Innholdsfortegnelse for December 2025 - February 2026 i DestinAsian

THE COLLECTIVE Hunter St. Hospitality, the group behind some of Sydney’s most innovative dining spots, has upped its presence in the city’s oldest neighborhood with The Collective, set among the 19th-century sandstone buildings of The Rocks. Joining established restaurants Saké and The Cut Bar & Grill are three new connected venues that showcase Hunter St.’s forward-thinking culinary philosophy: The Dining Room, The Garden, and Tailor Room. The first — a refit of old nightclub The Argyle — offers caviar service, oysters, and premium cuts of meat, while The Garden, dotted with potted plants and olive trees, has a relaxed alfresco vibe that runs from breakfast through to nightcaps under the stars. An intimate space once used to store textiles, the 20-seat Tailor Room serves sartorially inspired cocktails — try the…

MIND-BODY Gone are the days when wellness at sea meant a windowless spa buried deep in the ship’s hull and a token yoga class at sunrise. Today’s cruise ships are reimagining well-being as a sensorial experience that unfolds in sunlight, salt air, and open horizons. The result is a growing range of holistic experiences that weave fitness, nutrition, and mindfulness into the rhythms of the ocean. The new Harper’s Bazaar Wellness at Sea program from Cunard exemplifies this shift. Available across the four-ship fleet, it gives guests the choice of three themed journeys — Relax, Recover, or Energize — that each blend Elemis spa rituals with curated menus, expert-led movement classes, and time built in for reflection. Even more immersive is Queen Anne’s Wellness at Sea Voyage, which debuts in…

The Kata Rocks Superyacht Rendezvous turns 10 Each December, a fleet of superyachts and sailing vessels gathers in a bay off the Phuket coast for the Kata Rocks Superyacht Rendezvous (KRSR), a muchanticipated social affair among the global yachting elite. Founded by hospitality management firm Infinite Luxury and hosted at the award-winning Kata Rocks resort, the KRSR is celebrating its 10th anniversary from December 11–13, 2025. This event brings together discerning yacht owners, luxury lifestyle leaders, and global brands in one of Asia’s most exclusive gatherings, and has witnessed the evolution of Phuket into a world-class hub for marine leisure and high-end hospitality over the past decade. The milestone anniversary edition will feature exclusive collaborations, returning partners, and fresh experiences that capture the essence of luxury, innovation, and connection—honoring the…

THAILAND Pattaya might not be everyone’s cup of tea, but the city’s newest resort, in the up-and-coming enclave of Na Jomtien, is set to win over even the most skeptical travelers with its refreshing blend of playful modernism and laidback luxury. Just two hours from Bangkok along an expressway that bypasses the bustle of central Pattaya, The Standard, Pattaya Na Jomtien (standardhotels.com; from US$210 a night) is the brand’s second Thai beach resort, lying, as it happens, almost directly across the Gulf of Thailand from its sister property in Hua Hin. Like the latter, this 161-room newcomer comprises a cluster of low, blocky white buildings — here softened by undulating facades — that nod to the mid-century modern style of The Standard’s original Los Angeles outpost. The retro flair continues…

AUSTRALIA Named for two of Australia’s most iconic rock formations, Uluru– Kata Tjuta National Park unfolds across a vast desert plain of red earth and spinifex grass in the arid heart of the Northern Territory. This ancient landscape is also home to the Anangu people, who for millennia have lived here in kinship with the land, passing down their knowledge and traditions through generations. Since the park was returned to Anangu ownership in the mid-1980s, tourism has been carefully regulated, with visits limited to daylight hours. Now, however, a new initiative will allow a lucky few to stay overnight on a five-day excursion with the Tasmanian Walking Company. Launching in April, the Uluru-Kata Tjuta Signature Walk (taswalkingco.com.au) is a guided 54-kilometer trek developed in partnership with the Anangu community. Groups…

It happened in one heart-stopping moment. Heeding the alarm calls of langurs, our small jeep convoy slowed to a stop in Gir National Park, hoping for a glimpse of the apex predator we’d all come to see. Then, suddenly, he appeared: a golden male Asiatic lion, emerging from the undergrowth with the unhurried confidence of a maharaja. Framed in the evening light, he crossed the sandy track and roared — 16 times. I counted. “Like all big cats, they have retractable claws and the ability to roar,” said Kamakshi Trivedi, the naturalist at the lodge where I was staying, while he explained how Asiatic lions evolved separately from their larger African cousins over tens of thousands of years. “But they have shorter manes that expose their beautiful large ears, as…

