Re: Deccan to Nilgiris Road Trip

Again pics straight from the heart!

Re: Deccan to Nilgiris Road Trip

You went to a trip in heaven , very good , If I were you I wouldn't have come back .

Re: Deccan to Nilgiris Road Trip

Day 5

The only thing i wanted to do in this trip other than riding was a train ride...in the famous toy train from ooty to mettupalayam...hence we got tickets booked in advance a day before under tatkal(ive got no idea about reservation of railway tickets but somehow we managed to book them for next day)...the lesson i learnt that day while standing in railway queue is that its nothing less than an achivement to get a railway ticket booked on our desired date...i saw many army jawans struggling to find tickets to their hometowns in rajasthan/delhi/other places from ooty...poor guys had to change 3 trains, travel in wrong directions, had 10-12 hours of waiting period between trains and such, which resulted in wasting atleast 2 days of their vacation for one way travel.....and i thought i had wasted alot of time because of a connecting flight while coming for vacation to india...




we started our day by visitng boat house in ooty, although i prefer avoiding such common tourist places which are crowded but this place had something more to offer..loved the view firstly and then we spotted this


it took me some time to recollect that ive seen this place somewhere before........



then i recollected this scene from maine pyar kiya :P the first movie of my life i had seen in theatre when i was mere 3 years old and ever since then i mustve watched it innumerable times...i do like the 90's touch in that movie and hence it has been one of my all time fav movie.


there was a small but decent dirt track by hercules cycles...we under-estimated the difficulty initially but within 15 secs of starting on the track we realized later that darr ke aage jeet nai hai, darr ke aage sab ki phat jaati hai....



the fruits and vegetables sold over there had a different taste/freshness in them, i dont wanna argue about organic or inorganic but yeah they seemed to be more fresh than what we generally find in cities and also tasted much better.


then we headed to the highest peak in ooty, Dodabetta.. the climb to the peak was quite extreme accompanied by bad roads but thats fun again in its own way, where you are trying to ride through slush without keeping the foot down and the whole vehicle is drifting from back and front...i was trying to ride to more slippery areas and yeah activa can do a wheel spin :P (under certain conditions)

the view of ooty city from dodabetta peak, which is the highest peak of south india(andhra pradesh, karnataka, tamil nadu, kerela and telengana) the place is heavily crowded even in non-seasonal days and i wud still recommend a visit to the place for the views from top



that is view of ooty from 8640 feet above sea level...


and now it was time we leave back for ooty to catch our toy train from ooty to mettupalayam...



Ooty(a.k.a Udagamandalam) railway station.. we parked our bikes here and the parking guy did assure that the parking is haanddeereerrrdduuu parrsseenntttuu saaiiiffuuuu.....that did give us alot of reliieeffuuuu.... the plan was to keep the bikes in ooty, reach mettupualayam and take a taxi back to ooty...

the distance of whole journey was mere 50 kms approx but it took some 4.5 hours to travel...although this was just the descent but we wished we could do this journey while ascending the mountains which took almost 6 hours for those 50kms journey....unfortunately the train starts around 7am from mettupulayam so it was sort of difficult to reach there early morning by taking a taxi there...


the journey of this train is divided in two parts, ooty to conoor(diesel loco) and conoor to metupulayam(steam loco - which we were interested in) hence the jouney from ooty to conoor was nothing exciting but the views in general were amazing....by now we were accustomed to seeing clouds-mountains and amazing views...





we reached coonoor in sometime and then the diesel engine got detached, and came in the steam loco which is a delight to watch and music for ears...just fell in love with the sounds a steam loco makes.. i was not lucky as a child to experience steam locos so for me this was my first experience of a steam loco and i was eagerly looking forward to this.





here she comes, the queen of nilgiris as its called....if you are from I-generation or e-generation then you need to try this once to understand the charm of old school.




that is a honest expression.....




this train made me a child again, i was once again fighting for window seat :P like i used to do in my childhood....i wanted to see that steam coming out of engine, the train crawling through thickk, untouched jungles of nilgiri hills....i would say this train ride is the next best option for trecking a mountain....just sit back, relax and enjoy the views which barely pass because the train never crosses 20kmph ! and this time, slow was goood as i could enjoy those views for longer times !




wish i could have stayed back forver in a place like this.....





iam now tired of typing "awesome and beautiful"




guys if you have not tried this train ride in ooty and still believe youve seen ooty then i assure you that is like directly jumping to last page of a book !




i was just a tourist while this boy lives in ooty and i was jelous of him, as he can enjoy this train ride, those views many number of times ! :/



thats what i was saying about.....the ffeeeling you get when you pass through that steam



the train kept on crawling like a snake through those mountains




the train stopped at some stations to get the tanks filled...with water !



rack railway ! this track uses rack and pinion kind of rails(in center) to provide traction in those gradients.



lots of tunnels and bridges all the way.....and as soon as the train enters a tunnel, people start making noise..sounds stupid but sometimes stupidity is fun...pagalpanti bhi zaroori hai !





the sound of wheels passing over rails and joints echoed everytime we passed through such rocky places and that was the sound was nothing but music




juggad for stabilisation for videos :P




thats what the train has descended just now :s just the sheer size of those mountains made me speechless








finally reached the last stop......




