I Tried Ancient vs Futuristic Hotels

I've always wanted to be a time traveler and today I get to be one. In this video we're going to be stepping into two completely different worlds by visiting the most ancient hotel and the most futuristic hotel on planet earth. Would an ancient hotel or a hotel from the future be better for preparing me for my travels when I stop by for the night? Would I be healthier in the past or am I just better off in the future? And how does understanding what a traveler's life looked like in the past versus in the future help us in the present? I don't know, let's find out. I am now so deep in the middle of the desert in Saudi Arabia and it's time to check in to the world's most ancient hotel. Thank you. This hotel is over 800 years old and even reconstructed in the same way as the original old town from the 12th century. The hotel is set up to completely disconnect. There's not even a TV and very little electricity. The most unique thing about this hotel is actually that you can book a room that doesn't even have a roof. Um, what is this place? Are you kidding me? I cannot believe that I am actually going to be sleeping outside under the stars in an 800 year old house in the middle of the desert tonight. Agenda for today, I want to hit a workout in that crazy completely organic gym, then go out to explore this place and try to learn some of the incredible history of Al Uba. All right, let's go. Time to go explore. So I'm pretty sure the concept of physical fitness in the ancient world was pretty non-existent. I think the workouts were surviving every day, but the concept of this gym is pretty cool. Since there's no electricity, it's all body weight or there's machines that actually run with water, but this gym is pretty freaking cool. How are you? I'm good, thank you. I think I saw you on Instagram. Oh really? That's awesome. My new friend Osama here is showing me the old town and it's so interesting because when I came here, I had the feeling that everything would feel very old, like very ancient. Yeah. And it feels like that, but there's this almost way that people have been embracing like the cultural heritage and making it so beautiful with all of these shops. Yeah, they want to make it like a hundred years ago. Yeah. So how to feel when you're left with that. I've never been anywhere that's done it this well. It feels like almost like one of those sets at like Disney world. Yeah. It looks like this is where they film movies, but it's actually real, which is so interesting. It's a dream come true. It is. Currently exploring the farmlands inside the oasis. So many hundreds of years ago, people would live in what is now the old town on the other side of the road. They would come over here into the oasis to work primarily with date farms. And they would have these paths that lead them to and from their farms, completely constructed out of mud. So we have how to say hello. As-salamu alaykum. Yeah. Shukran, which is thank you. Okay, good. We got mud, which is done. Very well. Arabic letters, not too hard, but you have to use your sense. Your tongue. No, you just have to use your sense. You just have to not be dumb. Exploring places like this is surreal, but what makes any trip more meaningful is always the people and whether or not you can actually connect with them. I've traveled to every country in the world and I've gotten by just with my English and some well-placed hand gestures. But the best interactions have happened when I've taken the time to learn at least some of the language. This video is sponsored by Babbel and I wish I'd had it years ago. I can't even tell you how many times I've been traveling in a totally remote place. And when trying to communicate, I met with a very polite, but also very confused stare. But when I even attempt to use just a few words in someone's language, their entire face lights up. And honestly, I think that's what travel is really all about. Babbel is an award-winning app that makes learning a new language simple and effective. You can learn Spanish, French, Italian, and more. I personally have been learning French for years, but there's also so many languages available on the app. It's basically like having a private language tutor in your pocket. With over 25 million subscriptions sold, it just really works. To start speaking a new language in just three weeks, click the link in my description or go to babbel.com slash Lexie for 55% off your subscription. All right, now let's get back to the adventure. Thank you. Cheers. Cheers. Walking around here is absolutely insane. There are these massive tombs, temples, buildings built right into the side of the mountain, and it's incredible. The Napatines are the ones who constructed these tombs out in the middle of the desert, which is actually the same people who built these ruins are also the ones who constructed Petra, which is in Jordan, and that's why this might look somewhat familiar to you. How old are these? So they're 2,000 years old, approximately. No way. It feels absolutely wild to have such an ancient place completely to myself. Look at this. It truly feels like I've stepped back in time. And the way that these cities were constructed using just natural materials, everyone lived so close to each other for safety. They're just across the street from the oasis, this life-giving oasis in the middle of the desert that created all of their crops, where they got their water from, and they lived right next to it as farmers. I