Winter 2023

DEPARTURES DEPARTURES BEYOND

WINTER 2023

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Chanel

Belmond

Belmond

The Boca Raton

T H E B O C A R AT O N . C O M | 8 5 5 . 9 6 9 . 2 6 0 7

Naptime looks different here.

The Boca Raton

Retire for the Weekend.

Baja Bay Club

Baja Bay Club

The beginning of everything.

Presenting a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. | www.BajaBayClub.com

EX PLOR E THE UNR I VA LED ™

Regent Seven Seas

The Emerald Isle is a feast for the senses, the road to Western Ireland a lush, green dream. Hiking in the wild Connemara countryside, a lavender-scented breeze ripples the reflection of Kylemore Abbey on Pollacapall Lough. You breathe in and savor the scene, another moment to treasure on this Northern Europe adventure.

START YOUR ALL-INCLUSIVE JOURNEY AT RSSC.COM CALL 1.833.517.1067 OR CONTACT YOUR TRAVEL ADVISOR

Scan the QR code to learn about our latest offers or visit RSSC.com/specials

Regent Seven Seas

DISCOVER THE UNPARALLELED DEWAR’S 37 YEAR OLD Double Double 37 Year Old is the fi rst blended malt created by Dewar’s, and the fi rst in a Collector’s Series of four new marques created to honor Scotland’s famous whisky regions. Dewar’s Double Double 37 Year Old, which honors the Speyside region, undergoes our unique 4-stage ageing process including fi nishing in Oloroso sherry casks that once held Aultmore single malt whisky. The result is a profile rich with notes of cinnamon, honey, and vanilla, with a finish that borders on decadent. Appropriately enough, every 375ml bottle of this rare, limited-edition whisky is presented with two exquisitely crafted Baccarat Massena tumblers to further elevate your tasting experience into a celebration.

Dewars

ENJOY RESPONSIBLY. ©2023. DEWAR’S IS A TRADEMARK. Imported by John Dewar & Sons LTD, Coral Gables, Florida. Blended Scotch Whisky – 48% ABV.

Dewars

Rivage Bal Harbour

A Once-in-a-Lifetime Oceanfront Paradise Perfectly poised on the most beautiful stretch of beach in the country, Rivage Bal Harbour rises from the lush tropical landscape, a beacon of modern living. This very limited collection

of light-filled villas in the sky offers a luxurious life immersed in nature, mere steps from the ocean on the last beachfront property to be developed in Bal Harbour.

SIGNATURE OCEANFRONT DINING • SUNRISE & SUNSET POOLS • HAMMAM & AQUA THERAPY • COCKTAIL LOUNGE • PICKLEBALL & PADEL TENNIS COURTS

Rivage Bal Harbour

Schedule a private preview. RivageBalHarbour.com 786.572.3079

Future residences located at: 10245 Collins Avenue, Bal Harbour, FL 33154 ORAL REPRESENTATIONS CANNOT BE RELIED UPON AS CORRECTLY STATING REPRESENTATIONS OF THE DEVELOPER. FOR CORRECT REPRESENTATIONS, MAKE REFERENCE TO THIS BROCHURE AND TO THE DOCUMENTS REQUIRED BY SECTION 718.503, FLORIDA STATUTES, TO BE FURNISHED BY A DEVELOPER TO A BUYER OR LESSEE. RIVAGE BAL HARBOUR CONDOMINIUM IS DEVELOPED BY CARLTON TERRACE OWNER LLC (“DEVELOPER”). THE COMPLETE OFFERING TERMS ARE IN A CPS-12 APPLICATION AVAILABLE FROM THE OFFEROR. FILE NO. CP23-0060 This offering is made only by the Developer’s Prospectus for the Condominium. Consult the Developer’s Prospectus for the proposed budget, terms, conditions, specifications, fees, and Unit dimensions. Sketches, renderings, or photographs depicting use of space, design, furnishings, lifestyle, amenities, food services, club services, rental services, hosting services, finishes, materials, fixtures, appliances, cabinetry, soffits, lighting, countertops, floor plans, or art are proposed only, and the Developer reserves the right to modify or withdraw any or all of the same in its sole discretion. No specific view is guaranteed. No specific use of space is guaranteed. Pursuant to license agreements, Developer has a right to use the trade names, marks, and logos of: (1) The Related Group; and (2) Two Roads Development, each of which is a licensor. This is not intended to be an offer to sell, or solicitation of an offer to buy, Condominium Units to residents of any jurisdiction where prohibited by law. 2023 © Carlton Terrace Owner LLC, with all rights reserved.

Uniworld Cruises

UNRIVALED EXCELLENCE ON THE RIVERS because you deserve the best

From the moment you step onboard our one-of-a-kind, destination-inspired river cruise ships, you’ll notice the Uniworld difference. No request is too large, no detail too small. Every expectation is exceeded, every destination is uniquely experienced. Our mantra is simple: adore each guest and deliver only the best, because you deserve it.

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Travel through the heart of Europe, Egypt, Peru, India, or Southeast Asia, with authentic experiences awaiting you at each stop.

Everything you could ever need is included, from delicious cuisine to premium drinks, daily excursions, and so much more.

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The idea for Departures Beyond started with a creative prompt wellknown to any editor: What stories might surprise and engage our audience? In our case, however, the question was even more complicated because you, our readers, are already familiar with much of the best of the best the world has to offer.

The exercise quickly led us away from the tangible to examine the experiential.

It is well-studied that investing in experiences, rather than things, delivers the greatest emotional return. Here, we offer a collection of superlative global experiences that push the edges of

nature, culture, or genuine physical limitations. In their own way, each expands the boundaries of personal perception and, as many of the writers within these pages recount, provokes a reexamination of reality and one’s place within it. Experiences like these, I was reminded, provide the chance to freeze time by engaging us fully in the present.

As Sir Richard Branson reveals to us in his meditation on space travel, they also often inspire what’s next because they help to expand our imaginations, to dream a little more recklessly, to push ourselves a little bit further, to go … beyond.

Intro

S K Y E PA R R O T T EDITOR-IN-CHIEF

Art direction by Ramdane Touhami. Design and typefaces by Agency Art Recherche Industrie.

To bring this special publication to life, we expanded our collaborators beyond the Departures editorial team.

We would like to extend a special thanks to Ramdane Touhami and ARI for their partnership on design, as well as Polina Aronova-Cahn and Yasha Wallin for the critical roles they played in its creation.

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On the cover: Photograph courtesy of White Desert Antarctica by Andrew Macdonald

FOREWORD

Mandarin Oriental

Worldwide

WONDER OF ONE’S OWN

When viewed alone, the world’s most traveled-to places take on a transcendental dimension.

W O R D S B Y S K Y E PA R R O T T

F

—

I L LUS T R AT ION BY A N N A B E L B R I E N S

Small Feature / World Wonders

or a period in my 20s, I had incredible access to all sorts of interesting art events. I worked for one well-known artist, my boyfriend’s father was another, and I found myself in rooms I had no business being in, spaces that, even through the blasé lens of youth, I recognized as being very, very special. Reflecting on these experiences now — long formal dinners, smoky parties, hours spent sitting cross-legged on the floor sifting through the archives of art legends — one night still stands apart from the others.

After an opening in Düsseldorf, Germany, following a dinner at a collector’s home, a few of us took a private tour of the city’s modern art museum. It was close to midnight, and the museum was closed. Several women, myself included, had taken off our heels. There were fewer than 10 in the group, one being the curator.

As we walked through the silent galleries, I fell into step with him, and in each room, he told me about the works and how they fit together. The museum was so quiet I could hear my bare feet sliding across the floor as I got a personal rundown of the collection.

I have always remembered it — how sumptuous it is to have such an intimate experience of a public space.

To me, that kind of access remains the epitome of luxury.

As you may imagine, since I have been leading

Departures, I have had the pleasure to experience moments that bring back the feeling. And I seek these opportunities out. Any invitation that involves an intimate tour of a museum or monument? Count me in. In the past few years, that’s included entry to the Louvre while closed, thanks to Cartier; a peek into the jaw-dropping private archives of Gucci and Prada; and a visit to both Hermès’ and Louis Vuitton’s ateliers to watch artisans handcraft their products. It has also meant a stay at Airelles Château de Versailles, Le Grand Contrôle, the only hotel on the grounds of the renowned seventeenth-century palace. Each night, as the château closes and a mass of visitors are ushered out, hotel guests are gathered and ushered in, given intimate tours, including a peek into Marie Antoinette’s personal chambers, set behind a hidden door in her legendary bedroom.

