WelcomHeritage Bob's Place

Bob's Place had been on our shortlist for the past couple of years and fortunately this April we managed to take a break to visit this WelcomHeritage property located in Nathuakhan - 40 odd kilometers from Nainital and just 14 kilometers before Mukteshwar. I had a chat with Bob Anand (the owner of the property) and went for the rooms that he recommended. The drive from Delhi is long. In your own car, it would take 8 to 9 hours. We were a group of 10 and hired a tempo traveller. Since we were not going to make it in time for lunch, we called them and requested for a late lunch. We reached after a ride of about 11 hours at 6 in the evening (the road is quite bad in patches for several kilometers after Moradabad). Piping hot tawa chapatis along with bhindi, dal, rice and raita were waiting for us... our first meal at Bob's Place set the stage for a food and service experience that became the highlight of our trip - simple, homely, delicious food served at odd hours with genuine, unpretentious care - that made us look forward to every meal. They serve an english breakfast with corn flakes, porridge, juices, toast with jelly and eggs done to order but you can get paranthas or poori aloo made on prior request. Lunch is a vegetarian affair and dinner includes one non-vegetarian dish. All meals are served in the cozy dining room near the entrance. The property is actually bigger than what the pictures on the website make it look like. The 7 double rooms and one suite are built on different levels seperated by flights of stairs and featuring private, comfortable sitouts facing magnificent views of the Himalayas. The rooms are spacious and the beds are comfortable. There's a tea and coffee maker and a collection of travel magazines in each room. You will need to carry your own toiletries though. There's no TV in rooms but there's a common TV lounge. There's another (bigger) lounge near the kitchen. This is equipped with a hand-picked collection of books that one can read while sinking into the comfortable sofas. On the recommendation of the staff, we had a bonfire on the deck attached to the lounge - which turned out to be an amazing experience with the unhindered view of the sun setting in the background. We paid for the snacks but they did not charge anything for the bonfire. They also have a table tennis table (slightly run down, but good for a game or two of ping pong!) and a dart board which was a hit with the kids. Overall, our stay at Bob's Place was akin to visiting the home of a (very) generous friend. Wish we had stayed longer!