S3, E24: This Wilderness Lodge Will Take You to the Center of Life in an Ancient Forest

In this episode of Unpacked by Afar, senior deputy editor, Jennifer Flowers, spends a weekend at Clayoquot Wilderness Lodge. She becomes entwined in the harmonious ecosystem at Clayoquot Sound’s UNESCO Biosphere Reserve. She takes a cold plunge in the waters, a helicopter trip to a mountainous peak and traipses through the signs of new and old growth forests.

“If These Walls Could Talk” is an Afar series that explores the stories—and secrets—hotels can tell us about the places we visit.

From the First Nations groups that have stewarded the land for millenia to the resort staff who guide travelers through the forest by land,sea and air, we give you an inside look into this luxury travel experience.

Transcript

Aislyn: I’m Aislyn Greene and this is Unpacked, the podcast that unpacks one tricky topic in travel each week. And this week, we have another “If These Walls Could Talk” episode, our series that explores the stories—and secrets—hotels can tell about the places we visit.

For this episode, our guide is Jennifer Flowers. Jenn is Afar’s senior deputy editor and heads up all our hotel content. We sometimes jokingly refer to her as Afar’s Eloise because both of her parents were in the hospitality industry. So she literally grew up in hotels, and Jenn recently spent a long weekend at Clayoquot Wilderness Lodge, located in British Columbia. The lodge opened back in 2000 but a couple of years ago, it came under the ownership of Baillie Lodges, an Australian hospitality group that’s known for its luxurious tented camps in incredible landscapes around the world.

So we here at Afar consider Clayoquot one of the best hotels in Canada—it’s even part of our Hotels We Love list, because at Clayoquot, the forest is the star of the show—and Jenn got to experience it all by land, sea, and air.

Pilot: In the event we need to get out of the airplane early, just let the airplane settle on the water. Undo the seat belt. Stand up with a life jacket and fasten it. Do not inflate it inside the aircraft.

I’m in the cockpit of a tiny seaplane on a sunny day. To my left sits my partner, Tony. To my right, I see a white pontoon below me and sparkling water beneath it. We’re about to take a 50-minute flight to Vancouver Island to spend a long weekend at Clayoquot Wilderness Lodge. It’s a remote tented camp in the temperate rainforests of Clayoquot Sound. The waters here are so rich and biodiverse that the sound here was named a UNESCO Biosphere Reserve in 2000. For countless generations, the area has been the territory of the Ahousat, a Nuu-chah-nulth First Nation, which is a broad term for First Nations on the west coast of Vancouver Island. This area is the site of some of the last stands of old-growth trees on Vancouver Island. Some of the trees I’m about to visit are more than 1,000 years old.

And honestly, those trees are the reason I’m visiting. My trip is a pilgrimage of sorts. Clayoquot is famous for its luxurious tented camp experience, and don’t get me wrong—I’m stoked for the glamping part. But the lodge also promises to immerse guests in the millennia-old forest and the biodiverse marine ecosystem around here.

A few years ago, I fell in love with the temperate rainforests of the Pacific Northwest, so much so that I moved from New York City to my dad’s home state of Washington. I wanted to live closer to them. Pacific Northwest forests were my childhood summertime playground, my pandemic refuge. And now, they’re a part of my regular walking routine at home on Orcas Island, Washington.

I’ve heard that Clayoquot Wilderness Lodge offers the Imax version of these landscapes. You get to see them by air, land, and sea. As we climb higher in our seaplane, heading west toward Vancouver Island, urban areas give way to hillside forests. Some forests are a multi-hued green. Others are made up of stubby trees that look like mowed grass from above, transected by brown logging roads. Then we begin to approach Clayoquot Lodge, and the peaks around us climb dramatically in height. We’re whizzing by the stands of western red cedar, western hemlock, Sitka spruce, Douglas fir, and bigleaf maples. We’re so close to the trees that I’m almost convinced I can reach out and touch them. My heart is racing, and I can’t tell whether this is because of that epic view or the gusts of wind jostling the aircraft. On our final approach, I spot the lodge’s new solar field. A winding estuary hugging the property spills out into Clayoquot Sound. I can’t wait to see it all up close.

Sarah Cruse: My name’s Sarah, I’m Camp Mom, and I am just thrilled to be able to have everybody here for a little visit. Um, the weather is gorgeous, but we live in a rainforest, and you know what, if it rains, we don’t care. Tears of joy. And we never know which way the weather’s going to go, but it doesn’t matter. You’re in the house of Mother Nature.

