Friday, November 22, 2013

An underwater hotel opens in Africa, 하룻밤에 $11,710.00 라니....

Joining a list of other experimental under-the-sea hotel rooms in Florida, Sweden and the Maldives, the underwater room at Manta Resort on remote Pemba Island in Tanzania’s Zanzibar Archipelago immerses guests 4m below the surface. The room sits on the bottom of a three-level floating structure, located 250m from shore in the Indian Ocean.
Above and below each of the room’s eight windows, spotlights illuminate the sea life that swims by. Frequent visitors include a trumpet fish known as Nick, as well as squid and octopus at night. Above the underwater space, guests can climb a ladder to the water level, which contains a bathroom and lounge, or ascend to the rooftop to soak up the sun or lay beneath the stars.
The floating structure was designed by Swedish artist Mikael Genberg, who also constructed the structurally similar Utter Inn in Sweden’s Lake Malaren. For this project, he sought a more remote location with clearer waters, and found it off Pemba’s coast in the form of “the blue hole”, a circular clearing within the coral reef, measuring about 50m in diameter.  The open space made it the ideal location to anchor the new underwater structure.
The room officially opened for guests on 1 November. Since Manta Resort has only one underwater space within the now 17-room resort, single nights in the room can be added to an existing stay for $1,500 per night.



No one ever said sleeping with the fishes would be easy. Under sea hotels have long been a dream of architects, travellers and futurists alike, but the process of making them a reality has hit some rough waters.
Dubai’s Hydropolis, located 20m under the Persian Gulf, was set to be the world’s first underwater resort, but the global recession put the project on hold indefinitely. Fiji’s 24-room Poseidon Undersea Resort was slated to open in 2008, but has been delayed multiple times and now expects to open in late 2012.
Of the underwater operations that are still afloat, the most successful have been small ventures, offering only a room or two and somewhat minimal amenities. Jules Undersea Lodge in Key Largo, Florida has been open since the 1980s and requires guests to scuba dive 21ft below the surface to reach a 600sqft living space in the middle of a protected lagoon. The nightly fee ($500 to $600 per person) includes dive gear, diving access to the lagoon and dinner served in the lodge.
Owners of the Utter Inn in Vasteras, Sweden sail to the middle of Lake Malaren to drop their guests at a floating barge topped with a modest red entrance structure. Travellers descend a ladder to get to their room, 3m below deck. They also have access to an inflatable canoe for above-water excursions. Rates start at 12,000 krona per week.
The most luxurious underwater room option transforms the Ithaa underwater restaurant in the Maldives into a private bedroom ($11,710 per night), including a private champagne dinner and breakfast in bed. The resort needs 14 days advance notice to book it as a suite. 

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