Aurora Ice Museum at Chena Hot Springs Resort
Chena Hot Springs, Alaska, United States
The Aurora Ice Museum is the unusual case in this category: a structure built entirely of ice and snow that does not melt in summer. It is kept frozen year-round by absorption chillers running on geothermal energy drawn from the hot springs a short distance away — heat, in effect, used to make cold. The engineering is the reason it exists at this scale.
Inside, the building holds carved ice chandeliers, a full ice bar, sculpted figures and a set of ice bedrooms fitted with caribou hides and heavy sleeping bags. The carving work is done by championship-level sculptors, and pieces are renewed as they age. Visitors tour the interior in issued parkas; overnight stays in the ice bedrooms are offered as a separate arrangement to the resort's conventional rooms.
The museum is one part of Chena Hot Springs Resort, which lies at the end of a road roughly sixty miles east of Fairbanks. The resort itself operates on geothermal power and heat, runs year-round lodging, and sits far enough from city light to make winter aurora viewing a principal reason people make the drive.