mean, these views are absolutely insane. Now that the sun has set, I've made my way back to the hotel, and I'm honestly speechless looking at this place because I've never seen anything quite like it before. One of the things that caught my attention about this hotel in the first place is that they do this kind of hybrid approach to electricity. So there's a couple of basic like charger outlets in my room, but other than that, they completely rely on candlelight. Every single night, they go around the hotel and light over 1,800 candles, which just makes these ancient walls feel like even more mysterious. They're soaked in candlelight, and it definitely feels like I've stepped back in time. This place is just such a maze, and there's endless candles in every direction. These bathroom lights are the only actual lights in this entire hotel room, and I'm not gonna lie, it is pretty nice to have them in here, but the candlelight really feels like it's so much better for my winding down process. I'm not, you know, on my phone. I'm not using wi-fi. I'm using basically no electricity other than what is just in this bathroom, and it feels so peaceful, and it's a bit cold outside, so I'm a little bit nervous for sleeping under the stars tonight, but it's time to go get cozy. This is incredible. I've never been to a hotel that has a setup like this. They got all these cozy blankets because it is actually pretty cold out tonight, but wow, they have this whole little setup off the side of the hotel room. When I booked this place, I checked the part that said sleeping under the stars, and it's crazy that it literally meant sleeping under the stars. This is wild. I just can't imagine what it would have been like hundreds and thousands of years ago when people would sleep outside all the time. That was just the main way that they slept, especially people who were traveling for, like, through the trade routes and everything. Like, they were always sleeping outside, and to imagine having to sleep outside for that long in places like this with no blankets, just in a cave somewhere, it just makes me realize how hard of a lifestyle and uncomfortable of a lifestyle that must have been, and gives me another little sense of gratitude for these blankets and being able to curl up in such a beautiful and comfortable environment while also still being exposed to the elements and all this exposed brick and sand, the wood up above me, and the silence out here. It's just so peaceful. All right, it's been a long day. It's time to get some sleep. Good morning! Oh, wow. I swear the sun started to rise at, like, 5 30 in the morning this morning. It was, uh, definitely really cold last night. The blankets kept me totally warm, but the main problem was just my ears. My ears against the pillow were so cold, so there were times where just, like, put my entire head underneath the blankets just to stay warm, but being able to see the stars as I was falling asleep was so magical. I 10 out of 10 recommend this experience. I feel like this time travel experiment is already off to such a great start because where else in the world can you sleep in an 800-year-old traditional home? I can't believe how well they converted this into a hotel. I was reading that even the mud bricks that you see here, obviously they deteriorate over time, especially when it rains. It only rains a handful of times a year here, but when it does rain, apparently all of the mud would drain into a specific area as the city was designed, and they would continually repurpose those, that mud from the runoff, into bricks and continue building all of this. So technically some of this mud on the walls could have been here for over a thousand years and have seen that many different generations living inside of these walls. Now that we've explored the ancient world, welcome to the future. I cannot believe that this is real. This is absolutely, hands down, the most insane place I have ever been as far as accommodation goes. I'm just speechless. This is so different than any other luxury resort. It's so different than any other like over water villa because those ones are usually more like little houses, like beach houses. This one literally feels like I am in a spaceship right now. So now it's time for me to give you a tour of this literal spaceship, starting off with this absolutely massive living room. I came in and saw an entire plate full of snacks. We got stuffed dates, chocolates, fruits, a massive TV over here. There's also this gigantic silver mystery box. I will leave this to your imagination. This will be what we come back to. Is it a teleportation device? Is it a cryo sleep chamber? I will leave it to your imagination. But over here we have a full kitchen complete with a butler door so that if I wanted to order breakfast or some type of meal custom made to my room, I could close this door. The chef or the butler could come in, cook the meal in here or place it in here and we could have the meal without ever seeing anyone. The privacy here is unbelievable. Also, as you may have noticed, there are no straight lines in this entire room. Everything has this almost organic curvature to it. I think when it comes to that, one of my favorite parts of this entire room has to be the shower. This shower has this custom made glass that just reflects all of the light so beautifully. It almost feels like inside of the shower. There is a menu of shower options. There's a gentle mist that comes down. There's a full