Mahodadhi Palace

Getting to the beach area is easy on a wide, accessible road, with no traffic or congestion. You can also drive to New Temple Parking without trouble. It’s clearly a hotel in a prime location.

The food was good, though a little pricey, and the Food and breweries manager helped us choose well and handled our requests. What really stood out was the staff. Everyone was pleasant, professional, and ready to help. They even put extra effort into decorating the room when I asked. We had an amazing stay, it was worth booking, and I’ll definitely return. Special thanks to the manager.

The place I remembered from earlier visits had a grand entrance, intricate architecture, and real regal charm. We’d stayed at Mahodadi Palace in December 2018 after booking through Makemytrip, but in later trips to Puri we couldn’t find it listed on any booking site. For our anniversary in April 2024, we stayed at Sonar Bangla and had to rent a scooter to ask Mahodadi Palace about rooms. They said that after some incident they’d stopped taking online bookings and only accepted calls or references. During rathyatra, for jaganath darshan, we did manage to get a room for two nights, at around 3500/- INR per night. We arrived in the morning, waited to check in, and were soon disappointed. The room was nothing like the luxurious place we remembered: stained, peeling walls, old broken furniture, and dust everywhere. We called staff to clean, and even after their best efforts the room still felt unkempt. Basic food service wasn’t available either, and the whole hotel seemed neglected. The bathroom was in shambles, with a cracked bathtub and moldy tiles. Dust covered the bedside stand too, as if nobody had stayed there for a long time. The air conditioning was faulty, leaking water into the room and making it damp and musty, almost ruining our belongings. My partner and I couldn’t believe how bad it had become. It pains me to say our stay was a nightmare. Compared with those glorious earlier visits, when every corner felt beautiful and elegant, this once splendid palace now seemed forgotten and left to decay.

The food was really good, and the service was excellent, with staff doing their best for guests. It was a decent experience overall. Finding the hotel was tricky because its sign on the main road is too small. The pool wasn’t great, and there are no changing or wash rooms by it. The bar could use more space and a wider alcohol selection.