ooty | midliferadventure

Well India has provided some of the best and some of the worst experiences of our lives. In some areas the scenery, people and food are among the prettiest, friendliest and tastiest (respectively) we have seen, met or had…in other areas …not the same story. Despite this we covered a lot of the country, saw a lot of sights, places, cities and have some insights that may prove useful to future travellers.

India certainly has a lot positive to be said about it and there are some must see items that make planning a trip very worthwhile. There are also some places that quite frankly are ruined by the people that you are forced to encounter along the way. Our trip was more low budget that some but higher budget than the typical backpacking style holiday.

We spent our money on the food, beer, accommodation and transport…choosing to pay that little bit more for the extra space and comfort and things like private bathrooms. That said…accommodation was generally about $20 a night for both of us and at its cheapest was $10. For not much extra (than our allowance) per day you could plan a very nice Indian sojourn and by paying the little bit extra can avoid some of the shonks that we hit along the way. You will be overpaying for what you get but the extra money takes away some of the headaches and surely that is worth a little more.

Indian Must dos

With the beauty of hindsight this is where I would go to if I was to plan a short (2-3 week) holiday in India (in no particular order).

Agra – Taj Mahal and the fort…this one is obvious but they truly are that good. I suggest that 2-3 days is about the right amount of time here.

Amritsar – golden temple and the border show. Can be done in a one full day journey if time is tight but the people and food are so nice you will want to stay more.

Aurungabad – Ellora and Ajanta caves…absolutely stunning. Two days is about right. This was the surprise for me, had never heard of them but were the highlight of the trip.

Hampi – absolutely fantastic with so very much to see, need about 2 full days but will want more as the people and place are so good.

Jaipur – this has 3 forts, temples, a palace and all the old city walls and is again worthy of about 3-4 days depending on your schedule and timings. Jaipur is in Rajasthan and most of Rajasthan is pretty similar with forts and palaces etc. They are all different but are also very similar so if time is against you Jaipur would be my pick.

Ooty – the Indian blue mountains (Nilgiris) with a toy train ride to boot. Stunning scenery and clean by Indian standards.

Udaipur – we loved this place. The water and lakes make it very different to the other sights you tend to see. If you come in early in the morning you could see everything in a day and a bit so one overnight would be about right..add an extra night if you want to hit the fort and Jain temples which are a bit of a way out. We stayed for 6 days and enjoyed it all but most people will not have as much time.

The end.

My list would leave out 2 key ones on almost everyone else’s list and they are

Goa – a must for beach goers…we could have skipped it. It was nice and we had a good time but unless you are in dire need of sand and water it could be skipped.

Kerala – the cruise of the back waters was nice and a good treat. Our cruise was probably a bit long and one to two nights would be about right. There are afternoon cruises but you stay in the main channel with all the boat traffic.

Great if you have extra time

Now if you have a little more time available then these are my choices for good second tier spots with nice attractions, people etc

Darjeeling – tea fields, toy trains and the Himalayas on a clear day.
Hyderabad – an Indian city that is really trying to get it right.
Jaisalmer – desert, fort, safari. Nice if you have the time.
Jodhpur – nice place..very Rajasthan with forts and palaces.
Kanyakumari – the southernmost tip at the edge of 3 oceans
Mumbai – beautiful architecture, the gateway to India and Elephanta island.
Pondicherry – the French parts

Nice if you have LOTS of time

Mangalore – still the best food I have eaten in India (just not much to see)
Cochin – a nice afternoon but not too much to see
Trivandrum – good zoo and some nice architecture
Bangalore – not too much going on here

Don’t even bother

Bhubaneswar – caves and temples…not that fantastic and the experience is wrecked by the lying and cheating of what feels like almost everybody in the town. The worst that India has to offer.

I have left New Delhi off this list entirely because my experiences in New Delhi were entirely terrible. I came to Delhi 4 times (including transits) and had an atrocious experience each and every time. I may have been entirely unlucky…or it may well be the worst capital city on the planet, full of lying cheating scoundrels. Alas as New Delhi is a major transport hub you may just have to stop here to get to some of the nicer parts of India. Should you wish to do such a trip then I will let you form your own New Delhi opinion and would be happy to hear it.

