3 Day Trip to Ooty

This is a couple trip to Ooty - a beautiful hill station in the state of Tamil Nadu, that we did from Jan 22nd -Jan 26th, 2016.

Suggested Itinerary:

Day 1: Ooty Lake, Botanical Gardens & Toy Train Ride
Day 2: Pykara Falls, Pykara Lake(With Boating) and Lovers Point (Other points on the way to Pykara)
Day 3: Shopping and Return trip

Cost of Trip

All amounts mentioned below are in Indian Rupee(INR), for 2 Pax

Bus from Bangalore to Ooty - Round trip 2 pax - 2500Rs

Hotel for 2 days, 2 pax - 5100Rs

Food and Sight-seeing - 5000

Total - 12,600Rs

Trip in Detail:
We took the bus from Bangalore to Ooty. We took the Karnataka state RTC Luxury Volvo - Airavat to travel down to Ooty. While the trip was quite comfortable, it took us 10 hours to cover a distance of 250Kms. We reached Ooty bus stand at 8PM. We had pre-booked our stay in Space4hill resorts in Governor Shola Road(Link to property is here. I've mixed reviews for the place. The property is pretty scenic and has a rustic vibe to it, but the food was pathetic. The complimentary breakfast buffet was the worst, and anything we ordered in their menu was in-edible practically. 

But then, I liked the cottage layout of the property, the tree like wooden benches and the location was quite strategic - just a km away from the erstwhile Ooty lake. We arrived at around 9 pm and after a quick dinner, called it an early night.

The cottage like layout of the resort in the background

The next day was quite an eventful one. We had our breakfast at the resort and started for Ooty lake. The weather was at its best - sunny yet chilling! Looked up google maps and walked down to the lake. Had some great  boating fun!! Some glimpses:

We were done with boat riding and sight seeing by around 12. Me and my husband are great walkers and the weather was also quite conducive. We decided to walk down till the bus stand and try our luck with the Toy Train ride. The walk to the station was around 3 kms. Had great pics clicked on the way. At the station, tickets for the 2PM train were sold out which meant we couldn't take the ride that day. We grabbed quick lunch there and looked up the distance to Ooty botanical gardens. Rejuvenated post lunch, we walked another 3 more kms and reached up the botanical gardens by around 3pm. We had great Cardamom tea and bought some Eucalyptus oil on the way. Some shots in the garden -

At the Botanical Garden

On our way back from Botanical gardens, we happened to come across a movie theatre - Assembly Rooms. Now with the toy train not happening and with nothing else in mind, we inquired the timings and tickets and to our surprise, there was a show of "Airlift" at 6PM. It was around 5PM then. We bought tickets for the balcony seats and you will not believe the price of the tickets - 30Rs each!! It was thrilling to watch a movie in Ooty for 30 bucks and we had nothing to complain about!! We grabbed dinner at a subway near the theatre and took a rickshaw back to the resort. Lake, botanical garden and movie ticked off our list!!

Day 2 was even more eventful and fun filled! We started the day having our breakfast at the resort and took a rick to go to the station for the toy train ride. On reaching the station we got to know that we were again late and the tickets were sold out. Sharing the Toy train time table for tourists like us who can plan in advance:

However, we were determined to board the toy train having come so far. We took a bus to Coonoor from the nearby bus stand and decided to come back from Coonoor to Ooty in the toy train! Our plan worked and we  were able to get first class tickets from Coonoor to Ooty! Some glimpses from the wonderful joy ride:

Post the joy ride, we grabbed quick lunch. Now the biggest item on our bucket list was not ticked yet - The Pykara falls and the Pykara lake. We were still wondering how to go about it and came across a bike renting shop. We looked up the distance on Google Maps and saw that it was 25kms from our current location. We rented a bike and started at around 2PM from Ooty to Pykara lake. It was the best decision ever. The Pykara waterfalls is definitely the Shining Jewel in the Ooty Crown. On the way to Pykara falls was Lover's point. We stopped there, clicked some quick pics and got going. We reached Pykara lake at around 4PM. Got into the boating quickly as it was closing by 5PM. 

The best part of the Pykara lake was that immediately after our boating, it started raining. The weather became more lovely and we couldn't have asked for more. We had some hot tea and Mirchi Pakodas at the canteen and enjoyed the rain. It was just sufficient enough to wet the roads but not enough to delay our ride to the waterfalls!

Then came the climax - The Pykara waterfalls - beautiful falls making you wonder whether its water falling or milk falling!

The waterfalls close by 5.30PM. We were in time for all the places that we planned and rode back to Ooty by 7PM. We had our bus booked for the next day morning but had the night to look around. We looked up for places to eat and "Earl's secret" caught our fancy. This is a great restaurant on a small hill. The ride was quite bumpy and there were no lights to help us navigate but the destination was worth all the pains! It had great ambience with very courteous staff and the food was simply lovely! For lack of better pics, uploading the ones taken from our phones - must visit place in Ooty (Their menu had an interesting story on why the place was called the Earl's secret! Visit it to know the secret!!). Link to reviews on this restaurant here.

We took an auto-rickshaw back to our resort after the sumptuous dinner. Had a good night's sleep, checked out from the resort next day morning and returned the bike. Had a great trip back to Bangalore! In hindsight, we were blessed with very very good weather! It was the best time to visit, and I'm glad we stretched ourselves and walked quite a bit!