Nov 15, 2008 07:32 PM
16522 Views
Hornbill resorts - Dandeli, opted for this place seeing some great reviews on the net. Managed to book a tent house(was interested in the tree house - which is the highlight of this place) despite calling 3-4 weeks earlier. We were a group of 4 guys who took off by the Friday night train to Hubli to take a 3 day break from the routine Bangalore life. This place is around 103Km from Hubli, but takes over 3hrs on the horrible roads. After a long tiring drive we reached our tent house which were in good shape, well maintained with western styled attached bathrooms. Freshened up and we were immediately off for white water rafting.This was surely the highlight of the trip.Dandeli has some interesting places which we did catch up in the next two days. This being a review about the resort, I'll suggest you read about dandeli from other websites. About this resort,
1) Ideal for families, honeymoon couples or somebody not very adventurous. Very very commercial. This is surely not for people who like to be close to nature and be rugged.
2) Extremely remote with no proper connectivity, horrible roads. Suggest you hire a cab for your entire stay/trip from Hubli or Londa(if available). Don't take your car(jeeps and SUVs might be OK) here. If you happen to take your car, probably along with your trip expenditures, you might end up with a huge car servicing bills.
3) The staff are extremely courteous, responsive and helpful.
4) The resort charges 1250Rs for a rafting tour, while a neighbouring resort charges 999Rs only.
5) Buffet breakfast, lunch and dinner served here is extremely tasty, especially the deserts.
6) The facilities available inside the resort are good, they have a cool natural swimming place too.
7) The resort charges extreme high for arranging cabs and the managers exploit you knowing that you have no choice. 750rs for one way 27Km drop to Londa, 1650 for 35km return tour to syntheri rocks, 2500 for a one-way drop to Hubli, these were some rates quoted to us and which we had to finally end up paying as we had no choice.
8) This place seems to enjoy full occupation, meaning you might end up with another 20-30 people along with you, at least we were.
Overall: Good for families, great food, can be really costly, highly commercial. Surely NOT value for money.