But the moment that truly stands out from that tour was in the Hall of Mirrors. I had last been to Versailles on a school trip, and I remember being shuffled through its grandest room in a long, single-file line. This was quite different: I was in a group of eight, and as the guide moved to the next room, I stayed behind — entirely alone in the famous hall. I spun in a full circle, the mirrors reflecting just themselves and me. It was so quiet the only sound was my own breath.

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Bespoke concierge companies such as Kensington Tours and GR8 can arrange private access to everywhere from Angkor Wat to the Sistine Chapel.

Small Feature / World Wonders

Clockwise from left: Angkor Wat, Paws of the Sphinx, Sistine Chapel, Taj Mahal, Louvre Museum

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In

Nature

THE LONG RUN WORDS BY DR. BARBARA STURM

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PHOTOGRAPHY BY MITCH EPSTEIN

Dr. Barbara Sturm reveals how a combination of nature and nurture has the power to lengthen our lives.

A

Sturm / Europe

s a culture, we’ve become increasingly interested in longevity — both the desire to experience longer, fuller lives and to live optimally during them. As a doctor, I constantly work with leading scientists around the world to develop new ways to improve health and longevity on all levels, not just for the skin but also for the body. My anti-inflammatory philosophy plays a vital role: It includes leading a balanced lifestyle by getting adequate sleep, enjoying a healthy diet, reducing stress, taking supplements that protect the skin and body against oxidative stress, and more.

Employing breath work, taking ice baths or cold showers, and spending time in nature are also antiinflammatory practices. Studies have shown that being immersed in nature is amazing for us: Forest scents can influence numerous metabolic processes and have the potential to lower inflammation, relieve anxiety, and boost serotonin levels. I’m also a huge advocate of wellness therapies ranging from red light therapy and ear seeding (a form of acupressure) to IV therapies, lymphatic drainage massages, and services such as my Exoso-Metic Growth Factor Facial. Exosomes contain a variety of growth factors including proteins, peptides, lipids, RNA, and DNA,

which help encourage skin regeneration. Replacing exosomes is an effective anti-aging treatment — it’s the future of skincare.

I talk to scientists every day and love to get involved in discussions and learn more about science and longevity. At a recent workshop I hosted, I particularly enjoyed hearing from leading cellular health expert Dr. Nichola Conlon and internationally renowned beauty and skin specialist Nilam Holmes on the future of skincare technology, exosome therapy, and biohacking. I also had the opportunity to lead an anti-inflammatory and antiaging masterclass with the founder of Eat Burn Sleep, Yalda Alaoui, and Dr. Tamsin Lewis in which we discussed the impact of lifestyle, diet, and wellness for optimal skin health. Additionally, world-renowned osteopath James Davies and the author of the bestselling book “Sleep,” Nick Littlehales, hosted a masterclass with me where we delved into the benefits of innovative antiaging approaches and the power of sound sleep.

Their insights help me advance the most comprehensive procedures for my patients and bring us closer to understanding the path to a long lifespan: a path paved with lots of sleep, a connection to nature and ourselves, and holistic treatments for our internal and external prosperity.

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Dr. Barbara Sturm is an orthopedics specialist, aesthetics expert, and anti-inflammatory pioneer whose spas can be found in seven locations worldwide and whose award-winning skincare line is available globally.

A Lange & Sohne

LIMA,

AN

PERU

ARTFUL TABLE

At the world’s best restaurant, a 16-course journey takes diners from the Andes to the Amazon.

WORDS BY NINA RENATA ARON

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P H O T O G R A P H Y B Y S K Y E PA R R O T T

Dining / Peru

A

rriving at Central — the jewel in Lima’s dazzling gastronomic crown — I’m already aware of the restaurant’s legendary reputation. But I’m entirely unprepared for the unparalleled creativity of its offerings, all the more so given the restaurant’s modest appearance: set back, almost hidden, on a busy avenue in the capital’s hip Barranco neighborhood. Its interiors are muted and serene, but this neutral palette is a clever foil.

Central’s 16-course tasting menu celebrates Peru’s biodiversity with plates of vibrant colors and astonishing flavors, each dish inspired by a particular altitude. As I eat, the elevation rises, taking us from 66 feet below sea level to more than 13,000 feet above it, stopping in the Andes, the Moray ruins, the Sacred Valley, and the Amazon rainforest. Every plate is a

work of art, painted in richly evocative flavors. One seafood course served with algae foam, for example, tastes like the purest essence of the sea and pushes the boundaries of the familiar. By the end, I’ve consumed something delicious in every conceivable hue and texture. Then comes the final dessert: cacao in an array of experimental preparations as varied as the country itself.

It comes as no surprise when the restaurant is voted the world’s best shortly after my meal there, a meal that was more like a story: absorbing, rich in detail, lingering.

As husband-and-wife chef duo Virgilio Martínez and Pía Léon tell me, the journey is designed to impart a felt sense of the country’s landscape and its art. “You’re going to get an education about Peru, our culture, our emotions,” says Martínez. “And the feeling that you want to return,” adds Léon.

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Central’s ethos is rooted in Peruvian cooking techniques, using plants indigenous to the country, and a current menu that incorporates over 250 ingredients.

In 2023, the fine-dining establishment topped The World’s 50 Best Restaurants list.

Buccellati

CALIFORNIA,

USA

PAIN WITH GAIN Laird Hamilton and Gabby Reece advocate extreme performance training of the body in service of the mind.

W O R D S B Y P O L I N A A R O N O VA - C A H N

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PHOTOGRAPHY BY ANNE MENKE

Body + Mind / Malibu

I

t’s a Saturday morning in Malibu and you’re waist-deep in a swimming pool. You’re handed weights — heavy ones — and told to wade in further. “Inhale, then go under,” you’re instructed.

Your heart bangs in your ears at the decibel of a jet engine and the rate of a jackhammer as you push your body below the surface. Suddenly panic turns to focus. Your objective: to reach the opposite side. Everything goes quiet. Your fear dissipates when you realize you’ve arrived.

No, this is not a dream. The source of this stress acclimation is Laird Hamilton and Gabby Reece’s XPT Experience, where — for three boundary-pushing days in Kauai, Costa Rica, or the couple’s home in California — a select few can train alongside the legendary athletes.

Personally developed by Hamilton and Reece, the XPT program is rooted in three foundations — moving,

breathing, and recovery — which teach you how to push your body in service of the mind. As Hamilton explains, “If you want a rosebush to bloom, you prune it.”

High-intensity cardio is designed by Reece: 12 stations, two exercises, three rounds each. Through 72 sets, challenge and accomplishment are your state of flow.

Breathing, the kind that expands the lungs to capacity, is guided by rhythmic instructions. It loosens, then unbinds, tightly knotted emotions from your consciousness.

Recovery comes next, but not the passive kind.

You plunge into an ice bath to shock your nervous system. Stay for three minutes, or five if you can stand it — then drop into the sauna’s 200-degree dry heat.

Your system thermoregulates, back and forth, cold to hot, for 90 minutes. “The rosebush probably doesn’t like to be pruned, but it makes flowers as a result,” Hamilton concludes.

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Hamilton and Reece’s next three-day XPT Experience takes place in Kauai in February 2024, followed by another in Costa Rica in May 2024.

Body + Mind / Malibu

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Gabby Reece weight training as part of her and Laird Hamilton’s XPT program

London,

UK

QUILL AND QUIRK W O R D S B Y M E G H N A PA N T

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ILLUSTRATION BY ANNABEL BRIENS

London Behind everyStorytellers life is a story, and/Master Storytellers is here to pen it, closet skeletons and all.

M

ost of us long to be the hero of our own story. Whether chasing angels or fleeing demons, we make sly cuts and embellish dusty facts to weave an enchanting saga. Thanks to Master Storytellers, who can write your life story into a biography, that saga can transform from the realms of the ordinary into an extraordinary mosaic of quirks and quests, no matter where you’re from or what you do.

Master Storytellers is a revolutionary concept.

Penned by bestselling, internationally acclaimed authors, the enigma of human existence unfolds in intriguing tell-alls for everyone from business titans to war veterans and beloved family members. It’s written how you always imagined it would be told, but never thought it could be, and all within 10 to 12 weeks.

“Not everyone can climb Everest or survive a plane crash, but just because your journey may be less dramatic doesn’t mean it’s any less meaningful. I reject the view that only those who have achieved greatness

or experienced a profound event are worthy of having their life story written,” says Nick Boulos, who founded Master Storytellers after regretting he never learned more about his much-missed grandmother.

