone walls. Come mealtime, guests can head to poolside Cire restaurant for a Mediterranean-inspired menu of gourmet comfort food, or to The Warung for delicious Indonesian and Balinese fare. Sundowners are best enjoyed at the Sunset Cabana, a lattice-framed pavilion that overhangs the cliff and makes the perfect backdrop for selfies. After visits to the resort’s pristine beach—accessed by a cliff-hugging stairway of 600 steps—guests may want to…

On a bright December morning high up on the Grande Motte glacier, our group of snowshoers stops to admire the scenery. Below us, the Tignes ski area unfolds below the peaks of the Vanoise massif, home to some of the tallest mountains in the French Alps. From our vantage point at 3,460 meters, we can see clear across the wide treeless valley to snow-blanketed pinnacles with names like Aiguille de la Grande Sassière, Rochers de la Petite Balme, Pointe du Lavachet. Yann Greva, our trim, yellow-jacketed guide, says, “There to the north, that is Mont Blanc. And those mountains there, that is Italy. Just beyond that, Switzerland. It’s like being on top of the world here.” And with that, we unclip our snowshoes and clamber down a rope into a…

Best Cities & Islands After two years of playing second fiddle to Bangkok, Singapore has reclaimed its place as readers’ favorite urban destination, while Bali—no surprise here—is the No. 1 island, continuing a winning streak that began with the debut of these awards back in 2006. CITIES ISLANDS Best Cruise Lines With the cruise industry poised to make a strong comeback in 2023, readers weighed in on which operators they most looked forward to sailing with, giving Royal Caribbean top marks for a third year running. Best Airports & Airlines Despite the uncertainties of the last three years, one thing remains unchanged: Changi is the best airport in the region. Readers are equally steadfast when it comes to airlines in Asia Pacific, once again voting Singapore Airlines their carrier of…

Growing up surrounded by the concrete skyscrapers of Hong Kong, Esther Chow (estherchow.com) longed to experience the vast openness of Mongolia’s grasslands. The artist and educator finally got her wish on a visit to the country’s Gün-Galuut Nature Reserve, some 130 kilometers southeast of Ulaanbaatar. “I was met with an overwhelming sense of freedom when I arrived,” Chow recalls. “The lush green steppe stretched as far as my eyes could see under a magnificent blue sky.” Depicted here is a handful of felt ger (yurts) at the tourist camp where she stayed on the banks of the River Kherlen. “Backdropped by distant mountains and with sheep and goats grazing on the summer grass at their leisure, it was nature at its full glory. Time, worry, and stress were carried away…

BALI With its open “no-walls, nodoors” concept, Buahan, a Banyan Tree Escape (escape.banyantree.com) has sustainability in its DNA, from organic gardens and a zero-waste kitchen to the use of reclaimed timber from old jetties. Now, the lush four-hectare property in the hills north of Ubud has turned its attention to a smaller but no less magical wonder of nature: fireflies. Known locally as kunang-kunang, the light-emitting beetles have long been a familiar sight in the hills of central Bali, but their populations are dwindling due to widespread pesticide use and habitat loss. Buahan aims to help redress this with its Lentera Bumi (“Lantern of the Earth”) conservation program. Working with biologists from Denpasar’s Udayana University and local eco-consultancy Wise Organic, the resort has built a bamboo-framed breeding nursery where…

The diverse ecosystems of Ecuador’s Galápagos Islands are home to plant and animal species that can be found nowhere else on the planet—about 80 percent of the land birds one sees there are endemic, as are most of the reptiles and more than one third of the vegetation. The surrounding waters are equally unique and abundant. When legendary oceanographer Sylvia Earle first visited the remote archipelago in 1966, she remarked that it was “the sharkiest, fishiest place” she’d ever been. In 2010, the Galápagos Islands were chosen as one of Earle’s first Mission Blue Hope Spots, an initiative supported by the Rolex Perpetual Planet Initiative that identifies and safeguards marine ecosystems whose protection is vital to the health and future of the oceans. Last summer, ahead of the 25th anniversary…

AS IT CHUGGED ACROSS the turquoise waters of the Andaman Sea from the southernThai isle of Koh Phi Phi Don, a boat filled with divers was humming with excitement. It was mid-February, and the occupants couldn’t stop chattering about bamboo sharks around Koh Mah. Spotting the “right” kind of marine life is never guaranteed on a dive trip, but these divers were confident about close encounters with sharks, for good reason: they had packed their own. On board with them were four juveniles, raised at SAii Phi Phi Island Village resort’s Marine Discovery Centre, the biggest private conservation facility of its kind in southernThailand. Since 2021, its tanks have nurtured sharks, clownfish, and coral—all destined for reintroduction in nearby waters. Koh Phi Phi Don may be surrounded by a marine national…

We skirt the southern flank of Disko Island in a Targwa 37 motorboat, threading our way between icebergs as big as four-story buildings. They’re dazzling sculptures in white, electric blue, and cyan, sharply defined against the island’s steep volcanic cliffs. But size is relative in this part of the Arctic Circle. Even the most mammoth bergs are dwarfed by Disko, which the local Inuit call Qeqertarsuaq, or “Big Island” (it’s about the size of Cyprus). And Disko is a speck compared to Greenland proper, which at just over two million square kilometers is, by a vast margin, the world’s largest island. That’s the thing about Greenland: its sheer scale is difficult to grasp, not least the enormity of the ice sheet that covers about 80 percent of its surface area.…