Coonoor sightseeing

Day 13

Coonoor sightseeing 

We woke up to a foggy dewy morning. While still getting ready, a yellow sun rose to shine bright. We had our breakfast and started towards Coonoor. This is a city around 20 kms away from Ooty. Ketti valley view point was 5km away. 

It is the world's second largest valley offering stunning panoramic views of nature. They charge an entry fee and have a telescope installed. We were able to see St. Michael's Church which is said to be 150 years old, with the help of the telescope. This church was filmed in famous Bollywood movie Saajan. A railway track is also visible from this point where the song "Chhaiyya chhaiya" was shot. The view was breath-taking with greenery and beautiful landscapes all around. 

At 9:25am, we started towards Madras Regiment Coonoor(MRC) in Wellington. Tourists are allowed to take a tour inside their campus in our own vehicles. They also have a museum which displays their arms & ammunitions. 

As it was Tuesday, the museum was closed. We drove through the entire area looking at the greenery, their homes, the cleanliness of the area before exiting towards Sim's Park. Another beautiful park with flowers and well maintained plants. It also houses . 

My elder one wanted to experience pedal boating, we did that here. The negative with pedal boating - in a 4-seater, we were sitting back to back instead of face to face restricting the pedalling experience to only 2 people. We started towards Lamb's rock at 11:10am. On the way, we stopped at a chocolate factory and had a chance to see the process of chocolate making from the source. 

When it was just 2 kms we were told nothing is visible owing to the fog. We then moved towards a strawberry farm. It was a small farm, allowed visitors inside but we weren't allowed to pick the strawberries. We got flavoured tea from the farm's shop. We then went on towards Dolphin's nose point. The parking was over crowded. The road being narrow, vehicular movement wasn't smooth. Again, the fog had covered this view point as well. The curves & turns are steep here.

 We came across Singara tea estate also known as Mumtaj tea estate. We clicked some pictures there. We then started back to come across Hill View Chocolate factory in Burliar. They also extract oils like Henna oil, eucalyptus oil and Gaultheria oil all extracted from different parts of the same eucalyptus trees. They explained the process of extraction. We saw the boiler and how oil was being extracted. We purchased the required items from there and then proceeded towards our hotel.

While on the way , we passed through the Coonoor railway station. It was 3:10pm.

I took a chance, got down to enquire and got to know the last train to Ooty leaves at 4pm. Tickets were being sold at the ticket counter. The queue was long. I luckily got the last tickets. Husband got the kids to the station. 

The toy train arrived on time, we took out seats and settled down. The train started. Everyone was super excited for the toy train trip. There were breath-taking views from the train. As it was evening, the temperature was dropping too. The windows were open giving an awesome feeling. The train crossed through 4 intermittent stations before reaching Ooty station at 5:15pm. We got down at the station and walked towards the hotel. We packed our bags, loaded some of them in the car and then ordered for coffee. We relaxed for a while , then went for dinner.