Chp 678. Pune Weekend Getaway - Nayak's Resort Villa

A few months ago, I updated by blog with Pune Weekend Getaway - Dreamlandd Resortt. That was a truly enjoyable weekend indeed, spending a much needed break with my office colleagues.

Recently, we all went for another weekend getaway again, and here is an update on that…

Place: Nayak's Resort Villa

Location: 37 km from Pune, around 1:30 hours by car.

Duration: 1 Night, 2 Days (Saturday 1 PM to Sunday 11 AM)

Package: Accommodation (3 AC bedrooms) + Swimming pool + BBQ grill + Badminton court + lunch + evening snacks + dinner + next day's breakfast.

Total cost: INR 48,000/- (approximately 3000 per head)

Occasion : Just to take a break from hectic office life

A view from the location.

Beautiful, innit?

Unlike the last time we went to Dreamlandd Resortt, this time was a "family affairs" sort of weekend. That means many of my colleagues came with their wives and kids.

As always, Sumeet picked me up from KP, and since I was having Vishal's BBQ grill with me, we took that along for the weekend party too, not knowing that the resort had their own freaking BBQ grill! We were unnecessarily packed house-full inside the car, *facepalm*

I took a couple of pics along the way. The journey was extremely green, as monsoon had just started to set in…

IMPORTANT: Just to be clear, we almost went to the wrong location because if you search for "Nayak's Resort Villa" on Google Map, it will throw up a completely different location. Instead, search for "Fit & Fair Beauty Spa N Resort" on google map and you'll find this place immediately right next to it.The resort lies close to the pristine Khadakwasla lake.

After around an hour of road trip, just before reaching Bhandari Villa on your left (huge signboard), take the secluded road on the right. The road will look like one of those private gated-community roads. Just tell the security you're on your way to Nayak's Resort Villa and he'll let you through.

From there onwards, you'll climb up a beautiful stretch of well-maintained road with a scenic view of the lake below…

Just keep going for around 20 minutes (you'll pass a couple of other privately owned resorts on the way), until you reach Nayak's Resort Villa.

The view of the road and scenery from the villa was breathtaking…

The others too slowly arrived one by one…

Nice interiors…

Even nicer bar! :D

Absolutely amazing swimming pool.

The swimming pool even had its own bar area, where you can sit on concrete stools lying under the water!

I roamed around and took a few more pics around the villa…

Here's a beautiful panoramic photo taken by one of my colleagues. By the way, you can click on all photos to enlarge to a new tab.

The view from the Villa garden balcony was mesmerizing…

They even brought out these comfortable lawn chairs after we requested them to…

The exterior dining area…

Lunch was soon served…

I charged my phone during lunch time, and unfortunately, nobody took photos of the food. Overall, the food was good. It was just vegetarian, but they made it in Bengali style. The paneer was memorable as well. I think my friends were all too excited about the location and preoccupied to have taken a photo of the food, otherwise if my phone was not charging inside the house, I would have definitely taken some pics.

After a short break once lunch was over, some of the guys badminton…

And then before darkness descended, the caretakers advised us to check out the hill-top temple situated not very far from the resort. Unfortunately, they told us there were no shops around for miles and the temple was the only sight worth seeing, but they assured us the view from the hilltop was beautiful.

And so off we went…

Vishal struggling with his modified Padmini to reach the top :D

Ah finally, the tip of the plateau…

Just as the caretaker of the Villa promised, the Temple was so peaceful and tranquil…

Two friendly dogs immediately came towards as, expecting food…

Unfortunately, none of us had any snacks with us, so they looked at us judgingly…

Photo time…

Mansi with Ronin…

Hakr and family…

Sparsh sitting all handsome and photogenic…

Sumeet inducing mental and psychological trauma to Ronin :D

Debasis missing his wife :D

Another awesome semi-panoramic pic of the area…

Soon it was time to head back to our Villa…

On our way back we met the recently married Rahul and his wife taking a romantic stroll by the road…

Once we got back, we all rushed immediately to play badminton again, lolz. A view of us playing badminton from the road above…

I on the other hand, went to swim at the pool…

Soon, the moon came up…

Oh yeah, night party time!

While some of us stayed in the pool, others barbequed various meats on the Villa's grill…

The pool side DJ console even had disco lights!

By the way, two of the people in charge of the management were from Manipur! They were Zomi and they understood Mizo. Apparently, they had completed their hotel management and were working there as interns. At first I was surprised they got placement at such a place with a hotel management degree, but they told me the owner of the resort also owned a lot of other resorts and hotels around Pune and they were regularly rotated. I wished them all the best and asked them to play "Val to lo" and other Mizo songs and my drunken colleagues didn't even realize they were dancing to Mizo songs :D

Once we were done with the wild night, we headed back to sleep (at least I did, while the others continued drinking and even had dinner, which I sorely missed).

For the slumber arrangement, as I mentioned in the beginning, the resort had three large and comfortable bedrooms. Four of us slept in one bedroom, another four in the second bedroom, and the third bedroom was occupied by the wives and kids.

