Sunday 6th January; 'Ooti' (Udagamandalam)

Of a range of options I have chosen to go with three others for a ride on the famous 'Toy Train'. This is the same train my colleague Nora Lewis at the NT Music School rode to her school in the mountains every new term as a child growing up in south India. Thus the four of us were drive to the station in Ooti where our driver bought us four tickets for the 'plush end' of the train - this being a carriage with 'compartments'.

We had to wait some time before our train arrived and took the opportunity to be 'tourist' photographers. When it arrived the train had half a dozen small carriages pushed by a small diesel engine. if we had chosen to ride the train that evening we would instead have enjoyed the prime mover as a traditional steam loco - for 'New Year's' celebrations.

Nevertheless, this was still quite a delightful treat and we happily joined others in our allocated compartment.

travelling thus by train to Coonoor was a great way to enjoy the surrounding spectacular hill country scenery. The ride to Coonoor, our destination, took almost an hour and a half - Travelling some twenty kilometres. Then the same driver met us at Coonoor to drive us to a tea plantation.

 

Our journey took us in through Chennai (lower east), across to Kochi and Ooti (in line with Chennai to the west), then up to the huge city of Mumbai - population not much less than Australia's. From here we travelled by overnight train to Agra and on by bus to Delhi - our final stop.

Riding on the 'toy train' in the hill country

A rather ingenious piece of technology - a three-wheeled truck!

Last revised: August 09, 2004