Imagine: You walk into your own book launch to a roar of applause. You read from your memoir, sign copies for friends and family, and beam for the celebration that will catapult you out of the forgotten recesses of folklore and into the permanent etch of familial legacy. Is there a better way to be immortalized? Or to ensure that those we love are never forgotten?

There’s also something therapeutic, almost liberating, about not glossing over darker moments but embracing them. Like Boulos’ 80-year-old client who insisted her final chapter be about her death, describing her passing in vivid detail as though it already happened.

So, move over, Sherlock — the real story is not afoot in London’s foggy streets but hidden within the closets of family history, where biographies dangle like treasured coats, each with its own set of intriguing tales and secrets.

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The Master Storytellers process begins with a consultation and, depending on the client’s wishes, can develop into a memoir, a tale of travel and adventure, a professional success story, or anything in between.

BIRTHPLACE OF stories & LEGENDS Raffles

R A F F L E S L O N D O N O P E N S AT T H E O W O SINGAPORE BALI UDAIPUR SEYCHELLES MALDIVES CAMBODIA JAKARTA MANILA HAINAN SHENZHEN MACAU ISTANBUL DUBAI MAKKAH DOHA WARSAW PARIS BOSTON LONDON

San

IN VINO

francisco,

usa

VERITAS

An expert sommelier explains how a new generation of vintners is making wine for and of the future.

WORDS BY THATCHER BAKER-BRIGGS

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PHOTOGRAPHY BY FLORENT TANET

Future of Wine / SF

W

ine is no longer seen as something just to drink — where it’s from, who’s producing it, and how they’re making it have become increasingly important to oenophiles of all persuasions.

And it just so happens that some of the most renowned winemaking regions in Europe — think Burgundy, Champagne, and Piedmont — are experiencing one of the largest shifts the wine world has ever seen. As a new generation takes the reins at renowned domaines, it’s driving a wave of farming and production innovations that respond to the planet’s changing climate. This new guard is showing that adaptability is key, as is the importance of healthy farming, incorporating practices such as growing taller vines with more leaves to protect grapes from the sun and recognizing

that chemicals aren’t the way forward: Happy vines equals happy grapes equals happy wines.

Advancements in distribution are also apace: As the world moves faster, winemakers are cultivating wines that are more accessible in their youth, leading to new energetic flavor profiles. And the timing is perfect: The demand for small-production, properly farmed wines has surged and is now one of the most sought-after styles.

It’s the reason I wanted to start a platform to introduce collectors or aficionados to the next generation of winemakers and to help them acquire hard-to-find bottles.

For those accustomed to classic wines produced in Europe or domestically, it couldn’t possibly be a more exciting moment to try offerings from new winemakers who embrace traditional styles yet are revitalizing them with youth and energy. They create wine that dances on your tongue; the aromatics just pour from the glass.

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Thatcher Baker-Briggs is an expert sommelier with over 16 years of experience in Michelinstarred hospitality. He’s also the founder of Thatcher’s Wine Consulting and Thatcher’s Wine.

VERSAILLES,

FRANCE

SCENTS OF

MEMORY

Osmothèque archives the history of perfume in traces and bottles.

WORDS BY SUZY NIGHTINGALE

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PHOTOGRAPHY BY CRISTA LEONARD

Kerléo explains. The archive’s 4,000-plus scents are carefully preserved in smoked glass flacons to protect them from light and climate-controlled to 12 degrees Celsius. They’re identical but for their labels and housed in fridges that emit a constant low hum, as though the bottles contain not only the perfumes but also the whispered voices of those who’ve worn and adored them.

Many of these are scents synonymous with emotional recollections; others are ancient, such as the fourteenthcentury L’Eau de la Reine de Hongrie, the first European fragrance made with alcohol, created for Queen Elizabeth of Hungary — a wellness tonic that gave rise to citrus-fresh, herb-infused colognes.

Beyond storing these perfumes of the past, the Osmothèque is also where renowned “noses” secretly resurrect long-lost fragrances using one of the largest collections of raw materials that are no longer available on the market, usually because they became prohibitively expensive or unethical to produce. Here, the archive’s expert team can match an older fragrance that has arrived with just a trace left in the bottle, or recreate one from a surviving formula, drop by drop.

Consequently, master perfumers and their protégés pace the building’s hallways. Passing the occasional public visitor who’s managed to secure an appointment, they mix with contemporary perfumers who conceive fragrances of the future at the Osmothèque’s school, the most prestigious perfume school in the world.

Perfumers I’ve interviewed in the past have also cited the memory of their mothers kissing them good-night as an olfactory epiphany that shaped their career — a remembrance they try to capture with each new creation. But any of us who’ve been temporarily paralyzed by a passerby wafting something (or someone) from our past will understand the emotional power of scent, defining the Osmothèque as both a museum and a time machine.

Small Feature / Tracing Scent

A

short train ride from Paris, along the tree-lined Rue du Parc de Clagny in Versailles, lies a museum of living memories. Hidden from the hordes visiting the nearby palace, a surprisingly modernist building surreptitiously houses the fragrant recollections of millions: the Osmothèque.

My own scent memories began in the crib — my mother has always smelled wonderful. Recognizing her Clinique Aromatics Elixir on someone else had me bursting into homesick tears on my first day of college. It was then I realized the power of perfume, and that I wanted to dedicate my life to exploring it.

The Osmothèque was founded in 1990 by an even more dedicated cognoscente, legendary perfumer Jean Kerléo, as a living fragrance archive. “We chose the name from the Greek osmí (scent) and thíki (storage),” Private tours of the Osmothèque can be booked through the museum with a staff member or expert perfumer; individual perfume sessions are also offered.

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Small Feature / Cave

34

Quang

Binh

Province,

VIETNAM

NO PLACE ON EARTH

Hang Son Doong cave serves up an equal parts wild and magical subterranean adventure.

WOR DS & P HOTO G R A P H Y BY R A M DA N E TO U H A M I

I Small Feature / Cave t all started in my Paris office. We were looking for the planet’s most impressive mountain panoramas when my friend Leo came to me with a video about an underground universe: Hang Son Doong. Located in the middle of Vietnam, about 300 miles from Hanoi, and discovered at the end of the last century, it’s the world’s largest natural cave. It has its own ecosystem, an internal rainforest, and an underground river that, to this day, no one has found the end of — or so it’s believed. I’m not very wise, so, without really understanding what I was getting myself into, I said, “Let’s go there!”

To limit environmental damage to the cave, provincial authorities only allow a handful of visitors per year, but after a few hopeful calls we secured a spot for July 27, 2023. I didn’t read books about the cave, I didn’t watch any other videos — this was my first mistake. As the date drew closer, I received a questionnaire. Am I claustrophobic? Moderately. Do I fear heights? Reasonably. Am I in good physical shape? Fairly. I often walk in the beautifully rough mountains surrounding my Swiss hotel. How much harder can this be? I thought.

Second mistake.

The trip took shape quite quickly, and soon I was on my way, traveling first from Paris to Tokyo. It was there, in the airport, that I looked at my boarding pass.

It revealed the name of a city I dreamed of as a kid: Hanoi. There, we indulged in the worst pizza I’ve ever had — a slice of bread, ketchup, and cream cheese. Leo

Hang Son Doong opened to tourists in 2013 and can be explored through Oxalis Adventures, which leads groups of 10 on six-day, five-night trips.

and I shared a nervous laugh, half disappointed by the pitiful feast, half feeling the dread about our upcoming adventure creep in. As we later discovered, our meal was an anomaly. Anthony Bourdain was right about Vietnam being the best place on Earth for food.

Our trepidation about the cave, however, was entirely justified, with it far surpassing our nervous expectations. On our first night, Debbie, a 63-year-old former nurse who organized the trip and fears nothing, told us of snakes, humidity, leeches; then took us for a fantastic dinner before our last night of rest — belly full and mind on alert.

The next day, a car dropped us in the middle of the jungle where we paused, clothes drenched from the humidity, aware that something exceptional was about to happen. I can’t tell you much about the following days in the cave as it’s really a journey one needs to have for oneself, but I can tell you this: The expedition was the most dangerous thing I’ve done: it was also one of the best experiences I’ve had in my life. As we walked for what seemed to be an endless night, we discovered a new planet with its own rules, animal life, and climate.

Hang Son Doong gives you an idea of what the world was like before humanity, and that is a magical feeling like no other.

Was it easy? No. Should you do it? If you’re in good shape and can master your fears, run for it. Risk your life. Along with everything else, it makes for an exquisitely good anecdote.

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Antarctica

THE WEIGHT OF ICE A travel writer reflects upon the improbable beauty and brutality of Antarctica.