waterfall. There's a more concentrated waterfall. There's a hand shower tool. There's literally every different type of water that comes out of this shower. Also, this is basically just a smart shower because it comes with a remote where you can change the lights that are in the shower. You can custom choose what color they are. I think what may be the most futuristic part of this all is actually the toilet. You don't have to touch the toilet at all. This is one of those fancy Japanese toilets that, again, has a menu for the bidet options. If you swing your foot underneath it, it actually raises the toilet seat for you. You don't even have to flush because when you walk away from it, it automatically flushes the toilet for you. That isn't even a service that I knew that I needed, but I absolutely love it. Then, of course, the most incredible part of this entire villa is this seating area as well as the gigantic infinity pool overlooking this Gatorade colored reef down below. The water here almost has this creaminess to it. It's like the, I don't know, the whiteness of the sand mixed with the clarity of the ocean, but it just is creating this insane color that I feel like I've never seen anywhere else. Walk along the water. Just look at that ocean color. Are you kidding me? What do you mean? This is crazy. It's just, it's like, it's silly. It's silly how nice everything is. When my new friend was dropping me off from the reception, I made a joke when we first came in here about how I am definitely not in the tax bracket or the demographic of people who can actually afford to travel here, and I swear he laughed continuously for like a full two minutes. It was absolutely hilarious. It feels like I just can't even imagine what type of people travel here. Like, it must be such an interesting place to work because a really, really unique group of people can afford to come to a place like this. Like, I can very much only stay one singular night and I feel like I'm spending so much to be here. Just the transfers alone were over a thousand dollars, so this is not an easy place to come to at all. It was a solid couple hour flight from Doha to the Red Sea International Airport. It was also really hard to find a flight that would work because there are not flights there every day. This is actually a brand new airport. I have never been in an airport like this before. It was so small but luxurious. The architecture was insane. It felt like it was an airport that was basically just for like private jets because as soon as I came out of the immigration hall, I was greeted by someone who gave me a ticket for my private Mercedes EV ride to another hotel, which then put us in a buggy that put us on a boat for a full 45 minutes just to get to the resort. And this resort property is also massive. I'm going to go explore more of it soon, but this property is just huge and there actually isn't a great way to get around it. You either walk, which is actually pretty far, or you have to call for a driver to come, but they don't have bicycles, which feels like the biggest downfall of this place if I had to choose anything that I didn't like. So that could be added to the very small list of things that could potentially be improved around here. And now we have the grand finale. This is, in my opinion, the most unique thing in this entire villa. Any last guesses before we pop it open? Oh my gosh. Yes, this is in fact the most insane mini fridge I have ever seen. It is definitely not mini, but look at those wings. Truffle crisps, rainbow popcorn, caramel popcorn. All of this stuff in here is free, which is kind of crazy because it feels like nothing at this place would be free. They have gummy bears and all of it is completely included. As per the new tradition on my channel, I'm giving away some of these snacks from the world's most futuristic mini bar, plus a bundle of other Saudi Arabia mementos. For all the details on how to enter, sign up for my newsletter in the It's so comfortable. I need to be careful though because I would fall asleep here so quickly and I feel like there's just so much to do and literally so little time. It's now time to hit a workout in the craziest gym I have ever seen in my life. What is this place? Taking my first swim in the Red Sea off the coast of Saudi Arabia. Coming at you live from the UFO landing site off the coast of Saudi Arabia. If the ancient world was all about simplicity, then the future is all about optimization. Everything about this hotel has been optimized to make life as easy and aesthetically pleasing as possible. All of the lights, the air conditioning, even the curtains are all automated. The future version of me might be living like this every day and they say that we could potentially start living regularly up to 120 years. We are going to have devices that are tracking our every heartbeat. Our food and our exercise routines are going to be completely dialed so that we have as healthy of a life as possible. AI is going to be tracking every step and everything that you do and probably at that point everything that you think. We're also going to be living so much longer because all of the problems and reasons that people died in the past like diseases are going to slowly become more and more eliminated. And in the future, travel could be so much easier. It could have taken way less time to get all the way out to this remote section of the Dead Sea. I think there might be another side of the coin when it comes to all of