Recommendations

Dear Ms Poonam good morning!

I am very pleased to hear from you again. Thank you for the wonderful trip you have organized for us. Everything was perfect and we have enjoyed very much our trip.

I must begin my report mentioning first of all our driver Mr Singh (if I am wright with his name) as an excellent driver: Very attentive while driving, very discretionary during tho long hours of driving, very cool if anything dangerous happened during driving, indefatigable and very very calm as personality. Overall a very nice person. We have enjoyed very much to travel with him and he gave us a sense of security while driving.

Our SUV car was also perfect: Very comfortable, with excellent suspension and very clean. I have to say that Mr Singh always took take of the condition of the car so that to be always clean.

I have taken about 4.000 photos during this trip. Of course there are not all good. I have to find time to select the best of them. How many do you consider enough?
here is the rest of my report!

I have to add that in Jaipur at the Narain Niwas Palace the restaurant was very good and the bar also. Also the bar of the Mandawa Castle was great. 

Bikaner: Lallgarh Palace. Wonderful Hotel. Huge and clean  room. The bathroom was also very nice. The service was good.  We enjoyed it very much, especially the fact that it is in the same building with the Laxmi Niwas Hotel, so we could enjoy their very good  restaurant and bar. Practically it was as if we were residents of The Laxmi Niwas Palace.

Sam Sand Dunes: Nice room -and it was well heated.

Johdpur: Pal Haveli. Nice Hotel, very centrally located. Nice big room. Nice rooftop restaurant with wonderful view and good food. The personnel was very helpful and friendly.

Udaipur: Karohi Hotel. Nice hotel, very central located, beautiful garden and peaceful. Very nice room with beautiful view.

Delhi: The Metropolitan Hotel. Very nice hotel, we have appreciate it very much. Very central and close to the airport as well. If I was to come back to Delhi we would like to stay in the same hotel. Very nice restaurants too.

I have to say that all your representatives were very very good and were very much concerned about our trip. The caution they had showed to us had made us feel very secure.

About the guides we had:

All were very nice as personalities and they knew a lot about their subject. Mr Bopal (if I remember correctly his name) in Agra and Mr Hanuman in Jaipur were also very helpful with us, as we were trying to find and buy some clothes because of my husband's lost luggage.   They accompanied us to the shops and were acting as translators as well, which is far beyond their duties.

I also have to mention that Mr Hanouman knew and explained very well all about the Jantar Mantar in Jaipur with great accuracy. ( I could never  be able to understand any mistake, but my husband, who had studied those subjects in the University, said that Mr Hanuman explained everything in the right way and it is quite complicated).

Very nice and pleasant was also the guide we had in Jaisalmer -he had a great sense of humor as well.

And off course Mr Ragou at Jodhpur. He is just perfect! Mrs Reppas was absutelly right for him.

Our guide in Ajmer and Pushkar was also very nice. When my husband was angry with the behavior of a priest in the lake of Pushkar he phoned immediately to the authorities and during our visit to a temple an officer visited us. We were just astonished (and very pleased of course) with the reaction both of your guide  and of the officer.

I must not forget the guide we had in Udaipur and the guide we had in Bikaner. Both of them very efficient and very nice. Quite good guide was also the one we had in Mandawa.

Mr Manoj also was most helpful with us during all this adventure we had with this lost luggage! I have the best impressions of your travel agency and after  our return back we recommend you to whom asks mus about our trip to India.

I do not know when we shall be back, but we surely will, because India deserves many many trips, to obtain a glance of her beauty. And when the time will arrive, it will be again your travel agency to organize again our trip. 

Best regards
Ersi Koi  

Hi Poonam,

We are now back in our home country. I would just like to commend the great service that we received from Castle and King India. It's a shame that we weren't able to meet you (Poonam) and Arvind in person. Just the same, my dad and I would like to say thank you for the wonderful itinerary that was planned for us. The room provided on our last night before our departure from Delhi is much appreciated!

