It may be obvious to you by now that I spend a lot of time travelling. Naturally, this means spending several nights in hotels across the country. This also creates an opportunity to review those hotels and spread the word about good and bad things about the places I have stayed in. But so far, I have refrained.
I can’t think of a reason why I wasn’t doing hotel reviews so far. Perhaps I thought reviews are better left to TripAdvisor. Perhaps I thought it was something too commercial or may be I simply assumed this is not a place for hotel reviews.
But I started thinking otherwise a few months ago, when I began searching TripAdvisor to get information about hotels in some destinations. The reviews were often very contrasting and sometimes misleading. While some reviewers said that a hotel is the best choice, there were an equal number of people who said exactly the opposite. In some cases, it appeared likely that the reviews were rigged. And in some cases, unusually harsh reviews made me wonder if competitors were trying to defame the property. It wasn’t easy to qualify a hotel through the ratings and reviews on TripAdvisor or similar sources.
This, added with the fact that I spend many days staying at hotels, made me think it is probably worthwhile posting hotel reviews here. While I may never reach the volumes and coverage of a crowd sourced review system, at least I may be able to provide more accurate and trusted reviews of a few hotels in a few destinations.
Keeping this in mind, I will be starting hotel reviews on this site in near future. However, to prevent flooding this blog’s main page with reviews, I would be posting them as wordpress pages instead of blog posts. Only a monthly summary would be posted here as a blog post.
Your comments, if any on this, is welcome.
It is almost time to say good bye 2011. It has been a good year for me when it comes to travelling – there is not a thing I can complain about. Most importantly, we created Darter Photography, which allowed me the bandwidth and ability to travel wherever I please, whenever I want to. Here is a quick compilation of ten images I made in 2011. They aren’t exactly in any order and or not necessarily my ten favourite images from the year, but ten of the many images I liked, and enjoy photographing.
In January, I travelled on the first Darter Tour to Hampi, which will remain an experience that I will cherish for a long time. Here is an image of the hills of Hampi, photographed during the tour.
Soon after the Hampi trip, I was braving a -250C in Ladakh, walking on the frozen Zanskar River. The landscapes I saw there are something probably not to be seen anywhere else in India.
I was back in Hampi in February again, this time photographing the heritage sites and wildlife and focusing less on the landscapes.
I do not remember travelling anywhere in March. In the month of April, work took me to many parts of Kerala. I dreaded about facing Kerala’s sultry weather in summer, but untimely rains helped keep the days pleasant. Here is an image from Munnar photographed during this trip.
Here is another image from the same trip, at the well known Chinese Fishing Nets of Fort Kochi.
After a lull in travelling during May and June, I headed out to Ladakh in July. It was an eventful trip, but not being on the top of my health prevented me from actively seeking to make many images. Here is one of the few photographs I took, at Tso Moriri Lake.
I was back in the mountains again in August, this time at Lahaul and Spiti. For me, this was the most eventful trip of the year. Here is an image of confluence of Pin and Spiti Rivers, taken from Dhankar Village.
After another break in travelling during the months of September, I headed out, once again to the mountains. To Manali, this time without the camera. In the first week of November, I was back in Kerala for a short trip on work, visiting Trivandrum and Kochi. Here is an image of a handloom house that makes saris and dhotis, near Trivandrum.
In later part of November, I travelled to Rajasthan, which was a very productive trip in terms of photography. We made a long tour on two weeks, through Jaipur, Bikaner, Jaisalmer, Jodhpur and Udaipur. A few images from this trip, from Khichan and Jaisalmer.
