The Bison Reviews

All the frustration of travelling thro\' a \'Bullock Cart Trail\' vanished on reaching the Resort. The ambience, Rustic Tents with all the facilities is like what the doctor ordered for a serene & peaceful weekend with friends. The icing is the fare dished out by Chef Sharad, right thro\' the stay. Special kudos to Sharad. Anita & Anil Kumar were at their hospitable best....Thanks Guys!!! A small suggestion...Please inform the guests when they check in that they would have to come to the dining area to get their morning & evening cuppa...

Best Experience: Sorry..unable to single out any one...!!!

After a wonderful and peaceful early morning drive from Bangalore till HD Kote, we were greeted by the signboards for Kabini. Thankfully the resort info also had the directions listed, and we landed at the signboard pointing towards \'The Bison 2 kms away\', though i guess they forgot to put up another signboard pointing right from the next circle! Asking for Bison/Bushbetta finally took us in the right direction, until we saw a small 0.5 km offroad trail leading to the camp. I guess thats where the whole experience begins to seep in, with anticipations of a serene close to nature experience awaits you as you drive down the slushy trail down to the banks of the kabini river! And voila, suddenly emerging from the bushes stands the bushbetta with bamboo and teak cottages welcome you. Though we felt the parking could be a constraint especially with the monsoon vegetation growing in, the warm reception by the great couple Anil and Anita takes off all the exhaustion of the drive. They have ten luxury tents pitched on a raised platform to stay, while another pitched (though open) area for dining, bar and reception. Each of the tents open up into the patio overlooking a beautiful view of the kabini river. My wife was all excited to find the victorian era furniture maintained to pristine looks, with a four post bed with mosquito nets (remember the movie bombay!?), and a ultra luxury bathing area (yep no bathrooms in a tent pls!) which you wont probably find in a luxury resort built of concrete. The first step in took me away to the patio with a couple of well placed wooden chairs, opening up right into the river bank, and complemented with a welcome \'coffee-cozy\' and nice china, and i was stuck there for the next 20 mins enjoying the cool breeze, which felt like an hour! What i was even more excited was that lying on the bed gives you the same view! We both loved the fact that there was no TV/newspaper/WIFI connection to distract you from the pleasures of being so close to nature. And also for the luxury lovers, the place has 24 hrs hot and cold water, a true luxury tent in the middle of nowhere :) When we finally decided to let up our lazy bums and the comfort of the tent, we took a stroll down to the river bank, and found that though you are all exposed to the elements, seperated just by a canvas tent, yet tey have dug out trenches to keep the animals at bay thru the night, wired by a light voltage fence (which runs on solar power). The mgmt was glad to give us a friendly staff along with a fishing line with ragi bait to try our hand at it, though the strong wind and the currents didnt help the fishes to bite. Though the staff \'Ramesh\' did tell us about a 20kg red trout being caught the previous week, we understood that nature wants us to enjoy it sitting with a nice a hot cuppa coffee! Post lunch, we were taken for a local trek by Ramesh again around the facility, into the local tribal villages, which left us even more amazed to have found a local English medium school and solar powered street lights along with elephant watch towers. The next day was a jungle safari, though being totally the wrong season to have done it, the animals had their cover to hide, though we did spot a lot of deers, wild boars, a glimpse of the mighty gaur/bison, serpent eagles, and a couple of Sambhars. Yep no tuskers! All in all a truly wonderful experience of 1 night and 2 days. The best part of it was the weather and the fact that the mgmt has decided to use everything thats environment friendly- from the solar powered backup (at nights, yes they give electric lanterns), to wood burning geysers for the hot water.

Best Experience: 1. The view 2. The friendly staff- who let us overstay for an hour and enjoy the look of the rain splashing the kabini river 3. The aesthetics & the decor is truly fantastic totally made of wood and hay

Worst Experience: Not much to say about this though, the mgmt can give the food a little more thought especially the deserts. Even though food wasnt the only intention being there, but hey we do get hungry with the ultra appetizing weather ;)