[devrajman]

After lot of delay and considersation. I completed my Trip to Ooty with my wife to celebrate our anniversary.

We booked Delitze Inn near Sherlock for 2 nights @ 3.5K including yatra 750rs off.

I use my Samsung Galaxy Spice (Android) phone with RMaps app with Google Maps, Google Hybrid offline downloaded maps for basic navigation, route record and route track back. I have most of tracks saved. Please PM me for it.

Day 0:
Did full tank with HP Power previous night.

Day 1:
We left on Monday morning at 6:45AM from Malleshwaram packed with lots of snacks and some sandwiches as we wanted to break as late as possible. Crossed Kengeri in no time due to less traffic. This time my wife was on the wheel. She drove from Blore to Begur which is around 170kms, now only ~160kms left for me. We used rmaps and took Mysore ring road that connects to Bandipalya (Mysore Airport). My Zen was feeling half hungry and so were we. Hence we stopped at Gundlupet at 11:15AM. First filled Zen tank at HP and us at Hotel Sri Guruprasad. Average food. Later though we would have stopped at Udupi Upachar, thinking food might have been better there.

Started from Gundlupet at 11:45AM, We got chance to see Elephants and Deers on the way. Also Langurs. Reached Theppakadu at 12:25PM. Took Kalakatty route (36 hairpin bend). My '99 Zen with 91K kms on odo was doing great! Very less on coming traffic. Hardly drove in 1st. 2nd was good enough even at hairpin turns. Reached Ooty at 1:40PM. Took some time to search our Hotel. Reached hotel at 2:15PM. Hotel is last property in its road. Its located after Sherlock on the same road. Excellent prop.

We checked in, freshened up and went to Dhaba for Lunch. Good Food. Less choice for Veggies. After that our mission was to get Avalanche permission. I was searching for Forest Office and landed at Tourist Info center at Charring Cross. They called up the office and let me know that permission is easily available. I need to meet DFO - South division @ Forest Office only between 4-5PM. I submitted a written application with car details and my ID details with my ID zerox. Permission was given in no time for Avalanchee and Upper Bhavani. Here is Location of the office for fellow BHPians to find it easily: 11.412583,76.704996 - Google Maps

Then we left for Botanical Gardens on my wife's demand. Garden was full of people everywhere!! We found an empty bench and sat there for some time talking, taking snaps. Then we decided to go to Boat house just to see it. It was 6:30PM when we entered Boat House. Was almost closed. We again took a bench near the lake and sat there talking and taking pictures.

We then went to Commercial Road. Found a parking and went for walking. Bought chocolates from Kings Chocolate. I only liked roasted Almond bitter/dark. Should have bought more. Later had dinner at Side Walk as my wife wanted to have Pizza/Pasta and not South not North... Pizza is above average, however pizza toppings are a little odd. We customized one. Cheese is very chewy and heavy. Later we head for our hotel. It was a real isolated and dark road all the way. And once we reached the hotel it was brightly lit like a newly wed bride!! It was much colder here than in Ooty. Also as per GPS is was our highest point for Day 1.

PS: Our GPS helped us 70% to travel within Ooty and 30% by people/police on the road. However important is tracking/coming back with our GPS.

Day 2: Lots of excitement as we were going to much talked about Avalanchee....

[Cntd]

[gajadonga]

Nice start and some good pictures.
When crossing Mysore did you take the right turn or the left turn from Columbia Asia hospital
to bypass Mysore.

[selfdrive]

Rocking drive devrajman, and that too in my favourite car (my first car was a Zen too!). I am looking forward to the next instalments of your drive. I hope you will share a lot of pics

In fact your travelogue is more of a sign; I just saw a Wayanad travelogue by our fellow bhpian Fauji. Now considering doing this trip in September if my piggybank gets fat enough:
Pune - Bangalore - Coonoor - Wayanad - Coorg - Bangalore - Pune (PNQ-BLR by flights)

[ranjitp1]

Nice start to the TL.Could you please share the name of the place that you stayed at in Ooty?

You are right about the Sherlock cliff being colder than Ooty Town,that cliff is the second highest point and nights get miserably cold in winters.

Kings almonds are heavenly,so are the walnuts.The sad thing is that there is another Kings's open on the Botanical Garden road and many people think that is the original one whereas that outlet is just cashing in on the original's(one on commerical street) name.Sidewalk is pretty oridinary IMHO for the prices they charge.

Looking forward to more pictures

[kannan666]

Nice write up and pics Devraj, waiting to read and see more ! Which route did you take while coming back - Gudalur or Sigur ? Ooty was not all that cold though when I was last there beginning March, minimum was hovering around the 14 deg C mark.

[devrajman]

Originally Posted by gajadonga

Nice start and some good pictures.
When crossing Mysore did you take the right turn or the left turn from Columbia Asia hospital
to bypass Mysore.

Thanks. I took left from Hospital. I think both left and right leads Ooty. There are no proper signages. We relied on GPS and people at junctions.

