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Old 29th May 2009, 20:03   #1
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Another Trip Report to Ooty!

Initially thought I should post my travel experience with another thread already existed, but thought it would be good to have a separate thread. Bare with me.

It all started some time back with urge for a long drive, that was not done for a long time now, almost 5 months!
Wanted to get out of Bangalore for 3-4 days, enjoy a place that we had not visited yet. So It was all decided on 19th May, that we should go to Ooty.

So planning started with search for Hotels/Homestays in Ooty, found lot of information on Team BHP, but couldn't book any of them since there was a flower show during that weekend and everything were booked!
At a point where I thought I have to yet again cancel my weekend holiday, there cam Travel Guru!
Booked Hotel Savoy (though it was quite costlier), and decided not to cancel another planned trip!
As part of the planning I created attached XLS, has some useful details on directions, and places to see in Otty/Conoor, that many who visited ooty might have done, only different dimension to this travelogue is picture taken!!
While you folks go through the XLS on route map and places of interest, will post pictures. in total I took some 500+ pictures! will post some of them atleast!!

Till then Cya!!
Attached Files
File Type: xls BLR_ooty Drive.xls (28.5 KB, 923 views)
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Old 29th May 2009, 21:44   #2
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Some more details before I post pictures!
Travelers : Me-n-my better half with 2yr old kid
Vehicle: Skoda Laura, Sep-08
Distance Traveled :
~650 Kms (it is different story I didn't get trip meter to read correctly)!
Diesel Consumed : 35.87
Overall Mileage : 18kpl

Things to Note:
1. Ooty is best enjoyed when you use cab/auto within city, instead of driving around. Thanks to SkyWalker's report! I just decided to do this even before going to Ooty, so there was no surprise!

2. Start early in the morning and beat the traffic.
We started off at 5.15AM, and were at Mysore by 8.30AM, with some searching at Maddur to find Maddur Tiffany's to get some Vadas off my wife's request!
But then, there was some thing in store for us for rest of the journey!
Tyre got punctured just before entering Mysore, had to change, and then search for a place to fix the punctured tyre before proceeding.
This process took more than an hour because of the puncture wala opened at 9.30AM only, and we could effectively start from Mysore only at 10.15AM... while I was hoping to reach ooty by 11AM! Badluck

We left Mysore, and then there was another one waiting for us, emission light started glowing just when we were 10km behind Najanagud! So had to make a call to Vinayaka Service Station, had to remove the battery connection to check if it goes away, but didn't!
While I did all this, clock tickled 11.30AM.... OMG!
Then rest of the route is not a known route, first time driving, and had to be cautious.

4. Do not Stop in forest areas, do not block Road, while you want to watch some animals in the vicinity!
Please don't Honk, it did really disturb some one living peacefully there.

5. Use google map on mobile phone (You can download from Google Mobile | Maps for your phone), this really helped find route without a GPS device and quite useful!

6. Best part of Ooty holiday is Ooty-Conoor Toy Train ride! Book your tickets online at irctc.co.in

Finally we reached Ooty at 2PM, and part of the day planned in Ooty was lost! So decided to cut short some places of interest and visit others.

Bandipur stretch, until one enters Madumalai forest area was quite uneventful, except for the nice scenery and greenery around while driving.
We did stop at the Forest Safari Drive place at Bandipur, and took some pictures!
Some pictures on Bangalore-Mysore Road. This stretch was pretty much empty when compared to traffic situation we had while returning! What took us 3hrs to reach from Ramangar to home in the evening had taken 3hrs to Reach Mysore from Home in the morning!!

Highlights of the trip:
1. Nice drive from Mysore to Ooty, including those 36 hair pin bends, that was fun
2. Flower show in Ooty, best part of this was could get to see some interesting art done with flowers/fruits… And got a great opportunity for experiment my photography skills!
3. Home made Ooty chocolates! I love it, my son does more, and my wife liked it as well, who never eats chocolate!
4. Ooty-Coonoor Train ride, an excellent scenic ride one should take when visiting Ooty. Probably there are better places in Coonoor to stay than Ooty and Coonoor is less crowded (of course smaller city) than Ooty.
5. Sim’s Park, nice Boat ride in there and more flowers to take pictures of! Another opportunity for me.
6. Lam’s Rock, Dolphin Nose are other attractions, you take a cab at coonoor Railway station and he takes you around conoor, this guy kept suggesting we should go for full day drive on his Amby, but was not planned! But it took us full day to go around Singara Estate, Brookland’s Factory, other rock places, shelled out 800/- for car from 10.30AM till 4PM, felt too expensive, but was not in mood to search for a better deal once reached Coonoor.
[FONT=Wingdings]à[/FONT] Tips: Check if you can book a cab from here online for Rs. 500/= for full day, I guess it is possible, but have not checked.
7. Pykara water falls, horse rides are other attraction we covered while returning from Ooty via Gudalur. I didn’t get to ride on horse because kid was scared of sitting on horse… but that would dent 300/=
8. View /scenery from Pykara to Gudalur is some thing one must enjoy, it is quite amazing and very attractive. Be it the tall hills/rocks or dense niligir forest. Even the roads are far better this route compared to the route via Masinagudi, Kalhatti, Ooty


And I'll let the pictures do the talking!

