Tea County Ktdc Munnar

... enjoying the place. We are alone here most of the time. We walk the wooded roads along a jungle river here. They grow all sorts of spices here. You can see coffee plants, cardamom, pepper and pineapple. Lots of strange insects, and spiders. On one morning walk I came back with a bloody sock. I noticed it after I showered. I think I may have had an encounter with a leech. It's always ...

... beautiful wild flowers, and more tahr. But no other animals. We did, however, encounter many young Keralans and they were quite friendly and eager to practice a little English. As we left the park we sampled some local delights: "Home-Made Chocolate" aka fudge, roasted corn with marsala spices and spiced roasted cashews. While the corn could have been sweeter, the fudge and cashews were very good.

From the park we drove to a tea ...

... high until we reach Sethumadai. Not too much but we analysed for our next trip. Then from there I took incharge for taking in the hairpin bends to our guesthouse.. Thanks to Sreeni for his guidance, now I know how to drive in Ghats section. We reached guesthouse @ 8pm and had some delicious dinner and enjoyed the chillness in the lawn till late night with great discussion of life and travel.

Day3

Wake up early and finished our breakfast @7.30 and winded up @8am from ...

... to Munnar and we'd have to stay until the morning. A little annoying, but no big deal. So, we get an auto-rickshaw to a hotel and pay about 10 times too much because the drivers weren't willing to bargain at all, get to the hotel, which costs about 3 times what we had been paying everywhere else and laid down. The REAL fun came when we, foolishly, decided to venture out for some dinner. Now, we were on a small street with about 6 ...

... created from the sap of palm trees. The sap is extracted and collected by a tapper from the cut flower of the tree. We thought it was going to taste brutal but it was actually an aromatic wine, only mildly intoxicating and quite sweet. I thought i tasted a hint of a Pina Colada with added vinegar tinge and it left a spicy aftertaste. Ravi organised some spiced tapioca (a starchy root) snacks for us. I don't think the blokes who ran the joint were too impressed with us ...

... Pallivasal power project, we took our fair share of snapshots as there was no sight of the ubiquitous signboards proclaiming "Photography Strictly Prohibited". Descending the ghats, the trees became noticeably taller, and we enjoyed several easy walks alongside the forest on downhill stretches. More waterfalls awaited us, the Kallar, Cheeyapara and Vallara falls. They must be even more magnificent when in spate. From Adimaly to Neriamangalam, the road on either side abuts dense ...

... boil some water and drop me in for a couple of minutes to bring me back. Anyways, I'm trying to sort out pics for this one - then you'll see why I called it the Jealous-Maker. Tea-fields are very, very photogenic! Any of you who've used Travelpod - I'm curious to know which browser you use! Mine doesn't seem to work using the manual upload, plus the other one takes forever to download Java, etc...

... back and the plantations and spice gardens are still thriving today. Our first stop was in a small hill station called Kumily, right next door to one of indias largest wildlife reserves, Periyar. We decided to visit the park on a bamboo raft trip, organised by the park wardens. Although we found it pretty tedious at first, our silent, super slow transport payed off when a couple of ...

... for it's schools, so there are lots of children travelling by bus, bike or on foot to school. The cattle and goat herders are also on the move, which slows the bus down because they are quite often in the road! There are hundreds of Hindu temples in every village and along the roadside which are all cleaned in the morning. We are half way through the project and it is surprising how much we have accomplished considering we have only worked 5 mornings! In that time we have ...

... zunächst zu einer der alten Herrscherstätten Indiens, zum Padmanabhapuram-Palast, dem Sitz der Maharadschas von Travancore. Hier wieder einmal beeindruckend zu sehen, wie hoch entwickelt Indien schon zu früheren Zeiten war und welche Techniken es besaß. Wie ein Irrgarten erstreckt sich die Palastanlage über eine enorme Fläche, und ohne Führer hätten wir uns mit Sicherheit glatt verlaufen. Gebäude, die nur der königlichen Familie vorbehalten waren, wechseln sich ab mit großen ...