"Walking on Clouds - Kodaikanal" - Aug 2011
We started our travel season with a super getaway to "Cloud City" - Kodaikanal, for my birthday. Kodai as it is popularly called is a quiet hill station on the Palani hills. Situated at an altitude of 2133m, this princess of hill stations is the only hill station to be set up during the British Raj in 1845 by the American missionaries and built by British engineers. The pristine air and the beauty of flora and fauna prompt many tourists to visit Kodai, irrespective of the month or season. Having got our booking in place at Zest@Coaker's Villa, we were set, after a long weekend to tackle the 480kms drive from Bangalore.
Day 1 - 16/08/2011 Woke up at 4.30am to rain which had pounded all night and was still going hammer and tongs but nothing could dampen our mood. Ranga made breakfast and I made lunch, chatting and sipping hot coffee, and we packed up both along with a full flask of hot coffee and after cleaning out the fish tank filters and giving them the holiday food, we went down to a rain soaked morning where the sun was valiantly fighting a losing battle with the clouds. Set off at 6am, though it looked more like 5am. Thankfully, a few minutes later, the rain let up and the day was bright yet cool and perfect for a long drive. We took the Golden quadrilateral and whizzed past Hosur - Krishnagiri but got stuck in peak office traffic near Salem as this big city spills on to the highway. After negotiating our way out, we felt it was time to stop for breakfast, and we stopped near a grassy knoll and had the poha and hot coffee. Hardly having stopped for 15minutes, we took off again. We passed Nammakal, Karur, all at a steady 110kms/hr and then as we neared Dindigul, we took the road on the left next to the highway, then followed the markings and road
towards Madurai/Trichy. After this we gave a miss to the first underpass which goes to Palani and took the second underpass to the right, which goes to Battalagundu/Theni/Kodaikanal. The signage is clear and from this point Kodai is 92kms away. This is NH45 and we then go on to SH156, but roads throughout are excellent. The roads are smaller though and traffic is more so the speed comes down to about 60-80kms/hr. I did not mind the Rs.296/- toll paid till then at various points, the roads are worth every penny. After driving a few kilometres from Battalagundu, we spot a turning to the right towards Kodaikanal and turn there with 58kms to go. About 10kms from there, we stopped just before the ghats began to finish lunch which was a simple curd rice and pickles followed by some good hot coffee. Then we set off again, only to find that the ghats start almost immediately. The ghat road all 48kms of it, unlike Ooty, is not steep, but curvy, like a long serpentine track, weaving right and left and with every turn opening up 
new Vistas of natural beauty. A few kilometers up and you can spot a few shanties, which is the photo op for clicking the silvery 'Rat Tail Falls' - the pic is self explanatory as to why they are thus named. We spent a few minutes there and then moved on at a leisur
ely pace, and thanks to it being after the long holiday weekend, we had the road to ourselves other than an occassional vehicle. The air got cooler and crispier as we went up and entered Kodai at 
2pm after paying an entry fee of Rs.40/-. Immediately on proceeding, we braked to a halt, we had spotted the 'Silver Cascade Falls'. It is beautiful and the only aberration was a few shops with radios blaring Tamil songs at full volume, but nothing can take away from the natural beauty. Click-Click went the camera again and after buying some fruit, we moved on.
On entering Kodaikanal, we asked for Coaker's walk, then took a left to reach a restaurant called Astoria (am sure it is not just missing a Waldorf! - nonetheless, it offered us great food for the next couple of days), then past the bus stand and turn down a steep incline at Bryant's Park next to the CSI Church, went past
the Kodai Resort and Hotel and the Ramco house to reach Zest. No signage for the resort till the end so don;t bother trying to find one. A small bumpity bump ride over a cobbled driveway, brought us to the reception. In true Club Mahindra tradition, we were welcomed with a drink and were checked in, in a blink of an eye by Mr.Khan and as 
requested I got my room without any steps for approach. Sumanth, the bus boy cum waiter who let us in turned out to be a boy wonder who was literally a Jack of all trades, as we realised in the next few days. We changed and hit the comfotable bed having admired the spacious room with an attic for kids, a lovely ante room for storage, a dining table and a sofa in the living space and a bathroom with the latest of fittings. Sigh, it was just perfectly cosy.
