Vacation in short:
Time of our visit: SEP 06 2009 (2 night pkg)
Group: 7 adults (3 couples) and 2 kids
Experience: Food spree. Amazingly crazy - you will fall in love with it.
Staff: Very friendly and co-operative.
Food: unlimited all meal. Excellent.
Most of the time spent @ food court & pool.
Rooms: 1 Suite & 1 Dlx: wood, excellent, clean.
Resort Type: 4*, a bit expensive (as expected but wort it).
Price per Night: Rs 6500/- for Suite and Rs 5500/- for Dlx room.
Review on resort in short: Other than those rated by default as per site request.
Pool: 6/5 - 6 for the view that you get from the pool, simply superb.Staff: 5/5Booking convenience: 3.5/5 - 3.5 because the booking executive did not show enthu (very lathargic) in the beginning but was very helpful during the booking process.Plantation tour: 4/5Facilities: 4.5/5 (Has TT and other play area for kids)Recommended: 5/5
Location: 10/5 - 10 because- It is in the lap of mother nature. Home away from home. All of us liked it so much I can feel it even after one yr.Site seeing: There are 2 options: 1. Visit lot of local places ooty, coonor et all .... (most of them commercialized now - I felt so while driving to the resort) there are plenty 2. Stay at resort and enjoy the beauty/hospitality either way you will enjoy.we chose the later one.View from any co-ordinate of the resort: 5/5 (even from the bath room tub the views are amazing).
Now for some more details includes review and our journey & experience and lot more: Can ignore if you want. This is just to describe our experience.
*Last september we a group of closely knit friends 3.5 couples with kids were planning for a vacation when one of the friends indicated Kurumba, we had a look at their web site and liked it very much especially the spouses liked it a lot but looking at the rates thought will drop but made up our mind to go for it and keep it a surprize treat to the spouses.
So our journey started from Hyderabad, took a train to Bangalore and hired a Force traveller vehicle for our vacation. We headed towards coorg (spent 2 nights in club Mahindra - amazing resort again, skipping it here). Celebrated our friends B'day at Coorg Club Mahindra & Started for Kurumba @12:30AM, then started our adventure.
Passing thru Bandipur and Madhumalai forests was good (took the safari but you can skip it nothing great about it. Not much wild life was spotted - at least it depends on ones luck. Saw a lot of Deers and a couple of elephants, we were expecting to see tigers and all. over all avg safari).
What we did not expect is that from coorg to kurumba is you need to take the ghat section - amazing views/scenic drive, early morning fresh non-polluted mist (rarely found in cities), planatations et'all.
couple of folks were down with the ghat section bends. We had a refreshing hot chocolate coffee @ CCD in coonor, couple of hairpin bends and a few Km there will be a right turn leading to a kaccha Rd that leads to the resort. Bang!!! There it is and we announce - Kurumba, and the folks/spouses that were down suddenly get charged up and get down and get exited. Such was the hype we created that we were going for some jungle resort some where on the other side which they were not very interested.
BTW if you want to avoid the ghat section for most of time - Then reach Coimbatore and take the Nilgiri Railways toy train (one of the steepest tracks in India) and get down at coonor or some where near I don't remember and can avoid mos of the ghat. Children will like the toy train experience a lot. But believe me ghat section is one of the most scenic route in south India.
We get a good welcome drink and are check'ed into our rooms. 1 Suite and one Dlx cottage where were close by. Suite was a duplex, one room each on each floor. The views from the Sit Out of the rooms is amazing: facing the mountain covered by white mist/clouds in the early morning and evening. Each cottage is sitting on a small hillock.
BTW Tipu Sultan was in exile in the mountain for quite some time, You can see the cave also.
The rooms by itself were mostly wood, and soaps and shampoos and other toiletries used in the resort are organic, chemical free mostly made out of their own farms (at least that was what we were told). The view from the bath tub was also amazing like from the sit out. It was almost past lunch time and we were all hungry.
Now to the food, the best part of our trip. The dining area is on a small hillock and facing the forest and mountains. One can eat, drink and have gr8 time hear looking at the nature, a small stream can be seen flowing thru the resort. Proper care was taken not to disturb most of the nature part in the resort which is good. Had a lot of food which was very tasty and hit the pool and we all played some games in the pool till it was snack time and had some good snack and chit chatted for a long time and Night fell and it was dinner time. Had good food again. The menu was almost never repeated during out stay. Believe us we were either eating and chatting or playing in the pool for most of the time never got bored of it.
Then next day had a good break fast the waiters and the cook never complained how much ever we ordered ... various types of omelets, bread, etc ... Reason: The number of cottages are limited of number of guests are limited so attention is more and good more over it was kind of off peak season for them and other than us there were a couple of couples and a TV crew that arrived late in the night.
Now coming to the hospitality: Ideally only 1 couple and 1 PAX extra are allowed per room, but we all wanted to be in same room so that we can talk endlessly and have fun, so we requested them to shift all of us into the suite room and they obliged (of course the Dlx room was still with us). Believe me 7 adults and 3 could fit into one single room and we had a good time. We also asked for a camp fire which the Mgr agreed but Rain played the spoil sport and we had to avoid it. We asked for some spices and they got them for us from the local Mkt.
Plantation tour was educative and we had good trek around the resort. Came to know quite a few things form the guide. This was adequate. Info was more than sufficient and at time interesting.
Did you know Kurumba is a native tribe of the forest and can talk to the elephants thats why they are employed as guard to keep the pachyderms at bay at nights. They are your friendly neighbors but is safe.
Alas the day to depart had come and all of us were sad to leave the place. Most of them had some medication to avoid puking back on the ghat and headed back to B''lore. Over all the resort was good and we all relish it till date and are longing again to re-visit it. Even today after one yr we have very fond, beautiful and pleasant memories of that trip.
Have been to Goa last week and returned on this Monday, will have a review for that @ some other place. Bay Watch Beach resort... another good one. But I would say not as good as this.
Thanks for being so patience and all for all those who made it till here :D. Hope this give some good idea on the coonor/ooty area.
- Thank You! We appreciate your effort.