Jenn: That’s Sarah Cruse, the general manager of Clayoquot Wilderness Lodge, who’s greeting us at the dock. Sarah’s referring to the Pacific Northwest’s famous rain. They get a lot of it in these parts, so the lodge is only open between late May and late September. Today is one of the region’s glorious sunny summer days. Clayoquot Sound sparkles and the trees and moss-covered forest throw off a thousand shades of green. Sarah immediately sets the tone for the rest of the resort—she’s sincere, warm, and constantly engaged with staff and guests.

Sarah: From our hearts, I just want to welcome you, and say with gratitude, thank you. Because you came here and we’re not easy to find. And whenever people find this, I’m like, Oh my God, you did it. And you’re going to jump in and have an amazing experience.

Jenn: “Jumping in” is literally what Tony and I are about to do on our first morning at the lodge. We’ve signed up for a cold plunge in Clayoquot Sound. It’s our first time trying out this popular wellness trend. But as we settle into our tented accommodations, getting cozy with the propane stove and impossibly soft wool throws, the thought of a daybreak immersion in 44-degree-Fahrenheit waters doesn’t really appeal. Yet the next morning, we pull ourselves out of bed.

Jenn (on trip): So we’re just walking to a cold plunge this morning where we’re gonna dip our bodies into very cold water for, I don’t know, health benefits maybe? Somewhere here in the wilderness. So it is before 6 a.m. and it is still dark. There’s a beautiful crescent moon and we’re trying to get ready for this.

We enter the lodge’s heated yoga studio with seven other guests. A staff member named Malena is waiting for us. She has us do a series of stretches while she shares information about the plunge. But before we can get too comfortable, she invites us to strip down to our swimsuits and wrap ourselves in towels. Then she leads us down to the sound’s pebble beach. The crisp air instantly gives me chicken skin.

Malena: Alright, so towels can come off. Like I said, two minutes is it.You can take your hands, put them underneath your armpits, that incubates a little bit more so that retains some of the body heat and just witness your fight-or-flight-response. Acknowledge it and embrace it because it’s a beautiful thing. Alright? With the breath, we go in. Nice and slow. There’s a nice sandbar there that you can go into.

Jenn: Oh my God. Oh my God. Oh. Is it over yet?

Malena: There you go. Nice. Just breathe. Just breathe. That’s it. And nice and slow breaths, OK? Nice and slow, in through the nose, out through the mouth.

Jenn: I drop my towel and step into the water, starting with my ankles, then my knees and then my thighs. When I’m chest deep, panic begins to set in. My teeth chatter and I let out an occasional groan of discomfort, echoing the sounds of people around me. And then, after about a minute, we all begin to quiet down and settle into a collective calm. Toward the very end of our two-minute immersion, I’m even beginning to feel warm. I feel calm enough to start really observing what I’m quite literally immersed in—the idyllic beach, the evergreens fringing the shoreline, the glassy cold water that’s now a source of comfort rather than pain. I’m standing in the middle of all of it, neck-deep, and energized for what’s ahead.

And I’m grateful for that shot of energy because we’ve got a long day ahead of us. After breakfast in the main lodge, Tony and I set off on a multi-hour hike in the Ursus Valley with head guide Mark Brophy. Mark is a thirty-something Canadian. He’s tall, fit, and bearded—and a bit of a badass, too. He’s a biologist, an adventure guide, and a thrill seeker. For example, he’s climbed Canada’s tallest peak, Mount Logan, and spends his winters guiding expedition cruise ships in Antarctica.

Jenn: Wow, this is huge.

Tony: How freaking awesome is that?

Jenn: Oh my God. This is massive. You’re saying this is like, what, 320 feet or something like that?

Mark: Yeah, exactly. I’d put this one anywhere from 500 to 1,000 years. I don’t know.

Jenn: Oh my God.

As we walk through the valley, I’m in my element gawking up at the towering cedars, hemlocks, bigleaf maples, Sitka spruces, and Douglas firs. Mark stops us often to tell us stories of the area.

Mark: We’re in Bedwell Sound at the Bedwell Valley. We’ll follow the Bedwell River. Uh, old name for the Bedwell is the Bear, actually. Uh, Bedwell was a British navigator that they renamed it after. But the old name is the Bear, right? Because there’s lots of bears up here. And then we’ll go a little bit up the Bedwell, then we are going to break east into the Ursus Valley. Ursus meaning?