A

bout once a month, I have an awkward conversation with a cab driver. I live in Glasgow, Scotland, a city where people often talk to you — even when you’d prefer they didn’t — and cab drivers are among our most insistently garrulous residents. When they inevitably ask what I do and I tell them I am a travel writer, their next question is usually something like: “Go on, then, where’s your favorite place?”

My answer depends on my mood. But if I’m being honest, it is, and will always be, Antarctica. This is awkward because of its nature: unknowable and curiously distant. For the Glaswegian cabbie, I may as well say I have a soft spot for the southern hemisphere of Jupiter. And yet it is true — I like a good many places around the world, but since I first laid eyes on the Seventh Continent 14 years ago, I’ve been in love.

Back then, onboard a now-defunct converted Chilean naval ship, I met the continent as many people do: emerging from a cataract fog at the Antarctic Peninsula, three days after leaving the unlovely Argentinian port of Ushuaia. On the horizon, I couldn’t tell if I was seeing a cliff, an island, or an iceberg, but there, unmistakably, was a vast frozen barrier unlike anything I’d ever seen.

Standing on the deck of that old ship, the polar wind came at me with a knife, and some new fortification began building inside me. Wildlife — beyond count and compare — would soon join us, but before the penguins and the seals, Antarctica’s landscape began my undoing.

The planet’s highest, driest, windiest continent is often portrayed as a bleached void. That part does exist — a huge polar desert surrounds the South Pole — but the

overwhelming majority of visitors stick to Antarctica’s wild coasts, where fjords and mountains vie for attention above frozen seas.

There are designated landing sites around the Peninsula, mostly chosen for their resident creatures, but also simply because of their outrageous beauty.

Paradise Bay was a safe harbor for whalers and sealers at the end of the nineteenth century, the early days of Antarctic hunting exploitation, but today it’s a photographer’s dream, with high peaks wearing lenticular clouds like skull caps and the great exhalations of whales echoing off glacier faces. There’s also a short, stiff hike through snow that departs from an abandoned Argentinian research base and ends on a hilltop from which it seems like the whole glorious continent is visible.

These days, it is increasingly possible to fly to Antarctica, rather than endure the tumult of the Drake Passage, the notorious stretch of water that divides South America and Antarctica at the narrowest point.

This, however, seems like a betrayal of the continent — and of the explorers who risked and lost so much in pursuit of its frozen unknowns. It is also a betrayal of the self. Taking the easy route (or comparatively easy: flying requires very narrow weather windows to be open; if closed, the entire trip can be lost) means missing the monotony and grace of the ocean, as well as its extraordinary emissaries, the pelagic birds. I’ve crossed the passage two dozen times, yet I still find it thrilling to watch albatrosses, pintado petrels, and villainous giant petrels following the ship. Humpback, fin, and killer whales may draw gasps later, but these gliding birds stand as a definition of elegance.

Yet when it comes to Antarctic fauna, it is typi-

Feature / Antarctica

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Opposite page: Photographs courtesy of White Desert Antarctica by Kelvin Trautman (bottom) and Andrew Macdonald (top)

WORDS BY JAMIE LAFFERTY

Feature / Antarctica

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cally the penguins that consume visitor attention. There are 18 species of penguins globally, and while only five breed in Antarctica, they are its unofficial mascot. It has been this way since people started arriving on the continent just 150 years ago. The very fact that penguins walk upright generates empathy and laughter, never more so than when they goofily trip at the seashore or steal a nesting rock from a neighbor. “They are extraordinarily like children, these little people of the Antarctic world,” wrote the explorer-diarist Apsley Cherry-Garrard in his seminal book, “The Worst Journey in the World.”

“Either like children or old men, full of their own importance, and late for dinner.”

The more I visit Antarctica, the more I understand that it is a place of loss as much as it is love. This story is told by the animals and by the ice, too. The most colossal pieces are known as tabular icebergs, itinerant giants that break free from ice shelves and can roam the southern oceans for decades. In February 2023, onboard

Ponant’s Le Commandant Charcot, I sailed past one unromantically named B22-A that stretched over 12,000 square feet, with a face over 40 miles long. Passing it took hours.

Even floating shards of this monster dwarfed our ship. In their orbit, the wind bit with sharper teeth, its enamel hardened by unfathomable cold. Snow petrels, resplendent and pure white, appeared to have been exsanguinated by the same force. The only color came from sapphire fissures in the faces of mighty ice cliffs and the pale blue of the sky above.

Perhaps it’s a facile comparison, but this ancient ice and love have a lot in common, too. At their best, their light is equally intoxicating, but they also grow and shrink, advance and retreat, melt and reform. There are cracks that are usually resealed, but occasionally, a vital piece breaks off, never to be returned. Fragments drift away, and eventually disappear — gone but not entirely forgotten.

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Ponant’s Le Commandant Charcot will next make a semi-circumnavigation of Antarctica in January 2024.

From left to right: Photograph courtesy of White Desert by Kelvin Trautman (left); Photography by Jamie Lafferty (center and right)

Feature / Antarctica

Tiger’s Eye

Anchored • Rooted Balanced • Determined

Chateau Ducru

CRU-

BEAUCAILL

O

U

DU

FRENCH

ALPS

PEAKS AND VALLEYS

Weaving through postcard landscapes, L’Étape du Tour de France gives amateur cyclists a taste of the sport’s most prestigious race.

WORDS BY SHANNON HOGAN

Small Feature / Beautiful Sport

W

hile an aspiring tennis player will likely never volley on Centre Court at Wimbledon, and most golfers will never play a championship set up at Augusta National, for one day a year, ambitious amateur cyclists can ride a stage of the world’s most famous bike race: the Tour de France. Steeped in the sepia-hued traditions of the 120-year-old road race, L’Étape du Tour de France (literally “A Stage of the Tour de France”) is held shortly before the official event’s 22 professional teams of eight cyclists alight.

I’m a lifelong cyclist with a penchant for bicycles, but L’Étape marks my first cycling-centric trip to Europe, lightweight road bike in tow. Because I live in Seattle, I’m at home on rocky, rooty mountain bike trails, but I am eager to enjoy the speed of skinny tires on the picturesque, fully closed course.

Hosted on a different route every year, L’Étape passes through postcard villages and Alpine fields with Mont Blanc views. Along its 13,000 torrid vertical feet, participants are buoyed by effusive locals, with cheering crowds as bright and loud as the massive patinated

bells worn by the region’s dairy cattle, which emit a harmonic clang across otherwise silent pastures.

The year I embark on the race, it begins in Annemasse, where at around 7 a.m. I join thousands of riders spanning 92 nationalities at the starting line. Just a few miles into the race, the summer heat reminds me of the endurance sports axiom, “The longer you’re out there, the longer you’re out there.” Eight hours and 21 minutes later, I reach the highest mountain pass in the HauteSavoie region, with our race’s final ascent, Col de Joux Plane, considered a hors catégorie (beyond categorization) climb. “Beyond the grade automobiles can be expected to pass” reads the explanation. Beyond where cyclists — noble amateurs and dedicated pros — would otherwise venture with 90 miles accrued on nearly shattered legs. However, as I pass under the finish truss, all temperature, fatigue, and contact-point discomforts evaporate.

My fellow cyclists’ faces at the finish line are of genuine relief and elation in equal measure. The celebration for conquering five category climbs is surprisingly subdued; like many endurance events, the lesson is as much about humility as it is about accomplishment.

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L’Étape du Tour de France is the only event to allow amateur cyclists to race on the same closed roads and route as a Tour de France stage. The 2024 L’Étape du Tour de France is scheduled for July 10.

Photography by Michael Blann (upper left), ©Elena Dijour courtesy of Shutterstock (lower right), and Jered Gruber (cyclists)

Small Feature / Beautiful Sport

41

Orkhon

Valley,

Mongolia

PAST PRESENT

Mongolia’s pastoral plains invite travelers to explore the essence of nomadic living.

WORDS & PHOTOGRAPHY BY CHRIS SCHALKX

I

Reliving History / Mongolia

n Mongolia, it only takes five hours to travel back centuries — a long drive west from the country’s hazy capital, Ulan Bator, to its central Orkhon Valley.

Here, on an August morning at the Genghis Khan Retreat, I wake to the sound of a hundred tiny hooves trampling the grass around the felt walls of my ger (Mongolian yurt). As I open the door, sun floods in and I come eye to penetrating eye with a goat whose herd speckles the hillside in a bleating confetti of black, brown, and cream. I watch the animals in suspended silence until a herder on a motorbike roars down the hill.

