Departures-international.com
Many travellers, rather than clinging to the familiar anywhere they go, desire to immerse themselves in the new, the foreign, the unfamiliar. Instead of checking into generic chain hotels, eating bland food cooked for an unadventurous palate, and seeing the sights on well-trodden tourist paths, they seek out the local, unusual and challenging.
Those wishing to truly immerse themselves in art, music and local culture are surprisingly spoilt for choice in the no-nonsense port city of Rotterdam, at least at certain times of the year. Accompanying several local art and music festivals and enabling a round-the-clock festival experience, a project called Wake Up In It invites visitors to sleep in the homes and studios of creatives involved with each event, thus waking up in the middle of it.
Just over a year ago, Wake Up In Art was launched during the Art Rotterdam fair and saw contemporary art aficionados bed down in artists' homes and studios across town. Thanks to the success of its first instalment, Wake Up In Art was repeated in 2013 and the scope of the project has been expanded to include two music festivals. Wake Up In Opera and Wake Up In Jazz will provide beds for music fans during the Operadagen and North Sea Jazz festivals. Of course, here singers, musicians and other creatives involved with the festival play hosts. Hence, visitors might well be sleeping in a rehearsal space and should not be surprised at all to find themselves in the middle of an impromptu jam session or to be woken by the sound of their host strumming an instrument.
To add to the sense of adventure, the actual location of the accommodation will not be revealed until a booking has been made. If you're feeling adventurous, Wake Up In Opera and Wake up in Jazz will certainly have you absorbing the sights and especially the sounds of Rotterdam 24/7.
Book a room at Wake Up In Opera (May 25th - June 2nd) or Wake Up In Jazz (June 22nd - July 8th) and find out about Wake Up In Art 2014 onlin
www.departures-international.com/nc/sections/post/operatic-accommodations.html