After a long long time, I (Pradeep Kumar) am sharing another post, this time a sweet visit to ooty, Tamil Nadu. Ooty was a great place to spend the time during the summer as the temperature will be around 20C. We have a gone a little late during the mid of June.
Though the season is over, but still it’s a good choice to visit till the end of June every year. We had our plan to go by car initially, later we decided to go in bus because of climatic conditions. We booked a sleeper A/C for three of us (Me, my wife and my son) from Chennai to Ooty directly.
We have booked in Hotel Darshan through online for a two night stay (comes with a local free trip also). During off season the rates is so cheaper in the hotels. Ooty welcomes us with a mild drizzle. Since our hotel is just opposite to the Ooty Lake(see the pic below), we spent our timing in the Lake in the day 1. We just walked to the lake and enjoyed a 2 seater pedal boat.
There are so many places to see in and around ooty. Some of them we visited are
- Ooty Lake (There is a separate honeymoon lake and a boat house)
- Ooty Botanical Garden
- Rose Garden
- Ooty Golf Club
- Dolphin’s Nose
- Catherine Vally view
- Pykara Dam and Power House
- Kamaraja sagar Dam
- Pykara Water Falls
- Pykara Lake
- Tea estates
- Welington (MRC)
- Doddapetta
- Payemundh or Devils down or 9th Mile
- Pine Forests
Above Picture is taken while we are in the boat in Ooty Lake. The ooty lake water is not for drinking and its purely a drainage water and the only use for this is tourism. You can hire a 2 seater, 4 seater pedal boats or 8 seater, 10 seater motor boats. Cost range from 100 to 600 INR. Time limit is exactly 30 minutes.
Apart from boating, the lake has some games for kids, floral gardens (see pic below), horse ride. You can see sparrows.(really wonder while we were in chennai we cant even see a single sparrow)
Above: Separate boat house (free Entry)
Above: Near the boat house a long pathway. Very scenic and beautiful view of the lake
Above: A floral garden near the boat house
Above and below: Catherine valley view. This is just the road side view in which you can see the ooty, villages surrouding ooty and famour church in which the saajan film climax was shot and lot other places one can see from this view.
Below: Tea estates on the way to Dolphin’s nose (a valley view and you can see a waterfalls through telescope from this place). Really awesome to see the water falls, you cannot see the water through naked eyes.
Above and below: doddapetta. this is the highest point in tamilnadu and second highest in south Indian (First being Anaimudi in Kerala near Munnar). From this place, you can see the Conoor, ooty and other places from this highest point. Here also a telescopic view is there, but it was under repair during our visit.
Above: ooty Botanical Garden, Its in the city and people usually spend their times by visiting this place. Plants, herbs, flowers, etc..
Above: Ooty Golf Club. A place where one can remember the film “Moondram Pirai”. Some of the scenes are shot at this location. There is a horse ride to show the entire golf course for INR 250 onwards.
Above: Pine Forests. Pine trees are helpful for medicinal benefits and even it is used for our currency. So some part of the pine forest is closed down and there is an alternative location of pine forests. This is the place shown above. This place in the evening seems to be scary..
Above: Payemundh or 9th mile or devils down. Almost all the three names tells the same location. This place is the most lovable place for Tamil film producers, directors because most of the films songs are shot here. Devils down is the name given by the British and Mundh is the name given by the Tribes living in these area. So this area is Payemundh..
Above and Below: Pykara Lake: This lake contains water for drinking. Some parts of ooty this water is supplied.
Below: On the way to Pykara Water Falls.
Above and Below: Pykara Water falls (You need to have a walk for 500 meters from the roadside to come to this place).
Above and Below: Ooty Rose Garden. The wording written in the Rose Garden “You are visiting the best Rose Gardens in the world”. As the wording say, this rose garden contains 28000 breeds of roses and even it has black roses. By the time we visited, the black roses was not there.
So, there are some places we have missed like Mettupalayam to Ooty Train journey, A new murugan temple is there in the elk hill and similar like malayasia murugan status, here also there is a statue and also we missed mudumalai forests.
If you are planning for a trip to ooty, here are the guidelines and fares
From Chennai to Ooty (bus) – 650 to 800 INR per person
For local trips: There are 3 local trips
- Ooty local – Rs. 150 per head for van or Rs. 1000 for Separate Car
- Mudumalai and pykara – Rs. 200 per head for van Rs. 1600 for Separate Car
- Filmy chakkar - Rs. 150 per head for van Rs. 1000 for Separate Car
For Hotel Stay – Delux – 1200NR to 2000 INR per day.
Happy visit!!!!
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