Aside from the motorbike, little has changed since Genghis Khan and his clans roamed this very valley in the thirteenth century. The Orkhon River still winds through its grassy flats, nourishing pastures that unfold into boulder-strewn mountains. Not a single permanent building dots the landscape. Every summer, when the scent of wild rosemary fills the air, nomadic families arrive to pitch their camps. When winter rolls in, they pack up and head to drier climes, leaving nothing but footprints behind.

This retreat originated in the late 1990s, but its nomadic credo is no different: Each June, a string of some

three dozen gers is reassembled on the same hill overlooking the river. The camp is luxe, particularly by steppe standards, with a solar-powered hot shower and cashmere-covered beds that welcome guests like me who come in search of a rural tonic, untethered from the hectic pace of modern life.

Since the Bronze Age, numerous nomadic tribes have founded — and lost or left — settlements here.

On daily horseback treks through larch forests and flower-carpeted fields, I pass hills punctuated by monoliths so old they make Khan’s empire look modern.

A nomad’s life, I find, is humble and humbling. Days start well before dawn and follow the rhythm of the valley, under the watch of camp manager D’Artagnan Giercke. For those attuned to city life, this simple freedom of living unplugged and on nature’s whim offers a chance to reflect on the bare essentials of contentment.

“We look at life all wrong,” Giercke tells me over dinner one evening. “There’s a constant search for more.

But nomads carry only what they need and kill only what they eat.” He lists the rewards of life in the valley, which include untainted air and pasture-fed meat urbanites pay a small fortune for. “Nomads might not have much in their bank accounts,” he concludes. “But their souls are rich.”

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Ghengis Khan Retreat in the Orkhon Valley — a UNESCO World Heritage site — is open every summer, with tailor-made itineraries that include outdoor activities and visits to cultural sites.

Reliving History / Mongolia

43

SPACE

IN ORBIT

Sir Richard Branson contemplates the possibilities and inevitabilities of space travel.

AS TOLD TO T. COLE RACHEL

I

Soaking / Japan

’ve been curious about space for as long as I can remember. I’ll never forget watching the Apollo 11 moon landing back in 1969. I recall my family and I crowding around the TV, seeing Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin take those first steps. It left me inspired to get up there myself someday. I always thought that was realistic, but we decided to start Virgin Galactic when decades passed without it getting any closer. Flying into space on Unity 22 in July of 2021 was a lifelong dream come true.

Being up there, weightless, was nothing short of magical. The acceleration’s effect on the body is incredible.

The sky goes from a dark blue to matte black, but you’re bathed in sunlight. The most incredible part of it is seeing Earth — in all its majesty — from that perspective.

When you’re up in space, your outlook on Earth completely changes. Its borders disappear and you see the planet as a singular place that is overwhelmingly beautiful and fragile. As we descended back down, I felt so grateful. I couldn’t wait to see my friends and family and tell them all about it. Astronauts often describe this as the “overview effect,” an overwhelming sense of connection to other people and Earth as a whole. The experience taught me a lot about the power of a group of people working together to achieve something incredible.

Space travel begins with curiosity; humans have a natural urge for adventure and exploration. There are still so many unanswered questions about people and the planet, and with the innovation of space tourism, we can explore the unknown like never before. By pushing these boundaries, private astronauts and researchers can continue to build on the knowledge we already hold as humans.

In the coming years, space exploration will become more accessible, affordable, and sustainable.

Commercial space travel is the next chapter of human exploration, and our goal is to make space accessible for everyone. We have been working hard to bring the environmental cost of space flight down and will continue to make that a priority. Like the evolution of the aviation industry, we will see more spaceports pop up in different cities around the world, broadening access.

As the industry expands, we’ll see the price point come down, and more people will be able to fly with us on these life-changing journeys.

I believe that space tourism will play an important role in the destiny of our planet and our species. It will also give people even more of an appreciation for all the incredible places to visit here on Earth. The view of Earth from space can change the world.

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Richard Branson’s Virgin Galactic made its first commercial spaceflight with a crew onboard in 2019. In 2023, it completed five flights, with several more scheduled in 2024.

Photographs courtesy of NASA (sunrise) and Virgin Galactic (spaceship and Sir Richard Branson)

Soaking / Japan

45

Toyama,

Japan

RITES OF PASSAGE

A visit to Japan’s most remote onsen requires communing with the country’s Alps and oneself.

WOR D S B Y L I LY C RO S S L E Y - BA X T E R

B

—

P H O T O G R A P H Y B Y Y U S U K E YA M A T A N I

Small Feature / Space

ubbling deep in the Japanese Alps, Takamagahara Onsen forms the pinnacle of a pilgrimage: a journey across rolling green valleys and alongside crystal-clear rivers to experience a sacred bathing tradition in natural hot springs that can be traced back to the first century.

In Japanese mythology, Takamagahara is “the abode of heavenly gods,” a space high in the sky with a bridge back to Earth. The name is apt, given that Takamagahara is Japan’s most remote onsen. Reaching it requires a four-day round-trip hike, with overnights at seasonal mountain lodges. While there are certainly easier options for a soak — the country has more than 3,000 onsens — Takamagahara offers the opportunity to truly bathe yourself in nature, from start to finish.

The challenge of the expedition drew me in, as did the opportunity to disconnect from the everyday and focus on my surroundings. As we set out, my fellow hikers and I disclose our respective motivations and stories: Octogenarians recall tales of conquering Kilimanjaro, while university students reveal that this is their first leg of a monthslong mountain expedition.

After hours clambering up rocky inclines and

traversing forested trails, the plains finally unravel — luscious, green, and shrouded in mist. Wooden paths mark the way, protecting the undergrowth and drawing my eyes to the snaking mountain ridges that stretch into the distance. We stop at a hut for onigiri (rice balls) and eat them on the deck as jazz crackles through the speakers and the clouds dissipate, exposing glorious views.

At our lodge that night, we share steaming bowls of rice and crisp tempura before stretching out on sleeping mats. Satisfyingly exhausted, I reflect on the unexpected joys of the day’s trail: wildlife tips from ambling hikers, a refreshing dip in the freezing river, and the ring of bear bells floating among the trees.

Arriving at Takamagahara the following day, a narrow walkway concludes at a pale-blue pool beside the Kurobe River. Encircled by towering forests, the rocky riverbed extends to a ridgeline cutting across a stark blue sky.

As we soak, our fatigue gives way to recollections of delicate alpine flowers spotted along crest-top trails, shared sunrise meals, and cheery “kanpai” toasts during communal suppers. My pilgrimage has fulfilled its mission, allowing me to reconnect not only with the landscape but also myself.

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It is ideal to visit Takamagahara Onsen between June and October, before the mountain huts close for the winter season. Be sure to reserve accommodation in advance, as spots are limited.

Small Feature / Space

47

UTAH,

USA

OF THE

ESSENCE Grand in scale and philosophy, land art offers a unique perspective on our relationship with nature.

F

rom the barren northern shore of Utah’s Great Salt Lake, a 15-foot-wide line of rocks projects out across the lakebed before coiling around upon itself. Encrusted in white salt crystals that sparkle in the desert sun, this strange 1,500-footlong structure invites you to traverse it, to follow it into the eye of the vortex.

While it may look like an ancient ruin, the monument is actually an iconic work of twentieth-century art: Robert Smithson’s “Spiral Jetty” (1970). Walking it can be transcendent. At sunset on a still day, the lake’s surface mirrors the sky and it feels as though the jetty projects you into an infinite space.

“Spiral Jetty” is a key piece of land art, a genre originating in the U.S. and Europe in the late ’60s and early ’70s. Land art is not sculpture placed in or on the land, nor a picture of the land, but an artwork transforming its site. In the U.S., pioneering artists like Smithson, Michael Heizer, and Walter De Maria adapted the West’s wide-open spaces to make art of an unprecedented scale.

Heizer’s “Double Negative” (1969) in Nevada displaced 240,000 tons of earth to create two huge “cuts” (large enough to swallow the Empire State Building, he claimed) across the edge of a mesa. De Maria’s “The Lightning Field” (1977) in New Mexico — a one-mileby-one-kilometer rectangular plot dotted with a grid of 400 steel poles — requires an overnight stay in a small cabin on the site’s border to experience it. In Arizona, James Turrell has spent almost 50 years reshaping the crater of an extinct volcano into a celestial observatory

that remains unfinished.

These “classic” works of land art are awe-inspiring.

