The best lodges

Some folks book lodges because they read about it in a blog. Others just need a break from traffic lights, inboxes, and chairs with wheels. Either way, lodges tend to sneak up on you — one minute you’re checking in, next thing you know, you're sipping tea while a monkey stares at you from a branch that doesn’t belong to you.

• Families stumble in: often with mismatched socks and snack crumbs already falling from pockets. Lodges have stuff for them: walks through trees, someone with a map who somehow knows every bird’s nickname, and places where you can sit and do nothing together.
• Couples? Well, it’s no Eiffel Tower, but lodges whisper instead of shout. No one asks why you're staring at a rock for half an hour. 
  Just saying - being a couple doesn’t mean you can’t fall head over heels for a boutique hotel, too.
• Solo travelers love ‘em. Probably because it’s one of the few places left where someone might actually ask, “Where are you from?” and mean it.

Where adventure meets comfort: lodges

You’ll find lodges where roads get tired and stop. One day you’re brushing your teeth, the next you’re on a game drive watching a zebra scratch its nose. Mountains, jungle, coastlines - lodges just sit there, waiting. No rush. They know you'll come.

Pick a lodge, and the landscape kinda… picks you back. That’s not a marketing line, it happened to Jeroen from Utrecht once. Came for 3 days, stayed for 2 weeks, bought socks from a guy who lived in a tent. Long story.

5 Reasons to stay at a lodge

1. The nature doesn’t clock out
   Birds do not care that it's 5:43 a.m. They start yelling anyway. Lodges tend to be in places where your alarm is replaced by frogs, wind, or a goat with no sense of boundaries. Travel and nature? Check.
2. Made-to-measure days
   One lodge might offer guided hikes where your guide somehow knows when it’s going to rain. Another sends you off into a forest with a basket and says, “Just follow the red string.” It’s not the same everywhere. That’s kind of the point.
3. Doing good without trying too hard
   Many lodges play nice with the planet. Solar panels. Local jam. Staff who live nearby and tell you where not to step. Travel sustainability is real, even if your shampoo comes in a coconut.
4. Soft beds, hard-to-reach places
   It’s a strange combo: miles from any town and yet, somehow, you still get a hot meal and a blanket that smells like stories. Accommodations in lodges tend to be the kind where you wake up wondering if you dreamt the whole thing.
5. The adventure finds you
   You don’t need to chase it. Sometimes it’s just there. A reef you didn’t know existed. A Himalayan ridge no one on Instagram has geotagged yet. A safari where the elephant blocks the road for a while and everyone just waits. Travel moments you can’t plan - and shouldn’t.

Unique lodges around the world