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This Week in Hotel Lust: The Leela Kempinski Goa

Where: Mobor, Cavelossim, Goa, India, 403 731

Goa, India is an attractive resort state associated with equal parts bohemianism and luxury frills. Spirituality seeking backpackers enjoy it just as much as their richer-than-rich counterparts, who have a good number of opulent hotels to choose from as the tourism industry has taken off over the years.

The Leela operates a family of high-end hotels in some of the country's most popular destinations, among them Bangalore, Udiapur, and Goa, of course. It's the latter that we're focusing on in this installment of "This Week Hotel in Lust," with plenty of near-royal touches to qualify among the ranks of last week's Villa D'Este in Italy. And we do mean "royal"—they've had the audacity to include the word "Palace" in their name, a buzzword for anyone hoping to live the high life while traveling abroad.

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Tags: Celebrity Scoop / Jessica Simpson / Mumbai Hotels / → All Tags

Jessica Simpson Checks Into The Taj Mahal Palace

Where: 1 Apollo Bunder, Mumbai, India

Good old Jessica Simpson. Fresh from serenading guests at the Serena Hotel in Kampala, she’s moved on to Mumbai to film the next episode of her new show, The Price of Beauty.

She stayed at the Taj Mahal Palace & Tower, which reopened last December after the devastating terrorist attacks, and had a party thrown for her by Bollywood actress Neha Dhupia at the Vie Lounge bar on Juhu Beach. According to the Daily Mail, she “fitted right in with India’s fashion elite.” Wonder if she cracked out the guitar as well?

Having gone down a storm and impressed everyone with her henna tattoo and bindi, she left Mumbai for London yesterday. We’re not jealous. Really.

[Photo: Daily Mail UK]

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The Park Hyderabad Takes Its Pool to Another Dimension

Where: 22 Rajbhavan Road, Hyderabad , India, 500082

We keep hearing that The Park Hotels chain is doing the real, five-star luxury thing right in India. They've got a new 285-room property opening up sometime this fall in Hyderabad, which sounds like it fits the promise of being a "design hotel".

But what intrigues us more than the main architecture of the hotel — its unusual shape has been computer-modeled to maximize the natural light that gets in, for example — is the pool. Although these renderings make it look like just a large, slightly-oddly shaped pool, there's apparently a lot more to it than that: in fact it's

a “three-dimensional” horizon pool, with a stair tube connecting the hotel's night club to The Veranda through the volume of the pool.

We really need more pictures, but does this really mean that we could swim past people climbing the stairs to the night club? Do we want to do that? We're not quite sure.

We've got a few months to wait before we can find out exactly how this goes. Opening prices haven't been publicized yet but this hotel's cousin, the Park Hotels Bangalore has rooms starting at around 6,000 INR ($125) in fall.

Tags: Hotel Openings / India Hotels / Dream Hotels / VCH Hotels / Vikram Chatwal / → All Tags

Vikram Chatwal Wants Us Floating On a Cloud at Dream Cochin

Where: SA Road, Ernakulamv, Kochi, Kerala, India, 682020

While the opening of the Downtown Dream Hotel in New York is, pardon the pun, still just a dream, Vikram Chatwal's VCH group seems to have managed to get their act together with another Dream hotel at least: the Dream Cochin in Kerala is now up and running.

Per Luxist, The Indian tourism ministry has apparently already awarded the Dream Cochin five stars, although the Dream gang seem to think their new hotel is even better than that; they promise it "offers a glimpse of the future of deluxe accommodations."

The future is apparently going to be blue in color, which the Dream people think will give us the feeling of floating on a cloud. Think a mix of hippy and hip, because they've also tried to plug in modern technology all over the place too.

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Leela Kempinski Gurgaon Lets You See What's Cooking

Where: National Highway - 8, Gurgaon , Delhi , India, 122 002

There are a few Leela resorts around India but the very first in northern India has just soft-opened: the Leela Kempinski Gurgaon near Delhi, close to the Indira Ghandi International Airport. But hotel delays even happen to the best of the best in India. The hotel's website is currently boasting a planned opening date of January 15, so it's a couple of months late and not everything's up and going yet.

