The Ice Hotel in Kiruna, Sweden is the first, and perhaps the most famous. Since its creation in 1989, the hotel has featured in many television travel programmes, magazines and newspapers. An Ice hotel is a temporary building made up entirely of snow and sculpted blocks of ice. They are built each year in the coldest regions of the world as a way to attract vacationers to resort areas. Finland The Mammut snow hotel is not an ice hotel per se as it is made entirely of snow. About 10 km East of Québec City, near Montmorency Falls and within the grounds of the Duchesnay winter resort the first ice hotel in North America is erected each January. Its 22 beds were sold out when it first opened in 2000. In its last iteration it had 85 beds, all made of ice but lined with deer furs and covered with mattresses and arctic sleeping bags. Only the bathrooms are heated, in a separate insulated structure. All of the furniture is made of ice. In addition to using ice glasses as in the Kiruna ice hotel, the bar (and room service) also serves cold cuts on ice plates. In its first 4 years of operation the hotel has had 220,000 visitors and 10,500 guests. In 2005 it will open on January 7 and close down on April 3rd. when the exterior temperature reaches minus 40 degrees or less.