Scale is important, but so is time; the time it takes to get to them, the time it takes to comprehend them. You could spend all day at Nancy Holt’s “Sun Tunnels” (1973-76) in Utah’s Great Basin Desert, watching the daylight shift through massive concrete viewfinders. Similarly, “The Lightning Field” is, in author Geoff Dyer’s words, “not a piece of art to be seen but an experience of space that unfolds over time.”

But while De Maria declared that “isolation is the essence of land art,” it’s no longer necessary to mount an expedition into the desert to see these outsized works. At the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Heizer’s “Levitated Mass” (2012) — a 340-ton boulder — is unnervingly suspended above a walkway. At the Storm King Art Center in upstate New York, Maya Lin’s “Storm King Wavefield” (2007-08) makes four acres of lawn appear to ripple like water. And Turrell’s meditative “Skyspaces” — chambers for viewing the changing quality of light in the sky — can be found in cities across America.

Nonetheless, one really must get out to the desert for the quintessential land art experience. In that vast expanse, these incredible works place us into a visceral dialogue with the earth and remind us of our place within larger ecosystems: local, regional, planetary, cosmic. They urge us to reexamine our relationship with the landscape and nature. Certainly, as I walked Smithson’s jetty toward the vortex, the lake reflecting a fiery sunset, I was reminded of how small I am. And it was exhilarating.

Living Art / Land Art

48

Robert Smithson’s “Spiral Jetty” is a two- to three-hour drive from Salt Lake City; Walter De Maria’s “The Lightning Field” can be seen with a reservation; and Nancy Holt’s “Sun Tunnels” is open year-round.

Opposite page: Robert Smithson, “Spiral Jetty” (1970). Photography by Gianfranco Gorgoni, courtesy of © Holt/Smithson Foundation and Dia Art Foundation, and licensed by Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York

WORDS BY BEN TUFNELL

Living Art / Land Art

49

Gee’s

Bend,

usa

BY HAND AND

HEART

The quilters of Gee’s Bend shape a uniquely American art form that adorns the walls of museums and private collections worldwide.

WOR D S B Y A S H L E Y S H AW S C O T T A DJ AY E

O

n a steamy summer day, I travel deep into South Alabama’s fertile Black Belt, eager to meet the world-renowned quilters of Gee’s Bend. Since the 1960s, these artisans have enthralled art collectors and curators worldwide, their intricate textiles gracing institutions from the Whitney Museum of American Art to the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. Seeing their designs hanging on walls is breathtaking, but I yearn to touch one; to experience this extraordinary artwork in its original context. This is why visiting Gee’s Bend has been on my bucket list from the moment I laid eyes on a catalog from the quilters’ vast exhibition at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, in 2002.

On the way to Boykin, also known as Gee’s Bend, I cruise along luscious, tree-shaded County Road 29, the only route into this secluded hamlet, fringed by the serpentine Alabama River. Down an unpaved road, surrounded by cicada song, I pull up to the home of Tinnie Pettway, an 87-year-old master quilter. Pettway’s daughter, Claudia Pettway Charley, remembers her grandmother covering her with so many quilts in the winter she could barely move.

Much like a Pettway winter bed, Gee’s Bend’s story is layered: The first layer is the quilters’ aesthetic.

Although it’s poorly documented, the early residents of Gee’s Bend probably possessed West African heritage,

—

PHOTOGRAPHY BY RAHIM FORTUNE

which is why Gee’s Bend’s motifs often echo weaving traditions found across that region. Yet, part of the genius of Gee’s Bend quilters is their adaptation to place and continual evolution, as seen in their textile expression.

Like jazz and many other classic American art forms, their designs are simultaneously innovative and shouldered by the centuries-old lineage of West African creatives. Unlike traditional quilts, which rely heavily on patterns and symmetry, Gee’s Bend pieces are known for their abstraction, asymmetry, and unexpected color combinations. As Pettway’s granddaughter Francesca Charley explains, “We have no limit when it comes to how we sew.”

The story’s next layer explains how Gee’s Bend became a community of quilters. In 1816, 18 enslaved people were brought here by Joseph Gee, who bought the land for a cotton plantation. The wretched accommodations they were allowed to construct barely sheltered them from the elements, making the colder months particularly dangerous. To provide warmth for their families, the women combined old clothing scraps with burlap sacks and any other fabric they could find. Quilting became a necessary tradition passed from one generation to the next. Over many decades, within the confines of sharecropping, tenant farming, and small-town life, an artist colony was born.

Today, as evidenced by the showing of their works at myriad museums, the colony has added a new chap-

Feature / Gee’s Bend

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Feature / Gee’s Bend

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Feature / Gee’s Bend

Clockwise from upper left: Polly Mooney Middleton, Claudia 5 2 Pettway Charley and her daughter Francesca Charley, Tinnie Pettway’s hands

Mary Lee Bendolph, “Diner” (2004). The Huntington Library, Art Museum, and Botanical Gardens

Feature / Gee’s Bend

ter to its story, involving expanding exhibitions and bespoke commissions. Facilitated by Nest — a U.S.based nonprofit organization that advocates for the success, sustainability, and well-being of artisans and makers around the world — they have embarked on partnerships with fashion brands, such as Chloé, Greg Lauren, and Marfa Stance, and now accept bespoke commissions. Patrons of these commissions are paired with the quilter, who creates a piece based on the patron’s unique narrative, incorporating couture-level fabrics from renowned designer Roksanda Ilinčić, who, inspired by the quilters, began sending her luxurious fabrics as source material to Gee’s Bend last year.

These partnerships further enrich the Gee’s Bend story and underscore one of the defining characteristics of its community: the bond between its members.

Under the original guise of household work, quilting became a means of gathering and communing, with women sewing side by side. Grandmothers, mothers, aunts, The quilters of Gee’s Bend offer limited private commissions.

Contact partnerships@buildanest.org for more information.

daughters, nieces, and neighbors formed a matrilineal chain that continues today. “It takes my mind all the way back to when I first started making quilts, working with my mother,” quilter Stella Pettway explains. All the craftspeople I meet in Gee’s Bend have been taught by another woman.

While sitting with Sharon Williams, who began quilting over 45 years ago, I run my fingers over her work and feel its various cotton grades — another layer of this remarkable history. To the quilters, cotton simply feels good and behaves in predictable ways, unlike silk and synthetics. But in favoring cotton, they have also reclaimed as their own the crop that controlled their ancestors’ lives. Their handiwork is now at the end of the cotton value chain rather than the beginning, in the fields.

So lucky are the collectors, and the community’s family members, who add this extraordinary layer of American history to their walls or winter beds.

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Feature / Celestia

54

Lesser

Sunda

Islands,

Indonesia

IN GOOD TIME

A handcrafted ship brings Indonesia’s panoramas and the present moment into sharp focus.

WORDS & PHOTOGRAPHY BY SINNA NASSERI

T Feature / Celestia here’s a certain feeling you only get at sea.

Your senses are whetted. Your equilibrium sways. The surrounding water constantly changes, its color and shape engaging in an otherworldly dance. Pay close attention; you can see time shift in a way that escapes us on land.

That’s the state I found myself in one June day after three flights transported me nearly 9,000 miles from Los Angeles to Indonesia. Specifically, it was on Flores Island (a short hop from Bali), where I boarded the 148-foot Celestia, an Indonesian phinisi, becoming one of the first passengers to set sail on the bespoke, handcrafted ship. Over five days and four nights, the vessel transported us around Komodo National Park, a remote area of outsized beauty among the country’s more than 17,000 islands.

On several mornings, we awoke in peaceful seclusion — enveloped only by the ocean’s solitude — a feeling seemingly from a different era. This blending of past and present directly reflects the vision of siblings Jasmine Chong and Jason Tabalujan, the boat’s owners, who commissioned Bugis shipbuilders to craft the vessel from ironwood and honey-tinged teak using UNESCOrecognized techniques unique to South Sulawesi.

“Indonesia is so stunning, we wanted Celestia to complement it, not compete with it,” Chong explained.

This philosophy was on display in the main stateroom, where I stayed and where panoramic sea-view windows resided alongside an evocative mix of locally sourced, highly curated materials that celebrate the

Celestia sails to Raja Ampat, Komodo National Park, the Spice Islands, and elsewhere in Indonesia’s Coral Triangle and can be booked for groups of up to 14 guests.

region’s rich heritage, including hand-glazed Balinese blue tiles and modern amenities, such as rain showers.

The boat’s interior, with elegant wooden desks, cabinets adorned with chicken-eye rattan, and curved, chunky armchairs, were custom-built by Balinese artisans or sourced from young Indonesian designers.

