While in Kochi, we stopped by a travel office to find a place to stay during our next stop, the Hill Station of Munnar. We met a nice man, Mr. Johnson who told us of a nice place we should consider. He just so happened to own the place, coincidently. I’ve seen this a lot in India, but have never been burnt.
We made the necessary arrangements and headed off the next morning early for the drive to Munnar. It was not far, around 150km and the drive was very scenic heading up into the Western Ghats mountain range. On the way, we passed a wedding procession complete with Elephant. Everyone was in high spirits of course!
Although the weather was nice down near the coast that time of year, there was a noticeable difference once we got up into the mountains. Passing through tall forests of tropical, then subtropical trees, Eucalyptus growing taller and taller and the plant life growing more different the higher up we went, the temperature changed also.
Stunning waterfall along the route
Then everything really changed. We came around a sharp curve and there were tea fields as far as the eye can see. On every hillside and valley. Only spots of huge boulders and some patches of trees to break up the uniformity of it all. Absolutely stunning!
Our driver Chandra, while being very nice, seemed to be lost most of the time, which I thought was humorous, my wife and her Aunt and Uncle, not so much. To me, it just adds to the adventure. Besides, I’m here to tell my tale, so we were not really lost, right? We missed our turn off only to find ourselves in the Hill Station of Munnar proper. We headed back down the road a couple of miles and finally found our turn off. We knew we’d have time in town later.
The road to the house was just a tea field service road really, only wide enough for the van, tea plants passed by slowly at mid-van level. A few small women with cloth sacks supported by their foreheads picked the remaining new leaves from the tops of the bushes along the hillside, the preferred leaves are the newest, youngest ones.
Our rental house in Munnar
Our rental house was set amongst some small houses owned or rented by the tea field workers, probably numbering a dozen or so. Our house was very nice, three stories and we were greeted by a plump smiling man by the name of Dahs, who would see to it that I was well fed during our stay.
Smiling Dahs was quite the cook!
Massive boulders pose no problem with planting tea fields
Nice bridge on the way to Munnar
I’ll continue our stay in Munnar in the next installment! Stay tuned!
Copyright 2019 Michael Roseberry. Photos were taken with Canon Powershot SD750.
Check back for more images and stories of Incredible India!
Indus Revisited 