We will surely recommend your tour agency to our friends who are thinking of traveling to India.

Regards,
Jean

Dear Poonam,

I had a great trip and y'all did an excellent job.  I will send particulars when I get  home

Thanks.
Bill Christ

Hello Ms.Poonam and Mr. Arvind

I am well thank you.

Our trip with castle & king was well organized.

I travelled with your company from Nov 12-15’2010 to Jaipur and Pushkar and wanted to say thank you for providing such great service. Both Hanuman (tour guide) and Krishna (driver) were very helpful and made the trip a very pleasant experience. 

Please take note that: We were particularly impressed with our Tour guide in Jaipur: Mr. Hanuman & our driver: Mr. Krishna. I would recommend them in particular to other friends & family when they tour with you.

They both made our trip thoroughly knowledgeable & enjoyable.

We hope to travel again with castle & king to other destinations.

Thanks,
Tanisha.

Hi Poonam

Yes we had a brilliant holiday.  Thank you so much for organising it so well. Thanks also to the rest of your team.  We loved our holiday in India and look forward very much to coming back.  But the world’s a big place and you have to try new adventures too.  We’re off to Vietnam for a 2 week tour in April.  We’re keeping our fingers crossed that we’ve picked a good tour operator again this time. 

Kind Regards
Lorraine

Hello there Poonam,

Thank you for the nice holiday greeting.  We had such a nice time in india and mentioned your name to coworkers and they decided to use your company.  My friends’ names are Rey Berando and Ace Aujero.

They are very excited and loved our pictures.  Thanks again for the best vacation ever!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Alison Kirkwood

Hello Ms. Poonam Sharma

Sorry for a late reply. I got back to CANADA safely and wanted you and Arvind along with the team at Castle and King India Inc. to know that our stay in India was a wonderful experience thanks to you and your organization. Without your care the trip would not be the same.
Special thanks to your driver Krishna who is a gem, very caring, thoughtful and careful driver
Just imagine I am still processing the 1500 photos we took in beautiful India.
You’ve asked me for some feedback that may be helpful for you in a future.
Here some thoughts that came to mind:

Kajuraho:
Nice hotel, representative was very attentive maybe too much, our tour guide very knowledgeable and with a good sense of humor and flexible to accommodate us for an extra morning of site seeing.
Transfer to Jhansi went smooth.

Agra:
Hotel was clean and centrally located but not as impressive as the forthcoming small palaces.
Our tour guide was absolutely great. He was very attentive, educated and enjoyable to talk to as well as great photographer. We liked him a lot.

Rhantambore:
Hotel was delightful, stay there was quite restful, the restaurant was good and people were very nice.

Jaipur
We loved the hotel. Beautifully furnished, with a lovely pool it had a very nice restaurant as well. We had great time meeting the owner and his family.
The guide was also very good.

Mondawa
Here we stayed at another beautiful hotel with exquisite pool and the views, the rooms were very attractive, unfortunately some of them had problems with plumbing. Nice buffet was served for dinner

I started this letter in November but I stopped here for a luck of time, I will try to continue in 2010…

Dear Friends I would like to wish you lots of success in New Year …. You deserve it and I hope to see you again in beautiful and tantalizing India.
Until next time.

Bikaner, Jaisalmer, Jodhpur  Udaipur  Aurungabad  Delhi is to come and at this time I will send some photos from the trip.

LILIANA

Dear Ms Poonam

Greetings from Afghanistan!
Thank you and for assistance of all your representatives, it was a great tour. Special thanks for Mr Kisham our driver he was excellent.   Surly I will recommend your services to others when they interested to make tour in India, and I am quite sure that it was not our last visit in your country.
Sorry but I did not have internet access up to now it happens here
Once more thank you

Kind regards
Gabor Mate

Hi Poonam,
 
All is well thanks. I have misplaced the feedback form but happy to provide a quick summary:
 
Castle & King service / organisation: Excellent
Driver, Naresh: Excellent
Hotels: Metropolitan Delhi - not so good
Trident Agra: good
Trident Jaipur: very good
Tour guides: very good
 
Overall very pleased with tour and would recommend your services.
 
