Want to travel like a celebrity adventurer? A log cabin sheltered Ewan McGregor as he checked out polar bears in icy Churchill, Canada, while Julia Roberts famously slept on the floor of a yurt with local families during her trip to Mongolia. Or perhaps the Tunisian cave dwellings where the first Star Wars movie was filmed is more your style.
The choices are endless – from Sherpa teahouses in the Himalayas to the longhouses of Borneo on stilts, there's a jaw-dropping array of wonderfully unusual places to stay if you want a holiday that's like no other…
Troglodyte caves – Tunisia
At first sight, Matmata seems to have little to offer except bare hills, a police post and a Muslim shrine. That is until a voice from below calls "Bonjour!" and you realise you've all but stumbled into a cave dwelling. On closer inspection you discover a lunar landscape pitted with 300 or so craters, like a giant Swiss cheese. The setting featured in the first of the Star Wars movies, and each crater is the courtyard of a family home with rooms cut into the walls. Spotlessly clean, some of the caves sprout TV aerials, and although many young people have been resettled by the government in a modern village ten miles away, older residents often refuse to move, loving the fact that their unusual homes are cool in summer and warm in winter. To cope with tourists, a couple of cave hotels have sprung up (or down, to be more accurate). Carved out of rock, the rooms have beds, mirrors and cupboards – everything you need for a cosy night's accommodation.
Yurts – Mongolia
Travellers and traders through the ages have crossed Mongolia's mighty Tien Shan mountains, its vast grasslands and high plateaus where the nomads of Central Asia traditionally built their yurts. And now you can marvel at the landscapes, meet these warm people and experience their legendary hospitality. Made of felt - often waterproofed with sheep fat - stretched over a collapsible wooden frame, yurts are comfortable, yet portable, enabling the herders to travel in search of feed for their flocks. At the centre of the dwelling is the hearth, the most coveted spot and one which, as a guest, you'll be offered. The Silk Route passed through this area, transporting tea, porcelain, paper, spices and gems to the West, and returning with caravans of fruit, wine, ivory, wool and gold. It won't take a modern traveller the 200 days it once took to make the journey, but a taste of an ancient way of life will ensure a holiday to remember.
Cave dwellings in Tunisia are cool in summer and warm in winter
In Mongolia, a yurt - a wooden framed felt structure - is one unusual lodging option