Did someone say they prefer manual ?????? well this is the machine to try then in manual mode :P



well that was Day 5 overview :P
its more easy to ride and explore places than arranging pics, uploading, and posting on internet !

Re: Deccan to Nilgiris Road Trip

Very enjoyable triplog with nice mix of light humour and beautiful accompanying pictures.
(also first time seeing the Telangana registration on a vehicle. Cheers!)

Enjoying it. Thanks for sharing it so nicely.

Ride safe

Re: Deccan to Nilgiris Road Trip

A Ride on an Activa,Awesome!!! Hats off to you for taking Activa to a whole new level So happy to read an Activa cover 2300 kms. Simply Awesome Great pics and write up too.

Re: Deccan to Nilgiris Road Trip

Do try Kalka to Shimla on train during monsoons. You will be equally thrilled by the experience.

Re: Deccan to Nilgiris Road Trip

Day 6

today we wanted to visit few places around ooty...

the places which we had on our list to visit today were lambs rock, dolphins nose and pyakara lake.


rather than me writing about the places, let the pics do the talking.

and our day started with this lovely morning fog


what an Idea sirjee !!!



No idea what this means but saw on a bike in parking, wanted to know what i means :P can anyone help me translate this bikeiffitii



and then we encountered our first tiger of the ride, it was pretty awesome feeling to see wildlife so up close, we felt like idiots for looking tigers in banipur tiger reserve, where as they have moved on from forests to suburbs !




a smalll trek led us to a place called lambs rock, we were now expecting to see some lambs after spotting the tiger in above pic


that is just speeechlllessss view ! by far the best view of my life...i guess the reaction of my friend does explain how it felt to be there ! just fell in love with the place



thats how deep the valley was from where we were sitting...we even concluded that people who commit suicide from here die happily atleast enjoying the view and lush greeenary..




this was the time when even nature didnt allow us to leave from here ! as soon as we reached there it started raining and we found a small shade(umrella like structure usually built at view spots) which was literallly on edge of cliff giving us breathtaking view.... we sat there for 2 hours enjoying the view and waiting for rain to stop(actually we wished the rain never stopped)...this was just amazing where we could see clouds showeing rain on one mountain whereas the other mountain was covered in thick milky clouds and the plains were enjoying sun...magnificent !




this is not just a pic but a dream of childhood for me, of living in clouds....felt like we have achieved what we were in pursuit of ! happiness....


words......out of them


live life, Biker size ! (original line hai boss)




lambs rock another view point....



then we headed to a place called dolphins nose and as sooon as we reached there, we were confused if we have reached the right destination, because we wanted to go dolphins nose but we ended up in a place called paradise ! bikers and bikernis welcome to dolphins nose. by the way thats catherine water falls in backdrop.




thick dennnseee blancket of coulds soon covered the whole place !



p.s : all of these pics are shot from mobile ! and do not praise the pics bcoz it took no effort from my side to shooot them good, the whole credit goes the the one who created these, every thing was so amazingly beautifull that every pic loooked as if the best pic i shot.....


i would love to spend my whole life in this place, leaving my job......


left speechless by the views we headed towards paykara lake which was some 25 kms away from ooty... but the roads were nothing lesser than dream roads(although some streches had lots of potholes but there were some beautifull roads aswell in dense forests)


stoppped by at a small lake on way, dont know what it is called, but this road(towards gudalur) had very interesting names for places...6th mile, 9th mile etc i really loved the names and more than names the views..


aheeemmmmmm....eye opener :P just to make us realise to not to jungles are stilll dangerous places, reliable bikes-cars dont make jungles safe....




the road crwaled through jungle like a snake, and the forest was very dense throug out....


we failed to reach paykara lake within its accesible time of 5:30pm so had to return back but no regrets ! the ride was so awesome that we didnt wanted to stop at alll...but then we came acrooss this place i guess this is 6th mile...



just outside ooty i dont know what this place is called but this was a beautiful place in itself, with horses grazing around and that grass which looked nothing less than a gold course spread for miles and miles.....



just when we had thought that this is the most beautiful view and there can not be any view better than this, comes another view which proves us wrong....




after being out for almost a whole day, treat toh banti hai boss.....



bhookh lage jab dewaarein bhi paapad dikhte, yeh toh phir bhi grilled fish hai !!!! within couple of minutes iska naam o nishaan mitaa diye :P

Re: Deccan to Nilgiris Road Trip

Sahi bole pasha tum.hyderaaaaaadi Biryani sirf Hyderabad mein ich sahi milti...Ab bhook badha diye tum Biryani ka naam leke

Awesome thread buddy wonderful pictures.And totally agree with FZ tire hugger.I own a FZS v2 and at first i thought that the tire hugger is spoiling FZ tyre's stunning look,but as i took my FZ in rain (Kicchaddd paani ) i realised how much this tire hugger is useful ..