Tony: Bear.

Mark: Bear! We’re going from the bear valley to the bear valley.

This is definitely still black bear territory–we see claw marks on trees as we make our way through the forest. But Mark assures us that we aren’t likely to run into any.

Mark: The bears around here, we’re lucky ’cause they’re so well fed. You can imagine they go into the intertidal zone. They get their buffet twice a day. And especially around full moon, new moon, they’re getting those like premium buffets. Really big tides. Right? And then during the high tide, they wander out here, they eat berries. In the spring they’re eating the grasses. And then in the fall, they get the salmon, right? So they’re not really interested in us, which is great.

Jenn: Mark encourages us to touch the soft beds of moss that coat tree stumps like furry carpeting. I love watching my hand disappear into them. He explains that the older and newer forests here might look similar at first glance but are really quite different.

Mark: Once we get into the Ursus, you’re going to see the forest change, which is a really cool time, right? So take a look at it now. You’ll see a lot of kind of like homogenous forest, a lot of trees that are the same species, same age. There, a lot of them are fighting for resources, so a lot of darkness.

Jenn: Mark explains that this homogeneity means that it is a second-growth forest. Years ago, the forests were cleared for gold mining, and they’ve since been replanted. Old-growth forests are hard to define because there’s so much variation depending on what kind of a forest you’re talking about. But when it comes to temperate rainforests, they’re woodlands that haven’t been significantly disturbed by humans for more than a century. Mark tells me old-growth forests can better withstand fires than younger forests, and they can store more carbon, too.

Mark: And then as we go into the Ursus, we’ll hit a buffer zone, right? Where things will be changeable, but then closer to the end of the trail, you’re going to see a lot more diversity in the trees and the size and the species, more light coming through, a lot of understory. So it’s a really cool transition from, kind of, uh, modern regrowth forest into a 2,000-year-old forest.

Jenn: As we continue to walk, the smaller trees of the younger forests give way to giant trees, and the forest does indeed get darker as the overstory thickens. Mark brilliantly points out the distinguishing characteristics of different tree barks so that we can identify what we’re looking at. Western hemlock bark resembles fatty bacon strips, and you can’t unsee that once someone points it out to you. The bark of the Sitka spruce tree looks more like potato chips or dragon scales, while Mark says that western red cedar bark reminds him of spaghetti.

It’s easy to use the word “untouched” for places like these that haven’t been significantly disrupted by humans. But “untouched” isn’t the state of these places at all. First Nation groups, like the Ahousat, have lived here for centuries. And they have used these forests sustainably without disturbing the ecosystem. For many hundreds of years, they used the forest for resources like water, food, and shade, and for cultural reasons like building shelter, canoes, clothes, and totem poles.

We spot some yellow banana slugs, some of which actually look like spotty bananas. Mark explains that the Nuu-chah-nulth use this slug for medicine. Apparently, the slime of a banana slug has an anesthetic property.

Mark: And, uh, so if you had a toothache, right, then Nuu-chah-nulth would take the slug, stick it on the gums. And then that would numb the gums, numb the pain. And you let it sit there for, you know, a little bit, not too long. And then you just take it out, put the slug back.

Jenn: Woah. So he survives? You like put him back and . . .

Mark: Oh yeah, the slug’s fine. Yeah, yeah. You just take a little slug.

Tony: You’re just borrowing some slugs.

Mark: Yeah, exactly. Being the curious scientist I am, of course, I had to know for myself. I put him on my tongue for five seconds. My tongue was numb for five hours.

Jenn: But the trees are the real prize. As we walk, I see a cedar tree with a long and slender triangular strip of bark that’s missing.

Mark: So this is a culturally modified tree, or CMT we call them. And this would go back to the Nuu-chah-nulth people, right? So cedar being the tree of life, you can get all your resources from it. So very important to come in the spring, take a young tree like this, like I don’t know, 80 years old, for example. You take a sharp, uh, shell or, of course, ax or knife or whatever, make a slit in the bark. And then, after that, you pull back, peel the bark back, right? And then now you’ve got cedar strips, right? To do so many things with.

Jenn: You can weave a sleeping mat. Or do a looser-weave basket for mushrooms to allow the spores to fall out into the forest and make more mushrooms. Or make a tighter-weave, berry basket so you don’t lose your berries. Or a weave that’s so tight that it can be used for waterproof clothing.

