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Ten
Days of blissful relaxation on the South Goan Coast One of the finest hotels in which we have ever stayed!
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| This Hotel is a Great Place | Anne astride an Elephant | Anne's Birthday Treat | |||
| Home Page | Delhi-arrival | Ranthambore | Jaipur | Agra | Delhi departure |
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We were so lucky to have booked a De-Luxe Sea View Room at The Taj Exotica Hotel on the Southern Goan Coast. After our wonderful Tiger Tour all we wished for was tranquillity, sunshine, sea breezes, comfortable accommodation, good food and service. In every respect The Taj Exotica exceeded our expectations. It is one of the finest hotels in which we have stayed on our many trips to the parts of the world that we have been so fortunate to have visited. It
is a Great Place to see some of these |
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| Whilst
this view with our back to the beach may look simple the whole style of
the hotel is "Quality".
Allwyn Drego - Resident Manager - and his team do a fantastic job be it gardening, restaurants, room service, housekeeping, behind the scenes maintenance in fact every facet is superb. Here in the foreground is a cricket pitch. No wonder India beat England! There are also five choices of restaurant, two small golf courses, tennis courts, two spas and quality shopping experiences.
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This
is our view each morning as we took breakfast in our room.
The fresh fruits were sumptuous! Also good for Les's waistline! |
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The lovely sands of the beach look westwards towards the Arabian Sea which whilst we were there was a little rough but the warm breeze was great! |
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Whilst
we enjoyed paddling in the sea we found the pool idyllic with no swim up
bars and noisy activities it was excellent.
Its setting is beautiful and has a separate children's pool which was very good. It is the
not best pool we have ever seen - the one at Southern Palms Kenya That said we so enjoyed its beauty and the service from the poolside staff - Diego, Jerry, Ganesh, Brensley, and their colleagues.
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| We
had the pleasure of being shown around the hotel by the lovely Anu from
the Customer Relations Department.
Anu is a great driver of this golf cart and we understand of her motor bike! She was a great ambassador for the hotel - nothing is too much trouble for her. Here we are outside one of the luxurious garden villas situated on two floors. |
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Inside
on of the beautiful rooms with private pool.
Having said that all rooms were to this standard the only difference was space and additional features like this pool. |
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| This delightful patio and pool look out across the hotel gardens towards the sea and enabling the joy of the sunset. |
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Of
course if you have one of the two Presidential Suites there are more rooms and features. We though were absolutely thrilled with our De-Luxe Sea View Room - Room Number 216 - it was perfect and the room attendants, Osborn, Angelo, Melvyn and Elvis were first class. |
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| The
beautiful Patio Fountain viewed at night from the mezzanine floor |
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Another work of art in Recption - this natural floral arrangement so typical of the hotel. | ||||
| We
ate at all of the many dining locations but perhaps of them all we
enjoyed the Miguel Arcanjo Mediterranean Restaurant.
Here Creta, Ritesh, Umesh and the team became like our long lost friends.
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Whatever
the venue the food and service was terrific - Gary Palm, Executive Chef,
is rightly proud
of his kitchen brigade and front of house staff in all restaurants and bars. |
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| This is dessert for one - WOW! |
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We
only made one side trip - to fulfill the promise to Anne of a special
treat.
On the way we stopped to enjoy the spectre of this amazing new Roman Catholic Church in the village of Benaulim near the hotel. There is a still a strong Portuguese influence in what we saw of Goa - this was extremely modernist and impressive. |
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| As was the adjacent school. |
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At
the Sahakari Spice Farm Anne fulfills her dream. It is a long time since
she rode Rosie at Bristol Zoo!
Les was unable to make the ride although the Elephant named Matsue was capable of carrying ten of him!
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| At
the end of a lovely experience walking for twenty minutes in a simple rural setting along the lanes through the trees.
Anne was disappointed not to ride an Ellie at the Amber Fort. This was much safer and a more natural location for this experience. We fully understand why precautions are taken by Kuoni on advice from the Indian Safety Authorities not to arrange rides at The Amber Fort.
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After
our visit to the Spice Farm we visited a lovely Organic Botanical Garden
nearby where we saw many lovely things including this statuesque bird
waiting for his lunch.
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| The
gardens were beautiful as this photo shows Anne holding the flowers of
what we know as a Flame Tree.
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Yet another Holy Cow. | ||||
| We didn't see any big cats but we thought this one was cute having supped a bottle of Kingsfisher beer. |
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Then back to
the lawns outside our room at the Taj Exotica to relax |
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| But we didn't play chess with these huge chess pieces in the back garden. |
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Another
example of the detail to which the hotel goes - here is our laundry
returned in elegant style and a very reasonable cost.
Why did we take so much luggage - we could have just had it washed!
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| The
weekend prior to the 1st of May started as a special occasion as we were greeted by
Anu near reception.
She was awaiting some the arrival of guests wearing a delightful traditional sari. |
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Then
to the pool side where we spoilt ourselves by sharing a Chicken
Souvliaki - yes this a single portion divided for two!
No wonder Les needs to loose some weight!
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| At
five o'clock on 1st May the surprise arranged by Simon commenced.
A Birthday Cake with Bubbly arrived on a table at our side for Anne's birthday celebrations to start a day early. |
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Simon and the team had difficulty lighting the candle for Anne to blow out but here Simon assists Birthday Girl as she cuts her cake. | ||||
| Another shot of this with Simon, Donald, Ganesh and their young colleague. |
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Here
Allwyn Drego the hotel's most hospitable and efficient Resident Manager
toasts Anne.
It also made an ideal opportunity for us to express our thanks for this wonderful 11 nights stay to him and to the whole team employed in this 140 room paradise. |
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| Yet another birthday cake this time on our balcony after dinner watched by Ritesh and his colleague. |
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Our last sunset here on this trip - hopefully it will not be our only visit. | ||||
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This may seem a little bland to end but it was here we paid for our room account at Reception as we checked out. The mural created with shells is so typical as an example of the hotel's artistic taste. Our room account by our standards was very reasonable. Maybe more expensive than some other hotels in Goa but considering the quality we enjoyed it was well worth it. Only one word can sum up the whole of our "Trip of a Lifetime" to India - WOW!
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