The Palm Trees — Hotel in Goa

My wife and I booked palm trees for 8 days in the last week of December 2020 and thought it seemed pretty decent from it's online presence and reviews. Most people doted on its 'eco-friendliness' and hassle free rooms. ||Palm trees is located about 200m from the patnem beach on the patnem beach road. The staff, which mostly consists of Junaid, Mohammed, and a friendly aunty who single-handedly cleans the entire venue and does the laundry as well. There's a friendly on-site dog who's always a joy to see. The pros and cons are as follows, and I'm hoping people can make a well informed decision if they wish to stay here:||||Pros:|| ||1. Junaid, Mohammed, and the aunty are all super friendly and helpful.||||2. Clean linen. || ||3. The surroundings inside the property are super clean and kept spic and span (except the couple staying in the cottage next to us who kept loudly clearing their throats and coughing gobs of phlegm right out the front door into the sand. Disgusting).||||4. The friendly dog. ||||Cons:||||1. We paid nearly 4,500 a night, which I understand is the absolute peak rate thanks to the end of the year season. 40k for a week here is nearly 4 times the actual rate for what this places offers and the way the rooms are actually built.|| ||2. The room doesn't have air-conditioning and for this rate, that's pretty sad.||||3. Did we need air-conditioning? Well, it was winter, and the temperature at night was pretty cold outside, but the sad thing is, the cottages don't have any cross-ventilation, or any source of fresh air whatsoever. There are two windows, but if you keep them open at night? Mosquitos will drain you of your blood and life spirit before the sun even rises.||||4. There is no natural light inside the cottages. Even at 10 am, when it's super bright and sunny outside, the inside of your cottage will be pitch dark. This isn't nice to wake up to at all.||||5. Because there's loads of blood-sucking mosquitos, you simply cannot keep the two provided windows open. Please please please provide window mesh (even the basic velcro-fastened ones). The rooms need ventilation at night and light during the day. ||||6. We had to keep the windows closed, and the bed is covered by a mosquito net tent, tucked in on all sides, which meant it was hot, stuffy, and steamy inside the room. We could barely get a single night's decent sleep here.||||7. Even with the fan on high speed, the net pretty much blocks all the air flow, and we didn't feel any of the fan's cooling effects inside the net-tent. This meant tossing and turning all night, craving fresh air. To top it off, you are provided with thick, warm, winter quilts. ||||8. There's no bed side tables, or any hooks to hang anything. This meant piling used clothes, on top of a single provided stool, or on top of a wobbly steel cupboard inside the room. Storing used/sweaty/sea soaked clothes INSIDE the cupboard is a big no no because everything inside the room is steamy and suffocating anyway. ||||9. The bed takes up 85% of the entire room is abuts one wall of the cottage. The bed is only accessible from the bottom, or the side near the bathroom door. This means, the person sleeping near the wall has to roll OVER his/her sleeping partner if he/she wants to use the bathroom at night. Climbing out from the bottom of the bed means un-tucking the mosquito net and is a horrible acrobatic maneuver which ensures a few mosquitos coming in while leaving/re-entering the bed. Good luck doing all this in pitch black darkness. ||||10. Super dim bulb in the bathroom with no hand soap. Only the ubiquitous medimix is provided to bathe and wash your hands with. Not a big deal though. We carried our own shampoo and bought a hand soap dispenser from the neighborhood general store. The bathroom door was next to impossible to latch from the inside as the locking mechanism was brutally mis-aligned. This meant one partner had to sit outside the entire room while the other went for a poop because the bathroom door would swing open (and there's zero ventilation in the room so you know what that means). We stayed in room 107. Try locking the bathroom from the inside please.||||11. No place beside the bed to place a water bottle, place your charging phone, or any accessories whatsoever. Everything has to be placed on the bed where two of you sleep. Now imagine trying to charge a phone at night, and taking the wire through the mosquito net fortress, and then getting up at night to take a pee over your sleeping partner. Madness. ||||12. During the midday sun, when we didn't want to die of sunstroke, we would often come back to our room to lie down or rest, and we had to open the windows and front door to let some fresh air in, but even then, on a still day, with the fan on, you would NEVER feel any air hitting you as the top of the bed is completely covered by mosquito net. ||||13. We paid the full amount for all 8 days but checked out a day early since we found a nearby place which was a much larger room, with a nice split AC, and large french windows. We paid less than half the room rate there and happily gave up 4.5k just to leave. ||||You cannot do this to your customers Palm Trees. "Eco-friendly" doesn't mean exceedingly uncomfortable, stiflingly hot-and-sweaty, and very very tough to move around because of non-existent fresh air and exceedingly cramped interiors and furniture placement. The walls are so thin that we could hear every conversation of the occupants staying on our left, right, AND front! Now imagine them listening to loud music on portable heavy bass speakers! It's chaos. ||||This is aimed at being a factual report of the resort and there is zero hatred for anyone (except confusion and anger at the person who conceptualized and built the...