The rest of the guys who didn't sleep in the bedrooms laid mattresses in the lounge and slept there together.

Early morning dawn photos…

Sun is rising…

For breakfast, we had poha.

The pool looked so tempting…

Soon, the sun and rain were starting to battle in the sky…

I was like, what the heck, and jumped inside the pool again :D

Others too joined again. Sumeet had the time of his life with cute l'il Ronin, while Mansi was standing at the corner complaining that she had just dried their clothes #$%&*#… :D

The fun-less people who wouldn't join us for one last dip :P Abhishek was extremely sad because a certain someone didn't come for the trip :D

We took one last shower as we left the pool because it was already past our checkout time. We fought for the shower together as time was running out :D

A beautiful capture of rain at one location while sunny at another in one frame…

Awesome fist-bumps from Ronin, as we bid goodbye to a memorable weekend getaway…

So that was my experience at Nayak's Resort Villa. I would rate the place as -

Food (for veg): 4/5

Facility: 5/5 because disco lights!

Emergency back-up: 4/5 the place ran on solar power!

Comfort level: 4/5

Swimming pool: 2/5 because it wasn't deep at all.

Privacy and freedom to be noisy: 5/5

Music quality: 5/5

At first I was disappointed because we didn't have cell phone reception so I thought it would be like the time we went to Dreamlandd Resortt where none of us could play music from the cloud, but the two guys from Manipur had an awesome collection of music to choose from :)

Until my next trip then, cheers everyone. Have a great weekend. And to my friends at Navi Mumbai, see y'all tomorrow! :)

Chp 677. The Adventures of Tubby - season 2

The exciting adventure and souscapade of Tubby continues! For those of you who came in late, Tubby is my new girlfriend, made of 100% food grade stainless steel. She is my personal plate here at office :) This series of post consists of the lunch I order at office and eat using this plate.

Now why would I be having my own personal plate at a reputed Business and Corporate center in the heart of Pune, you may ask? Well you can read all about her origin here at Part 1 of the Adventures of Tubby.

In case you didn't notice, yesterday, we saw a lot of popular TV shows airing their new season's episodes - The Blacklist, Chicago PD, Designated Survivor, Criminal Minds, The Brave, Seal Team, Modern Family,  and Law & Order SVU just to name a few. What an awesome night it was to binge-watch them all.

Likewise, I think it's time to release season 2 of The Adventures of Tubby today. So here are 10 mouthwatering episodes to feast your eyes (and stomachs) on…

Season 2: Episode 1

First up for the season 2 episode opener is one of my favorite restaurants here in Koregaon Park - Porotbello. They specialize in pork dishes and their price is mid-range (most of the restaurants in KP that serves pork are expensive). In this episode, you can see Tubby holding a magnificent plate of Spaghetti Alla Carbonara with Bacon (₹300). I mean it's a bit redundant to include the "with bacon" part because a Carbonara by default should contain bacon, but I guess they put it like that in the menu to warn people who may not know about it that it contains pork. I also ordered their Piri Piri Prawns with Mayo (₹200) as sides, and it was tasty as hell!

Season 2: Episode 2

The name of this restaurant is 5 Loaves 2 Fish. Yes don't you just love the subtle Biblical reference? :D When I looked at their menu, I wasn't surprised at all that it was a Malayali restaurant. They had everything from puttus to appams. But then when I saw this particular dish on their menu, I jumped up in joy! Egg Kothu Parotta (₹120). Having being brought up in one of those hill station residential boarding schools in Tamil Nadu, this used to be my favorite roadside snack. It consists of minced Malabar parottas mixed with shredded eggs, onions, tomatoes and other condiments. Since it was just a snack, I ordered their Surmai Tawa Fry (₹320) to complement it, and they went so well together. Definitely 5/5 rating.

Season 2: Episode 3

The above assortment is from Café Hormuz, the best Parsi restaurant in town. As I have explained in season 1 where I featured one of their dishes, what I really love about this place is not just the delicious and authentic Parsi food, but the fact that their quantity is small (along with low cost) hence making it convenient for me to order a variety of different dishes without spending much. Above you can see their soft and super fine Iranian Egg Pulao (₹105), along with Kheema Ghotala half (₹75) and Irani Herbal Masala Egg Omelette (₹80). Kheema Ghotala is a popular Parsi dish made from minced chicken, scrambled eggs, onions and capsicum.

Season 2: Episode 4

One of my regular blog visitors Daniel commented on the previous Season 1 post, saying he's disappointed that I won't be able to order Mizo dishes at work. I know, that's sad (you will find Mizo dishes in my other non-Tubby related blog posts). Tubby will never get to know what real Mizo love feels like, but this is the closest I got - Spicy Naga Pork.

