Ooty

We are now in a town established by the Brits as a vacation hill station. The Brits are long gone and the Indians have remodeled into their kind of hyper-gritty manic paradises.

We left Kochin on a train. We rode in a mid grade car. It was substantially better than riding a cattle car. I think, as I have not ridden in a cattle car, but feel confident in saying so. It traveled in a tropical area of forests, rice paddys, banana farms, and many more gritty towns. We transferred to a van in a town I don't recall. From there we headed for the hills. The sky was cloudy and obscured the tops of some fantastically rugged mountains. The ride was harrowing. Indians are literally all over the road. Flashing lights and blaring horns seem to make it all ok. Many times we were on the wrong side (the right) passing every kind of vehicle from ox cart to bicycle to motorbike to trucks to busses. At one point I looked up to see a large bus heading straight at us and no where for it to pull over. It flashed its lights and honked, but we had no where to go either. Neither driver was willing to concede an inch. Everyone in our van was gasping "Oh my god!" At the last second the bus careened back into its own lane. It listed and toppled over right onto us. We all died instantly. Actually, it listed, but did not fall over. Fooled you, didn't I? Ha Ha Ha. I am getting an Indian sense of humor.

That was not the end of it. There were 2 1/2 more hours of this to go and it got better. The road narrowed and started to climb a serious grade. It was very narrow, often with room for only one lane. That did not slow anyone down much. With enough blaring of the horn you can do anything. It was very hard to believe any place could have so much traffic - busses, cars, trucks - endless streams of them going up and down the narrow hairpin turns. Adding to the interest was a rather constant rain and frequent pea soup fogs. The mountainsides were covered in dense cloud forest. Monkeys sat along the roadside watching traffic go by. At last we arrived at our hotel about an hour past dark.

Our hotel is the Ratan Tata Officers Resort, or something like that. It is an old British officer's retreat. It is a prize antique building that does not look like it has had many improvements, or maintenance since the Brits left in 1949. There is no heat and it is cold here. When we arrived it was raining and we were rather fed up with the road so did not leave for dinner. Instead we washed out dirty clothing in buckets in the bathroom. That was rewarding because the clothing was crusted from the train ride and splashing through most forms of stinky road debris that are common in India.

This morning we arose to a partly cloudy blue sky. Nice! We walked around the grounds of the hotel and admired the view which included a large pile of rubbish left by decades of cleaning up after hotel guests. I read that this town used to be very charming. That most certainly could be true.

We then headed to the train station for the scenic hour long ride along scenic hillsides above farms and villages to where we would visit a tea farm and factory. It was very nice in how it was described. We missed most, or maybe all of the views due to very thick fog and rain. There were some nice breaths of fresh mountain air when the black diesel smoke went away from the train.

The tea farm was interesting. We saw how Indian tea is grown and prepared for sale. We found out how guests are given small samples of the tea as it goes through the many processes and how after sticking your tongue into it for a taste you must not waste the surplus and so toss it back into the bin you took it from. Now you know why tea is boiled before use. It just tastes better that way.

The van took us all back to Ooty proper. It was still raining off and on. The weather was very much like a Portland spring with cool temperature, fog, and rain. It was a lot like home. The English women thought so, too.

This afternoon we had a very good lunch of Indian food which is one of the local specialties. 7 of us shared a table. We had about 10 people serving us. This may have been due to the Brits with us, or the great expense we were undertaking with about $4 per person on the bill.

After lunch Susan and I took off looking for an Indian tunic for her. She had found one she liked in Kochin, but wanted another one. We could not find a ready made to fit so one shop sold her the fabric to have two custom tailored for her. The silk fabric was about $10 and the tailoring about $2. The whole job will be done in about 1 1/2 hours. I have never had a tailor made anything. It must be nice.

Now we are both writing email to you from one of the fairly rare internet shops. We tried to do so earlier, but every one of them had lost their net connection. The computer I am using is difficult. It is obviously very virus infested and their effects are intrusive every minute or so.

Tomorrow we head out of Ooty. The destination is Masinaguti
National Park where we will have a day safari. I doubt there will be any internet there so the next contact will be a day or two later from Mysore, a city near Bangalore.

Some of you may be questioning our sanity taking a vacation like this. It is a reasonable question I have asked myself, too. No matter, it is not boring. That is for sure.

Namaste.
--
Michael & Susan Kuhn
Trip email: indiaadventure2007@gmail.com
Trip blog: www.indiaadventure2007.blogspot.com