Citrus Hotels Lonavala - Review

I was at Citrus Hotels Lonavala for Corporate meet few months back for a two days stay. The hotel is very close to Lonavala station and easily accessible. It was corporate booking and the check-in was quite quick.

The room we stayed was very well done, while few of my colleagues had complaints on maintenance. Rooms have mini fridge, snack basket, tea/coffee maker, safe, flat screen TV, guest slippers. Bathroom is glass partitioned and well maintained with toiletry kit, hair dryer and bath gown. Since its amidst the city, view is no great, not to expect anything for a hill station. Most of the room windows open inside the hotel towards the restaurant which looses privacy. 

Food was good, in open space restaurant with Indian and Mediterranean spreads. Breakfast is complimentary. They also have 24 hours coffee shop and cocktail lounge at the restaurant area.

There is swimming pool and enough place for ball games towards the back of the hotel. Also carrom board and pool table at the restaurant area. There is a private mini theater, best thing when you are in group and looking for a night out, watching movie.

The business center is quite sufficient for a meet of around 30 people. On the first evening we had karaoke party arranged by our management, while second day the hotel had arranged for DJ night.

You can check out the price on their website here.

Stay and Din option at Pathankot..

Due to kiddo's bad health we had to skip Dharamshala and come back to Pathankot from Dalhousie. We were at Pathankot by 8 in the night and our taxi driver who had come to drop us from Dalhousie took us to Hotel R K international. R K International is next to Dalhousie Bus Station and very close to Railway station. We had our bus booked for Chandigarh the next day and the hotel looked convenient.

The rooms are quite big and clean, with bed, dresser, TV, mini fridge, sitting place and cupboard. One of windows of the room we stayed at opened towards the backside, thats Pathankot bus stand. With snow fall on last few days, the view also had snowcapped Himalayan peaks, which is always a bliss to watch.

A budget option if you are looking something just for a night's stay, but they don't have a restaurant. We had our food at Hotel Green which is close to R K International. The food is very good at Hotel Green, with Indian, Chinese, Continental. A very good restaurant at the proximity of Bus stand and railway station. When we checked at Hotel Green for accommodation, we were told the hotel was going on with some renovations and hotel was to start very soon, might be we will head straight to Hotel Green during our next visit to Pathankot.

Tariff at R K International Rs. 1500/- per night, contact detail 0186 223 1888

Hotel Review - Oak Valley Residency, Dalhousie...

As I shared in my previous post, it was our taxi driver who took us to Hotel Oak Valley Residency. It started snowing heavy when we reached Dalhousie and we didn't have option to look for other Hotel at night. The hotel is few steps from Dalhousie Bus Stand, taxi stand and Lhasa Market. Its a budget hotel, no great view, as the window opens towards the city. Few reviews about this hotel say, there is sewage line next to the hotel which makes the room foul, but during our stay, the temperature was very low and we hardly used the balcony.

Restaurant was not so great, ok kind of for budget. Room was quite clean, they have wooden flooring rather than carpets, which makes it tidy. Bathroom was clean as well. They don't have blower heater, but only coiled heaters, which you have to be in front of, to warm yourself. They don't have power back up as well, which makes it more difficult to stay with-out heater during winter.

The view from the room

Proximity to bus stand is the only reason you should look for at this place to stay. Being next to bus stand, this is the route which gets cleared first during snow fall, thats from our personal experience. I suggest this hotel only if you are looking for budget stay, else its a no, especially if you are visiting during winter.

Hotel tariff starts at Rs. 1200/- per night, with 1PM check-in and 12noon check- out.

Do check out the complete series on this trip of mine here. 

Hotel Review - The Golden Hotel, Jaipur

As I mentioned earlier, we were about to reach Jaipur early morning, and we wanted confirmed booking to land at an unfamiliar place that early. We googled for hotels near Sindhi Camp, the main bus stand of Jaipur and came across The Golden Hotel. We called them up and they also arranged for pick up from Sindhi Camp. Golden Hotel is around a km from the bus stand, and in a small road inside the market, if you search for yourself directly am sure you would never end up there. Though the approach road was small, the hotel was very good with quite big rooms. We had booked a standard A/C room for 2, there was some renovation going on in their ground floor(where they had most of their standard bedrooms) and others were occupied, they gave us Family room for 4 at the same rate. 

That was quite a huge room, with marble flooring and basics like TV and wardrobe. The bathroom was very neat with shower space, separated by shower curtains. There is no much ventilation as there is single window, which opens towards hotel's inside passage(not sure about other rooms). The passage though is well lite with big windows, you don't feel like keeping the room window open, as there are people using the passage. They have their restaurant as well, which serves most of the Indian food.

Indian Thali, which they served at our room itself

Overall it was a good experience, at a budget rate(I came across their website, where few have mentioned its under priced). Like all other hotels they too have fixed check in, check out times, and we ended up paying for 3 days, while we stayed for around 36hours(how I wish, most of the hotels had 24hours stay options). You can check out their website here for price and booking.

