America’s premium nature attractions keep pulling in visitors, but until recently, most of the accommodation options were not too grand. These chic inns offer everything from soaking tubs to telescopes for stargazing.
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America’s national parks experienced their busiest year ever in 2024 with tens of millions of visitors seeking a slice of nature at sites from Alaska’s Kenai Peninsula to the Great Smoky Mountains.
Though the U.S. park system is facing budget cuts, its popularity isn’t slowing down.
And thanks to a spate of luxury boutique hotels opening near these storied landscapes, Americans can now bond with nature more poshly.
“National parks offer accessible, restorative travel experiences, but for years, visitors had to choose between some version of camping, select service hotels or inconsistent independent properties,” said Mike Weiss, co-founder and co-CEO of Trailborn and Castle Peak Holdings based in New York.
He and his co-founder, Ben Weinberg, are among those updating the idea of “camping out” by launching boutique hotels near national parks.
While demand for legendary lodges, such as the Ahwahnee in Yosemite, the Old Faithful Inn in Yellowstone and the cliff’s-edge El Tovar Hotel at the Grand Canyon hasn’t dwindled, boutique hotels draw guests with serene spas and fine-dining restaurants that offer spectacular views.
Among their non-rustic features: soaking tubs, fancy high-count bed linens and telescopes for stargazing. Here, the new hot tickets where swooning over Mother Nature doesn’t mean roughing it.
Don’t let the name fool you: Wyoming’s most famous park is a 2.5-hour drive away.
But at this adults-only lodge that opened last summer, waking up in your roomy suite includes perks like views of the Grand Tetons and Snake River Valley.
Should the scenery become too overwhelmingly majestic, focus instead on the house granola or a huckleberry and peach smoothie, options on the breakfast menu.
Situated right outside the billionaire bustle of Jackson Hole, the retreat houses a tranquil spa, where guests can book 10 minutes in the Himalayan Salt Treatment Room ($60) to wind down after a day spent with Old Faithful at Yellowstone National Park.
Others watch the sunset from the patio with a glass of William Knuttel “Atlas Peak” Cabernet from Napa Valley, Calif. From US$1,199 a night.
Set in Williams, Ariz., arguably the Route 66-iest town in America, this newly opened outpost dispenses with road-trip kitsch to offer 96 colorful rooms beside the celebrated ravine.
Consider a curated hike, lounge by the pool or schedule a laser-guided constellation tour for a group of up to 10.
A Southwest-inspired steakhouse and on-site saloon (named Miss Kitty’s after Amanda Blake’s character in “Gunsmoke”) are nods at the area’s rootin’, tootin’ heritage, while extras like bocce ball courts and a scavenger hunt board for children provide entertainment before, or after, visiting the main attraction. From US $123 a night.
For California travelers exploring Yosemite’s granite domes and sequoia groves, this gaggle of pet-friendly cottages and villas in the town of Groveland, Calif., makes a good base camp.
Guests can kick back in spacious indoor-outdoor living spaces, play cowgirl on a trail ride or try mountain cuisine (like bone-in wild boar) at on-site restaurant YOVA .
Opened in the spring of 2024, the welcoming spot has a heated saltwater pool and hot tubs.
Its proximity to the northwest entrance station of Yosemite is a plus too. From US $525 a night.
Colorado’s Great Sand Dunes might not be the best-known national park, but this luxury resort in the San Luis Valley (a certified Dark Sky region) is attracting travelers with its inventive design and focus on astronomy.
The rooms—transparent geodesic domes—cater to those who want to marvel at the Milky Way by night and the Sangre de Cristo Mountains by day.
Amenities include private Jacuzzis, heated floors and, of course, high-end telescopes. Situated 3.5 hours from Denver. From US $700 a night.
Nestled between Utah’s iconic national parks—Bryce Canyon, Capitol Reef and Zion—this adventure-focused retreat sits within a landscape no one would call dull. Choose between vintage Airstreams, cozy casitas and 4-person cabins.
