The good.
Price. Early check in, immaculately clean room, TV (English movies), AC, Kettle, hot water, safety box in room. Gym, Pool.
The bad
Gym only open till 11 am, and again in the evening. No afternoon use.
Pool cold (February). In shade, though 5 sun beds do get sun most of the day. Staff studiously don’t make eye contact as they pass the pool area in case you do something, like ask for a towel, or beer. I had difficulty during check in process as I made mistake with online booking.com (booked double room for 1 person). I realised my mistake and tried to correct at time of booking and offered to pay the INR400 but they didn’t answer email. This had risen to INR1,500 paying on arrival. Still a good price, but hugely frustrated (at my mistake, and their taking advantage).
The ugly
Two things:
1. probably as a result of my attitude during check in, we were given room 325. I think this is directly underneath some machinery (AC units?) on the roof. It was loud. A deep, booming noise that was a cross between a ships engine room, and the refinery from Mad Max II. I used to work on oil rigs (and loved Mad Max movies) so found the rhythm and vibration from rotating machinery comforting and went to sleep no problem. Not so my wife. Or probably you.
2. But our experience in the restaurant. Wow. The first night was great, to be fair. The second night was a catalogue of disasters. We ordered a bottle of ice cold sparkling wine. They didn’t have any so brought warm still white wine and were surprised we didn’t want it. We then ordered steamed fish, honey pork, chips, rice, naan. The food came as it was ready. Not too unusual for this part of the world, but you would expect a hotel not to serve your chips and naan as a starter and the rest to come when you have finished (chips) or is cold (naan). Then the fish came. It smelled like fish so I only had one bite. My wife poked around at it for a while before we called the waiter over. We are British so hate doing this. Waiter was clueless so we asked for chef to come out. Chef took one look, agreed fish wasn’t cooked, and took it away. The bill come and waiter explained he only charged 50% of fish as we had tried to eat it (!!). I refused and eventually it came off the bill. There was some confusion (mine) as to if they removed the tax and service charge from the bill. The tax was removed. They did not remove the service charge. The hotel manager came to my room later that evening to explain that to me. In hindsight I should have maintained that the service be removed - but when it’s only about £1, my wife told me to just pay it and suggested to write this review - and in fact the manager should have refunded the entire meal cost.
Conclusion. When all said and done though, you get what you pay for. This was a very cheap hotel. I was really frustrated, but not really surprised. After almost three weeks and several hotels in Goa, I would not discourage anyone from staying here. Just get a different room, and set your expectations per the above. The staff were pleasant. And of course it’s handy for the airport, and included a free transfer. Precisely the reason we chose it.