I will leave the India topic with a few of my favourite moments…

And my all time favourite moment…was…

Farewell India…it has been an experience…

Our last week or so in India has been one of extreme transits and short stays in multiple locations. The end of phase one occurred as Jill really wanted to be in China for Chinese New Year. So from Pondicherry we did a 9.5 hour train trip to get to Bangalore. Bangalore is a big city with all of the usual bits of temples, churches, architecture etc. we had a nice day wandering around parks, gardens, the tipu palace, the lake, all capped off with afternoon beers and a meal at a pub called ‘Plan B’. The Canberra crew will know the significance of this.

From here we took a 7 hour train ride to Coimbatore which was little more than a transit stop with a meal and a few hours sleep. This flowed on to a 1 hour ride to Metupalaiyam where we met up with the Nilgiri Railway which was a 5 hour train ride through the Nilgiri mountains to the town of Ooty. Now this can best be described as a toy train trip and it was fantastic. The 5 hours are essentially a 50 km climb on a steam powered locomotive using a rack and pin setup to be able to climb the steep sections. The journey goes through the middle of the Nilgiri mountains which greatly resemble Australia’s Blue mountains, west of Sydney. This journey stops frequently to fill the steam engine with water and is utterly charming.

As an aside I learned from my mother that this is the part of the world where she grew up. I knew she was born in India and knew my grandfather was in the British army and there were some moves. But throughout this journey she has been dropping little family history gems in the random e-mails that pop into my inbox. She apparently grew up in a town called Wellington and was schooled at Coonoor…both of these the little toy train went through. Quite frankly this is the cleanest part of all of India (but will not be for much longer). Despite the locals taking pride in the area…and big signs in the train and all around…the Indian tourists continue to use the world as their own personal garbage bin. (I think I will have to do a sideline rant on the attitudes of the Indians attitude towards cleanliness, hygiene, the toilet and rubbish).

The entire area up the Nilgiri mountains is fantastic and is one of the nicer parts of the world. Blue mountain views, a steam train, low level clouds intermittently, tea plantations, the lake and people who take pride in the local area all combine to make it a great place to escape to for a few days. The highest peak of the range is Dodddabetta peak which is higher than mount kosciuszko and the surrounding area was the home for a rogue tiger that had killed 12 people and at least one cow in recent times. Sadly about 3 days before we got there they found and killed it. The parks people tried with tranquilliser guns but as the locals were losing money as their shops could not open…(excerpt from newspaper)…On Wednesday, hundreds of them ventured into the forest armed with sickles, logs and iron bars to kill the tiger. Though officials from forest, revenue and police managed to convince them that such adventurism would only hamper the experts’ efforts, the pressure seems to have weighed heavy on the hunting party which shot to kill, not capture, when it was finally spotted in the evening.

After a night in Ooty we did the reverse journey down the hill on the train followed by an overnight train ride to Chennai which in all was over 17 hours of train commuting. A nap, a meal, a shower, a sleep… then a flight to Calcutta, had a nap and a meal planned but hit the filthiest hotel on the planet near the Kolkata airport so we opted to sit in the airport for 7 hours rather than stay in such filth…then a flight to Kunming in China.

This hotel was something to behold…we had to cross one of India’s many open sewerage drains along with a seething mud pit just to get into the property…upon arrival I noticed the grey pillow cases and commented to Jill…she turned them over to find that this was the clean side as the other side had drool stains and god knows what else…the sheets were dirty….at this point it was time for a proper inspection of the joint…the one inch yellow ring of baked in urine around the toilet was the clincher…Jill hit rampage mode and all but dragged the manager up by his ear…

He made stupid faces and suggested that it would be better with a new pillowcase…and then it started…those that know Jill well will not need an explanation and those that don’t I’m sure can understand what followed…I even weighed in from time to time when it seemed the process was stalling…but in reality Jill was well in control…needless to say we did not stay, got our money refunded, blacklisted the place through the Indian WOTIF equivalent, listed them on trip advisor as the filthiest hovel on the planet and returned to the airport to sit and wait for 7 hours for an overnight flight to China.

All in all quite therapeutic.

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