Now is not necessarily the right season to make weekend trip to a place like Karjat, but being a long weekend, everyone being available in family and wanting to avoid rush at Mahabaleswar / Panchgani, we narrowed on the Forest Club Resort.
Nice property, with good accommodation, good food and decent service is a short summary of this place. It is being advertised as a luxury resort, and while it is a good place, I will not necessarily call it luxury. The price point is a bit on the higher side. The executive rooms with the meandering pool look great and is probably the highlight of the place.
The standard and premium rooms, don’t have access to the meandering pool, but rather to an infinity pool (which doesn’t really looks like an infinity pool), located on one side of the resort, near to the restaurant and the reasonable sized lawn. The view from here is good as you see vast open land, trains and locals near Karjat station, mountains on the backdrop and also planes flying in and out of Mumbai. Had it been monsoon or afterwards, the view would have been lot greener. This time of the year it is very dry and in the night time, you can make out forest fires on the mountains.
To reach the resort, from Pune, on the Pune Mumbai expressway, after Lonavala, you need to take the Khapoli exit on to the old Pune Mumbai highway and past Khapoli, right at Jamrung Karjat Phata, onto Karjat Murbad road and finally onto Karjat Neral road. The resort on a small hill top and the climb up is very very steep to start with, and then a final steep uphill again to the final parking spot.
Alternatively, you can not take the Khapoli exit and continue on the expressway, have a quick bite at the food mall, exit onto Pen/Alibaug (extreme left) at the Khalapur toll naka, right onto Pen Khapoli road, left onto Jamrung Karjat Phata and follow the route as above (follow the GPS :-))
Enter the resort’s reception that is tastefully decorated, and while you check in, you get a welcome drink (a very small shot) and then head to your room with standard and premium rooms on the left and executive rooms on the right, and straight up ahead being the restaurant, play room, gym, infinity pool, bar on restaurant’s first floor and the lawn (all the way to the end of the hill top).
The premium room is nice, but with a few flaws in the interior design. The entrance is a huge sliding glass door, and as you enter, the bed is right in the front. The room on the front side as east facing and they have this challenge that if you get up early, open up the curtain in the morning to say get your morning tea, you cannot avoid letting in bright light, disrupting the sleep of the other person.
The room had separate bath and toilet, which is good as can be separately used, but the wash basin in outside, and way too huge. This is not a good idea as you cannot wash your hands without coming out of the toilet. Also the huge basin, leaves little room on the side to keep any toiletries, powder, deo etc. The light inside the bathroom and toilet is pretty dim, and hence you need to keep the lights above the wash basin on, which can again disrupt the sleep.
The TV is right on one corner of room and with the premium room’s bed having thick staff’s on all four corners, it blocks the TV view. Good part is that the TV is mounted on a moving arm, so you can pull the TV out and bring it towards the center for better viewing, something we realized a bit late, after having cursed the blocked view for a while. The person who brought us to the room, failed to mention this small point.
The package usually has two options. One including breakfast and one meal and other with all meals, which then also includes high tea in the evening. You may intend to stay at the hotel all day long or go out to see things like ND’s Film World, Morbe Dam, the five temples in Nadhal or maybe Irshalgad Fort; In all cases, taking the breakfast and one meal plan will be a better idea. While the a-la-carte rates are high, but an extra meal at the hotel, will still be cheaper than what they charge for the all meal plan.
If you are non-veg lover, then this place may not be very attractive as the non-veg options in their buffet spread are limited. Breakfast typically has chicken sausage, boiled eggs or a live counter for other egg preparations. Lunch/Dinner has 1 non-veg starter and 2 main dishes, that may include fish at times. No non-veg soup, no non-veg salad, no non-veg rice preparation.
In the current warm season, the infinity pool is a place most crowd is, and while the signage says to maintain proper pool dress code, but no one seemed to bother and people were in there with all sorts of cloths on.
Overall, as I have earlier, it is a nice and comfortable place and worth visiting, especially during or immediately after monsoon. I do feel that it is a bit high on the price point, though.
That’s all folks. Do share your feedback or your experiences if you do happen to visit this place.
Bye.
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