Cherai Beach Resorts — Hotel in Vypin

The resort has individual villas and not rooms. Each villa has a sitout, a small drawing room, a spacious and neat bathroom and a double bed with what seems to be spring mattress. Each room has tv and a small fridge and a kettle. However, the room that i stayed in had a few problems.

The ceiling fan in the bedroom was faulty and didn't spin fast. It was painfully slow even at highest speed setting on the regulator. Kettle for boiling water or making tea was missing in our villa. Room service took forever. Extra pillows were not provided even after requesting them after check in. During booking, it was informed that there is one extra person in one room. But they only provided mattress and said they have a shortage of pillows. Cost cutting maybe. The extra mattress that was provided was also left outside our villa and we had to take it inside and place it where we wanted. Housekeeping didn't bother with that. Swimming pool water was highly chlorinated. Some of the pool side showers didn't work. The TV in our villa did not work and all the channels just had white noise. The mattress on the bed is very uncomfortable. You just get buried in it and end up with a sore back next morning. The fridge in the villa was off when we checked in and took almost 7 hours to cool stuff. The grass in the walkways and around villas was very poorly maintained. There were some artificial ponds in some areas and in front of the restaurant. The water there was stagnant and it emitted a very bad stench. No wifi service in the rooms.

I'm sorry to say this but a resort of this price range needs to do better than what I witnessed. Really poor management and maintenance. I will definitely not recommend going here. Not to mention these rooms I'm talking about were premium rooms that were given to us as an upgrade. Some upgrade that was.

One good thing I must mention is the restaurant. The food was buffet system, prices were reasonable and the food was very tasty. Restaurant is definitely...

The positives of the place: Location - right on the beach, with a road separating the property and the beach Ample parking Spacious rooms, with some of them having a view to the backwaters (the property lies on a narrow stretch of land between the backwater and the sea) Large area to walk around Big swimming pool A nice ayurvedic spa within the property Courteous staff Good eateries within walking distance

The not so great things: there is an overall slackness in the maintenance of the property that you might come across in different ways The food, especially the breakfast was just ok. without anything being available to order They do not take any a-la-carte orders, only the buffet items will be available even for paid lunch and dinner. The property has been around for a while (probably one of the first of this location), and certain units are unused due to lack of maintenance. They become a bit of an eye sore on an otherwise beautiful property. We stayed there for 2 nights and the items in the rooms were not replaced on the second day (water bottles, towels etc.). It was done very quickly once we requested for them, but it would be ideal for such things to happen as per a schedule rather than each guest having to ask for it. We had a duplex unit with a view of the backwater. The view from the first assigned unit was completely blocked by shrubs and tree branches. Our request for another unit with a better view was promptly granted, but some guests might miss out on a good experience just because the management has been lazy in trimming the branches / shrubs. No Wi-Fi in the rooms or...

The beach isn't as private as the staff would tell you: it's away from the main resort and separated by a road. The locals and some shady characters feel free to use it for any purpose they see fit, with no guard to keep an eye out for such things.

The property itself is full of mosquitoes, which get in the way of everything, making simple things like eating a huge chore. The staff is indifferent at best, almost dismissive if you're Indian. They make the check-in a very painful process, lasting well over 20 minutes even if you've made the booking online and several days in advance. Coming after 30-60 minutes of winding through narrow roads barely avoiding death tends to be too much.

There is WiFi, of course. But only nominally - covering no more than the reception area, and never fast enough to upload anything without the page timing out.

The restaurant serves disappointing food - they say that the catch is fresh and everything is made in-house, but the quality and spread leaves a lot to be desired. Rooms old and starting to show: doors don't open properly, the key turns but the lock continues to be jammed, the main door needs more than a gentle shove to open up and the TV looks like it's straight out of a farce.

The only saving grace is that the AC works well.

And in spite of all the above, the going rate for rooms here is at least 50% more than similar properties around the city. Honestly, if someone hadn't sponsored my trip, I would have been kicking myself for the colossal waste of...