Chong and Tabalujan’s commitment to honoring their country was also underscored by the trip’s expert crew of 18, all from Indonesia. They included cruise director Jennifer Tan, who shared her great knowledge of the island nation’s culture and environment, and chef Wayan Kresna Yasa, who trained at New York’s Blue Hill at Stone Barns and who prepared regional meals simply, but with sneaky nuance and lingering, cerebral flavors.

On the island of Rinca, I communed with several of the world’s largest lizards, the endangered creatures from which Komodo National Park, which lies between the Indian and Pacific Oceans, takes its name. I also snorkeled mere feet above large swaths of porous coral in intensely clear water. Neon reef fish jutted about, and I joined a school for a few unforgettable seconds. When the ship’s diving guide spotted a giant sea turtle gracefully swimming toward the ocean floor, I followed, my mind wholly freed from reality above water.

One evening, the scene that played around us was similarly eternal: Tens of thousands of flying foxes — large fruit bats — poured from Kalong Island’s mangrove forest and, illuminated by the ivory moon, filled the peach sky. For a moment, time was suspended; everything just felt like now.

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Feature / Celestia

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Feature / Celestia

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Small Feature / Sunday Drive

58

Malibu,

usa

SHIFTING GEARS

The forgotten Sunday drive delivers the ultimate luxury: a visceral escape from the everyday.

WOR DS BY JOH N C H U L DE N KO

T

—

PHOTOGRAPHY BY JAKE MICHAELS

hey were always intended to set us free, these objects that propel us into the world with boundless enthusiasm, fast enough to chase our dreams. And now, in an age of relentless distraction, cars may offer the ultimate luxury — uninterrupted escape.

With our redoubled attention on mindfulness and emotional awareness, perhaps it’s time to perfect the art of kinetic disconnectedness through an act that requires our full attention: the simple Sunday drive. This is not commuting; a recreational drive is different. It’s a purposeful, mind-clearing engagement — a calm focus on the car in hand and the road ahead.

After driving a few miles, the cacophony of everyday life feels far away. With the right car, a beautiful road, and an hour or so to spare, the decadence of undisturbed time manifests through a transformative journey that doesn’t require a passport.

I firmly believe that our cars, like our friends, should have distinct character and charm. We should want to spend time with them. And while a recreational drive doesn’t necessitate a particularly extraordinary vehicle, a unique vintage car certainly amplifies the sensory experience — the vibrations transmitted through the steering wheel and pedals, the fuel-tinged breeze wafting through hand-cranked windows, and, of course, the sound. If the machine under the hood is an orchestra, the right foot is a conductor, commanding a symphony of baritone growls and hair-raising whines.

For my drive, I’ve sourced a 1971 Alfa Romeo Montreal, a prime example of 1970s Italian design styled

by Marcello Gandini. It’s a car that would look equally at home in front of Studio 54 as it would in a classic sci-fi movie. I’m taking it on one of my favorite loops through the Malibu canyons: a tangle of roads that twist through varying elevations to reveal spectacular views of the Pacific Ocean. The Montreal has minimal electronics and boasts such luxuries as manual steering and a stick shift. It’s devoid of a cupholder, much less CarPlay.

As soon as I turn the key, it’s apparent that this is not just a drive. It’s an event. From this moment forward, I am unreachable. There is joy in merely operating the car. The large windshield, free from obtrusive A-pillars, provides a panoramic vista, a closer connection to the world whizzing by, and an appreciation for the pure novelty of motion. This isn’t about miles per hour, for many of the sportiest vintage cars are now bested by a base-model Prius. No, speed isn’t a number, it’s a feeling, and in an analog car, 30 miles per hour can be thrilling; 60 feels like racing down the Mulsanne Straight at Le Mans.

An analog car becomes a partner: communicative, responsive, at times finicky, even needy. But once acquainted, its shifts become second nature and all that’s left is peace and meditative tranquility. Driving gloves, a silk scarf, and oversized glasses are optional; only enthusiasm is required. A drive is a time to be cherished, a moment that can’t be artificially generated.

Small Feature / Sunday Drive

America is rife with beautiful roads. For inspiration, consult Butler Motorcycle Maps.

They’ve made discovering gorgeous routes their life’s work.

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Small Feature / Sunday Drive

DEPARTURES Index

BEYOND

2 6 4 17

18 14

5 7 1 10

Index

15

8

3

9

12

1

WONDER OF ONE’S OWN WORLDWIDE

Page 22

To have an intimate experience of a public space is the epitome of luxury, concludes Departures editor-in-chief Skye Parrott, as she recalls viewing the world’s most visited places — from the Hall of Mirrors in Versailles to the Louvre Museum — alone.

2

THE LONG RUN IN

N AT U R E

Page 24

Renowned aesthetics expert and anti-inflammatory pioneer Dr. Barbara Sturm shares her longevity philosophy, a combination of nature and nurture that includes lots of sleep, a healthy diet, stress reduction, and a strong connection to the world around us.

3 AN ARTFUL TABLE LIMA,

PERU

Page 26

A meal at Peru’s Central (The World’s Best Restaurant 2023) is designed to impart a felt sense of the country’s landscape and art, with each dish in its 16-course tasting menu juxtaposing vibrant colors and astonishing flavors to take diners on a journey from the Andes to the Amazon.

4 PAIN WITH GAIN C A L I FO R N I A ,

USA

Page 28

Legendary athletes Gabby Reece and Laird Hamilton’s signature three-day XPT Experiences — hosted in Kauai, Costa Rica, or the couple’s home in California — teach a select few how to push the body in service of the mind, or as Hamilton puts it: to prune the rosebush so it blooms.

11 13

5 QUILL AND QUIRK

Index

LO N D O N ,

UK

Page 30

Master Storytellers believes that behind every life is a story, which is why it pairs everyone from business titans to war veterans to beloved family members with bestselling, internationally acclaimed authors who pen their subjects’ intriguing tell-alls in just 10 to 12 weeks.

6 IN VINO VERITAS SAN

F R A N C I SCO ,

USA

Page 32

Expert sommelier Thatcher Baker-Briggs considers the future of wine, specifically the rise of small-production, properly farmed wines, and why he believes in new winemakers who are revitalizing traditional styles with youth and energy.

16

7 SCENTS OF MEMORY VERSAILLES,

FRANCE

Page 33

On the tree-lined Rue du Parc de Clagny in Versailles, the Osmothèque archives trace the history of perfume via over 4,000 scents, raw ingredients, and elaborate formulations that serve as both a laboratory for master perfumers and a living catalog of olfactory memories.

8

NO PLACE ON EARTH

Q U A N G B I N H P ROV I N C E , V I ET N A M

Page 34

In Hang Son Doong, the world’s largest natural cave, Ramdane Touhami encounters the most dangerous yet perhaps best experience he’s ever had, prompting him to ponder the value of risking one’s life for an exquisitely good anecdote.

9 THE WEIGHT OF ICE A N TA RC T I C A

Page 36

A travel writer recounts why his favorite destination is the highest, driest, windiest, and southernmost continent: Antarctica, where fjords and mountains vie for attention above frozen seas, whale exhalations echo off glaciers, and platoons of albatrosses stand in regal splendor.

10 PEAKS AND VALLEYS FRENCH

ALPS

Page 40

A passionate cyclist confronts both Alpine peaks and her inner resolve when riding L’Étape du Tour de France, a road race that offers amateurs a scenic yet challenging taste of the sport’s most prestigious competition, the Tour de France.

11

PAST PRESENT ORKHON

VA L L EY ,

MONGOLIA

Page 42

In the Orkhon Valley, a seasonal resort offers a rural tonic for modern living that takes cues from the nomadic tribes that have alighted there for centuries — through slow-cooked open-fire meals, horseback riding, and a simpler way of being, it reveals that we just might be looking at life all wrong.

12 IN ORBIT

Page 44

S PAC E

Space is the inevitable next frontier of travel, according to Sir Richard Branson, whose own voyage beyond the stratosphere aboard Virgin Galactic’s Unity 22 convinced him that cosmic tourism has the power to change the destiny of both our planet and our species.

13 RITES OF PASSAGE TOYA M A ,

J A PA N

Page 46

Takamagahara, Japan’s most remote onsen, is the pinnacle of a four-day pilgrimage that traverses rolling green valleys, the country’s Alps, and crystal-clear rivers, providing visitors with the opportunity to commune with nature and oneself.

14 OF THE ESSENCE U TA H , U S A

Page 48

From an extinct volcano transformed into a celestial observatory to a manmade lightning field in the middle of the desert, America’s land art offers a unique perspective of nature and places us in dialogue with its varying ecosystems: local, regional, planetary, cosmic.

