A quick vacation with family which was totally impromptu, and planned in less than ten minutes. Ooty and Kodaikanal were ruled out as we didn’t want to lose time on travel. Yelagiri was one of the obvious choices next. I have been there quite a few times, and I am aware there’s hardly anything there for sightseeing! Since the purpose was only to relax and spend some time with family, this seemed quite apt.
I haven’t heard of this place during my previous visits. It showed up when I was searching for hotel bookings. The place looked wonderful on their website. Decided to try! Made a hassle-free booking on Agoda.
We finished Lunch at Star Biryani, Ambur which is one of our usual lunch places on this route. The weather was very hot and quite unbearable. As we were nearing Vaniyambadi, and close to foothills of Yelagiri hills, there was a downpour for sometime, a very welcoming respite from the heat! 🙂
We reached around 2:30PM on Friday. The last 500m of the road to the resort was pretty bad, and it was sort of a struggle to get there. Then we got to know there is also another way, a shade better than this. We used that for further commutes.
We checked in into the Indian Luxury Cottage. It was good, and comfortable.
The place looked beautiful, quite like in their website. Went around clicking some pictures of the resort. Nice property, lot of greenery, and the swimming pool was spotlessly clean, and wonderful! Weather was okay because of the rain, otherwise nothing worth raving about. Early mornings and late evenings got a bit pleasant, daytime was hot! 🙁 The AC is the room was a blessing! Else it would have been extremely uncomfortable.
In the evening, there was a nice food-cart kind of a set up for serving tea, coffee, milk, and snacks (Thalluvandi, as it is colloquially called). That was very good. A nice refreshing tea with veg sandwiches and cookies. Sandwich, a tad dry, but not worth complaining, tasted good. Cookies, I simply loved. This was complimentary.
We went for a drive, finished dinner at Mirako Pizzeria and it was already dark by the time we returned. The view of the resort at night was nothing short of amazing! The lights made it very eye-catchy, especially near the pool and restaurant! Went around clicking some pics.
IPL screening was on the big screen! Seeing CSK in action got quite a few people excited. The outcome wasn’t what we were expecting though. 🙁
Next day started with Tea and cookies followed by breakfast. The breakfast buffet was pretty good with Live counters for Dosa, Uthappam and Paratha. Food was tasty, didn’t have any complaints!
Lunch was a mediocre affair at Hotel Nigress, and then we were back to the room. A nice swimming session with kids in the evening, followed by Tea, cookies and Sandwich again, pretty much a repeat of the previous day, except for the games that followed. Tried my hand at Archery, managed to hit the board if not the Bull! 🙂
After some rest, decided to proceed for dinner. One thing I have to mention – The prices in the menu for a la carte were expensive. In fact, we decided that opting for a Buffet at 500 Rupees plus Taxes for 4 Pax would be VFM than going for a la carte.
Buffet set up seemed inviting, and food was good. No complaints in general. A couple of dishes stood out – Dal Palak, Veg Balls Manchurian, and Moong Dal Halwa.
Another breakfast before checking out – This, I felt could have been better. The crispy vadas were a tad sour, and Pongal could have had more flavor. Otherwise rest of the items were all good. They could do with some better cleaning of tables in the restaurant. When you have table cloth on tables, they tend to get soiled and definitely need to be replaced. Otherwise, better to have clean table mats. I had to call someone to clean my table on two occasions.
In general, the service was very courteous. The place was comfortable, relaxing and I’d certainly go back at the next opportunity. More importantly this is a pet-friendly place in case someone is thinking to take their pets along. This is a completely Vegetarian resort, and outside food (veg or non-veg) is not permitted. With other restaurants in the vicinity, it wasn’t much of a problem.
With that, we ended our trip and spent two days at leisure. I would certainly recommend this place for a comfortable stay.
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