Orange County - For years the picture of their private pool villa had enchanted me, so I had no second thoughts while booking this place for my second honey moon, a month after my marriage. More over , I had the recommendation from my colleague that this is definitely worth the money . Remind you at Rs 22k/night, orange county is not by any stretch of imagination reasonably priced. We went in for an all inclusive package, 2 nights 3 days at a private pool villa.
So, here is how it went - we started from Bangalore at 6.30 am aided with Google maps and directions provided in orange county website. We stopped at Kamath lokruchi for our break fast on Blore-Mysore highway, still managed to reach Coorg by 11.15am. From Srirnagapatna we took a right as the big board of orange county directed (same in their website as well), but this road was horrible. Many stretches, the road almost did not exist, so it was a very tough drive for almost 20 kms, till we joined Hunsur Road. Actually if you take the GRS fantasy park route, you can avoid this treacherous path .So dont follow the route map in Orange county website, check in travel blogs to find out the best route.
We reached at 11.15 am, the check in was supposed to be at 12pm, but we thought the resort might have a room ready for us , but not yet. They infact needed time till 12.30 , we were given wet towel refresheners but no welcome drink, considering that all of their guests have to endure a not so great drive from Siddapura town to the estate.
At around 12.45 we were checked into a private pool villa, but this was one disaster. I think this was the oldest villa they had in their property. The room looked no where near the magnificient picture on internet, a small pool in the backyard, with no jaccuzzi. The interiors of room had strong scent of wood fungus, which was camouflaged with another strong scent. One look at my wife's face, I knew she was not impressed, and I was looking for some positives here. The bathrooms were just about okay, bit of untidy tiles, but I was completely disappointed as I had specifically asked for the same room and pool shown in the website. Time for damage control. I expressed my concern to the resort staff, she said all the villas are occupied and I have to check with the staff who took my booking at blore office.
I dialled the blore office , she had an excuse that few pools have jaccuzzi and they are not working !! This really put me off, I interrupted her excuse by disconnecting the call in middle of her talk. Two minutes later, there is a call from Reception, that I have a lake facing villa ready. Not sure how they had this ready, I was not keen to know. We were shown that villa, which had better rooms and a better pool, also I noticed that quite lot of floral decoration done in the bath tub and on the towels, which were completely missing in the first villa. Now, if I had not asked for a change, then you get a lesser one ? That is certainly not the best customer service. Now there was another problem, the pool was facing the lake and did not have a natural fence to cover view of people from other side..Infact this private pool offered vintage view of our pool for ppl on other side of the lake, including the pepper corn restaurant. I did not have any more interest to raise a concern, I asked them to check us in this villa, and by then the time was 2.30pm. We were kept waiting , sent here and there for almost 3 hours after our tiring drive. I was already contemplating the harsh words to be used in my reviews in Infosys bulletin board and in online forums, but things changed soon after we checked in......
An electric buggy was sent to pick us up from our villa to restaturant (this is a 5 mintue walk) . The spread was huge in the restaurant (Granary), this was easily the best I had ever seen or tasted. After the sumptous lunch, we decided to take a stroll to our villa. The lake had a great view, the resort seemed quite deserted and peaceful even though there were good crowd in restaurants. Orange county offers the kind of ambience that you would love to have , to destress you from city life..and then pamper you silly.
The three restaurants, I like Granary (muti cuisine) for the huge spread they have. Pepper corn serves sizzlers and kababs and we had our candle light dinner here. The ambience was not that appealing for a honeymoon couple. You are seated very near family crowd, where the kids keep on shouting and run around your table :-The veg restaurant , plantain leaf was excellent as well, with their great veg delicacies. They have a menu seperate for Southies and Northies. But are we missing some luxury in these resturants? agreed we are in a wilderness resort, but definitely can do with a little more luxury in the interiors.
There are not much activities here, except for the nature walk, plantation walk, badminton, TT, carroms. The common pool is nothing great as well. If you are not staying in a private pool villa, you might as well drop the idea of swimming. For a luxury resort, you might as well expect more facilities than this. And to top it all, there is no temperature control for your private pool. Considering this pool was up for public view from the other side of lake, my wifey preferred to get to the pool only after sunset, but by then the water was freezing cold.
The pool villas were good, built in traditional coorg style, and had air conditioned bedrooms(AC is not available in any of the other options!!). The wilderness and country theme is good enough to impress foreigners, but I have definitely seen better resorts with better facilties (Zuri, kumarakom is an example)
All in all, Orange county is a good place for honeymooners for the quiet and peaceful ambience or for corporate bigwigs to take a break from their stressful life. The resort staff is very courteous (that does not include their booking staff at bangalore office!) and the most friendly lot I have seen in hospitality industry.
Orange county is definitely the place for you if you are lookign for a quiet get away to relax doing nothing , eat sumptuous meal not bothering about your calorie intake and then lazer around. but again there is a glitch here as you have timings for your meals and snacks at restaurants and room delivery is charged exorbitantly. Reminded me of my hostel days when you have to rush into your dining room before the time for lunch gets over. Still for the scenic beauty surrounding you when you walk, I forgive Orange county :-)
I would not recommend this to South Indians as the theme might not impress you for the money you pay. This is not extra ordinarily new for them, but might impress people frm North or foreigners.
My one sincere advice for all who check in to a private pool villa, make sure you have a jaccuzzi attached pool, your pool has good fencing on other side not making this a public viewable, and specify that you need the same kind of facilties in the villa as shown in Oragne county website.
Orange county would pamper you silly definitely, but only at a price.