May consider reading this in full, if you care for your stay and money-||||Don’t be fooled by the photographs. The images are professional just to attract business.||||If you really care for your holiday experience, I wish you to be alert by sharing my experience.||||It was a very fancy discussion with Julia for the property when I was preparing the iternary from Delhi.||||The location is very isolated and you will struggle for basic necessities like ordering food. It took 3.5 hrs post my ordering for the dinner upon arrival. There is no restaurant to offer lunch and dinner within the premises and had to order from outside with heavy rates. The options are very limited being an isolated highway-side location.||||If you are traveling with kids dependent for milk and immediate attention at times, this place will be a nightmare for you.||||I travelled with two kids including an infant and had a terrible experience with electricity. There was a power cut of 3 hrs from 2200 hrs till 0100 hrs in the night. Upon arrival, it was told to bear with us due to pre-scheduled power failure in the proximity for an hour, however, they did not mention at the time of bookings. The owner, Julia was aware of this power failure to happen which extended for 3 hrs and resulted me and family in a challenging situation with hungry kids and struggle to manage with mosquitoes.||||The hutments or cottages are not hygienic. You will find a variety of mosquitoes, flyers inside room, street dogs (pets not allowed) in your balcony that need your major attention to manage your stay. The provided carpet, towels were dirty and I had to request to change them upon my arrival. There was no cleaning of the floor done before my check-in. No toiletries and no water bottles were provided. I had the most expensive cottage booked at the resort to ensure the best convenience to the family, however, the experience forced me to consider much better conditions at home. My money got wasted.||||Even I found that the listed items towards facilities in the room were not available like wardrobe safe, etc. There is no TV in the rooms and no spa facility. There is no river beside the resort, it is actually a naala of dirty water-attracting even more mosquitoes inside the hutments. The place is extremely silent and dark which experiences as not safe for family during night.||||I tried to connect with Julia, the owner numerous times who took my bookings. She did not care to attend correspond to my calls. I made precisely 21 calls to her. She was enjoying the beachside with friends. Late night at 1130 she called. I tried to make her understand the situation my family was into the and necessity to help overcome the challenges, however, she tried to dominate and started to mention for my early check-out adjusting all my advance payments made to her. Her unsupportive attitude towards the guest and the faced challenges at the resort, made me feel to have made a big mistake in opting for this stay.||||I had planned for the stay for week. However, moved from the property the...

Imagine.... ||Waking up to the chirping birds and the leaves of the majestic mango tree rustling over your roof, you walk out, taking in the beautiful Goa breeze at your patio, followed by a walk at the serene Patnem beach which is literally a minute away. ||You come from the beach, enjoy tea or coconut water at one of the many options in the friendly neighborhood. ||Back at the resort, you pick up a book and lay in the hammock, soaking in the beautifully filtered sunshine, admiring the effortless beauty of this gorgeous property, wondering how breathtaking nature's simplicity is. And then you go grab a bite at one of the many cafés/restaurants/shacks. ||After a long day, you come back to your clean, comfortable, poster bed, sleep like a baby & wake up the next day mentally, emotionally and physically, nourished. ||||This is how my days at the Palm Trees Resort were like. Words can't justify the experience. A little bit of Kerala, little bit of Goa and a full lot of heaven. I stayed there for 3 days and below are some things I loved about my stay at The Palm Trees:||1. Property - it's everything you want when traveling, it's clean, dreamy, comfortable rooms, spacious bathrooms, each cottage has a patio and an excellent free WiFi/network. Most importantly, the tarrifs are unbelievably low for the place. ||2. Proximity - it's close to all the main attractions of the Palolem and Patnem beaches. Beach is just a minute's walk from there, tonnes of options around to eat and Palolem is just a 10 mins tuktuk.||3. People - I was traveling solo, hence it was super important for me to be comfortable about my surroundings and I can gladly say the team made me feel at home. George (the owner), Junaid and Mohammed, all 3 are seasoned hosts who truly look after you and are there to help you with everything you might need. ||||Thank you George for making this place and letting us experience the joy of being wrapped in...