Ice Hotel

I've been living in Sweden for 5months, that was in 2004. With my cousin Cécile in December of that year we've made a fantastic trip to the northern part of Sweden, Kiruna, where we've been dogsledding and where we saw northern lights! That was amazing! I'll never forget that night where we were waiting in the night, freezing, for hours. Because nothing happened we came back inside our hostel and made us a cup of hot tea.

Until now this story has nothing exciting.

We sat down and here they came! Beautiful green lights, waving in the sky. Because we had no idea of what northern lights were supposed to look like we couldn't believe what we saw: was there a night club in the neighbourhood? We ran outside and tried to find the darkest spot in that small city. And then we stand there for a good hour. It's not like it sudden and disappears quickly after like a falling star, when you meet the proper conditions those things last very long. It was breathtaking!

After that, we learnt that for northern light to be seen it requires being above the polar circle, a very cold weather, a bit of wind and some solar agitation helps. I don't think we met all these requirements but we saw one!

Since then, I haven't been in the proper environment to see an other one (even though this year there have been exceptional solar activity and people have seen some in Northern Ontario - look at the size of Ontario and you'll understand).

Anyway, the small disappointment from that trip was that we went to early in the season and that we were unable to visit the Ice Hotel, north of Kiruna. Since then the idea of sleeping in an hotel entirely made of snow and ice has kind of obsessed me. In December 2009 we've even tried the IceBar in Stockholm to pretend we went there. That was just 20 minutes in a freezer with a vodka in a glass made of ice.

Until I discovered that there is one in Quebec city! And we finally got to sleep there last week-end! That was interesting/wonderful/worth the experience.

I've slept in the Ice Hotel before I turned 30!

We've learnt that the temperature is naturally kept at -5°C in the entire hotel (77 bedrooms, a chapel and a huge bar). It's entirely made of either ice or packed snow (no wood, no metallic backbone). Unfortunately this is not natural snow, neither natural ice: because fresh sky snow is to wet and doesn't pack well and because water normally freezes outside-in and engulfs air bubbles that makes it non transparent.

They have developed a process (with a small tube inside) that makes the water freeze inside-out, preventing any bubble to stay in, which makes it totally translucent.

This year theme was the northern peoples of Canada, with their myths and legends. It was like if we were in the Brother Bear Disney animated movie! Colourful, cold, mystical and beautiful.

And oh, I am so compassionate with the homeless people in Canada and everywhere else. It's so hard to sleep at -5°C after a sauna, a hot shower and in a 250$ North Face (-29°C) sleeping bag, I can't imagine how they do it.