Ooty

Ooty

Well the long weekend falling on April 10, 11 and 12 zoomed by. We (Me, Upendra and Rajagopal) had been to Ooty and surrounding places. Initially the people we enquired, that is, the bus reservation people, the hotel guys all said there is lots of vacancies so dont worry just show up in Ooty. Then on thursday evening we go to a KSTRC reservation counter to get tickets and he says "There are just 3 tickets available for today and tomorrow .. that too on a dakota bus .. non sleeper.. one like our BMTC and that too last seats." We had almost decided to go home and sleep the weekend. Then we found a Package tour @ 1850. Costly.. for individual not .. but as 3 people.. yes. .damn costly for 3. Anyways so he said 2 tickets are booked third he will adjust.. We reached Shanthinagar bus stand at 8 and we get two tickets for 9.30 bus. Man I havent seen shanthi nagar bus stand so crowded since it was built. It looked like the whole of bangalore was going to ooty. every couple of minutes a bus to ooty pulls up and picks people and leaves. all buses were following IST, so out 9.30 bus left by around 10.30 or 10.45. All this while we were stuck in the stupid bus stand without a place to sit. Anyways.. finally got into bus and started journey. We reached Ooty friday morning by 7 .. 7.30. Damn it was cold and we didnt even have sweaters. We were all in summer wear.. going by the advise of a friend who said.. ooty man..it was hot like hell in january only when we had gone.. now it will be even hotter.. oh damn.. how wrong he was.


Once we reached ooty the tourist guy picked us up and dumped us in a hotel where the rooms were still being checked out. So we had to sit in the lobby while a room was vacant. Finally we got a room. We freshened up and then had breakfast in the same place. The person at travel desk of the hotel offered us one more trip on friday.. as our sight seeing trip was on Saturday and Friday was our free day. We took that up.

First stop... Outside of the golf course in ooty. He gave us some explanation about it and showed us the fences and off to next.

Then we went to Pykara Dam..... Again no entry inside or near the dam.. just a show from the road a few hundred meters off .. "See thats the pykara dam".. and throughout the trip the guide kept blabbering about which all movies were shot in those places.. all useless trivia which we really did not care.

Then we went to a place where there were lots of nilgiri trees were there beside a nice lake. That spot was good.. again we got some useless trivia about films shot there ..

Then we visited a place called pai mund.. .well it is supposed to be a tribal area.. this time we got some useful info about the native people there and what they do..

The best part there were the fresh carrots that were being sold by the locals.. damn they are tasty..though u got to wash clean before u eat..

Next stop... Pykara lake and boating... It was a nice and big lake .. but somehow the water was green and i was convinced that it was dirty (god knows what and all .. :P) .. so never put my hand in water when we went boating.. though rajagopal and upendra felt the water was clean and the color was natural... they put their hands in water and .. u know played with it...

Next stop .... Rose Garden...... Oops we chose a totally dismal time to visit Rose Garden... of the 2500 odd types of roses in there only some 250 odd were flowering.. and by god they were beautiful...

Finally we roamed around ooty trying to find some food.. well thats one problem.. and upendra managed to pick up all types of natural oils that were being sold there.. like nilgiri oil..eucalyptus oil.. .etc etc.. Then back to hotel and sleep..


Day 2: ...coming