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Killer View / Explora Hotels / Patagonia Hotels / → All Tags

A View To Savor While Chillin' in Chile

Where: Patagonia, Chile

We are suckers for a room with a killer view.  We find that we are even more likely to forgive some minor hotel inconveniences if we can stare out the window at something pretty--yeah we are that shallow. Let's help out our fellow hotel mavens by uploading rooms with killer views to the HotelChatter/Flickr photo pool, or by sending the photo along to us. We will feature our favorites in this space from time to time. Remember to tell us the name of the hotel and the room number of the hot view.

Look at this freaking view. No, just look at it.

Can you imagine sipping some tea with your feet up in your hotel room staring out at that view? The clear skies, the blue water — it looks like a fantasy world.

This is the view from the Explora Hotel Salto Chico on the shore of Lake Pehoé in Patagonia, right in Torres del Paine Park, which was designated a UNESCO World Heritage site. The location is pretty remote — you fly from Santiago to Punta Arenas, and then an Explora staffer will meet you at the airport and drive you to the hotel; the trip takes about 5 hours from Santiago. But, um, it's worth it, dontchya think?

The hotel develops "explorations" for guests; each day, you get your pick of 5 different explorations (which have been designed/selected according to the weather, duration and difficulty). Room rates include those explorations, airport transportation and three meals per day, but the all-inclusive-awesomeness will cost you: rates start at $2,660 for a four-night stay. Check out all the info you need here. Or just continue gazing at this picture.

[Photo: Ben Oh]

Explora Hotels / Chile Hotels / Adventure Hotels / Monica Guy / Cubicle Dreamin' / → All Tags

Cubicle Dreamin': Explora Hotels are an Adventure Playground

Where: Chile

Cubicle Dreamin' is a feature in which we ask the hotel mavens to take some time out of their busy work day, surf the Internet, and tell us what hotel they wish they could beam themselves to right that very second--all on the slave driving companies dime, of course. Oh, like these people aren't surfing aimlessly anyway--at least now their purposeless clicking will be cobbled together into useful hotel stories--we hope. Have a destination hotel you are just dying to leave your cube for? Send the story our way.

In this episode, Hotel Maven Monica Guy returns to Chile. Enjoy.

Split the cubicle in half: I'm dreaming of two superb hotels at opposite ends of the longest, skinniest country in the world - Chile.

The Explora Hotel in Atacama and the Explora Hotel in Patagonia are my constant fantasy ever since a stay in the Explora Hotel in Easter Island last month.

Let me gush:

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Luxury Hotels / Easter Island / Chile Hotels / Explora Hotels / Monica Guy / → All Tags

Chilean Hotel Scene:: The Most Isolated Luxury Hotel in the World

Where: Posada de Mike Rapu, Rapa Nui, Chile

This week our roaming correspondent, Monica Guy, is giving us the low-down on the Chilean Hotel Scene. Today, she has exclusive review of the much-vaunted, just-opened luxury Explora hotel of Posada de Mike Rapu on Easter Island. Enjoy.

Easter Island

Take one of the loneliest islands on earth, cover it in miles of unkempt grassland, teams of wild horses and hundreds of mysterious stone statues. Then drive a kilometer down a bumpy track off the island's single main road and you'll come across the most isolated, luxury, dreamland hotels you've ever read about.

We're talking about Easter Island, known as Rapa Nui by the natives, or as Isla de Pascua by the Chileans. It's 3,600 km from the nearest mainland in Chile and a 5h40min flight from Santiago. Famous for those great, stone Moai statues you'll have read about but probably not seen.

And we're talking about the Explora Posada de Mike Rapu, opened only since late 2007 and already one of the hottest topics of the Latin American hotel world.

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Chile Hotels / Hotel Openings / Explora Hotels / → All Tags

Another Reason to Visit Chile : The Explora en Atacama Hotel

Where: San Pedro de Atacama, Chile

We had a little meet-and-greet with a Chile tourism rep yesterday, and he reminded us that Patagonia is home to the Explora Patagonia, an all-inclusive resort with killer views of the mountains.

But it turns out, there's a new Explora on the scene, this time in Atacama. (You'll remember Chile's northern desert from the latest season of Amazing Race.)

Aside from the reality TV tie-in--reason enough to visit!--the Explora en Atacama does its best to put jaded urbanites back in touch with nature. Just check the brochure:

Its core is a hotel built for linking man with the temporal space--present and past--and the mysteries of nature. To travel is to pass, to arrive and leave. Architecture is permanence, freedom and security.

Rates, including hyperbole, start at $1,546 for three nights. And in case you're curious, Explora is opening another hotel in Rapa Nui (Easter Island) in December 2007.

Related Stories:
· Patagonia Hotel Guide [HotelChatter]
· Explora Chile: Alpaca Style [HotelChatter]