What we did: arrived in Baga (Goa), fought with reception, hung out in the hotel
Budget: 3500R/$70; Spent: 5175R/$104
After a horrible night being tossed around on a bus we were relieved to arrive at our pleasant looking hotel. We had been looking forward to spending 5 days of relaxation at a resort thanks to the generous Christmas gifts we were given by Ivan and Izabela and the Usinowicz's (thank you guys so much again!).
The resort we chose is called Sun Village, it’s supposed to have all the luxuries, hot water, spacious room with balcony and on suite bathroom, complimentary buffet breakfast, rooms get cleaned everyday, swimming pool, several restaurants, free shuttle to beach. All the makings for an awesome stay. Needless to say we were pumped.
We arrived in Goa around 9am and grabbed an auto-rickshaw to the hotel. 15 minutes later we arrived at Sun Village, which looked very nice from the outside.
We checked in with no problems, we were shown to our room. I spent the next 10 minutes crying about how awful our bus experiences have been and vowed to never ever do it again in India. Jeff consoled me and we came to an understanding. Then we received a slight blow to the budget when we received a phone call about booking a single occupancy room. Sadly we knew full well we had paid the price for a single occupancy room on Agoda. Having done this several times before and never having had any troubles made us think there would be no issue this time either. Well we were wrong, but we also figured that the worst case scenario was that we’d end up paying the slightly more expensive price. We were wrong about that.
The front desk receptionist demanded we pay an additional 2100 rupees per night for the extra person!! That is about another $42 per person when we were already extending ourselves with the choice to stay here. So for obvious reasons this was outrageous to us and we went down there to talk to her face to face.
We spent the next hour fighting over the cost. We decided to check Agoda and there was a $10 difference, or 600 rupees per night, between single and double occupancy. Jeff very eloquently and assertively made our case. It was quite impressive seeing him in action like that. He is certainly growing more confident and sure of himself on our trip and I am so proud of him.
Once we showed this to the receptionist, she backed off and offered that rate.
We were very upset that we had had to fight so hard only to get a price that is fair so we spoke with the manager and asked him to consider providing us with something as compensation for our troubles. He said he’d get back to us.
We went to go grab some lunch from the hotel’s restaurant; had a really nice chicken burger, then grabbed some drinks by the pool.
After this, we went to reception to inquire whether the manager had gotten back to us. The first conversation we had with him over the phone he refused to give us free wifi, which from our extensive experience has ALWAYS been complimentary when available. So this was not acceptable to us and we set up a talk with him half an hour later; we killed some time before our meeting with him and went walking around the hotel. We picked up some water and I bought a jumper for $5 that I could wear over my bathing suit since it’s not common place for women to roam around the beach in just their bathing suits. None of the local women do and the foreigners who do get gawked at, which didn't interest me.
We talked to the manager and at first didn't get anywhere with him. Then he finally offered us 25% off the buffet at their restaurant, as well as a late checkout. Unfortunately even this didn't leave on the best of terms, but satisfactory I guess. He was not the most sympathetic of types.
After resting in our room for a bit, we went to the hotel’s dinner buffet; it was decent, with pretty good selection; Jeff enjoyed it more than me.
After dinner, we had a couple drinks at the hotel’s bar; we were the only people in there, but had a good time together just chatting; unfortunately, my pina colada came to $5 (250 rupees), which is outrageous, considering the price of all the other drinks. A 650ml beer for instance cost $2.25.
After this, we headed back to the hotel room, hoping for some much needed sleep!
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