Igloo Stay Vacation Dares Tourists In Manali Valley

Manali: Now get the feel of arctic region in India which bring to you a first of a kind travel adventure, one that will leave you with goose bumps first , IGLOO stay in India. Experience something truly novel in winters, (Manali) India’s first ever Igloo stay vacations. Spending a night inside an Igloo, in the backdrop of the snow clad mountains in Manali and live your childhood dream. Camping out in the summer is one thing. The Igloo, also known as a snow house, is a round, dome-shaped shelter built of snow, originally constructed by the Inuit Tribe. Igloos are made from blocks of compacted snow and built in various sizes, sometimes housing up to twenty people. The name Igloo derives from the word ‘Iglu’ meaning “house, dwelling” in the Eskimo-Aleut language.

Every tribe choose a type of housing to suit their lifestyle, the climate, the environment and the natural resources (known as biomes) that were available to them, and the Inuit tribe were no different. The Igloo was chosen as the most suitable type of house for the Inuit tribe who lived in the Arctic regions of Alaska, Canada and Greenland. The cold, harsh climate and the barren, treeless landscape of the Artic tundra resulted in Igloos or snow houses being built as the Inuit people were skilled builders and made good use of the snow and ice found in their habitat which they used to make the igloo house. The Inuit built three different types of igloos in different sizes and used for different purposes.

Igloo accommodation at Manali

Tashi, further said that snow is a very good insulator which means that the igloo was able to retain its heat. The trapped heat inside the structure caused the igloo to melt slightly. The melted snow would then refreeze when the igloos was unoccupied. The thawing and refreezing cycle resulted in the entire structure becoming solid ice, which was even stronger and warmer than the original structure made from blocks of snow.

Tashi explained the igloo is built in several sizes but the average Inuit family igloo was about about 9 to 12 feet (3 – 4 meters) and could comfortably house 5 adults. This unique shelter was a dome built using independent blocks of snow that leaned against each other and were polished to fit, without an additional supporting structure during construction. Inuit igloo was able to support the weight of person standing on the roof.

Photos by Sanjay Datta

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9 Comments

  1. says: Sandeep Thakur

    May I know what do they keep between the mattress and floor? Hope thawing with body temperature on mattress/floor won’t wet everything.

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