Yeah so the other day, I found this new place on zomato called Pema's Kitchen. Their menu was proper Tibetan, and I was so excited when I saw Spicy Naga Pork on their menu. I ordered immediately but the owner, whom I assumed was Pema, called me up to say it was available only for dinner. And then around a month later, I called her up again and told her I would be ordering this dish for lunch the next day and so she prepared it for me in advance that night. I had been regularly ordering their Thukpas and Momos at home so the trust factor was there. And so the next day for lunch, Tubby finally got to meet Spicy Naga Pork (₹320). It came with a good portion of white rice, and what I really love about Pema is that she always throws in a free sample of Raja Mirchi pickle only for me after I told her I'm from Mizoram :)

Season 2: Episode 5

I'll try to include at least one burger meal every season. For this season, I give you "Yo Mama's Threesome Burger" from Ringer Burgers. I kid you not, that is the actual name of the monstrous burger above. It costs a cool ₹300 bucks and consists of two Mutton BBQ patty, three layers of Chicken salami, five strips of Bacon, two fried eggs, and cheesy fries oozing with their secret MMS cheese sauce. Tubby really loved it, so did my tummy :)

Season 2: Episode 6

I love a "make your own" meal joint, where we can customize our meal just the way we want by selecting our preferred ingredients. However, such places are not very common. Slice of Soul (S.O.S.) is one of those few restaurants having this feature. Above you can see my Make Your Own Non Veg Pasta (₹260) consisting of Pork Pepperoni, Chicken Sausages, Garlic, Onion, Sun Dried Tomato, Green Chilly, Grilled Paneer in Red Sauce, Parmesan as Garnish and Macaroni as Pasta.

Along with that, I also ordered a Make Your Own Non Veg Salad (₹175.25) consisting of Pork Chorizo, Bacon, Tequila Prawns, Mac and Cheese, Button Mushroom, Sun Dried Tomato, Jalapeno, Green Chilly and Grilled Paneer, with Caeser as preferred dressing. Both were super yummm.

Season 2: Episode 7

I'll try to include at least one Pizza order every season as well. This time, Tubby met the awesome Pork Overload Pizza (₹260) from Bubsterr's. For those of you unfamiliar with Bubsterr's pizzas, they don't make round pizzas, and instead, one serving consists of one huge slice. The Pork Overload Pizza is their signature pizza and it consists of Smoked Ham, Peperoni, Bacon and Sausage! I also ordered their Classic Chicken Dog (₹140) as sides and it was awesome.

And since I am a "Zomato Treats Partner", my order came with a complimentary Chocolate Pizza slice, which is pizza made with Hot Chocolate sauce, Cinnamon'd Banana, Crushed Oreos, Melted Chocolate and Salted Caramel. For those of you who had never seen a chocolate pizza before, this is it. And it was really goooood!!

Season 2: Episode 8

On Fridays, my Muslim colleagues would go for their Namaz at a local Mosque nearby in the afternoon, where they apparently serve awesome Beef dishes (buffalo meat, since cow meat is banned in Maharashtra). And so I would ask them to buy for me some of the stuff when they come back to office. Above is an awesome platter of juicy Beef Sheekh kebab (₹200) along with roti, dal and sabji, and it definitely reminded me of my Bangalore days when we used to go all the way from Bannerghatta to Fanoos just to have their awesome Jumbo, Mumbo, Rambo and Sambo Beef Sheekhs wrapped in Romali rotis! Mannn…

Season 2: Episode 9

There were times when I just didn't feel like having a full-fledged meal or even junk food like burgers and pizzas for lunch. And so I would go for light snacks like Chicken Puffs, Mutton Puffs, Egg Puffs etc. Above was one such occasion when I gorged by mouth with puffs and made my cheeks all puffy. Tubby was surprised to see such an odd assortment of food for lunch, but then I told her about my past history many years ago -

Back when I was doing my Engineering course at Coimbatore, I used to be so broke that while my classmates had their lunch at the campus cafeteria or the restaurants outside, I used to eat alone quietly at the local bakery and have 2-3 egg puffs for lunch, which was all I could afford back then. Having those puffs everyday gave me more determination and will power to succeed in life, and that was the reason why I worked hard every day till now so I could eat anything I want for lunch today. Tubby cried after I told her that story. It's all thanks to the puffs that I got where I am today.

Season 2: Episode 10

Tubby was also delighted to have her first pork ribs in office, ordered from Murphies, renowned for their USP dishes called "Murphs" (meat, mashed potatoes and cheese wrapped in jacket potatoes). This place is Heaven for meat-lovers. The Murphies Pork Ribs came in sweet and spicy BBQ sauce and costs a cool ₹350 bucks. It was dillu!

I also ordered their German Suppe Soup (₹200) so that my ribs meal wasn't too dry. It was a thick broth with loads of bacon and mashed potatoes. A spoonful was enough to have a very calming effect on my inner belly lining. :D And of course just a drop of two of my spicy Naga Chilly pickle completed changed the taste as well, making it super awesome!

And so with that exciting pork ribs and soup, Season 2 of the Adventures of Tubby came to an end. Do watch this space for more when Season 3 starts. Do give me your feedback on how you think this season went, and I'm ready to listen to any recommendation or suggestion that you would like to see for season 3.

Until then, bon appétit everyone!