[puru15]

Dear all,
I am now ready with my first travellogue at Team-BHP, for my recently concluded 3 day tour
to Kodaikanal from Chennai.
First i would thank swami69 for his Kodai log which was the base on which i planned by trip.
Route: Chennai - Trichy - Dindigul - Batlagundu - Kodai
I.Summary for the quickies.
==========================
---------------------------------------------
Onward Journey: Chennai(Gandhinagar) to Kodai
---------------------------------------------
1. Total Distance: 530km
2. Total Time: 10hrs[ 5:00am to 3:00pm]
3. Driving time: 8.5 hrs
4. Toll Gates : 6 , Total Toll Fee is 196 =( 20, 20,56,35,35,30)
---------------------------------------------
Return Journey: Kodai to Chennai(Gandhinagar)
---------------------------------------------
1. Total Distance: 522km
2. Total Time: 10hrs[ 6:35am to 4:35pm]
3. Driving time: 9 hrs
4. Toll Gates : 6 , Total Toll Fee is 196 =(30,35,35,56,20,20)
Total Trip Distance: 1138km
Highway Mileage: 16.9
Average Total Mileage: 16.4
Food experienced at:
1. Adyar Anand Bhawan(Veg) , Ulunderpet
2. Tava(Veg) , Kodai
3. Tibetan Brother's( Ground Floor)
4. Annapurna(Veg), Kodai
5. Astoria(Veg), Kodai
6. Hotel HillTop(Veg), Kodai.
7. Eden Garden Restaurent(Veg), Dhindukkal-Theni Rd.

II. Detail Information
======================
Day-1, 21-Apr-2011 Driving Chennai to Kodai.
--------------------------------------------
Started early on 21-Apr-2011 at 5:00 am from Gandhinagar,Chennai with my wife.
Having taken NH45 earlier i wanted to avoid the rush at Tambram and Chengalpattu.
However my plan was to start at 4:30am,but found it tough to leave the bed after
sleeping at 2:00am the previous night. Why ? I don't no,sometimes i just can't
keep time.
There was some heavy traffic after Guindy on way to the airport road. Metro
construction was in full swing. Reached Adyar Anand Bhawan(A2B), Ulunderpet at
7:47 am. I am very fond of Idli,Vada and Sangeetha in Gandhinagar and Murugan
Idly at T Nagar are one of my regular joints. But Idli, Vada @ A2B was simply the
best. After a relaxed breakfast and customery daily morning calls to parents and
in-laws i continued again on NH45 after a tank full at BP.
Driving through NH45 was an awsome feeling. I could constantly drive at 100-110,
and some times 140. I was carefull though at regular intersections, wherein i
slowed down. As mentioned in older posts, at some intersections people are too
crazy and would not heed to your honking and just cross.
There are 6 toll plaza enroute to Kodai and the last one is just before Trichy.
We reached the last one @ 9:50am.
I was guided by the GPS on my E71, so was pretty confident on the route. Infact i
made the route and save as "My Maps" in google maps which i accessed it on my
mobile for navigation. Helped me immensly.
The trichy bypass killed a lot of time as there was heavy traffic added to the
fact that my GPS receiver showed no sattelites. I was wondering if i would take
Trichy-Dindigul highway correctly. Trichy bypass unlike Tindivanam or Villupuram
bypass is a not smooth road, there are some potholes and is a bit narrow stretch.
I could get onto Tricy-Dindigul highway correctly around 10:33 am. The 4 lane
highway is far from complete and have frequent diversons as swami69 pointed out.
But it was mostly deserted, so i could drive at 110-130 most of the time.
Once we reached Dindigul i missed the right turn towards Batlagundu instead took
the flyover towards Madurai. Realized it quickly and took a U turn and i was
correctly on Dindigul-Theni road. Stopped at HP petrol bunk at Sembati(30 min),
tank full had some coconut water and drove off.
There was heavy traffic in Batlagundu near bus stand and was just crawling for 30
minutes. Some heavy trucks got stucks while coming from the opposite side.
Reached Ghat road at 1:10 . From there it was mostly in 2nd-3rd gear driving at
30-40kmph max.Road was fine except few potholes that too at corners. Stopped in
between for a view before it started raining very heavily when we were 15KM
away from Kodai. I reacalled the hotel guy mentioning that it was raining in
Kodai from 1:00PM to 4:00PM for past few days.
Reached Kodai bus stand at around 3:00PM and quickly to Hotel Cokkers Tower at
Woodville road.A little diassapointed with the hotel though we freshened up
quickly and head to Tava for a some spicy north indian veg food.
Had been to Kodai before before bachelor days, so remembered the spots well.
I was feeling tired after the long drive, so we had dinner in hotel itself and
was off to bed by 8:00PM.





Day-2, 22-Apr-2011@Kodai
------------------------
Woke up with a very bad cold and running nose on Friday, just could not bear.
Didn't want my health to play spoilsport, so determined out after a light
breakfast at the hotel.Coakers Walk was near so hit it first. From inside i was
wondering wether i will be able to cover rest of planned spots today or not.
Had some hot tea and bajji,don't know if it gave me some energy. Left Bryant Park
and instead headed towards pillar rock. Enroute touched upper lake view,pine
forest,Guna caves(now closed) . Infact it is waste to halt at Guna cave since
there so much of mist that you just can't see any thing. Reached pillar rock at
around 11:30, the dissapointing mist was there too. From there we returned to
our hotel had lunch and took to bed. Around 4:30 woke up with a fever of 102.5 F.
Rushed to Van Allen hospital near to Coakers walk.Was given an injection and
some medicine. It was drizzling outside so came back at hotel took some rest
watching IPL. Around 9:00pm headed straight to Tibetan Brother's and had some
delicious non-veg amidst heavy rains outside.