Kind regards
Tom Shcubert

Dear Poonam,

In fact I have filled up the form but forgot to past to Mr Gopal despite him had reminded.

I will fax to you next week when I come back from out station.

The Hotels, Tour Guides, Representatives, Itineraries and Transportation & Driver are good and of Five Star Quality,.

Thanks
Joe

My niece and I spent a little more than two weeks using the services of Castle and King Inc--and they delivered EVERYTHING they promised and MORE. Their contacts in each city were personable and professional. We had a car (relatively new and well maintained) and driver (who was with us for essentially the whole trip--very friendly and helpful, but spoke little English) and a different guide in each city (each of whom was very knowledgeable and fluent in English). We were met at airports and hotels, by company representatives, precisely as arranged--even when our train was delayed for six hours until 3:00 in the morning, our driver was right there at the platform. At trains, the guide would not leave us until the train had arrived. The hotels were as stated per contract or upgraded. The local agents were all very flexible with making last minute additions to our itinerary. (We "added" a guide for a night visit to the Ganges in Varanasi and on the last day my niece needed a guide for shopping in Jaipur.--I would recommend a guide any time you venture more than a block or two from your hotel--not so much for safety, but India can be quite chaotic.) I would not hesitate to utilize their services again. Arvind did a great job!

Mr. Mark Kasper

Dear Mr. Arvind:

I just want to thank you for more making my Indian vacation an incredible experience. I will never forget the beautiful castles, temples, and palaces I stayed at. You could not have picked a more perfect accommodation. India is amazingly beautiful. I loved Rajasthan, so many incredible cities with so much history. The contrasting colors, people, foods, and religions are everywhere. Everyday was more exciting than the last. Finally, finishing the trip at Hari Ganga Haveli Spa & Hotel along the Ganges was a perfect end to my journey. My driver Sanjeev was very kind, patient and well traveled. He drove us 3,500 miles across northern India "Hassle Free!" Traveling to India with Castle & king was one of the smartest decisions I've made. The whole trip was carefully planned and organized. I didn't have to worry about anything or anyone. I HIGHLY recommend using Castle & King if you want it to be "Hassle free" in India. No problems, no worries just sit back and enjoy yourself.

I will certainly be coming back to India again!

Sincerely,
David Villegas

Happy New Year! Arvind.

I hope this year finds you and your family well. The tour was lovely and you went over and above our expectations. We had a superb time in India, thanks to you. We also had a wonderful time in Meharabad. The countryside was beautiful and the people were warm and welcoming.

I hope your new baby is well and your wife and your business good.

thank you for an unforgettable vacation of a lifetime.

Regards,
Tracy Hollis

Dear Arvind,

First of all can I say that we arrived home safely, on time and with all our luggage.

Secondly, may I repeat our thanks for organising such a wonderful tour for Rosemary and myself.

The hotels - were all excellent recommendations, with splendid rooms and service. If I had to rank them I would do so as follows:-

1) Amarvilas - Agra - the room here was beautiful with a fantastic view of the Taj Mahal. First rate service from all the staff. A truly magnificent place to stay.

2) Samode Palace - Samode - what a lovely building to stay in and the view from our room was stunning. It was also a very good place to enjoy dinner and watch a good show of local dancing and music. We were also fortunate to enjoy the fireworks as it was Diwali.

3) Imperial Hotel - Delhi - everything you would expect from a world class hotel in an international city.

4) Samode Haveli - Jaipur - we had a lovely suite in a building full of character. Lovely pool area and again all the staff were very friendly and helpful.

5) Ajit Bhawan - Jodhpur - last on the list, but by no means was there a big difference between here and the Samode Haveli. The only complaint was the very noisy air conditioning.