this technological advancement. I have not needed to talk to anyone since I've been here. I can order my food online. I can have it delivered through the back entrance so I don't even see the service workers. I haven't seen any other travelers since I've been here. It just feels like I'm so isolated. If we can work and socialize and travel completely on our own or even virtually, then what happens to real human connection? Being here surrounded by this cutting-edge design and technology, I can't help but notice how quiet it is. It's beautiful. It's efficient. It's almost flawless but it's also kind of lonely and I think I need to change that. One thing to know about me when I'm traveling by myself is that I'm actually pretty naturally antisocial. The last thing that I want to do is get out of my comfort zone enough to make new friends. But I have been feeling so lonely since arriving in the future. Everywhere I go in this resort, I find no one. I've been completely alone all day. I met this very kind woman when I was arriving and going through immigration coming into Saudi Arabia because we both had the Ray-Ban Metaglasses and both had our sunglasses confiscated because of the the cameras that are inside of them. And she actually offered to, because I'm leaving out of a different airport than I came into, so I was gonna just not be able to ever get my glasses back, but she actually offered to pick them up for me when she was on her way home and mail them back to me when she gets to the US which was so kind and she really did not have to do that at all. So she's actually here staying at the resort as well and I felt a little out of my comfort zone but I asked her on a little dinner date this evening. So we're about to go to dinner together and this is the first time in a long time that I've gone to dinner with a stranger and I actually have just the thing for this occasion. Because this is such an insane place, I decided to bring this crazy dress all the way here in my carry-on because I feel like it matches the aesthetic of this place so much and I'm gonna wear it tonight on my little dinner date. Okay, I do very rarely ever do this. This is probably gonna be one of the handful of times you will ever see me in a dress, but here it is. My favorite part is definitely this back. I absolutely love this dress. It's one of those ones that like fully cooperates with the twirl and with that I am ready for my dinner date. Why am I nervous? Why am I like this? Hello. Oh, you look amazing. I literally dressed up for you too. Meet Kay. She's honestly a total badass. When we were talking at dinner, I learned that she's a mom and a doctor who owns her own practice in Texas, but she's traveling solo for over a month throughout the Middle East. Now, go spam the comments saying thank you Dr. Kay for being so inspiring and for also helping cure my loneliness. This was honestly the last place that I was imagining running into another solo female traveler and this conversation reminded me of how many adventurous women there really are out there. All right. Yeah, I'll see you tomorrow. Get home safe. It's funny, there's this control, literal control panel on the nightstand here that's the exact opposite of the ancient hotel. It has everything from the air conditioning controls, which is so nice to just have that on your nightstand, to all of the lights, your do not disturb for the door, and even the automatic curtains to control all of that morning light with the fully blackout curtains. It's honestly just so nice to have electricity again. Don't get me wrong, it was probably so much better for my nervous system, like not having access to the internet, but this is way better. And also just not having the ability to like see everything well was genuinely quite impractical. I feel like I'm literally melting into this pillow. This whole bed is so fluffy. It's time to turn the lights out. Miss Alford, I'm sorry to ask you, how's the feeling of being the youngest woman to ever travel the world? Oh, that's a good question. You know, it's feeling pretty good. It's feeling pretty good right about now. Wow, I mean, this is definitely one of the most unique places I've ever stayed. Honestly, when I got the offer here, I was like, is this place real? Yeah, it doesn't look real at all. So, so cool. After having what was potentially the most beautiful room service breakfast I'm ever going to have in my entire life, it was time to check out. In the lobby of the hotel, I noticed this olive tree that's supposedly over a thousand years old. It feels like the perfect symbol of everything that I've been experiencing. Something ancient, still standing strong, right in the middle of a place that feels incredibly futuristic. After bouncing between both worlds, I've realized it's not really about choosing one or the other. The past has things we've lost. Simplicity, slower living, real face-to-face community. And the future has things we're lucky to have. Comfort, technology, and possibilities people here centuries ago couldn't have even imagined. But honestly, the highlight of this whole experience wasn't the crazy futuristic hotel or the ancient candlelit nights. It was just sitting at dinner, laughing, and talking with a new friend. And that reminded me that no matter how advanced the world gets, human connection is still the most important part. Maybe the real goal isn't to live in the past or in the future. It's to take the best of both and build a life somewhere in the middle.