If having winter-themed ice hotels and ice bars has come to seem a little predictable, try this one: A Japanese ski resort town has built an entire ice village.
Located near Mount Tomamu in Hokkaido, way in the north, the village is at the Hoshino Resort. Among the village’s eleven ice buildings are an ice sweets shop, an ice bar, an ice bakery and and ice slide. The day’s highlight is, in a way, ice tea: an afternoon tea, with pastries and sweet shaved ice served on slabs of ice to patrons seated at tables made of, well, you get the picture. The tea itself, by the way, is hot. The cups are not made of ice.
What the village doesn’t have, by the way, is an ice hotel. Guests are accommodated at the resort’s regular lodging, with the ice village open from 5 to 10 pm daily from December through March. But if you want the tea, reserve early: it’s only served to four customers per day.
