What does a night in the museum really feel like?

Definitely none of those nightmare-ish experience where ancient animals survive to claw you alive.  I've stayed in an art museum before - well, sorta.  To be exact, it's an entire art island on its own which is called Naoshima in the South of mid Japan, which was truly an unforgettable experience.  Just to give you an idea how beautiful it was:

The Bennese Art Site at Naoshima was designed by Tadao Ando and he is one of the world's most revered architects.  Speckled around the island are some of the world's finest artists and one for example is Yayoi Kusuma's spotted pumpkin - you could see works by Andy Warhol and Claude Monet (yup, there's where they kept em' waterlilies!).  If art is your thang, you've come to the right place.  Dug out some of my photos I took when I was there in 2008 and boy, that's nostalgia...

Here's Cat conquering the world.

Yea, little guy likes ice cream on waffles :)

The underground museum that you could 'experience' art via immersion like the first picture you saw on this post.

Yup, that's me.  Walking Cat.

Yayoi's famous spotted vege.

Up, close and personal with the pumpkin.

The Benesse Art House, hotel.

Clean, simple design - truly Andao's blueprint.

The rooms were simple, equipped with 'smart' carpentry system.  A push and a pull of a board/cover/wall, you could transform the place to something else.

Cat reading up on Naoshima.

Love healthy breakfast :)

That's Cat and my Japanese mom asking for directions.

Glass steps to the shrine.

Beautiful 'noren' - the piece of cloth that's hung at the entrance of Japanese traditional homes.

Functional art - toldja they were speckled everywhere.

Another of Yayoi Kusuma's pumpkin installation.

Yes, brought back so much memories.  And in my pursuit of extraordinary travel experiences, I came across another boutique art hotel recently.  Now if this doesn't make your heart leap in excitement, I don't know what does:

Ladies and gentlemen, introducing HOMA - Hotel of Modern Art, Guilin, China.  Who would have thought there's such a fine piece of design in Guilin?  

Am planning a trip there in April.  Hey, landscape baby, wait for me :)