Ooty Visit
Visited Ooty recently. Started off from Bangalore on Friday morning at 9:30am. Midway, took a tea break in Shivalli restaurant near Channapatna (about 60 Kms away from Bangalore).
Route: Bangalore -> Mysore -> Nanjanagudu -> Gundlupet -> Bandipur National Park -> Theppakadu -> Masinagudi -> 36-hairpin bends -> Ooty
Note: We need not go to Gudalur to reach Ooty. But, Road transport buses takes Gudalur route.
Road Conditions:
After crossing Mysore, road between Mysore and Nanjanagudu was not the best of state roads. Also, after Nanjanagudu, road to Gundlupet was undergoing repair at regular intervals. Apart from these patches, road was very good to reach Bandipur.
Inside Bandipur, road was good, but, speed limit was about 30Kmph. We reduced speed and did wildlife watching. After crossing Bandipur, we reached Masinagudi (Tamil Nadu). From here, it took is about an hour to hit the base of Nilgiris. From here starts 36 hairpin bends to Ooty. Our resort, Mystique Ville was at 15th hairpin bend.
We reached our resort at 4pm. It was total travel time of 6 hours. After a quick late lunch, we headed to Botanical Garden. On the way to the garden, we had a quick stop in Chocolate Museum (a small shop). We sneaked in to garden few minutes before gate closes (gate closes at 6:30pm). It was chilly here as the sun had already set. The garden is worth a visit though we could not complete checking out all sections of the garden.
Saturday (Aug 8th):
Train journey experience from Ooty to Coonoor is a memorable one. We had arrived in station an hour an half early for 12:15pm train. We purchased the tickets and waited in the line. It was a refreshing moment to see the train arrive after a long wait. Journey was very scenic with view of the valley and dense tree canopies. With few tunnels passing along the way, it was worth a shout while cross tunnels.
Note: Plan in advance for doing this heritage train journey. Check train schedule and plan accordingly.
After reaching Coonoor, we had lunch in a restaurant that was next to Coonoor station. We had couple of hours to spend before taking the return train to Ooty. We visited tea estate and Sim's Park by hiring an auto. Once we entered the tea estate, it was a refreshing experience to take a deep breath of tea aroma. We took a tour inside the tea factory and got to know about how tea powder is made.
Sim's Park (Garden) had to be cut short because of shortage of time. Our return journey from Coonoor started at 4:30pm in a jam-packed train with no space to stand too. Fortunately, we had got early to grab our seats.
We had no plan for evening after reaching Ooty. We opted to have a leisure dinner at Club Mahindra that was 5 minutes away from railway station. We reached the restaurant an hour ahead of dinner time. We were hosted by friendly Club Mahindra team that made us comfortable to spend some time with a snack. We got to spend next 2 hours by have a very slow candlelight dinner.
Sunday (Aug 9th):
Return journey to Bangalore: Started from Ooty at 10am. Our first stop was after 4hrs of travel at Shivalli for lunch. From Shivalli, it took us another 90 minutes to reach home. Return journey took us 5.5 hrs.
Pictures: here.
Route: Bangalore -> Mysore -> Nanjanagudu -> Gundlupet -> Bandipur National Park -> Theppakadu -> Masinagudi -> 36-hairpin bends -> Ooty
Note: We need not go to Gudalur to reach Ooty. But, Road transport buses takes Gudalur route.
Road Conditions:
After crossing Mysore, road between Mysore and Nanjanagudu was not the best of state roads. Also, after Nanjanagudu, road to Gundlupet was undergoing repair at regular intervals. Apart from these patches, road was very good to reach Bandipur.
Inside Bandipur, road was good, but, speed limit was about 30Kmph. We reduced speed and did wildlife watching. After crossing Bandipur, we reached Masinagudi (Tamil Nadu). From here, it took is about an hour to hit the base of Nilgiris. From here starts 36 hairpin bends to Ooty. Our resort, Mystique Ville was at 15th hairpin bend.
We reached our resort at 4pm. It was total travel time of 6 hours. After a quick late lunch, we headed to Botanical Garden. On the way to the garden, we had a quick stop in Chocolate Museum (a small shop). We sneaked in to garden few minutes before gate closes (gate closes at 6:30pm). It was chilly here as the sun had already set. The garden is worth a visit though we could not complete checking out all sections of the garden.
Saturday (Aug 8th):
Train journey experience from Ooty to Coonoor is a memorable one. We had arrived in station an hour an half early for 12:15pm train. We purchased the tickets and waited in the line. It was a refreshing moment to see the train arrive after a long wait. Journey was very scenic with view of the valley and dense tree canopies. With few tunnels passing along the way, it was worth a shout while cross tunnels.
Note: Plan in advance for doing this heritage train journey. Check train schedule and plan accordingly.
After reaching Coonoor, we had lunch in a restaurant that was next to Coonoor station. We had couple of hours to spend before taking the return train to Ooty. We visited tea estate and Sim's Park by hiring an auto. Once we entered the tea estate, it was a refreshing experience to take a deep breath of tea aroma. We took a tour inside the tea factory and got to know about how tea powder is made.
Sim's Park (Garden) had to be cut short because of shortage of time. Our return journey from Coonoor started at 4:30pm in a jam-packed train with no space to stand too. Fortunately, we had got early to grab our seats.
We had no plan for evening after reaching Ooty. We opted to have a leisure dinner at Club Mahindra that was 5 minutes away from railway station. We reached the restaurant an hour ahead of dinner time. We were hosted by friendly Club Mahindra team that made us comfortable to spend some time with a snack. We got to spend next 2 hours by have a very slow candlelight dinner.
Sunday (Aug 9th):
Return journey to Bangalore: Started from Ooty at 10am. Our first stop was after 4hrs of travel at Shivalli for lunch. From Shivalli, it took us another 90 minutes to reach home. Return journey took us 5.5 hrs.
Pictures: here.
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