When you’ve had your fill of nature, spend an evening at the drive-in movie theater, cannonball into the pool, or order patty melts and soft serve at its Americana food truck.
For a more secluded experience, deluxe cabins come with private bathrooms and fire pits. The cozier lodging options feature shared bathhouses with shower stalls. Tiny cabins start at US $169 a night, deluxe cabins, US$259; Airstreams, US$175.
Bar Harbor’s newest boutique hotel is two blocks from the sandbar to Bar Island, a part of Maine’s Acadia National Park. Situated downtown on Cottage Street, with its nearby shops and restaurants, the Pathmaker’s 46 rooms have Americana-style furnishings and smart TVs.
Dining is easy too: The mid-century-furnished restaurant serves up a complimentary breakfast, which includes Belgian waffles or spicy frittatas. From US$139 to US $329 a night, depending on the season.
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Kit Braden, an executive at French beauty empire L’Occitane, has spent every winter for the past 13 years at the stone vacation home.
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A historic Barbados estate with a 300-year-old villa and 11 acres overlooking the Caribbean Sea is now for sale with a guide price of $22.5 million.
The seller is Kit Braden, chairman of the U.K. branch of French beauty empire L’Occitane Group, whose family has spent every winter for the last 13 years at the island property, known as Fustic Estate.
“It’s very much a family house,” Braden said. “We love having a lot of people there. It’s a collection point to keep everyone together.”
The main villa dates to 1712, though it’s been reimagined and expanded substantially over the years.
It spans 13,000 square feet and features seven en suite bedrooms across three wings, as well as expansive verandas, stone courtyards and rows of louvered doors in gay Caribbean pastels.
In the 1970s, when the home was owned by Charles Graves—brother of British poet Robert Graves—it was reimagined by stage designer Oliver Messel, one of the foremost theater designers of the last century. Messel expanded the home, added a lagoon pool with a natural waterfall and other theatrical features, according to Braden.
“The whole place is a little bit magical,” he said.
The home sits about 350 feet above the water, and surrounded by lush gardens that slope towards the water.
“We look down through our garden—which is about 12 acres of tropical gardens and palm trees and wonderful old mahogany trees—onto the Caribbean,” Braden said.
He and his wife first saw the property on New Year’s Eve 2013, during a quick trip from where they were staying in Grenada.
The couple spent an hour walking the perimeter, some of it still untouched jungle, in the pouring rain.
“By the time we got back, I had fallen in love with it,” Braden said.
His wife, however, wasn’t so sure. But in Braden’s telling, a second visit in sunnier weather with two of their children brought her around.
“She had to be talked into that it was a jolly good idea; now she absolutely loves it,” he said.
When they bought the property, the edge that runs along the waterfront was a jungle, so they cleared the ridge and transformed it into gardens.
They also bought an additional sea-level parcel with two beach cottages, giving the property direct access to the water and the town below via a five-minute walk.
The property also has a 15-person staff, a reflecting pond, an outdoor pavilion suitable for yoga and a commercial grade kitchen that can serve more than 100 guests, according to a brochure from Knight Frank, which posted the listing in March. They did not provide further comment.
For Braden, the property is special because of its natural beauty, its proximity to the town of Saint Lucy and its history—which dates way way back to when the island of Barbados was first formed via tectonic activity.
“It was basically tectonic plates that collided about a million years ago so the seabed is the top of the hill,” Braden said. “We’re on coral rock.”
As a result, Fustic Estate includes an extensive network of caves that were likely used by the Arawaks, a Venezuelan fishing tribe that followed the fish to these islands about a thousand years ago.
“If the fish were good they’d camp here,” Braden said. “There’s evidence that they stayed there in those caves, they lived there in good winters.”
Now it’s someone else’s turn to live on the land shared by Arawaks, the plantation owners of 1712, Charles Graves and the Braden brood.
