Arriving in Coimbatore by bus, we dropped off our luggage at the friend 's apartment where we will be staying and made our way to Mukundan's sister's home to visit his family. They were all so welcoming, we were fed, we visited between a couple of homes and had a good afternoon / evening.
The next morning we set forth in a hired taxi, heading south into another set of mountains. The first stop was at some gardens built around one of the outflows of a large dam. Beautiful scenery, that is used in Indian movies. I had bought some sweets for us to share later in the day, when we had breakfast, and when we stopped at Monkey Falls I wasn't particularly diligent about closing the car window since Sumathy and the driver would be staying there while Ragu, Mukundan & I walked to the falls, Well, didn't a monkey just come right out of the trees to the car, reach in the window and grab my package of Burfi right off the front dash! Cheeky Monkey!
Up the mountain sides with us, 40 hairpin turns this time. There is a small viewpoint about halfway up, with an amazing view back over the lake to the gardens that we had just visited. Once we got up over the first mountains, we were again in tea plantation territory. Those bushes make interesting patterns on the hillsides. We visited a temple high in the hills and then drove down into the valley, through the town of Valparai to another large dam. The water levels are quite low right now so there was an interesting canyon rather than a large lake to see there.
We went to another temple and had a late lunch / early supper (Lupper?) on our way back to Coimbatore.
The next day we had a nice lazy start, went back out to visit the family for lunch and then caught the train back to Chennai.
Train travel in India is the way to go! You get airline (international NOT domestic!) type service: a large water bottle initially, a newspaper & a snack, and later, a full meal. A late night, but it sure was nice to be back in my own (temporary) bed.
Up the mountain sides with us, 40 hairpin turns this time. There is a small viewpoint about halfway up, with an amazing view back over the lake to the gardens that we had just visited. Once we got up over the first mountains, we were again in tea plantation territory. Those bushes make interesting patterns on the hillsides. We visited a temple high in the hills and then drove down into the valley, through the town of Valparai to another large dam. The water levels are quite low right now so there was an interesting canyon rather than a large lake to see there.
We went to another temple and had a late lunch / early supper (Lupper?) on our way back to Coimbatore.
The next day we had a nice lazy start, went back out to visit the family for lunch and then caught the train back to Chennai.
Lupper- Don't think that will catch on!
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DeleteNice photos Karen
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