Where Winter Shines Brightest: Four Places Not to Miss

Most winter travel advice begins with a choice: embrace the cold or escape it.

We think there’s a more useful question: Where does winter meaningfully change the experience?

In some places, the season brings different traditions to life through festivals, holidays, and foods or experiences only offered when the conditions are right. In others it changes how people gather or move (think dogsledding instead of e-biking, or sailing across the ice instead of sailing across a lake). And in yet more it makes the landscape accessible in an entirely different way. A mountain valley in the winter is not the same as that valley in July.

We travel the world every year looking for these places. Here are four of our favorites, where winter is far more than just a pretty picture and some hot cocoa.

Finnish Lapland: The Storybook Winter Adventure

There’s a reason Lapland’s influence is found over and over again in children’s movies, from Frozen’s Northuldra to the Sami village in Klaus. Its winter is the winter of childhood imagination: snow-covered forests, reindeer, huskies, frozen lakes, and skies that may suddenly fill with the northern lights.

But while a trip to Lapland is full of deeply cinematic experiences, we’ve found that the most meaningful experiences are often the quieter ones. Instead of a short reindeer sleigh ride with a photo op at the end, we’ll send you to spend time with a family that has raised reindeer for generations. Learn how the animals are fed and harnessed. Share lunch around a fire while your host explains what reindeer husbandry means to life in the Arctic.

Or you can ride through the forest behind a team of huskies, snowshoe across an ancient mountain ground down into a hill by glaciers over generations, or experience a traditional smoke sauna followed by an ice hole plunge. For accommodations, we’ll send you somewhere like Arctic Nook, where a private sauna and outdoor jacuzzi let you melt into the landscape even when it’s frigid, or Northern Lights Ranch, where glass roofs allow you to watch the sky from bed.

We can’t guarantee the Northern Lights will show up to dazzle you, but that’s part of the point. We’ll design a trip you’ll remember forever even without them, so that if they do appear, you’ll be able to appreciate them even more.

The French Alps: The Classic Ski Trip That Works No Matter What

The French Alps set the global standard for winter travel for generations, and while the rest of the world has caught up, these ancient mountains still have an enormous amount to offer, both on and off the slopes. What that means for our clients is that no matter what their party is looking for, the Alps can deliver it.

As an example, we often send clients looking for a great winter ski trip to Val d’Isère. It offers exceptional skiing, but also phenomenal ski hotels like Airelles Val d’Isère (which features ski-in, ski-out access and an onsite Guerlain Spa), a charming village that’s practically the Platonic ideal of a European ski holiday, and plenty of activities off the slopes, from après-ski to dogsled rides to spas.

Flying in and out of Geneva also gives you a chance to experience Swiss art, culture, and food as a bookend. We recommend ending the trip with a few days in Geneva to experience the Old Town, check out how a city famous for its connection to a mountain lake adjusts to winter, and find an experience that caters to your interests like a private chocolate-making workshop with a master chocolatier or a private shopping day for watches or fashion.

The adaptability of the Alps means that no matter what you’re looking for during your trip, you’ll find it. The mountains are exceptionally beautiful during any season, but during the winter, they shine their brightest.

Patagonia: The Outdoor Summer Adventure in Winter

When Shakespeare opened Richard III with a line about turning a winter of discontent into glorious summer, he probably wasn’t thinking about taking a trip to Patagonia. But he might as well have been.

December through February brings long summer days to the region, which is one of the most visually striking in the world. That makes our winter the perfect time to experience its immense and extraordinary landscapes. You might leave a cold, foggy San Francisco or a snowbound New York, but you’ll end up in warmer lands ready to welcome you to outdoor adventures.

One morning might lead to a remote viewpoint over Grey Glacier. Another could mean riding horseback across the Patagonian steppe or hiking through grasslands where guanacos (imagine a cross between a llama and a camel) gather beneath the mountains. You can stay in private villas with your own personal guide and vehicle, allowing you to customize each day to the conditions and what you feel like experiencing in the moment.

Getting to and from Patagonia also means traveling through Chile or Buenos Aires, which creates the perfect opportunity to experience Chilean wine country or the architecture, food, soccer, and dancing of Argentina. When you go to Patagonia, you get an unforgettable outdoor-focused summer vacation in the middle of winter, and that’s an experience that’s hard to beat.

Vietnam and Cambodia: Making the Tropics Manageable

Winter is one of the best times to take a trip to Southeast Asia. In Cambodia, it’s the dry season, so the days are generally warm to hot, skies are sunnier, humidity is lower, and there’s relatively little rain. That makes winter especially good for exploring Angkor Wat and the temples around Siem Reap, where you’re spending substantial time outdoors. It might not feel like winter, but if you’ve ever been to the region in the summer, you’ll appreciate the difference immediately.

Vietnam offers more variety, with the north of the country cool and the south of the country warm. In Hanoi, you’ll see residents gathering around the lake for morning exercise in the mist and street vendors preparing breakfast. The weather is generally mild and good for days outdoors, like exploring the city with a food expert who can introduce you not only to what people eat, but to the family recipes and neighborhood rituals behind it. 

Farther south in Hoi An, late winter is the perfect time to get out into the countryside, as the rains dry up and the weather warms. Traditional crafts, cooking, and exploring all feel better this time of year.

Southeast Asia is one of our favorite places to connect with other cultures and people, and it all feels much more enjoyable during the mild winter months.

What Winter Makes Possible

The best winter destination isn’t about what makes for the best photos. It’s about connecting to a place during a season that brings out its best.

That might be the wonder of a frozen landscape, the exhilaration of a great ski day, the monumental scale of an unforgettable landscape in the southern summer, or a misty street in Southeast Asia before the city has fully awakened.

Our work is to understand what matters to you, then use the season, the route, and the right local relationships to bring it together.