DEBUT She may be the newest addition to the Aqua Expeditions fleet, but Aqua Lares is no stranger to the high seas. Built for Soviet service in the 1970s, the sturdy icebreaking tug was refitted in 2016 as an ultra-luxury explorer vessel before her latest transformation into the boutique cruise line’s first ice-class superyacht. Now decked out with sleek interiors by Aqua’s design director Birgit Galli Zugaro and Milan-based studio Hot Lab, the 15-cabin Aqua Lares will launch ahead of the summer Arctic season in the warm waters of the Indian Ocean. Sailings through the inner and outer islands of the Seychelles — including the seldom-visited Aldabra Atoll — and onward to the shores of East Africa begin in February 2026. A 1:1 crew-to-guest ratio and niceties such as jacuzzis,…

Flying between Australia and the United Kingdom doesn’t sound like much of an adventure today — since 2018, Qantas has operated a non-stop Perth–London service that covers the distance in just 17 hours — but in the early days of commercial aviation, the journey was a true odyssey. Pioneered in the 1930s by Imperial Airways (a forerunner of British Airways) and Qantas, the route truly took off with the advent of the Short Empire flying boat, a long-range seaplane designed to link Britain with its far-flung dominions. Like the Qantas Coolangatta pictured above, these aircraft carried up to 16 passengers on overnight flights, complete with wood paneling, silver-service meals, and sleeping berths. Yet getting from Sydney to London was still an epic undertaking — 10 days with more than a…

PARIS The arcaded Haussmannian landmark at 2 Place du Palais-Royal has led many lives. Built as Paris’s first true luxury hotel for the 1855 Exposition Universelle, it later served for nearly a century as a grand department store before becoming an antiques emporium. Today, following a radical revamp by starchitect Jean Nouvel, the five-story complex is the new home of French fashion house Cartier’s Fondation Cartier pour l’art contemporain (fondationcartier.com), a 21st-century counterpoint to the Musée du Louvre across the street. Integral to the design is a fully modular structure Nouvel describes as both an “industrial cathedral” and a gigantic theater, with five movable floors that can be positioned at 11 different heights by a system of pulleys and cables, allowing for multiple configurations. Retractable shutters regulate the daylight streaming…

SINGAPORE The weekend downpour does little to thin the crowd at Singapore’s last surviving Teochew mansion. Curious visitors stream into the granitepaved courtyard — some with walking sticks, others shepherding restless children — as urban sketchers perch with pads and history buffs angle for shots. A few clutch cups of herbal ice cream or milk tea from pop-up food stalls. People on a docent-led tour pause to take in the details, their faces alight with wonder. A short stroll from the eastern end of Orchard Road, the House of Tan Yeok Nee (houseoftyn.sg) is stepping back into the spotlight after decades of obscurity. Its November reopening marked the first time the gazetted monument has welcomed the public since it took shape in the 1880s as one of the “Four Grand Mansions”…

So, where were these snow-cloaked mountains, exactly? The sun had barely tipped above the horizon when the wheels of our prop plane kissed the tarmac at Pantnagar Airport. I had boarded an hour earlier, bleary-eyed in Delhi, and watched the landscape below unfurl into an endless, chapati-flat patchwork of farms and industrial estates. A car was waiting at Pantnagar, and we drove north, past shanty towns and smoke-belching paper mills — yet the alpine peaks I’d imagined were still nowhere to be seen. Here in northern India’s Kumaon district, you don’t get anywhere fast. Taking up the eastern half of Uttarakhand, this little-visited region is wedged between Tibet and Nepal in the northeast, and the palace-dotted plains of Uttar Pradesh to the south. I’d come here to check out Indian…

At 8 a.m., the Thai national anthem hums from speakers strung to lampposts along the waterfront of Tha Uthen. Passersby and border guards stop and stand respectfully, peering across the murky waters of the Mekong to the far shore — perhaps a kilometer away, but another country nonetheless. Narrow boats on the Laos side soon swing into the mighty river. Their engines spit smoke as they plow a course through the slow, strong currents to Thailand. This morning there are three boats, crammed with passengers bound for the weekly market on the stepped embankment at Tha Uthen. They bring forest honey, bundles of foraged herbs and spices, frogs and the occasional squirrel, baskets of mush- rooms and odd tropical fruit. Rice and other goods can be much cheaper on this…