Pura Vida — Hotel in Kerala

We booked in for 5 nights and had to cut the visit short and head back to Chennai after 2 nights. But the staff were great and very helpful. ||The room we had (A/C on the first floor) was large, had a good bathroom and a great balcony for whiling away the days or evenings. The food is good enough although quite limited - if we had stayed for the full 5 nights we would have wandered along to some of the other places on the South Cliffs for a bit of variety. ||The tourist action is on the North Cliffs and this is a 20 minute walk of a couple of minutes in a Tuk Tuk. This is a much quieter place.||The steps down to the beach are very steep (but all the steps are steep along the South Cliffs) and quite long so you need to be reasonably comfortable with irregular steps. The beach is pretty deserted and you can walk for miles along it to the south seeing a couple of fishing villages without being hassled and it is cleaner than further North (North Cliffs) underneath the restaurants and coffee bars. ||The waves are petty robust and the rip is strong - not really a place for leisurely swimming unless you are very comfortable in the sea and / or good / confident enough to get out past the breakers.||In summary: very comfortable and pleasant but with steep steps to a beach that you need to be a confident...

Pros Private access to the beach, away from the crowded North cliff area Nice lawn area Lounge chairs placed at the edge of the cliff to enjoy the uninterrupted sea view Clean rooms and bathrooms Descent food at the in house restaurant, The place really has a romantic vibe with the sea facing views , trees, etc.

Cons Rooms lack the basic amenities like cupboard, hot water kettle (provided when asked for), no hangers in bathrooms, no drinking water glasses, no tea/coffee sachets Bathroom door lock not working No chairs in balcony to enjoy sea view (provided on 2nd night when asked for) Red and black ants in and around the room. Lack of intercom, calls on mobile number answered for like 50 percent of time, no call back. In house restaurant don't provide normal drinking water not even glasses are not kept on tables, when asked for water we only had option for buying bottled water. Complimentary breakfast items are made to order and they don't have buffet Unclean swimming pool full of insects and sea sand and some white granules (might be chlorine), when asked to clean their guy worked for like 5 minutes which did not cleaned even 10 percent of the pool.

I agree that above are not major issues but for the price we are paying for we expect more hospitality instead of...

What a beautiful stay we had in Pura Vida, Varkala. We had recently visited this place for 3 days vacation (last week). And in love with this place. Rooms are clean and specious. Sea facing rooms has beautiful clear sun set view. Because this resort is on the cliff the view of ocean is what made this place looks like heaven. Very clean beach and way to beach is from resort itself and through steps.

Food was good and available till 11pm. Staff was very good and friendly. Room service was also upto date.

Only thing I request to the maintenance team there is swimming pool needs to be cleaned daily as we went there was some treatment was going on in swimming pool and quite dirty. So couldn't use that fully. So check with them before booking if swimming pool is completely functional for days you gonna stay.

Highly recommend place if you are visiting varkala. All the other famous beaches, places, cafes, shopping streets and restaurants are very bear by and within 500 Mtrs of distance.

Thank you pura Vida team for making our stay beautiful. My kid also enjoyed throughly as all kind food was available too. See...