Woke up around 5.30pm, made some hot tea in the room and ate some lovely fruits, then went out to see the view. The rooms faced a steep cliff that dropped down into a valley that was
shrouded in clouds. Mountain peaks rose around us on either side, framing the world as the sun set. The fog filtered the pinks and purples of sunset into a gentle hue, appropriate for evening. Pictures do not do this sight justice, words fall flat when trying to describe the crisp grass drenched in dew, or the smell of the evening air as it rose to greet a dusky nightfall. Places like this feel almost too beautiful for words, but I'll take the time to ramble on none the less to try to let you in on the secret. 
When we walked back to our room, past the 40 year old pine tree towering over our car, we had a smile plastered on our lips which did not leave us for the next few days. We watched the classic move "Where Eagles Dare" on the home theatre system in the room, with the cosy woody
ambience of the room and it somehow made the characters more alive. A dinner of fruits and milk was perfect. We were doing full justice to nature's bounty - the fruits available are rich and abundant. When we slept, the rains which had stopped in the afternoon before we got in, started off and the rhythmic pounding of the rain on the roof lulled us into a deep sleep on the comfortable bed.
Day 2 - 17/08/2011 Woke up to a cold and misty and incredibly beautiful morning at 7am. Made some coffee and had it while marvelling at the clouds under our feet as we walked out. I couldn't help myself and sms-ed a few friends about the beautiful surroundings. We took a stroll and then feeling hungry drove down to Astoria Veg around 8am for some hot idlis, sambar and also finalised a deal with a taxi for a half day sight seeing trip for Rs.1100/- in an Innova. We returned to the room, and got
ready by 9.30am to start our sight seeing. We first stopped at Bryant's Park which is the quintessential hill station garden for couples to moon in!, then we moved on to Coaker's walk, a lovely cobbled track around some exotic plants which ends at a telescope house which purportedly gives you the sweeping views of the valley, but thanks to Mama Nature giving us a mist cover, it was a no-show. We moved on to a point from 
where we could see the lake from a long distance, then we ambled on to the Pine Forest and according to me the piece de resistance, acres and cares of mighty pine trees silent and stoic sheltering and nurturing a large population of primates, reptiles and fauna, this is a mini biosphere of its own. The silence is a balm on urban nerves broken only by the chirping birds and the wasps busy buzzing. It was ethereal 
and eerily perfect. I spoke too soon, a bus load of youngsters arrived with music blaring and catcalling, they shattered the magic aura. We shook our heads at human folly and moved on to the memorial point where a road used to connect Munnar and Kodaikanal, made during the 1920s, and currently closed due to a dispute between Tamil Nadu and Kerala. We bought and chomped on 
some great red carrots, and then moved on to a 500 year old tree and from there on to Pillar Rocks, which again was a no-show thanks to abundant cloud cover, disappointed yet we decided to wait for about half an hour but to no avail. We then drove through some pristine green to reach the Kodai lake, which has a paved walkway all around it for a quiet stroll. After spending a half hour admiring this man made wonder when in the late 1800s, British engineers dammed 
mountain springs and created a fresh water Kodai lake which stretches over 5 acres and even today brings pleasure to tourists who like to gp for a boating out. After buying some wood apples, guavas, pears and lichees, we returned to the resort, post a brief stop at Pambar Falls, the place made famous as the 
spot where the 'Liril Soap Ad" was shot. Lunch was a hot soup and a biryani cooked ny Chef Vinod and smilingly served by Sumanth, and we had this in the dining hall overlooking the valley which looked like a bowl filled with white cotton candy and very scrumptious looking. We retired for a small siesta. Woke up in the evening to pouring rain, so stayed in and watched some TV, chatted and basically just lazed. A quiet dinner in the room and retired early to bed to another night of sound sleep.
Day 3 - 18/08/2011
Kodaikanal is a cloud city that sits high in
the mountains. Now, when I say that Kodai is a cloud city I mean that in every sense of the word, the city is literally filled with clouds. Mist rolls through the streets, clinging to the trees, and coating the hill sides. The air is crisp and clean and it really does smell vaguely like jasmine flowers. The days are cool and the nights are cold and crisp. This morning, we decided it looked a clear and bright day to venture to see Pillar Rocks once again. So after a leisurely breakfast and packing up a book, we started off. We found the signage excellent and had a realisation that we could have done without a taxi, roads are good, well paved, well lit, clean and sparsely poulated around the sights thanks to stringent laws, so a pleasure to drive unlike the overly crowded Ooty and other hill stations, we found Kodai relatively less commercialized and still retaining its virgin beauty in a lot of places.