However this hotel's unique selling point is that it's the only hotel or resort in the region that's got a full range of accommodation choices, from rooms and suites through to three-bedroom residences.

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Tags: Hotel Openings / Taj Hotels / Bangalore Hotels / Interantional Hotel WiFi / Hotel WiFi / Hotel Technology / → All Tags

Vivanta Hotel Bangalore Has WiFi Everywhere

Where: Whitefield, Bangalore , India, 560 066

Soft-opening alert: India's Vivanta Hotel in Bangalore has opened its doors for the first tentative time, in the middle of Bangalore's growing International Tech Park (and a quite distant 26 miles from the airport).

Vivanta is claiming to be a bit special for several reasons, and one of them is the outside of the building:

The hotel's unique facade changes colour, texture and tone to express the borderless potential for the guests who will feel at home in any of its 199 rooms and suites.

Thumbs up for something as exciting as "borderless potential" though we're not sure how this sparkly blue-green combo will bring that about. Anyhow, being in a tech park means we expect decent facilities and we're not let down: there's WiFi throughout the hotel and portable printers for hire. Even in the hotel's cars you can get WiFi and a Playstation!

Last-minute rates at the moment range from 8,075 Rupee ($155) while the standard rack rate for a double room is 17,000 Rupee ($325).

We'll leave you with one more unique thought about the Vivanta: they lend musical instruments to their guests on request. Not sure we want to be next to the guy who borrowed the trumpet though.

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Checking In On The Taj Mahal Palace, Post-Terrorism

Where: 1 Apollo Bunder, Mumbai, India, 400 001

It's a couple of months now since the terrorist attacks and, two weeks later, an accidental fire, caused havoc for the poor Taj Mahal Palace in Mumbai. We figured it was time to check in on this Taj and see if it's really up and running again.

And it looks like, just as they promised, the Taj Mahal Palace reopened the rooms of the Tower Wing plus the restaurants, banquet hall and chambers on December 21. That's a pretty impressive at just 24 days after the attacks.

A brass and bronze sculpture named the "Tree of Life" which was already on display in the hotel has now been turned into a memorial to the 31 people who died at the Taj during the terrorist attacks, with their names inscribed at its base.

Since the reopening there hasn't been too much gossip amongst guests; a traveler who stayed there a week after the reopening said it was "good to see things starting to buzz again albeit a bit quietly". But hey, we can understand being a bit quiet about things there.

[Photo: Dey]

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Mumbai Hotels Re-Open With Parties and Prayers

Yesterday, both of the five-star Mumbai hotels attacked by terrorists in November — the Taj Mahal Palace Hotel and Tower and the Oberoi — reopened to guests. The swift repair and re-opening of the hotels were meant to serve as a symbol of hope and restoration for the city of Mumbai, which has been devastated by the attacks that claimed more than 170 lives.

According to an LA Times report, the Taj re-opened only its tower wing yesterday, as the Palace wing (which houses the restaurant, where some of the worst fighting took place) could take more than a year to completely repair. From the Times:

The Taj marked the occasion with a grand party in its tower featuring Bollywood stars and other local celebrities, several of whom took to the podium to offer their own heartfelt homage to those who died in the attacks.

Meanwhile, the Oberoi held an afternoon prayer service with religious leaders from eight denominations to mark the re-opening (only one of the two hotel buildings in the complex opens to the pubic, as the other still has a few months of repairs ahead).

