As travelers, our need for new and more extreme experiences has opened up a range of travel options that bogle the mind. For instance, overnight travel by train had always been available for rich and poor alike but when the Orient-Express came along, it took train travel to whole new, glamorous heights.
Today -like Lego blocks- you can build any unique hotel experience your heart desires or your mind can create. And we're not kidding. Don't have your own private plane? No problem. You can stay as long as you like in plane properties in Costa Rica and Sweden. Always fantasized about being a crane operator (listen, we don't judge here)... Well you and your significant other may love a romantic getaway for two in the fully functioning Dockside Crane Hotel in the Netherlands.
We're not in Kansas anymore, Dorothy...See below for more.
Planes, Trains and Cranes?
Fuselage City: Your own private plane in the Costa Rican jungle
This fully outfitted, meticulously detailed, two bedroom, Boeing 727 Fuselage Suite is the newest offering at Costa Rica’s Hotel Costa Verde, an eco-friendly hotel on a coastal rainforest bluff overlooking the Pacific beaches of Manuel Antonio National Park near Quepos. The refurbished vintage 1965 Boeing 727, in its previous life, was used by both South Africa Air and Avianca Airlines (Colombia) to shuttle jetsetters around the world.
Today, although the plane has been permanently grounded, plane-aholics can still enjoy its master suite featuring two bedrooms, a flat-screen TV and hardwood decks built over the wings. There are stunningly scenic Pacific ocean views everywhere and quick access to a jungle full of monkeys, exotic birds and other fascinating creatures.
Want more plane? Then visit Costa Verde's after-hours El Avion Bar, a bar and restaurant inside a decommissioned cargo plane from the Iran-Contra days. www.costaverde.com
Jumbo Digs: Welcome to the cockpit. Stay as long as you like
With all the security precautions after 9/11 you would never think you could enter a plane cockpit ever again. But Sweden’s Jumbo Hostel plane not only invites you to enter but to spend a night…or two. This Boeing Jet 747-200 is the world’s first “luxury” hostel with glammed out digs and a gift store all within the plane.
The Jumbo Hostel sits at the entrance of Stockholm’s uber-busy (almost 18 million travelers per year) Arlanda Airport, where it’s become not only a destination but a prime tourist attraction. Open for business since January of this year, you can book your stay at www.jumbohostel.com.
Choo... Choo!: An Express Ride to Glamour Heaven
Even before Agatha Christie made it a household name, the sumptuous, luxurious and glamorous Orient-Express had been transporting wealthy British travelers for years. Today, the Orient-Express offers a multitude of exotic train rides from London to Venice; from Singapore to Thailand; from Thailand to Vietnam and in Peru, from Cusco to the legendary Machu Picchu ruins. One can also take delightful day trips through the UK or Scotland.
The Orient-Express has almost singlehandedly defined luxury train travel (Quick, name another luxury train line!) with attentive personal service, gilded dining cars and indulgent and opulent cabins that convert from daytime seating to a luxurious bedroom by cabin stewards while you enjoy dinner.
Each cabin – Doubles and Suites - has its own bathroom with an original washbasin cabinet, soft towels and crisp linen. If you love trains, can you think of a better way to spoil yourself for a few days? We can’t.
Used to unload timber until 12 years ago, the Dockside Crane Hotel is today the ultimate vacation conversation starter. Stay here and you’ll have lots to tell your friends when you get back home. On arrival, adventurous couples will be taken by elevator up to the crane’s former machine room now a bedroom decked out with Charles Eames chairs, mood lighting, a large LCD flat screen TV and modern audio equipment.
And get this: Hop up the small staircase from the bedroom to the crane’s control room and you can maneuver the completely operational machinery in any direction you desire with wide windows for sweeping views. How fun is that?!
After that exhausts you, wake up the next morning and Viola! Breakfast is served by the hotel’s proprietors via the crane’s internal elevator.
If you love this experience then you may also want to stay at this company’s other two properties: A lighthouse and a lifeboat. Let the adventure begin…
