View from the breakfast table. Sitting here, drinking coffee and enjoying the view. This was the right decision to forgo the day trip to Kanyakumari.
Ravi, the local tour manager had assured me yesterday that we will be credited whatever charges we incur for the additional boat trip since we decided to forgo the original plan which saves them money.
Reluctantly left the breakfast area after a couple of enjoyable hours and went back to the cottage to get ready to go the beach.
Met the enterprising and very pleasant head Gardner of the property, on the way to the beach.
The beach is beautiful as expected from seeing from our porch. There was active fishing going on by the locals and they weren't very friendly or interested in answering our questions, lack of a common language may have been the culprit.
Interestingly I always get more interest saying I am from Kolkata than the US. Maybe they think I am crazy to come from one seaside fish eating area to visit a similar one.
We watched the fishermen bring in the catch, empty the nets and stretch the net for drying.
Reluctantly left the beach area as it got too hot. Seems like the tide was starting to come in and it was fun to get soaked knees down. Of course Sudip didn't get any where near it and kept telling me to get back.
Lazed around some more on the porch and decided to go in for lunch around 1:00 PM. Wasn't very hungry from the late breakfast, ordered Dal Tadka (lentil with vegetable) over plain rice.
The food was excellent as always and complimented by cardamom tea after the meal.
Really really enjoyed all the open air dinning at all the resorts and sitting on the porch enjoying the weather. A major luxury for me since whatever grows in Racine, kicks in my allergies and makes me miserable to be outside.
The manager came to talk to us expecting us to say everything is perfect and left in a hurry when he got a well deserved earful.
Continuing the saga of mis-managed, the gift shop is supposedly open 9:00 am to 9:00 PM and was closed at around 2:00 with the "open" sign hanging on the outside.
It so very frustrating to such a beautiful property that has such potential and amenities, so mismanaged and in such disarray.
Left to go to the Karaikkattu boat tours that we had booked yesterday. The local tourist agency, Clipper Tours kept their promise and picked up the tab and refunded our deposit from yesterday.
The backwaters boat tour was fantastic, we saw many birds and Sudip got some great pictures. We went through mangroves, and went past floating restaurants, resorts, and rural villages, ending with a gorgeous sunset over the Arabian Sea. What a fabulous finale to a great vacation. It will help us to forget the ineptitude of the resort. The boatsman was young, energetic and with a keen eye.
After we came back, all of a sudden we started getting the service we should have had to begin with including working wifi everywhere and ice cold beer in chilled mugs.
We wondered if our local contact Radhika had pulled some strings, she did call earlier but I had told her not to do anything since we were leaving tomorrow morning anyway.
Will be leaving tomorrow morning to drive to Kochi to catch our flight to Delhi that will connect to the International flight to O'Hare.
No comments:
Post a Comment