Nutshell — Hotel in Kerala

At the outset based on our experience this place does not merit the 4 star rating as claimed on the Booking.com website reviews. I was misguided by this rating.|I chose this place for a group of 4 ( a couple and 2 ladies) for one night stay and turned out to be disappointing. That said, there is scope for improvement.. |At the time of booking I was impressed when the hostess Ms. Nisha Babu provided a WhatsApp number for easy communication, furthermore had kindly offered free airport pickup and transfer to the hotel. On arrival we were taken into the first floor of the building through an unlit flight of concrete stairs which was hazardous to navigate, given the average age of our group was 70. We were then ushered into the dining room and requested to be seated by a teenaged boy who brought a register for me to enter details as the main guest. This was unusual as I did not see any adults in the vicinity to oversee this procedure. The teenager was standing over my shoulder prompting me to enter details. After completion he asked for my passport, at this point I felt this was irregular refused his request instead asked to see the hostess but was told she was busy dyeing her hair. Since our flight arrived late we had requested dinner which was served, unappetising and oversalted. The hostess appeared at that point to welcome us. We were shown to our rooms which were spacious with AC and decorated with numerous wooden carvings and other artefacts. There were double beds in both rooms. The bathrooms were clean , the toilet and shower were not separated from one another which meant one had to sit on wet seats. There were no towels or toilet rolls which we requested as well as bed sheets to cover ourselves when the AC was switched on. Unfortunately the supposedly white towels and sheets were of poor quality, stained brown with other deeper stains on them, frayed and ripped. It appeared to us as if they were hand washed. We were all reluctant to use them. In the morning we got ready to leave as soon as possible without having breakfast on offer, but 2 kind, polite and thoughtful lady helpers persuaded us to stay for breakfast with the promise of hoppers and stew .We all had a discussion with the hostess about the poorly organised, unsupervised check-in process by an inexperienced youngster and poor quality towels and sheets. In her response she tried unfairly to deflect the responsibility of maintaining quality to her helpers. In defence of her willing helpers we commented it was her prime responsibility to make sure about the quality of the towels and sheets and suggested have them machine washed or dry cleaned to whiten them.|We indicated that our criticism were constructive as I initially indicated there is scope for improvement. However, the whole experience was not pleasant- the unsafe backdoor approach to the rooms in spite of the presence of a safer wooden staircase in the front, the dirty towels and sheets and the unsupervised check-in.|The positives were the proximity to the airport, free airport pick-up, WhatsApp number, spacious AC bedrooms, clean bathrooms. The seaside site and views were welcome although the beach were full of litter and not easily accessible from the immediate vicinity. |We would not choose to stay...

Nutshell is a delightful, spacious homestay just out of main town but only a short tuk tuk drive to temples etc. It is on the beach, and it is great to watch the fishermen preparing their nets. Walk a few hundred yards along the beach,and there is a nice restaurant, The Coffee House, (no alcohol) and a good beach that comes alive at night with families.||The rooms at the Nutshell have air-conditioning, TV (with HMO, CNN etc), ensuite bathrooms, and most have balconies. Great breakfasts and we often ate there is the evening, as the food is superb. Nisha the owner and her husband Venu, and their adorable children, Arun and Aruna, could not be more helpful and welcoming. Nisha will collect guests from the nearby domestic and international airports (but we hardly heard the planes), night or day. She found my husband an excellent dentist as he had bad toothache. Venu drove him there, and waited for him for two hours. He needed to go back two days later, so Nisha drove us there and took me shopping...My husband had 3-4 hours in total with the dentist..all for around £50 for deep root canal work!. Nisha is just lovely, and takes extra care of women who travel alone. Venu, unbeknownst to us, is a well-known actor and singer, and one night he sang for us, which was wonderful and very memorable. He also drove us to a lovely palace in nearby Tamil Nada (about an hour away). ||Nisha had arranged train tickets for us before we had left London, which took some doing even for an Indian, as we wanted to go by train to Kochi. She and Venu drove us to the station and helped us onto the train and to find our seats, which we'd have found almost impossible. We really loved them and will miss them. If ever we go back, we will definitely stay there - they are like family and really looked after us superbly well ...

In hindsight, chucking the usual "five star suspects" for a short stay in the capital of God's Own Country wasn't a bad decision. For a person who grew up prancing on the beach, not very far from Trivandrum and now living abroad, staying at Nutshell Airport Retreat by the Sea was a grand homecoming with a baggage of memories.||||Sandwiched by Kerala's ubiquitous greenery on one side and the infinite vistas of the Arabian Sea on the other, Nutshell offered what I wanted: Nostalgia in abundance. Forget all the free comfort they offered such as WiFi, car park etc, what made Nutshell an unforgettable experience was the human touch in every moment of my stay -- from the complimentary airport pick-up by none other than the hosts, Nisha and Venu, to the "mama's touch" in all the seafood dishes and the quintessential Kerala Sadhya served on banana leaf.||||The boutique retreat is a confluence of comfort, convenience and serenity with the airport within walking distance and a number of temples and other landmarks at a stone's throw. Nutshell's verdant ambiance outside and brilliant hues inside practically put me in a dilemma. While one part of myself wanted to enjoy barque and sunset on the beach, the other half wanted to cozy up to the radiance of the wall colours that are truly Indian, adapted from Rajasthan's handcrafted tapestries to Kerala's folk arts like Kathakali.||||The third option was to relax in the private balcony with a book and drink, with a complimentary view of the sunset. In a nutshell, the Nutshell experience was something that made the terminology "home stay" realistic. I wish I could stay longer. ||||--...