We reached Pillar Rocks and lo behold we saw the 500feet of craggy rock face from the Charconite period dating back thosands of years in all its resplendent glory. If the Pine Forest is fabulous, this leaves you speechless. Its rugged beauty shelters in its crevices exotic birds like the Bald Eagle, Honey Buzzard and several other endangered species. Its Nature's Reserve and its stark beauty against rolling clouds is awe-inspiring. We admired it and were also pleasantly surprised at how seriously everyone takes eco preservation. A few men cutting some bushes carefully picked up a snake 
which crawled out and set it free at the other end and didn't kill it as they do in cities. Wonderful! Also Kodai is strictly a plastic-free zone and they are very serious about it. We also clicked monkeys perched on tree tops swaying against the clouds - it was absolutely delightful. After a hot cup of coffee, we moved on to the Pine Forest and settled in 
the car reading a book, to the background of 'foresty' sounds. We returned in time for lunch and after a simple meal, slept soundly and woke up to find a rain washed fresh evening. We walked over to the end of the property overlooking the vallry and settled down to soak in the nature's beauty and sat in companionable silence enjoying the play of clouds which did a 'now you see it, now you don't' with the Palani hill ranges. Watched the evening sun set in a meek watery world, washed and cleaned our car and worked up an appetite. The news during dinner which we had switched on after 2days brought into this haven the issues of corruption and human greed, leaving us feeling a bit down. A quiet dinner and we ended the day with the early to bed routine.
Day 4 - 19/08/2011 We had requested and the resort obliged us with an early breakfast and we checked out at 9am for our drive back. Having packed lunch and coffee, we took a coffee break at around 12noon and had our lunch after Salem around 1.30pm and touched Bangalore at 3pm and crawled through the chaos of uban morass to only reach home by 4.45pm. The last 2 hours tired us out more than the entire journey to Bangalore. Well, that is the reality we live in but than heavens we have the means and the opportunity to take these small breaks. I thoroughly enjoyed our laid back holiday and Ranga and I fell in love with Kodai and the Zest Resort and an encore is a foregone conclusion.
Route Taken - Bangalore - Hosur - Krishnagiri - Salem - Namakkal - Karur - Dindigul - Battalagundu - Kodaikanal.
Distance Covered - 972kms in all.
Petrol Economy - 17kms/litre.
Day 1 - 16/08/2011 Woke up at 4.30am to rain which had pounded all night and was still going hammer and tongs but nothing could dampen our mood. Ranga made breakfast and I made lunch, chatting and sipping hot coffee, and we packed up both along with a full flask of hot coffee and after cleaning out the fish tank filters and giving them the holiday food, we went down to a rain soaked morning where the sun was valiantly fighting a losing battle with the clouds. Set off at 6am, though it looked more like 5am. Thankfully, a few minutes later, the rain let up and the day was bright yet cool and perfect for a long drive. We took the Golden quadrilateral and whizzed past Hosur - Krishnagiri but got stuck in peak office traffic near Salem as this big city spills on to the highway. After negotiating our way out, we felt it was time to stop for breakfast, and we stopped near a grassy knoll and had the poha and hot coffee. Hardly having stopped for 15minutes, we took off again. We passed Nammakal, Karur, all at a steady 110kms/hr and then as we neared Dindigul, we took the road on the left next to the highway, then followed the markings and road
towards Madurai/Trichy. After this we gave a miss to the first underpass which goes to Palani and took the second underpass to the right, which goes to Battalagundu/Theni/Kodaikanal. The signage is clear and from this point Kodai is 92kms away. This is NH45 and we then go on to SH156, but roads throughout are excellent. The roads are smaller though and traffic is more so the speed comes down to about 60-80kms/hr. I did not mind the Rs.296/- toll paid till then at various points, the roads are worth every penny. After driving a few kilometres from Battalagundu, we spot a turning to the right towards Kodaikanal and turn there with 58kms to go. About 10kms from there, we stopped just before the ghats began to finish lunch which was a simple curd rice and pickles followed by some good hot coffee. Then we set off again, only to find that the ghats start almost immediately. The ghat road all 48kms of it, unlike Ooty, is not steep, but curvy, like a long serpentine track, weaving right and left and with every turn opening up 
new Vistas of natural beauty. A few kilometers up and you can spot a few shanties, which is the photo op for clicking the silvery 'Rat Tail Falls' - the pic is self explanatory as to why they are thus named. We spent a few minutes there and then moved on at a leisur
ely pace, and thanks to it being after the long holiday weekend, we had the road to ourselves other than an occassional vehicle. The air got cooler and crispier as we went up and entered Kodai at 
2pm after paying an entry fee of Rs.40/-. Immediately on proceeding, we braked to a halt, we had spotted the 'Silver Cascade Falls'. It is beautiful and the only aberration was a few shops with radios blaring Tamil songs at full volume, but nothing can take away from the natural beauty. Click-Click went the camera again and after buying some fruit, we moved on.