Mark says that according to tribal law, trees only have to give once. A cedar that has been stripped for clothing or baskets would never be cut down for firewood or used to make a canoe. CMTs are protected by British Columbia law if they pre-date 1846, so if you were to harm or cut down a protected tree, you could be fined or even go to jail. But what’s even more fascinating is that these culturally modified trees are also used as legal documents of land rights.

Mark: Because these trees hold these scars, right, for the rest of their life, these can actually be used as proof of place. So in, in, uh, determinations of, of land use or historical land, they can say like, well, see this CMT, this is a thousand-year-old tree, the scar is 900 years old, we were here 900 years ago, right? Like this is living proof of existence and use for Nuu-chah-nulth people, for any people.

Jenn: But having a say in the use of their ancient lands hasn’t come easy to the First Nations groups here. Clayoquot Sound was the site of what many call a decades-long “war in the woods.” In the ’80s and ’90s, activists that included First Nations people blockaded logging efforts in the area, leading to hundreds of arrests. Finally, in June 2024, the Ahousat and Tla-o-qui-aht First Nations and the government of British Columbia turned about 300 square miles of this forest into 10 new conservancies.

The First Nations groups will manage the area with philanthropic support. The creation of these conservancies has nearly doubled the amount of old-growth forest protected in the area. The conservancies are still Crown land. But the First Nations groups can use them in ways that they feel are beneficial and sustainable. They’re looking into sustainable forestry in second-growth forests, carbon credits, and even tourism similar to what’s happening at Clayoquot Wilderness Lodge.

Mark tells me that about a fifth of Vancouver’s old-growth forests remain, and much of it falls within these new conservancies. As I stand in the forest, I take a deep breath in and smell the fresh pine, dirt, and residual moisture from recent rain that helps to sustain these forests. And I can’t believe I have this place all to myself today.

The next day, we return to Clayoquot Sound to get a closer look by boat. We board a Canada-made 40-foot Titan with Mark as well as Isaac Shaw, our captain, who grew up in this area. We’re on the lookout for black bears, porpoises, gray whales, bald eagles, tufted puffins, and anything else we might see along the way. We plan to circumnavigate Meares Island, which is included in the protections of these new conservancies.

Mark: We’re in nature, so it’s not just bears here, right? There’s eagles in the trees, look for the white head. Bears on the shore, look for the black bodies. And there could be harbor porpoise or other things in the water. So look everywhere all the time. Expect the unexpected.

Jenn: We’re looking for black bears at low tide because they like to come to the shore to eat crab, barnacles, and other marine life. And they have their work cut out for them: It’s bulking season before they go into hibernation, and the spawning salmon they like to eat in the rivers haven’t arrived yet. But these bears can weigh as much as 600 pounds, so they need to eat as many as 15,000 to 30,000 calories a day.

Jenn: Soon we see our first bear on the shoreline, and Isaac slows down so we can get a closer look.

Mark: Good spotting, bear right in front of us. So folks, let’s go out on the front deck here on the bow. We’ll get good looks. And let’s just remember when we’re bear viewing, they have amazing hearing. So let’s be quiet, let’s be calm. Enjoy the bear. And, uh, let Isaac do all the work.

Jenn: And there it is: a beautiful black bear, coat shining in the sun. He’s busily turning over large rocks with an impressive ease, looking for his next meal of crab. Turns out, black bears like Dungeness crab as much as humans do.

Mark: And you can see him crunching, right? You can see the [crunching sound] and the tongue going, right? So, there could be crabs. There’s lots of green crabs, little guys in there. We’ll see them sometimes get the Dungeness, which are the big orange ones. Sometimes you’ll get them with a mouthful of crab and then the little, the arms out just like trying to pinch him, right? But the bear’s chomping away on him. It’s awesome.

Jenn: I feel heartened that Mark and Isaac, and so many guides here at Clayoquot, are focused on making the smallest impact possible on nature as we observe it all.

Mark: That was a beautiful encounter too, right? Like that is the dream. For us to show up with a bear doing its thing, watch it, and leave, and it’s still doing exactly what it was doing, right? So, amazing job by Captain Isaac to get us close enough to get that experience, but not to invade on his private space. There might be a bear in there, actually. Oh no, just a rock. Stand down.

Jenn: Not too long after that, we’re looking for more charismatic megafauna—this time, gray whales.

Mark: You can see nice, big, horseshoe sandy bay. Quite shallow in here. Great spot for the gray whales. They both filter feed through the water column, but they also get in the shallows. Right along here. They’ll just drag their face along the bottom. Just taking in all kinds of muck and crab, egg, crab eggs, whatever critters are in there. And just like any other baleen whale, they’ll stick their tongue up, and flush the mud or the water out.