Originally Posted by selfdrive

Rocking drive devrajman, and that too in my favourite car (my first car was a Zen too!). I am looking forward to the next installments of your drive. I hope you will share a lot of pics

Thanks. There many more pics on the way....

Zen is pure pleasure driving. Mine is '99 model with carb and manual steering.

Originally Posted by kannan666

Nice write up and pics Devraj, waiting to read and see more ! Which route did you take while coming back - Gudalur or Sigur ? Ooty was not all that cold though when I was last there beginning March, minimum was hovering around the 14 deg C mark.

Thanks. Sure. I took Gudalur route for fro journey and Sigur for to journey. Ooty was plesant climate. However nights at hotel were cold!

Below is my GPS track from Pykara to Srirangapatnam.

I stayed in Delightz Inn after Sherlock. Website : http://www.delightzinn.com/
Reviews: http://www.tripadvisor.com/Hotel_Rev...amil_Nadu.html

Hotel location is very good. There are 5 cottages in which there are 20 rooms/apartment like accomodation. Each one has 1 Hall cum Kitchen, 1 bedroom with 1 large bed and 1 extra bed. Few have common balcony with good views. Service and food are average, we always ate out. However breakfast was good. It has small garden and camp fire place. I will upload more pics in short while.

[VindyWheels]

Hi,

Nice pics. I've been to Ooty, but havent heard about avalaanche and bhavani. Are these restricted places? How far from Ooty? What is the attraction there? Can you drive to these places in own vehicle? How are the roads?

Rgds
VW

[hvkumar]

Thanks for the information on how to obtain the permission for Avalanchi.
Do they work on Saturdays also?
Are they issuing permits for Upper Bhavani also?
Which route did you take for Ooty-Avalanchi-Upper Bhavani-Ooty?

[Travel_newbie]

Originally Posted by VindyWheels

Hi,

Nice pics. I've been to Ooty, but havent heard about avalaanche and bhavani. Are these restricted places? How far from Ooty? What is the attraction there? Can you drive to these places in own vehicle? How are the roads?

Rgds
VW

Avalanchi and Emerland are two lakes which are located ~20kms from Ooty. You need to reach Fern Hill palace and take teh right road from there. The drive is awesome, but when you reach the lakes it is a jaw dropping view. Having said that, the roads are just average and the route is slightly deserted, but it is not crowded. You dont need any permission to visit the lakes. You come across a bridge seperating the two lakes Avalanchi is on the left and Emerald is on the right.

[devrajman]

Originally Posted by hvkumar

Thanks for the information on how to obtain the permission for Avalanchi.
Do they work on Saturdays also?
Are they issuing permits for Upper Bhavani also?
Which route did you take for Ooty-Avalanchi-Upper Bhavani-Ooty?

Wow...Looks like theres lot of excitment building up!

However, please wait till tomorrow till I update this thread with Day 2 details. I will try to mention as much details as I know.

[ampere]

Do you need permission for Avalanchi? I thought you can visit the lake without it. (In fact we did that.)

Also I know that Dabba. Its the one right opposite to Ooty Gate right?
When we landed there, folks were streaming out of three buses which had just landed there and in an instant that daba from empty became full! And it took quite a while to get our orders through!

[Travel_newbie]

Originally Posted by ampere

Do you need permission for Avalanchi? I thought you can visit the lake without it. (In fact we did that.)

There is no permission required to visit the lakes. However, permission is required to visit the dams (Avalanchi and Emerald), but you can always slip through and visit the dams -> most of the times there is nobody keeping a watch (we found only one shepherd woman at Avalanchi dam and nobody else)

[ampere]

Sorry for back-to back posts.

@Travel_newbie I just saw your post after I commented. What you say is true. For lakes one can directly visit without any permission. I found about the place thanks to Laluks and @C_L.

@Vindywheels,

As @Travel_newbie mentioned, the road to these lakes goes through Fern Hill palace and then Good Sheperd school. The road is very good.

But for Upper Bhavani and the power house is where, one needs to have permissions from EB.

[ravib]

Originally Posted by ampere

But for Upper Bhavani and the power house is where, one needs to have permissions from EB.

Yes, we need permission from EB or forest dept, to enter beyond Avalanche checkpost and view power house & upper bhavani dam.

We knew a friend in EB working at avalanche, hence we could see these 3 places easily.

-Ravi

[ampere]

@devrajman Sorry for this set of notes. Since you started this TL, I realized though I have been to these places, but there remains many much more to be seen!

Eagerly waiting for more of your logs.


I was trying to Google about the location of these places. What I realized is that if one is not interested to go to Ooty but to these places alone, it can done from CBE as well. From the NH67, getaway from Karmadai and come up via Manjoor/Kundah Dam.

This way one needs to base at CBE to go around these places and come back.


And since these places form a part of the Mukurthi National Park (or border close to it), it would also be a nice idea to plan a trek in the park alone. I found quite many TL/Blogs on the net about it. Has anyone more details regarding the same?