Stayed at the pondicherry ashok for a couple of days had an awesome experience .. the food quality and the time we spent in beach without any trouble was the best moments of ma life.. hats off to ITDC ASHOK

Stayed here with friends for a weekend. The location of this place is just amazing. Only 100 m from the sea. All the rooms are sea facing and you can see the sea sitting in your private balcony.The rooms and the resort are poorly managed inspite of the fact that they have an awesome location. I think this resort is still managed by the Government and it surely reflects that. The room service is pathetic. We ordered food and we had to call at least 5 times to remind them. Finally they turned up after 1 hour.The room decor is very basic and reminds of old time bunglows though there are signs that some renovation was tried recenly. The verandahs and the passageways are full of chairs, tables and table clothes lying around. They did not even try to conceal these from the visitors. The food was very varying in quality. One day we had very nice dinner but the quality came down very next day and we heard many people complaining to the manager.Only thing we enjoyed was the sunrise each of the mornings we were there and the beach. One more issue of concern is though the beach is said to be privately owned by the resort .you will find many villagers from nearby village doing all sort of activities there like drying fish and or readying their nets. When we were there the beach was clean and there was not much of issue except villagers readying their nets. But I heard from the staff that the villagers use the beach for drying fish and they cannot stop them from doing that. The resort also had few sport facitlies where you can spend some time playing games in the garden facing the sea or the beach like Volleyball, cricket ,frisby etc.
All in all a very average experience but at a higher cost. Would recommend this place only when all other alternatives are not available.

Stayed there with family for 2 days... location and ocean view is fantastic. However, couldn't go to the beach which was 50mts away from our room due to smell and the beach was covered with fishes meant for drying (i guess!). Rooms are ordinary which are not maintained properly. I understand that this resort is managed by Govt. If so, I am not sure, why should Govt. be in this business. Private players would have converted this place in to a great place to stay.

I had booked the Ashok resort seeing its location on the map - so close to the beach hoping to have some quiet /enjoying time on the beach - Booked the hotel for 3 days Oct 6 - 8 ,2011.... Maid payment too online - almost 16,500 + for 3 days --- WHAT A BLUNDER!

When I just arrive in the lobby - the strong smell of Fish hits me very hard - i ask the receptionist if they were having an open barbeque of fish -"NO" is the answer...

I did the mistake of checking in without getting into the room - ONE MORE BLUNDER ---the room also smells of fish - mind you - I am very travelled internationally and am not sensitive about non-veg smells - but this is like standing in a bazaar where they are selling fish + drying them.

I stayed there for 30 mins in the room - I step out into the balcony from where i can see the beach - but again the omnipotent/omnipresent STRONG Fish smell - my daughter and I very feeling very nauseating and my daughter almost vomited...

I immediately went out of the hotel - found an alternative hotel - Ocean spray - no sea view - but definitely better in terms of amenities and no fish smell --- i checked out of Ashok within an hour of checking in and moved to ocean spray.

Ashok was not willing to reimburse the amount I had paid online - after lot of arguments - they reimbursed me around 10,500 - I had to pay the penalty of Rs 6500 for staying the hotel for an hour... I am usually careful with money - but there is no way i could have stayed 3 days in that hotel... so to enjoy my rest of the vacation - I bore the loss.

Mind you - I am not complaining about the very average amenities in the hotel or room - I could have put up with it even after paying the premium price – but expecting to have a resort with fish smell is not at all acceptable.

We checked into Ocean spray and found that there very many people who had initially checked into Ashok and later moved into Ocean spray…
The Hotel Ashok Management claims that the local fishermen dry their fish on the beach (so called private beach of Ashok) and they have no control over what is happening – There is not even an attempt to reduce the smell by putting some air fresheners……It is like Take it as it comes …

So Book this hotel at your own risk and only if you are an absolute fish lover (including dried fish smell)…..