[Photo: EPA/STR]

Tags: Hotel News / Hotel Emergencies. Mumbai Hotels / → All Tags

Mumbai's Taj Mahal Tower Will Reopen December 21st

Where: 1 APOLLO BUNDER, Mumbai, India

After the devastating terrorist attacks on November 26th in Mumbai virtually destroyed the city's iconic Taj Mahal Palace Hotel and Tower, the hotel had vowed to reopen as quickly as possible. Though a fire on the property last week presumably caused some setbacks, Taj announced today that the hotel has announced an official (partial) reopening date of December 21st:

Only the rooms in the Taj Mahal Tower will be reopening on the 21st (the Palace and the Tower are two different structures), but the hotel released this statement:

Acknowledging the massive efforts devoted to the Hotel’s swift re-opening, Mr. Raymond Bickson, Managing Director and CEO, The Indian Hotels Company Limited, said, “We dedicate our reopening to the city of Mumbai as affirmation of the values of courage, resilience and dignity.”

“To reopen the Taj with such speed but with no loss of attention to details, shows our resolve to commemorate all the innocent and brave people who lost their lives during the terrorist attacks. In their honour, the Taj will shine again in all its brilliance,” Mr. Bickson added.

The hotel will have only been closed for less than a month when the doors reopen at 7 p.m. next Sunday.

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Fire Breaks Out at Mumbai's Devastated Taj Mahal Palace Hotel

The Taj Mahal Palace Hotel, which was nearly destroyed in the devastating Mumbai terrorist attacks two weeks ago, suffered a fire on its 20th floor early this morning.

According to an Associated Press report, officials have not yet said what caused the fire (possibly a short circuit), but it was under control quickly and there were no casualties reported.

When we headed over to the hotel's own website to see if they'd updated their news page with details about the blaze (they hadn't), we learned a bit more about the efforts that have been underway since officials announced that they'd be working to get the iconic hotel restored as quickly as possible:

In addition to the recovery of guest possessions and luggage from those parts of the hotel where safety conditions allow, specialist teams have already begun clearance of damaged fittings, rubble and furniture.

Everyone involved in the work is motivated by a single-minded determination that the hotel will shine again in tribute to the people who fell during the terrorist attacks on the city of Mumbai. But the rebirth of the hotel does not simply involve bricks and mortar. Ministers and clerics of seven religions will also be contributing services and ceremonies of blessing and benediction.

Hopefully, this fire won't cause any major setbacks in their efforts to rebuild and recover.

[Photo: EPA/STR via Guardian]

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Mumbai's Trident Hotel to Re-Open December 21

Where: Nariman Point, Mumbai, India, 400 021

Bloomberg News is reporting that the Trident Hotel Nariman Point in Mumbai which was attacked in last week's horrific terrorist attacks on the city, vows to re-open on Dec. 21.

Additional security will be put in place at the hotel, Oberoi Group, which manages the property, said in a statement e-mailed from New Delhi.

While the damage wasn't as bad as the sister Oberoi Hotel, the Trident Hotels website also says a "round-the-clock" effort is going on to get the place to re-open. The hotel evacuated over 300 hundred guests during the attacks.

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Mumbai Hotels Determined to Rebuild and Re-open

After last week's devastating terrorist attacks on the Taj Palace Hotel and the Trident-Oberoi in Mumbai, the affected hotels have vowed to rebuild and re-open as quickly as possible.

According to a report from Reuters, the Trident Hotel is set to re-open in 10 or 15 days looking just as good as it did before the attacks:

Trident, the tower block of EIH Ltd's the Trident-Oberoi Hotel, is being cleaned and its broken windows and doors replaced, said Ketaki Narain, director of corporate communications for the Oberoi Group.

Employees have returned to work, and new security measures are being put in place, she said, without giving details.

The lobby of the Trident is already "sparkling clean," and the employees are ready to go. Unfortunately, the older Oberoi wing of the hotel suffered much more damage, so it may take quite a bit longer to reopen — it should still be a few months now.

The Taj Mahal Palace nearby (pictured), which was nearly destroyed in the attacks, has been constantly updating a webpage devoted to news about condition of the hotel here, and the front page of the hotel's website displays a single bold red statement: "We are working to restore the symbol of Mumbai’s enduring spirit and dignity."

[Photo: Julian Herbert / Getty Images via Denver Post]