The Ice Hotel in Arctic Sweden…Part Two of Exotic Arctic Exploration By Photographer, Author & Contributor Don Hurzeler
I had heard about the Ice Hotel in arctic Sweden for years, but never had a good excuse to visit it. My wife and I found that excuse when we decided to visit Lofoton, Norway and added a few nights at the Ice Hotel on to the end of our trip.
The hotel is open year-round, but the ice part is only available in winter. We went in February and the weather was mild…a low one night of 22 degrees F and an average temperature of 32 F, with little wind. The hotel is in two parts…the warm rooms and infrastructure facilities built in a normal manner for year-round use and the ice rooms built each year from ice blocks from the nearby Torne River. The ice rooms are all quite different, designed by different artists and all are magical to see.
About anything you can imagine has built out of ice…slides, viewing platforms, sculptures, “paintings” and art forms of all kinds. It is a wonderland for sure…we loved it.
Check prices on the normal travel/hotel sites and you will find some good discounts. However, it is not inexpensive. A night in one of the ice art rooms for two people is about $1500. The warm rooms are much cheaper…and much more comfortable. In the Ice Art Rooms, you are literally sleeping on a bed of ice with a great sleeping bag and whatever clothing you care to sleep in. We were not cold…but we were not comfortable. Had to be done, but one night was enough. The warm rooms were nice cabin type structures with heat and hot water. No heat and no hot water in the ice rooms.
They have an excellent website at icehotel.com.
By the way…you can stay in a warm room or at some other nearby location and pay a small sum to visit the Ice Hotel. You can see the outside for free, but you will want to pay to go inside the various rooms and structures and see the fantastic work. You will love it.
The food was good. We found that three or four days was about right. There was plenty to do in the daytime, like look for moose or exotic birds or just see the Lapland type landscape. We spent one night out all night viewing the Northern Lights.
The resort is nearby a sizable city, Kiruna…site of one of the largest iron mines in the world. We flew into Kiruna from Stockholm…and had a great time staying a couple of extra days in Stockholm…a terrific city.
We dressed warm…but noted that they had heavy winter clothing for either rent or to borrow (not sure which) that would see you through any conditions. We wore scrappers on our snow boots to decrease the chance of slipping on the ice…it is winter…there is ice.
We did not catch a great night for photographing the aurora, but got a few shots. We had just come from Lofoton Island, Norway…where we were spoiled with great aurora conditions. Still…lots of fun to see the aurora 150 miles north of the arctic circle.
One last thought…get a window seat on your trip to and from Stockholm or where ever you chose as your gateway city…perhaps Oslo. We flew over Greenland under perfect conditions and put our iPhones to work grabbing shots.
We live on the Big Island of Hawaii and are not used to winter conditions. But this year, we explored the cold…and loved it. Minus 40 degrees in Yellowstone National Park in January, about 32 degrees in Norway and Sweden and then as low as 16 degrees in the high deserts and mountains of Bolivia in March.
Drop me a note if you need specific information. I can be reached at djhzz@aol.com. Aloha.
Don and Linda are “lucky to live Hawaii” for the past seventeen years and claims to have never experienced an unhappy day on the island.
However, he does admit that he thinks of PV often…as it stands today and as it was. And what he misses most from those early days on the hill are growing up with a great set of friends and neighbors and the unimaginable freedom enjoyed in those days. He claims that he was raised like a free range chicken, able to hitch hike to get around town, to go out in surf that would scare any parent and to carry around a bow and arrow or small caliber gun to protect himself from rattle snakes when he hiked the canyons…not as a highly trained, accredited, licensed gun owner…but as a 12 year old kid whose dad treated guns like tools…there for protection and to be treated with respect and care.
And the best part of his freedom, no cell phones. Don was basically on his own and no one could track him or reach him until he decided to come home. Don always knew when dinner was served and he made sure to sneak in the door a few minutes prior. And, get this, dinner always included beer for Don…from about age 9 on. Or a milkshake made using 31 Flavors Baskin and Robbins ice cream from the Hollywood Rivera store mixed with crème de menthe. His dad felt the alcohol would whet Don’s appetite and help him grow from the skinny kid he was in those days. That did not work, but it did make him (temporarily) unafraid of orcas.
You can catch up with Don Hurzeler on Facebook. He is also on Instagram @donhurzeler. His book writing website is donhurzeler.com and his photography website is lavalightgalleries.com.
For a kid who grew up on the mean streets of Palos Verdes Estates, parented in a way that would land everyone in jail today, but supported, coached and loved…Don came out alright. A PV boy who fully understands how lucky he was that his parents built their dream home on a hill with a million lights sparkling below…or a fog bank a thousand feet thick.
To purchase Don’s books, please visit his Amazon page: