Best Destinations for Sleep Tourism Around the World
Calling all sleepyheads and serial snooze-button hitters – it’s time to take your sweet dreams to, well, your dream destination. Sleep tourism is the latest curiosity-sparking (or rather, slumber-inducing) travel trend, reinventing the hours between dusk and dawn. From counting constellations in Chile to camping out in Jordan or cosying up in a sleeper cabin aboard the Orient Express, there’s no shortage of getaways promising a lullaby-worthy place to rest your head. Sound like your kind of holiday? Read on as we pull back the covers on our favourite destinations for sleep tourism…
- Iceland
- Singapore to Malaysia: The Eastern & Oriental Express
- Atacama Desert, Chile
- The Maldives
- Wadi Rum Desert, Jordan
- Paris to Venice: The Venice Simplon-Orient-Express
- Kerala, India
Iceland
We’re kicking things off with a bang – or rather, with a hushed gasp – in Iceland, where the Northern Lights are enough to leave even the chattiest travellers momentarily speechless.
For your best chance of catching the aurora (and some extra beauty sleep in the quieter off-season), visit between September and April, keeping your mittened fingers crossed for those ethereal green ribbons swirling across the night sky.
And for a bedtime scene worthy of the storybooks, settle into a glass-roofed cabin, don some novelty-print pyjamas and snuggle up beneath a cosy blanket, watching this glowing phenomenon from the warmth of your bed.
Image by - Paolo Graziosi / Getty Images
Singapore to Malaysia: The Eastern & Oriental Express
If there’s one quintessential sleep tourism experience, it’s surely a journey aboard a sleeper train. Our carriage of choice? The Eastern & Oriental Express, where three glamorous nights on the rails whisks you from the bright lights of Singapore into the tropical heart of Malaysia.
And if your bedtime routine is practically a military operation (face mask, herbal tea, the works), you’ll be pleased to know this train takes winding down just as seriously. Think spa treatments designed with your forty winks in mind, serenading piano melodies floating through the carriages and a soothing cuppa before lights out. Add the gentle rocking of the train into the equation, and you’ll be lulled into a blissful slumber in no time…
Image by - Pia Riverola
Atacama Desert, Chile
In Chile’s vast Atacama Desert, a day spent hiking across its lunar-like landscapes should leave you primed for some uninterrupted REM come sundown. But for the ultimate nightcap, turn your eyes to the skies, where minimal light pollution reveals a sparkling canopy of stars worthy of a Bortle Class 1 rating. That’s as dark as it comes, astronomically speaking.
Slap bang in one of the world’s clearest night-sky regions, it’s the perfect place to peer through a telescope with a celestial expert, discovering the animal constellations of traditional Andean astronomy. A llama, a fox, a serpent, another llama…feeling sleepy yet?
Image by - © Marco Bottigelli / Getty Images
The Maldives
Still awake? Good, because next on our sleep tourism shortlist is the oh-so-dreamy Maldives. Granted, the Maldives is already a hotspot for horizontal pursuits but the private island resort of COMO Maalifushi, located in the Thaa Atoll, takes this one step further with a bundle of after-dark activities.
Enjoy a moonlit plunge at nearby COMO Cocoa Island, where special UV torches and snorkel masks reveal glowing corals and psychedelic-patterned fish. Or, if you’re more of a film buff, sink into a beanbag for a cinema experience under the stars, complete with a projector screen and popcorn aplenty. Just try not to doze off before the credits roll...
For the ultimate sleepover, spend a night marooned on Lavadhoo, an uninhabited island neighbouring COMO Maalifushi. Here, consider your usual white noise machine and lavender pillow spray officially redundant – the gentle waves of the Indian Ocean should send you straight to sleep.
Image by - FilippoBacci / Getty Images
Wadi Rum Desert, Jordan
Why count sheep when you could count stars in Jordan instead?
Deep in the country’s Wadi Rum Desert, Bedouin tribes have long looked to the constellations as their celestial compass, travelling by night to avoid the scorching daytime heat. These days, you can follow in the caravans’ footsteps (and camel hoofprints) with a night at a traditional desert camp, where sprawls of Sadu-woven rugs, hearty feasts and stories around the campfire await.
Should a shooting star streak overhead, you know what to wish for – a pillow that’s forever cold on both sides. And even if that particular wish goes unanswered, the desert’s utter silence and blissfully dark nights are bound to send you straight to sleep in record time.
Image by - Abdullah Cadirci/Pexels
Paris to Venice: The Venice Simplon-Orient-Express
Ever drifted off and found yourself dreaming about the golden age of train travel? Well, you can experience it for yourself aboard the Venice Simplon-Orient-Express on a rather swanky overnight journey from Paris to Venice. And if you fancy even more shut eye in those plush sleeper cabins, opt for a longer rail journey and alight in Portofino or Istanbul.
When you’re not snoozing or watching Europe roll by outside your window, explore the original 1920s carriages – all Gatsby-esque granduer and Art Deco decor. You'll soon see why this dose of historical deja vu on rails is practically the poster child for sleep tourism.
Image by - Lucy Laucht
Kerala, India
The wonderfully chaotic country of India might seem like an unlikely contender for our sleep tourism roundup, but the backwaters of Kerala deliver blissful peace and quiet by... well, the boatload.
Board a traditional kettuvallam houseboat for a voyage across Vembanad Lake and palm-fringed waterways, passing sleepy villages and puttering fishing boats. Some cruises even offer Ayurvedic treatments, complete with warm herbal oils and soothing massages. That's sure to have you floating back to your cabin, hanging up the ‘do not disturb’ sign and leaving tomorrow's alarm gloriously unset.
And if all this has you planning your next getaway (and perhaps a cheeky nap), that's just the occupational hazard of reading about dreamy places to sleep...
Image by - Boby
Header image by - Maria Korneeva / Getty Images
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