On entering Kodaikanal, we asked for Coaker's walk, then took a left to reach a restaurant called Astoria (am sure it is not just missing a Waldorf! - nonetheless, it offered us great food for the next couple of days), then past the bus stand and turn down a steep incline at Bryant's Park next to the CSI Church, went past
the Kodai Resort and Hotel and the Ramco house to reach Zest. No signage for the resort till the end so don;t bother trying to find one. A small bumpity bump ride over a cobbled driveway, brought us to the reception. In true Club Mahindra tradition, we were welcomed with a drink and were checked in, in a blink of an eye by Mr.Khan and as 
requested I got my room without any steps for approach. Sumanth, the bus boy cum waiter who let us in turned out to be a boy wonder who was literally a Jack of all trades, as we realised in the next few days. We changed and hit the comfotable bed having admired the spacious room with an attic for kids, a lovely ante room for storage, a dining table and a sofa in the living space and a bathroom with the latest of fittings. Sigh, it was just perfectly cosy.
Woke up around 5.30pm, made some hot tea in the room and ate some lovely fruits, then went out to see the view. The rooms faced a steep cliff that dropped down into a valley that was
shrouded in clouds. Mountain peaks rose around us on either side, framing the world as the sun set. The fog filtered the pinks and purples of sunset into a gentle hue, appropriate for evening. Pictures do not do this sight justice, words fall flat when trying to describe the crisp grass drenched in dew, or the smell of the evening air as it rose to greet a dusky nightfall. Places like this feel almost too beautiful for words, but I'll take the time to ramble on none the less to try to let you in on the secret. 
When we walked back to our room, past the 40 year old pine tree towering over our car, we had a smile plastered on our lips which did not leave us for the next few days. We watched the classic move "Where Eagles Dare" on the home theatre system in the room, with the cosy woody
ambience of the room and it somehow made the characters more alive. A dinner of fruits and milk was perfect. We were doing full justice to nature's bounty - the fruits available are rich and abundant. When we slept, the rains which had stopped in the afternoon before we got in, started off and the rhythmic pounding of the rain on the roof lulled us into a deep sleep on the comfortable bed.
Day 2 - 17/08/2011 Woke up to a cold and misty and incredibly beautiful morning at 7am. Made some coffee and had it while marvelling at the clouds under our feet as we walked out. I couldn't help myself and sms-ed a few friends about the beautiful surroundings. We took a stroll and then feeling hungry drove down to Astoria Veg around 8am for some hot idlis, sambar and also finalised a deal with a taxi for a half day sight seeing trip for Rs.1100/- in an Innova. We returned to the room, and got
ready by 9.30am to start our sight seeing. We first stopped at Bryant's Park which is the quintessential hill station garden for couples to moon in!, then we moved on to Coaker's walk, a lovely cobbled track around some exotic plants which ends at a telescope house which purportedly gives you the sweeping views of the valley, but thanks to Mama Nature giving us a mist cover, it was a no-show. We moved on to a point from 
where we could see the lake from a long distance, then we ambled on to the Pine Forest and according to me the piece de resistance, acres and cares of mighty pine trees silent and stoic sheltering and nurturing a large population of primates, reptiles and fauna, this is a mini biosphere of its own. The silence is a balm on urban nerves broken only by the chirping birds and the wasps busy buzzing. It was ethereal 
and eerily perfect. I spoke too soon, a bus load of youngsters arrived with music blaring and catcalling, they shattered the magic aura. We shook our heads at human folly and moved on to the memorial point where a road used to connect Munnar and Kodaikanal, made during the 1920s, and currently closed due to a dispute between Tamil Nadu and Kerala. We bought and chomped on 
some great red carrots, and then moved on to a 500 year old tree and from there on to Pillar Rocks, which again was a no-show thanks to abundant cloud cover, disappointed yet we decided to wait for about half an hour but to no avail. We then drove through some pristine green to reach the Kodai lake, which has a paved walkway all around it for a quiet stroll. After spending a half hour admiring this man made wonder when in the late 1800s, British engineers dammed 
mountain springs and created a fresh water Kodai lake which stretches over 5 acres and even today brings pleasure to tourists who like to gp for a boating out. After buying some wood apples, guavas, pears and lichees, we returned to the resort, post a brief stop at Pambar Falls, the place made famous as the 
spot where the 'Liril Soap Ad" was shot. Lunch was a hot soup and a biryani cooked ny Chef Vinod and smilingly served by Sumanth, and we had this in the dining hall overlooking the valley which looked like a bowl filled with white cotton candy and very scrumptious looking. We retired for a small siesta. Woke up in the evening to pouring rain, so stayed in and watched some TV, chatted and basically just lazed. A quiet dinner in the room and retired early to bed to another night of sound sleep.
