Indeco Hotel, Mahabalipuram

Great atmosphere,friendly staff good sea food-.....overall waaaaaaaa great!!!!!the museam is good,nice collections &last the prison gate is amazing!!!!kaatmaram ride is one of my good entertainment in indeco & the bullock cart ride ,foot msg is very good

Sterling Mahabalipuram is a good resort made bad by the service attitude. I had a torrid time booking myself into the resort. I was trying to make a last minute reservation. The resort does not take reservations directly. Nor can they give you accurate information on availability. You have to contact the corporate office in Chennai for this. They are not accessible after office hours. The only mobile number given in the website is perennially out of order. I left a message with an early arriver in the office but no one got back to me. I managed to contact Jude, the appropriate person the next day. He kept his word and got back to me through his staff. I booked myself for a night and headed to the hotel. The resort is in the centre of town and is amidst the historical sites to be see. But for that very reason, the beachfront is not tranquil. You cant the blame the resort for that tough. But you hope that they temper the description in the website a little. The resort claims that it is a franchisee of Tamil Nadu Tourism. I think leased from Tamil Nadu Tourism is the correct word. They have probably made a good job of transforming a Government property into a nice looking resort appearance. The resort has curios and museum pieces fro the Portugest and British era all over the place. A small annoying factor is the name of Steve Borgia staring down at you from all over the place except the bathrooms. he has right as the CEO of the hotel chain, but you sincerely wish for some solititude at times. The pieces are interesting though. The food is pretty ordinary. It carries the indifference of a restaurant attached to a resort, whose guests have no other option. I was pleasantly surprised to see Ulli Thaiyal, a kerala preparation in the menu. I promptly checked with the staff if it actually available. He confidently said yes, and after a prompt 30 minutes of waiting, brought be cauliflower masala. I was surprised, thought he has mixed up the order. He asserted that it is Ulli Thaiyal. I told him with growing impatience that Ulli Thaiyal is small onions in a tangy spicy gravy. He fished out a small piece of small onion in the middle of cauliflower pieces and looked at me triumphantly. I lost patience and told him to check with the chef and that I actually have tasted Ulli Thaiyal elsewhere in the country. After another prompt 20 minutes or so I had my simple dinner of Ulli Thaiyal and chapathi. The breakfast buffet was dreadful and reminded me of small time hotels trying to play big. The buffet spread had flies swarming all over and I had to request them to keep the fan on. Later on, I found a nice fly in the sambhar. The staff told me that it could not have come from the spread and that I may have picked it up at the table. I had given up hope by now and told them they can do what they like with this fact. It is their hotel, their quality. My wife had ordered room service and found the taste bad. We eventually cut short our visit to a day because of the bad food. There was more waiting for us at check out. I told the staff (at around 10 am) that we are going for sightseeing and could be back by around 1 pm. I wanted to know if I can keep the room till then. Gopi, the front office staff said, they are running full (surprise, because they had said that they can let us stay for one more night) and we have to check out on time. I said I could come back by 12. Gopi maintained that check out time is 10 am. I was surprised by this. ( all other sites representing Sterling claim that check our is 12 noon. I could not find check out information in the sterling site). He promised that he will take the bags out right then (nearly 10 am) and will give us a free room when we are back. When we got back at 12.30, our room was checked out but was not occupied. They refused to let us use the room since it had already been cleaned. We eventually got a room for ten minutes that was in the process of being cleaned (the bathrooms were clean though). All in all, sterling is a nice resort, betrayed by bad food, indifference to customer service and at times downright exploitative. This reminds me of Vythiri resort in Kerala, which is again a great resort betrayed by slightly haughty and indifferent service. Will I recommend sterling again - The competing resorts are slightly away and are slightly more expensive. But I think they may be worth trying, especially since bad service arising out of indifference is hard to correct. The others may deserve a fair try.