Yelagiri - Chennai's Ooty

Yelagiri popularly known as "Chennai's Ooty" is an ideal drive-down hill station from both Chennai and Bengaluru rendering to the hi-tech people of both these metros looking to get a break from stress. Located is Vellore district of Tamil Nadu, 21 kms from Jolarpettai railway station. It is part of the Western Ghats range. Though the number of picnic spots to be seen are few, it  provides a calm, pollution-free environment.

Enroute to Yelagiri

The place is dotted with resorts providing in-house food and holiday activity facilities. I stayed at Sterling holidays which provides tasty food (comes at a price though :P) and the structure of the building is like a palace. Places you can visit are the usual lot of Lake view points, boat houses, gardens and such. One place that is sure to redefine the tourist pull to this place is the new 8-month old Perumal temple. This temple follows most of the traditions of Tirupati Venkateshwara temple.

Food:
Tasty, homely food at a much lower rate compared to the resorts is available at Hotel Yelagiri. Crisp non-oily 'Masala vada' is available en-route to Heritage village at Re.1 each . Pure honey can be bought from near the YMCA Camp House.

Baskets used for food storage in the village

Sterling Resort at night

Enroute to Yelagiri from Chennai you can drop by at Kanchipuram to visit some of the architectural marvels of the erstwhile kings showcased through the series of temples. Also Kanchi Math of Sankaracharya is close to the highway. Rathnagiri Murugun temple closer to Vellore is perhaps the only South Indian temple which provides a Ghat Road to reach the top to bypass the 100 odd steps (even Gods are providing easy accessibility unlike the politicians :P).

Ratnagiri Murugun temple

Nelliampathy

This is a blog post on a place I have been to recently. I am very sure that not many of the readers would have heard of this place. 

Well, Nelliampathy is a hill station near Palakkad (2 hr journey from palakkad). I have been to most of the hill stations on South India, but none has impressed me as much as this. The primary reason for this should be the fact that not many people know of this place. The very journey to this Hill station is an awesome experience. Even at 2 in the afternoon there is hardly 5m visibility.

Fully snow filled tea plantations

Enroute Nelliampathy there is Pothundy dam, which is famous for the fact that it is the second largest Earthen dam in Asia. In front of Pothundy dam, you get excellent tea from a 'tattu kada' :) All along the upward climb there are small streams of waterfalls with crystal clear water. There are extensive teak plantations all along and once you reach Nelliampathy there is tea and coffee plantations. The highlight of the journey was the awesome scene that nature presented as Kesavanpara, when the snow and clouds moved away in front of my eyes to give a breath taking scenery. Other places to visit are Sitarkundu and Karapara.

Nelliampathy hills as seen from Pothundy dam

                 The dampener however is the poor mobile range available :P Anyone planning to go there do have a BSNL mobile connection . One thing I can guarantee you will never be disappointed :)

Moncompu - Travel review

I don't know how many of the readers of this blog would have heard of this place's name.For starters its a naturally formed island in the Kuttanad taluk of Alleppey district.Another fact reg: the place is that famous agricultural scientist M.S.Swaminathan ( Mancompu Sambasivan Swaminathan ) is from here. The place marked as 'A' is Moncompu.                              

                                       

For those people who have been living in the concrete jungles of the metros and not so metro areas, this will be a refreshing change.The calm,serene waters of Vembanad lake are ideal for the house-boat journeys. 

                                            

Its really heartening to see how nature presents itself with such beauties that leaves its observers enchanted :)

This  is the pic of the  Moncompu temple.Whats peculiar about the visit to the temple is that one needs to take a boat ride for crossing the river. River is not the one seen in pic :P.