Jenn: I love that Isaac knows the name of the whales by sight—one of them is Orange Crush, who was first spotted in Clayoquot Sound in 1977. I can sense excitement in his voice when we reach Cleland Island, a popular spot for many species of marine life ranging from birds to seals. It’s so ecologically important that you need a research permit to make landfall on this small rocky isle.

Isaac: Dead ahead. Quite close.

Jenn: Isaac points out a kelp forest that surrounds the island. He explains that the forests are just as ancient and important as the ones on land. They sustain countless lives including vulnerable creatures like small fish, crab eggs, and sea urchin. All of a sudden, Isaac wants to familiarize us more with the bull kelp. He reaches into the water and snips off a small piece of one of the long slender stems with a knife and cuts off tiny slivers.

Isaac: Have you guys ever tried bull kelp before?

Jenn: That’s amazing.

Mark: It’s a touch, taste, and feel kind of trip. Juicy goodness. Cheers!

Isaac: Anyone else want to try?

Tony: I’ll try.

Jenn: Sure. It’s, uh, it’s nice. It’s, like, salty and, like, like umami.

Tony: Pretty salted.

Jenn: A little umami action.

Mark: Yeah, right? It’s like a cucumber.

Jenn: As we snack on our kelp, Isaac says that every summer, his family does a big bull kelp harvest. They pickle and can them for the winter.

Isaac: Yeah, fastest growing plant on the planet basically. You could also cut that off. And when this is longer and it works like a beer bong.

Jenn: Haha. That’s what growing up in this area teaches you.

Mark: That’s right.

Jenn: He also says that seaweed pairs especially well with a beer.

Isaac: They’re back there if you want one. You know, a brewing company actually, I don’t think they have one in the cooler there, but they make a kelp stout.

Jenn: Ooo.

Isaac: And they do the same thing, they’ll infuse the kelp into their dark beer.

Jenn: That’s cool.

Isaac: Gives it kind of a salty . . . pretty tasty.

Jenn: I came here for the forests, but realize I’m also falling in love with the coastal ocean biome too. The one that’s so interconnected with the trees I love so dearly. When we’re boating around, I learn that when spawning salmon in the Bedwell River die, they become nutrients that feed the trees. That’s a big reason why coastal trees here grow so much bigger than the inland ones. From that point on, I realize that everything here is living in harmony together. That includes all the people, staff and guests alike, who have come all this way to marvel at it all.

After some time on the ground, I’m eager to zoom out and see the big picture again. One afternoon, Tony, Mark, and I have a date with Dug Gammage, the lodge’s helicopter pilot, in the forest.

[ Helicopter sounds]

Jenn: We’re sunning ourselves by the Bedwell River after lunch and an icy dip, and we hear his helicopter before we see it. Not long after, the chopper descends onto the rocky riverbank. Soon, we’re in the air, zooming over, around, and next to craggy, tree-covered peaks, spotting deep blue glacial lakes along the way. I’ve been in helicopters before, but whenever we pass a mountain peak and then watch the land drop beneath us, my palms sweat a little.

About 15 minutes later, Dug lands below the summit of Ursus Mountain on a small plateau and leaves to pick up other guests at nearby sea caves. Tony and I climb out and Mark is soon leading the way to the summit of Ursus Mountain. We scramble awkwardly along the rocky landscape as we climb in altitude, following a much more agile Mark, eating alpine blueberries along the way. A sweaty 30 or so minutes later, we reach the top, and I cling to a rock as I take in the 360-degree views of the area. Mark, who is wearing rubber boots, seems to be in his element as he scrambles over to another rock to set up a drone.

Jenn: So Tony, we are at the top of Mount Ursus. How are you feeling about it?

Tony: I’m feeling pretty good.

Jenn: Yeah? Feeling excited that our helicopter is behind us. Our guide is climbing around the rocks like a monkey . . .

Tony: Catching drones.

Jenn: . . . catching drones. And then there’s a beautiful lake down there, where the helicopter just was, and it’s a little vertiginous. I’m not gonna lie.

We return to our plateau-turned-helipad, and Mark sets up a table and chairs for us and pours us ice-cold margaritas. He brings out a lavish charcuterie spread, and the three of us talk, sip, and eat while we wait for Dug.

