Munnar Trip

Finally met Tony (sitting on the right), one of the original offshore team members that I worked with over email. He has since moved on to bigger and better things with a rival company. He came along with Ashwin and I, to go to Munnar, which is about a 3hr drive from where we are staying. We hired the car and a drivefr, it cost about at least 2000 rupees for the whole thing, about $60 for the whole day. It's very convenient to have a driver, they drop you off where you want to go, and go find parking somewhere, and wait for you.

Munnar is a town, that's near a mountain, with plenty of touristy things to see. There is a tea plantation owned by TATA (one of the biggest companies in India, they practically have their name on everything), a big waterfall (very small at this time of year, monsoon hasn't started yet, see left with the boys), speed boating, and some scenic places, which they call "hill stations," basically lookout points at various spots along the mountain.


The TATA tea plantation, it's EVERYWHERE. You see rolling hills covered in pillow-like shrubs, makes the hills look like they're covered in carpet, that you could almost walk all over.

Tea shrubs up close

They utilise cheap human labour, to cut the leaves, where they have special scissors and a bag attached to their wrist, so when they cut the leaves, it drops into the bag. They then carry the filled-up bags into a truck to transport it to the tea factory to be processed.

Carrying the tea bags to the truck

Transporting the tea bags

To be processed in a factory

Rajamalayi National Park is where you can see the natural habitat of Nilgiritahrs, a breed of goat. Their horns appear really sharp, and they have a patch of black on their knees, looking like knee pads. The national park covers 98km square, and we're only allowed to walk 2km square of it. It covers the the peak of the mountain, apparently this mountain is the highest peak in the state. Apparently, there's elephants and tigers, but we only saw the Nilgiritahrs. That was enough for me...

Previously, you could drive from the entrance into the park, but now they have shuttle buses (20rupees each), because last time, someone goat-napped one of the nilgiritahrs and took it home. Alot of indians from neighbouring states come and see these goats, so, alot of ppl come through. They also blocked off parts of the mountain, because someone had committed suicide by jumping off the cliff.

The weather here is much more bearable than back in Kochi, much to my liking. Cooler, fresher, and cleaner air to clear your lungs with. It was probably about 10 degrees cooler.

The end of the road for me, and Ashwin hanging on for dear life below.

This is the 3 of us, I don't think indians know how to take pictures well. You could not tell that the boys were not on the ground.

Nilgiritahrs - a breed of goat only found in this national park

They just roam where they want to, and try not to get too close to the baby, while the mother goat is around

Echo Point

Mattuppetty Dam