Your Sci-Fi Guide to Winter Travel

The Place: Vulcan
Landscape: Rocky
If you’re looking to cut down on your travel time, Vulcan makes for a relatively quick trip. At just over sixteen lightyears away, you’ll be sipping plomeek soup and watching the sun rise over the L-langon mountains before you know it. The people aren’t friendly, exactly, but you won’t have a more efficient, practical vacation to anywhere else in the quadrant. One warning: if you’re looking for romance, you may want to move along. Things get dodgy during pon farr season.
OK to go? If you don’t mind a little peace and quiet, sure. Tolerant disdain is all that passes for hospitality on Vulcan, so bring your sunglasses and a book or two.
 

The Place: Gethen (aka “Winter”)
Landscape: Icy
We’re all for mixing things up a bit while traveling, and they definitely do things differently on Gethen. The folks there are ambisexual, and only take on sex characteristics once a month. For the more adventurous traveler, it’s a great time to meet new people and to explore, er, a bit more than just outer space. The downside? Gethen is never not cold. There’s a rumor that the planet might, someday, emerge from its impossibly long ice-age, but no one is holding “hir” breath.
OK to go? Are you out of your mind? It ain’t called “Winter” for nothin’. You’re better off staying at home.

 

The Place: Solaris
Landscape: Water world (not to be confused with Waterworld)
Not everyone wants to spend a vacation basking in the sun. You won’t find pristine beaches on Solaris…in fact, you’ll find no land whatsoever. Stare too long into the deeps of this giant ocean-world, though, and you’ll soon find the water staring back at you. The sentient planet is a great get-away if you’re looking to do a little soul-searching during your time off. There’s even a bonus for celebrity-watchers: Rumor has it George Clooney was spotted in the system once or twice, so don’t forget your camera.
Ok to go? Solaris knows all of your secrets, and is best avoided if there are things you’d rather not discuss.
 

The Place: Trantor
Landscape: Metropolitan (see also Coruscant)
The administrative (and literal) center of the galaxy, the enormous city-world of Trantor has something for everyone. Provided you like large buildings. And lots of people (45 billion, give or take). And you don’t like forests, or deserts, or large bodies of water. Visit the underground yeast-factories that provide for the planet’s nutritional needs, or see how things are really run when you tour the halls of power. Bookworms should set aside plenty of time when visiting the Library of Trantor—it’s the repository of all human knowledge, and can’t be done in a morning. Notable citizen Hari Selden has suggested that Trantor may one day return to the agricultural roots of its ancient past, but what does Hari Selden know?
Ok to go? If you’re positively living for the city, then we predict that you’ll have a great time.
 

The Place: Arrakis (aka “Dune”)
The Landscape: Desert
Religious fanatics, giant carnivorous sandworms, and a series of increasingly unstable commercial dictatorships. But, here’s the thing: it literally never snows. As long as your idea of fun makes room for inconsistent access to drinking water, you’ll enjoy a very authentic stay with the local tribes (charmingly called “Fremen”) who will introduce you to their quaint and time-honored culture and their delightful custom of drinking their own reprocessed bodily fluids. Sample the spice melange while fleeing sandworms and fighting over tiny drops of moisture.
Ok to go? Absolutely. They don’t even have a word for “snow” there. Be prepared to learn about urine reclamation.
 
What planet would you choose for your winter getaway?