Day 3 - 18/08/2011
Kodaikanal is a cloud city that sits high in
the mountains. Now, when I say that Kodai is a cloud city I mean that in every sense of the word, the city is literally filled with clouds. Mist rolls through the streets, clinging to the trees, and coating the hill sides. The air is crisp and clean and it really does smell vaguely like jasmine flowers. The days are cool and the nights are cold and crisp. This morning, we decided it looked a clear and bright day to venture to see Pillar Rocks once again. So after a leisurely breakfast and packing up a book, we started off. We found the signage excellent and had a realisation that we could have done without a taxi, roads are good, well paved, well lit, clean and sparsely poulated around the sights thanks to stringent laws, so a pleasure to drive unlike the overly crowded Ooty and other hill stations, we found Kodai relatively less commercialized and still retaining its virgin beauty in a lot of places.
We reached Pillar Rocks and lo behold we saw the 500feet of craggy rock face from the Charconite period dating back thosands of years in all its resplendent glory. If the Pine Forest is fabulous, this leaves you speechless. Its rugged beauty shelters in its crevices exotic birds like the Bald Eagle, Honey Buzzard and several other endangered species. Its Nature's Reserve and its stark beauty against rolling clouds is awe-inspiring. We admired it and were also pleasantly surprised at how seriously everyone takes eco preservation. A few men cutting some bushes carefully picked up a snake 
which crawled out and set it free at the other end and didn't kill it as they do in cities. Wonderful! Also Kodai is strictly a plastic-free zone and they are very serious about it. We also clicked monkeys perched on tree tops swaying against the clouds - it was absolutely delightful. After a hot cup of coffee, we moved on to the Pine Forest and settled in 
the car reading a book, to the background of 'foresty' sounds. We returned in time for lunch and after a simple meal, slept soundly and woke up to find a rain washed fresh evening. We walked over to the end of the property overlooking the vallry and settled down to soak in the nature's beauty and sat in companionable silence enjoying the play of clouds which did a 'now you see it, now you don't' with the Palani hill ranges. Watched the evening sun set in a meek watery world, washed and cleaned our car and worked up an appetite. The news during dinner which we had switched on after 2days brought into this haven the issues of corruption and human greed, leaving us feeling a bit down. A quiet dinner and we ended the day with the early to bed routine.
Day 4 - 19/08/2011 We had requested and the resort obliged us with an early breakfast and we checked out at 9am for our drive back. Having packed lunch and coffee, we took a coffee break at around 12noon and had our lunch after Salem around 1.30pm and touched Bangalore at 3pm and crawled through the chaos of uban morass to only reach home by 4.45pm. The last 2 hours tired us out more than the entire journey to Bangalore. Well, that is the reality we live in but than heavens we have the means and the opportunity to take these small breaks. I thoroughly enjoyed our laid back holiday and Ranga and I fell in love with Kodai and the Zest Resort and an encore is a foregone conclusion.
Route Taken - Bangalore - Hosur - Krishnagiri - Salem - Namakkal - Karur - Dindigul - Battalagundu - Kodaikanal.
Distance Covered - 972kms in all.
Petrol Economy - 17kms/litre.
Dear Ms.Purnima,
ReplyDeleteA wonderful piece to read. Wish you many more happy family holidays with Club Mahindra :)
With regards
Mahindra Holidays
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