15 BY HAND AND HEART GEE’S

BEND,

USA

Page 50

Down a rural Alabama road resides an American treasure: the quilters of Gee’s Bend, who have been transforming history into art for generations, their work recognized by world-renowned museums and collectors, who can now commission bespoke textiles that reflect their personal histories.

16 IN GOOD TIME

LESSER SUNDA ISLANDS, INDONESIA

Page 54

A voyage on the Celestia, a 148-foot phinisi (traditionally crafted Indonesian ship), to some of the country’s more remote islands is a journey suspended in time, past underwater coral forests and Komodo dragon-inhabited islands into cotton candy-hued sunsets.

17 SHIFTING GEARS MALIBU,

USA

Page 58

The forgotten Sunday drive delivers a visceral, leisurely escape from the everyday that — coupled with a unique vintage car, such as an Alfa Romeo Montreal — takes on a decadent analog dimension.

18 MOUNTAIN HIGH FA R

W EST ,

USA

Page 67

For those in eternal pursuit of alpine euphoria, this roundup of the best off-the-radar powder terrain in the U.S. offers pristine snow and unspoiled slopes, along with their nearest general aviation runways.

Index

DEPART

BEYO

TURES

OND

Index

Index

far

West,

USA

MOUNTAIN HIGH WOR DS BY E R I N DI XON

For one sublime season, I worked at a low-key mountain resort, which meant I had unlimited access to its precipitous slopes.

Flying through unspoiled “cowboy powder,” the wind lifting my skis, I would — without fail — experience a rush of adrenaline and freedom. No one ahead, no one behind; just me and the mountain. For those in eternal pursuit of alpine euphoria, here’s a roundup of the best off-the-radar powder terrain in the U.S., along with their nearest general aviation runways.

8

L O C A T I O N : Whitefish, Montana A C R E S : 3,000 E L E V A T I O N : 6,817 ft V E R T I C A L : 2,353 ft S N O W F A L L : 300 in S N O W C A T : Yes A I R P O R T : Glacier Park International

2 Powder Mountain

L O C A T I O N : Eden, Utah A C R E S : 8,500 E L E V A T I O N : 9,400 ft V E R T I C A L : 3,346 ft S N O W F A L L : 500 in S N O W C A T : Yes A I R P O R T : Ogden-Hinckley

3

6

Pass 5 White Ski Area

1

L O C A T I O N : Naches, Washington A C R E S : 1,400 E L E V A T I O N : 6,500 ft V E R T I C A L : 2,000 ft S N O W F A L L : 350 in S N O W C A T : No A I R P O R T : Yakima

7 11

Lakes 6 Anthony Mountain Resort

L O C A T I O N : North Powder, Oregon A C R E S : 1,100 E L E V A T I O N : 8,000 ft V E R T I C A L : 900 ft S N O W F A L L : 250 in S N O W C A T : Yes A I R P O R T : Umpleby Ranch

2 9

Wolf Creek Ski Area

L O C A T I O N : Pagosa Springs, Colorado A C R E S : 1,600 E L E V A T I O N : 11 ,904 ft V E R T I C A L : 1,604 ft S N O W F A L L : 430 in S N O W C A T : No A I R P O R T : Stevens Field

L O C A T I O N : Salida, Colorado A C R E S : 800 E L E V A T I O N : 11,952 ft V E R T I C A L : 1,162 ft S N O W F A L L : 350 in S N O W C A T : Yes A I R P O R T : Harriet Alexander Field

L O C A T I O N : Silverton, Colorado A C R E S : 1,819 E L E V A T I O N : 13,487 ft V E R T I C A L : 1,900 – 3,000 ft S N O W F A L L : 400 in S N O W C A T : No A I R P O R T : Telluride Regional

7 Lookout Pass

3 10

4 Monarch Mountain

9 Silverton Mountain

4

Ski 10 Taos Valley

L O C A T I O N : Taos, New Mexico A C R E S : 1,300 E L E V A T I O N : 12,400 ft V E R T I C A L : 3,131 ft S N O W F A L L : 300 in S N O W C A T : No A I R P O R T : Taos Regional

67

Map: jonpic/DigitalVision Vectors/Getty Images

sh 1 Whitefi Mountain

L O C A T I O N : Idaho/Montana border A C R E S : 1,023 E L E V A T I O N : 6,150 ft V E R T I C A L : 1,650 ft S N O W F A L L : 400 in S N O W C A T : No A I R P O R T : Coeur d’Alene

8 Silver Mountain Resort

L O C A T I O N : Kellogg, Idaho A C R E S : 1,600 E L E V A T I O N : 6,300 ft V E R T I C A L : 2,200 ft S N O W F A L L : 340 in S N O W C A T : No A I R P O R T : Coeur d’Alene

Trail 11 Lost Ski Area

L O C A T I O N : Sula, Montana A C R E S : 1,800 E L E V A T I O N : 8,200 ft V E R T I C A L : 1,800 ft S N O W F A L L : 325 in S N O W C A T : No A I R P O R T : Ravalli County

Louis Vuitton

Les

Clefs

d'Or

SECRETS OF LES CLEFS D’OR A coterie of the world’s finest concierges discusses how they make the impossible possible.

“The impossible is concierageable,” declares Zineb Meliani, chef concierge at Morocco’s iconic La Mamounia hotel. While this isn’t the official mission of Les Clefs d’Or, the world’s most prestigious concierge association, it accurately encapsulates the philosophy that drives these connected and passionate professionals — distinguished by the discreet golden crossed keys that adorn their lapels — to fulfill their guests’ requests, no matter how outlandish. Here, they share some of the more memorable times they’ve gone above and beyond to successful ends.

Les

Clefs

d'Or

A prince wanted a specific bottle of wine for a party the following afternoon.

There was only one bottle in the U.S., in New Hampshire, and overnight shipping wasn’t an option.

If they sent someone from New York City, they’d never make it to the store before closing. Refusing to accept defeat, the prince rented me a Mustang convertible to retrieve the bottle and deliver it in style.

D av i d

Rahner

concierge, The Carlyle New York

Les

Clefs

d'Or

A guest’s dog would only use the restroom on the perfect green lawn of our garden. One day, the guest was going on a yacht and requested we cut a parcel of the grass so her dog could still use the restroom on our lawn — on the boat.

Co n c i e rg e

t ea m

EDEN ROCK - ST BARTHS St. Barthélemy

Les

Clefs

d'Or

A few notable out-ofthe-box requests were for a rare gray species of ferret, a dunk tank, and a Ford truck to be shipped overseas.

James

Lamboglia

Concierge, The Plaza new york

Hotel

A client sought our assistance in arranging a last-minute private audience with the Pope.

Securing this proved unfeasible, but we organized a private visit to the Vatican Museums and Gardens.

L eo n a r d o B ot to n e a n d M a u ro Co n t i n o concierges, Le Sirenuse Positano

Les

Clefs

d'Or

We had a request to find a specific dog breed for a client’s wife’s birthday. There’s usually a waiting time of one and a half years, but we found a puppy within two weeks.

Is any request too much?

Anything goes at the Palace.

S t e fa n o B e r t a l l i chef concierge, Gstaad Gstaad

Palace

A guest asked me to do their kids’ homework. Even though I have a career and am passionate about hospitality, I am not good at mathematics.

So, I turned to Google and YouTube and refreshed my memory with a fractions tutorial. We achieved an A+.

Dav i d chief

R.

Lo z a n o

butler, Fairmont Mayakoba Playa del Carmen

Les

Clefs

d'Or

One of our regular guests saw a rare 1990 Jaguar XJ-S V12 convertible at a classic car show. It was already sold and the model — a real collector’s item in blue with light leather seats — was not easy to find. We searched for almost four weeks and eventually found one in Spain. Our guest was driving it a few days later.

Jan-Luca sr.

Funck

concierge,The Dolder Zurich

Grand

Les

Clefs

d'Or

A guest was breeding her show dog, but first had us arrange a wedding for the two collies, complete with a minister, catering, and outfits. They got married in the Crystal Ballroom (the bride wore white) and honeymooned in a garden suite, Bungalow 14.

Abbas

G o l e sta n i

chef concierge, The Beverly Hills Hotel Beverly Hills

Les

Clefs

d'Or

I compare a concierge to a swan that moves gracefully on a lake. You see a picture of elegance but what’s hidden from the eye is the activity going on beneath the water’s surface. One time a guest wanted to propose in front of the Trevi Fountain with a dancing flash mob — we found a group of dancers and made it happen.

A l es s a n d ro chef

concierge, Rome

A rc i o l a Hotel

Eden