And let me tell you—a helicopter ride in the mountains before a margarita versus after a margarita are two entirely different experiences. As you can imagine, the liquid courage takes away some of your inhibitions—and your self-editing.

Jenn: Does this ever get like, normal or boring? Does this ever get normal? Is this normal? [Jenn screams] Ahhhh, oh my God.

Dug’s answer is to start climbing fast toward the big blue sky above us, before making a stomach-turning pivot back down toward the riverbed. Moves like this are safe, and they’re all in a day’s work for a pilot like Dug, who has been flying here for decades. For a helicopter novice like me, it’s one of the most thrilling experiences of my life—and I’m glad the margaritas have taken the edge off.

Dug is a bit of a legend in these parts. So a couple of days after our helicopter adventures, I track him down at his helipad for a chat. He sets up a couple of chairs for us in the shade of a tree nearby. Dug was born in Ontario and worked as a pilot for many years. He flew planes for the mining industry and in the ’80s landed in British Columbia, where he has been working for the lodge since 2012.

As we get to talking, he tells me he had the chance to buy a 160-acre plot of land where Clayoquot Lodge now sits and homestead it. But Dug and his wife were raising kids at the time, and getting them to school in Tofino would have been a challenge. And the lodge’s first owner, Vancouver businessman Richard Genovese who was dreaming of building a nature lodge there, paid a bit more.

Dug: And, you know, it’s always neat to daydream: Well, if we had bought this, there’d just be a house sitting over here and a couple boats at a dock. And would the Bedwell have been saved?

Jenn: As we continue to talk, the answers seem both simple and complicated all at once to me.

Dug: It comes down to like, there’s like three main questions, that, like, uh, nobody seems to answer, at least for me. What is old growth? Where is it? And whose is it? And go in the reverse order.

Jenn: But what’s clear is that Dug, who calls himself a pragmatic conservationist, is happiest when he’s exploring these forests, both on land and in the sky.

Dug: Look, I’m, I’m a really avid gardener. I spend a lot of time to get a carrot that big to grow. And then you look at these things. And they got these tiny little root wads and the ground is like lousy. And look at the growth out of them. That’s just such a head scratcher. That whole hillside, there’s so many great trees on it and the, the dirt is too minuscule. Haha. To me, I find that it’s just, as a gardener, you’re composting and doing all this right stuff and, oh I got a radish, wow, look I got a tomato now. And then you see these trees growing like this.

I think it’s called pantheism. So I see as much God in that sapling there as I do in the helicopter, or that big tube, or you. So I think basically everything has some sort of subatomic divinity.

Jenn: One of the things I love most about Clayoquot is the collective awe we’re all sharing. I feel it in the helicopter, and while we’re swapping stories with staff and other guests in the dining room. The staff seem truly happy to be here, and many make a point to return to the lodge every summer.

Later that afternoon, Tony and I are preparing to board our flight back to the city of Vancouver. The sun is shining, illuminating the water and the green landscape like it did on the day we arrived. I think of those long walks in the cool shade of the old-growth forests, the helicopter swooping over blue alpine lakes, even the energy I felt from that invigorating, espresso shot–like dip in the cold waters of the sound. And I’m finding it hard to leave.

I am about to leave Clayoquot Wilderness Lodge and I’ve been here three nights and I’m hearing the planes come in and out. There are guests leaving today. And it is a beautiful, stunning day. There are evergreens just shining in the sunshine, and it is pretty hard to break away from this place. It’s going to stay with me for quite a long time.

Aislyn: And that was Jenn Flowers. We’ll link to her social handles, where she shared some phenomenal photos of her trip. And we’ll link to the lodge itself, which is now accepting bookings for May 2025. Next week, we’ll be back with tips on how to experience Paris like a local from longtime resident Lindsey Tramuta.

Ready for more unpacking? Visit afar.com, and be sure to follow us on Instagram and Twitter. The magazine is @afarmedia. If you enjoyed today’s exploration, I hope you’ll come back for more great stories. Subscribing makes this easy! You can find Unpacked on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or your favorite podcast platform. And be sure to rate and review the show. It helps other travelers find it. We also want to hear from you: Is there a travel dilemma, trend, or topic you’d like us to explore? Drop us a line at afar.com/feedback or email us at unpacked@afar.com.

This has been Unpacked, a production of AFAR Media. The podcast is produced by Aislyn Greene and Nikki Galteland. Music composition by Chris Colin.

And remember: The world is complicated. We’re here to help you unpack it.