Day-3, 23-Apr-2011 @ Kodai
-------------------------
It was 7:00am when the flickering ray's of the sun alarmed me that i had enought
of sleep. Was feeling much better today. By 8:00am i headed for pillar rocks,
hoping to catch it clear.Pillar rocks is around 4-5 km from coakers walk if one
doesn't take the road along side upper lake view. This 4-5km stretch is actually
blocked during tourist season and the entire route is made one way.I wanted to
have a nature ride so took the longer route, but before reaching Guna cave found
the road blocked by authorities. Realized that they would not open up the road
so early. Travelled back took upper lake view and took the next right turn reach
Pillar lake quickly. The view was good, the place was not crowded as most of the
shops were just about to open.Headed straight to hotel HillTop(Veg) had breakfast
at around 9:45 and went down to the office of the forest officer for an entry pass
to Berijam Forest. It was bad a luck!, a notice at the office read that entry to
the Berijam forest is restricted untill 24-Apr-2011 due to some elephants
damaging the route. Spend rest of the time of the day at the lakeside and took a
shikara ride anticipating heavy raining . It did start raining and we had a nice
time. Around noon we headed back to the hotel and had lunch. It was still
drizzling around 5:00 pm when we went see the bear shola falls and then to the
lakeside spending rest of the evening strolling and shopping .We planned to leave
Kodai by 6:00am the next day , so had a nice veg food at Astoria( near to bus
stand) and returned to the hotel around 9:00pm.





Day-4, 24-Apr-2011 Kodai to Chennai
-----------------------------------
Started downhill at around 6:35( late my 35 min) and stopped at Silver Cascade
Falls at 7:00am. Had some ginger tea and left the place around 7:20am. The tea
tasted of awfull:(.Had went through guides on driving downhill, so was at 2-3
gear with an average speed ranging between 35-40kmph.Was following a white Lancer
all the way and also observing it being manouvered down the slopes and corners.
The 47km ghat roads came to an end around 8:30am and i stopped at the nearest IOL
petrol bunk at the intersection of Ghat Road and Didigul-Theni road at 8:40am.
We started off at 8:47 heading towards Dindigul byepass before stopping at Eden
Garden Restaurent for a light breakfast. I felt Dindigul to Trichy byepass better
this time, as i realized that there were less diversion way back. Need to mention
that i noticed the white Lancer cruise past me again. I think it was headed for
chennai too,since i noticed it again at at Villupuram.There was very little traffic
except on the trichy byepass where due a marriage we got stuck for about 20 min.We
reached Adyar Anand Bhawan at Ulunderpet around 1:00pm had our lunch and slowly
started from there at 2:00pm.There was slow moving traffic at Chengalpattu due to an
accident! a car ( Indigo probably) hit a Scorpio.The emergency medicle van could
be seen with the driver of car blood stained all over his dress as he was talking
to some authorities.Left that stretch sad and slow, thinking about the injuries that
could have been sustained.As we neared chennai traffic became worse and we could
reach gandhinagar only by 4:35 pm.
I thus concluded my longest trip so far with my Swift, the previous one being chennai
to pondy and bangalore to chennai both in Aug 2009.

[pjay_in]

Somehow the pictures are not showing up for me :(

[puru15]

Originally Posted by pjay_in

Somehow the pictures are not showing up for me :(

Sorry i must have made a mistake while posting the pics. Sorry for the trouble , i attach the pictures now.

[Surprise]

Nice report. Where are the photos?

Originally Posted by puru15

went down to the office of the forest officer for an entry pass
to Berijam Forest. It was bad a luck!, a notice at the office read that entry to
the Berijam forest is restricted untill 24-Apr-2011 due to some elephants
damaging the route.

Usual story. I encountered similar boards during my last two visits to Berijam forests...you could have seen inspite of clear cut display of message, tourists will be moving around that place. When the forest officials spot not much of crowd in the premises, they issues slips in limited numbers. I have been lucky to get one both the time. But with family, we cannot make them wait without knowing whether we will get it or not. Also it works better to go directly rather than through brokers or lodge in-charge.

[supertinu]

nice pics Puru, I am surprised to see pics with sunlight . I was in Kodai the same wkend, drove from bangalore and i barely saw the sun. All my pic are with clouds all over the place. And the place was super crowded. Since i was returning on 26th, i had a extra day on sunday when everyone left the town and it was more manageable to go around without traffic jams .

[puru15]

Originally Posted by supertinu

nice pics Puru, I am surprised to see pics with sunlight . I was in Kodai the same wkend, drove from bangalore and i barely saw the sun. All my pic are with clouds all over the place. And the place was super crowded. Since i was returning on 26th, i had a extra day on sunday when everyone left the town and it was more manageable to go around without traffic jams .

Truly commented, what i observed was the following:
a) On 22nd the weather was awful, even i started sightseeing at 9:45am and could see only mist. It rained very heavily during the night.
b) 23rd and 24th was good it was sunny untill 10:30 am.

Lucky that you stayed back and avoided the rush. Did you visit berijam?