The mix of heritage and luxury hotels worked very well for us. Occasionally it was very nice to enjoy the sevice and surroundings of the big hotels, but it was also good to enjoy the smaller, more intimate character of the heritage hotels.

The driver. - Krishna - he looked after us very well. He was also punctual, as far as I could tell he was always ready at least 10 minutes before the appointed time. He was always in good humour, despite some quite long drives. He recommended many good restaurants for us, which we enjoyed much more than if we had eaten in the hotels all the time. He was also very informative. Highly recommended!

Mahadev Kashana - Jaipur - he was a lovely guide, making sure we enjoyed ourselves and giving us many pieces of advice.

Sajeet Dikchit - Agra - sorry if the spelling is wrong. He was a very knowledgable guide with a wonderful understanding of history. He too gave us many useful pieces of information which helped us a lot, and also helped with buying clothes until our luggage arrived.

The tours -

Taj Mahal - as expected it was wonderful.
Agra Fort - very good.
Fatehpur Sikri - well worth a visit.
Amber Fort - another excellent trip, including much fun with the elephant ride.
Village safari - very, very interesting visit to Bishnoi village and opium ceremony.

I would also like to thank Nutan for his assistance whilst with us in Delhi.

Finally, thank you once again, and I hope the above comments (constructive I hope) are of some use in your future planning. May Rosemary and I wish you every success in your business and please do not hesitate to use us as a reference for future clients.

Yours sincerely,
Malcolm and Rosemary Siddons.

Good Evening Arvind,

Barrie and I would like to thank yourselves and your company for an excellent and unforgettable holiday. From start to finish, the tour was perfect. We would especially like to thank (and will you pass on again our appreciation) our guides,

Puja in Mumbai, Rashid in Agra and Dev in Jaipur and our greatest thanks (and we've missed him since we came home), to Ramesh our driver, he was wonderful.

We have recommended your company to all our friends, family and colleagues and if we decide to have another tour in India, we will definitely ask yourselves to organise it for us.

Hope everyone in India is well, especially your new daughter and your wife.

Once again, thank you very much for a wonderful experience. We certainly came home with sweet memories of India!

Best Regards
Sue Barker and Barrie Grimes.

Dear Mr Arvind,

We have now returned home having spent a wonderful holiday in India, due in great part to the excellent 11 days you put together for us in Rajasthan. We were delighted with the amazingly smooth arrangements made by you where nothing seemed to go wrong. From the moment we were collected from New Delhi airport and taken to The Imperial (a wonderful hotel - thank you for recommending it) to the very last day when we were taken to Udaipur Airport, the trip was full of amazing and delightful experiences. We were very impressed by the way that your local agents met us at each stage of the journey to ensure that all was running smoothly (as it always was), and the local guides were extremely well informed and unfailingly helpful and courteous.

The car you provided was excellent and we were very happy with the standard of the hotels you arranged for us. Obviously they varied in quality; all were very acceptable and some were outstandingly good. We were delighted especially to be able to stay in the Maharajah's Hunting Lodge in Gajner, though of course it was really a palace - a beautiful place to stay and be looked after.

The extra trips you organised were great but I would like to say how much we loved the camel safari and the evening of entertainment, and also the village trip in the jeep. The guides were very helpful and when we asked whether it might be possible to visit a school, they immediately obliged and took us to one. As we are both ex-teachers, we found it particularly interesting.

However, our holiday could not have been so fantastic without Anil our driver. I cannot praise him enough; his primary concern was always our well-being, enjoyment and safety. He was totally reliable, thoughtful, clean and smart, always ensured that our car was immaculate and was the safest driver, by far, that we experienced in India. He spoke English well enough to be able to answer our many questions and we felt totally secure with him at all times.

We will recommend you and your company (and Anil as the preferred driver) to all who ask us about India and tell them how efficiently you put together an outstanding holiday for us which we also felt was extremely good value.

Please feel free to use any of our compliments in this email in your advertising.

Many, many thanks.
Wendy and Judy