OYO Premium Review and Wandering Around Bangalore, #Oyoxplorer!!!

Its been a while I blogged, had been to native for kiddo's summer vacation and got to travel around Bangalore, Mysore and Hassan. The best of my vacation was #Oyoxplorer activity with Oyo Rooms and Indiblogger, when few of we bloggers got to review Oyo Premium Rooms at Bangalore and explored places around their property. 

I was just back at native after my short visit to Bangalore that I found a mail in my inbox about the #Oyoxplorer. The activity was on 30th May at four cities, Mumbai, Bangalore, New Delhi and Gurgaon and me still being at native during the activity applied for a slot with Bangalore bloggers. It had to be a two day trip for me and worried how kiddo would behave without either me or hubby. I somehow convinced her and left on 30th morning. On the way had breakfast at Vidyarthi Bhavan and left for OYO Rooms.

About OYO Rooms:

OYO Rooms is a network of branded hotels, operating in 16 major business and travel destinations including Delhi, Mumbai, Bangalore, Hyderabad, Pune, Chennai, Goa, Jaipur, Gurgaon, Ghazabad, Manesar, Neemrana, Kolkata, Varanasi. The properties start at Rs.999, promising a comfortable stay which includes AC rooms, complimentary breakfast and Wi-Fi with 24*7 customer service support. OYO offers budget hotel stay experience that would otherwise cost twice or thrice more.

My experience at OYO Premium, Bangalore

OYO room we were invited at, was OYO Premium Majestic near Race Course. Though most of the auto rickshaw drivers knew about Hotel Bangalore International, non was familiar about OYO Rooms. But as soon as I reached Crescent Road, I could spot the OYO Premium in bold. I was quite on check-in time(12AM) and was welcomed by OYO team. I completed the formalities and soon got my room all for myself. 

It was a standard room with two single beds and comfortable linen. I don't know but I have a special liking for wooden flooring, which gives the room luxe feel, and that made me awed. The room had TV with most of the channels, but I hardly watched them, also had dresser, cupboard. There was mini fridge as well, which makes your stay comfortable especially when you have a kid, with all their perishables. There was a electric plug point underneath the side table, which I always look for at most of the rooms, when I need my cell phone to be put for charging bedside, if not for anything but to wake up early with alarm. I also look for plug point next to dresser to use hair styling gadgets, both the dresser and the mirror in the washroom had plug points next to them. The washroom was quite compact and neat, with shower area separated by curtain(while few other rooms had bathtub as well). 

During check-in we were handed over the Wi-Fi user-name and password. There were so many secured Wi-Fi connections of the hotel with different series, I had to take the help of the hotel staff to get the Wi-Fi connected. But again, since I had both my cell phone and tab, I had to wait for 5-10mins to log in to the second one after logging in the first. With no Wi-Fi, the hotel had very weak data network connectivity, I could hardly access my net, with out Wi-Fi. We had complimentary breakfast, which included cereals, with south Indian dishes and samosas, along with juice, coffee and tea. 

While Hotel Bangalore International's traffic starts at Rs. 6,000 for double deluxe room, this OYO Premium is available at Rs. 1,899(it varies for other rooms).

#OYOxplorer, Wandering around OYO Premium, Bangalore

Just next to my room was Shrinidhi's and got to meet him for the first time, though we knew each other online. Later met Vidya Sury and Shailaja, who had checked-in as well and were about to leave to explore Bangalore. Meanwhile Roohi dropped into my room and we thought of getting around the place together. 

We headed to Mantri mall for lunch, wandered around(window shopping, lol). Since most of my family and friends are put up in South Bangalore, I had hardly explored North. Every time I wanted to plan a visit to Bangalore Palace one or the other cousin's said, they were not sure if the palace was open to public visit. So this time, I really wanted to check out Bangalore Palace. So before taking an auto to the Palace, I inquired about the palace at the information center of the mall and all the lady at the counter said was, she knew there was a palace in Mysore, but not sure about Bangalore Palace. Laughing at her and myself(for checking with her lol), I checked with one of the policemen in front of the Mall, he said it was open and helped with an auto to get over. 

I was really stunned by the architectural beauty of the palace and wondered why people hardly visited this palace and why there was so less crowd. Our auto driver was ready to wait till we could return and while we were getting around there he was honorable Home Minister of Karnataka, K J George. Later we took the tour of Vidhana Soudha and Attara Kacheri(Karnataka High Court), before reaching Ulsoor lake by sunset. There is a small garden at the entrance of the lake, just wandered around, had road side snacks and returned back to our room. Had dinner, later Roohi and me joined Swati,, at her room. We spoke almost till 3 in the night, all about blogging, vlogging, bloggers and more, till we went back to our rooms to call for the day. Next morning joined the other bloggers at the restaurant, met Partha for the first time, had some chit chat and groufies before we checked out. 

It was one of a kind experience for all we bloggers to experience the stay at OYO Premium and explore the city(guess what, we were paid to explore as well), and to get to know the bloggers from the city.