[COLOR=blue][/COLOR]
Attached Thumbnails
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Old 29th May 2009, 22:50   #3
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Great pictures. Thanks for sharing the details.

Where is the picture of the car?
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Old 29th May 2009, 23:03   #4
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Cool pictures. Great place to enjoy.

Thanks for sharing, expecting some more pics.
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Old 29th May 2009, 23:24   #5
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The Car and Flowers

Continued with pictures.
To begin with Some pictures of the Red Laura...
Followed by pictures of flowers!

To be continued.
Attached Thumbnails
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Old 29th May 2009, 23:55   #6
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More than a Flower Show that was at Botanical Garden!!
Some art from water melon at the flower show in Botanical Garden in Ooty.
Some interesting displays int he previous post, including
flight in take-off position
Stop TB - What a way to communicate!
The National emblem

Various other themes that caught my eyes in the pictures.

Day2:
Coonoor a place to look through lenses!
Some places that my camera caught!
- Non stop clicking on the train to Coonoo
- Singara Estate, known to be owned by Mumtaz having more than 100yr old tea plants!
- Some nice views while going down the hill from Singara Estate towards Brooklands Tea Factory
- Views from Lam's Rock, Dolphin nose
- Finally Sim's park Boat Ride


And some more pictures to come, pictures taken from Train between Ooty-Coonoor and Coonoor- Ooty
Attached Thumbnails
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Old 30th May 2009, 00:22   #7
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Look around from the Windows of Toy Train!
Deserves dedicated post of pictures that were clicked while sitting on the Toy train
Variety of scenery is what you can expect! including a some very old factories and steam engines, nice Railway stations.
Attached Thumbnails
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Old 30th May 2009, 01:56   #8
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Good write up & pics. Art on the Water Melon & Pumpkin looks awesone! Thanks for sharing the pictures.

~Gops
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Old 30th May 2009, 07:27   #9
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Great Pics Anand. Keep them coming!
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Old 30th May 2009, 09:35   #10
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Nice travelogue and great pics Anand Bhat, thanks for sharing !
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Old 30th May 2009, 15:06   #11
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Day3
Drive back to Bangalore, places visited on the way back:
- Kamaraja Dam
- Pykara
- Pykara Water falls
- Naduvattam

Pretty much return trip after Madumalai was uneventful.
Reach Mysore at 4PM or so, with a stop at Maddur at Coffee Day, it was quite painful return from there on to Bangalore due to traffic situation.
I would have traveled early morning next day from Mysore to beat the traffic, but had to return home the same day.

My suggestion would be to stay at Mysore in the evening, start early morning (6AM or so), can reach Bangalore by 9AM.

Some thing worth a mention here, my care gave much better fuel efficiency on the return way than onward journey. I could manage <4.5ltrs/100km till Mysore, but by the time we reached Bangalore, the display was showing 5.1ltr/100km... Thats quite bad, else I would have got an average FE >20km!!

Below pictures:
- Few pictures of Hotel Savoy Taj
- Pictures of Kamaraja Dam sourroundings
- Pykara, horses there
- Pykara water falls

And that is pretty much it about this weekend outing!
Thanks for reading through and all the encouragements!!
Attached Thumbnails
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Old 30th May 2009, 15:23   #12
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Great pictures. Its best to see Coonoor and Ooty during the off season though, saves you the hassle of traffic.
You should also visit the private agricultural sheds, its an experience, yet I am not sure if whether you would like something like that. These sheds grow flowers like carnations, bird of paradise and some other varieties.
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Old 30th May 2009, 15:44   #13
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Great Pictures, Ooty is perfect holiday gateway. I am waiting when Karnataka will find better tourism infrastructures.

Ravi.
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Old 30th May 2009, 16:40   #14
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Nice travelogue and great pics . Botanical garden is beautiful and Excellent art work. Some more pics please.

+1 Ravi.

Last edited by mnhegde : 30th May 2009 at 16:41.
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Old 30th May 2009, 23:22   #15
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Complete agree with you Ravi.
There is a tonnes of difference between what tourism means in Ooty compared to any tourist place in Karnataka.

Other part that I liked, which has been highlighted many times in various other threads in this forum is about road condition in other states.
When we crossed Karnataka border, there is a markable difference in the road conditions!
Though roads were not completely broken on Karanataka side, on the other side of the state, it was butter smooth as some one have mentioned!
I got to witness it.

Thanks Bejay and MN Hagde.
Will try to put up some more pics when I get some time. I need to do some work on the pictures to reduce there size one by one, because I have taken all of them in 10MP resolution, and file size is 3+MB!
Before I can upload here, I resize them to below 1MB limit.
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