Sterling Thekkady

The room was great; spacious and comfortable. The staff were very helpful; especially the concierge, Anaz. He set up my taxis and even went to a restaurant in a wildlife reserve I'd left my credit card at, just to get it back and return it to me! The boy at the front desk (I forget his name unfortunately) was very helpful as well. He phoned places to make inquiries on my behalf and answered my questions as best he could. A few cons: there's no spa, gym, 2nd restaurant, bar or cafe as is suggested in their signage and in some of their online info. They are relatively new and unfinished, which probably accounts for the decent room rate. The tv, advertised to have many cable channels (they even leave a laminated menu of 1000+ channels on your coffee table), only has a few local non-English channels. If you enter cable channels on the remote, it either says "invalid selection" or "contact your provider to subscribe to this channel." This is something they should have already done. The tv is located in the room you enter, but not in the room your bed is in, so you can't watch tv in bed. I was the only guest staying there sometimes. Other times I was one of maybe 3 guests at most. As a result, they were sometimes overly-attentive, like waking me with a phonecall to ask what time I would be coming down to breakfast at. The breakfast is mostly Indian and didn't have many interesting Western choices. One morning, they said there was no buffet that day. Inconsistent.