Recently I visited ooty (2nd Oct 2008) !! What a mistake...I am not sure why people go to ooty anyway? I went there thinking that its hill station where I can go and relax ....far away from the hustle and bustle of Bangalore city...Well, the only thing thats still true is that it is a hill station...
I drove from Bangalore to ooty. My first mistake. The road is very good till mysore. But from Mysore to Bandipur the road was horrible. Can’t go at a speed of more than 20 KMs. Even though the ghat road was good, but there were lot of construction activities, where they have left big boulders, concrete and sand lying on the mid of the road carelessly through out the ghat section. You have to not only negotiate the traffic but all these things in those narrow winding roads.
I had planned to take the train to coonor, visit Botanical garden, and do boating at the lake. and below was my experience.
I had decided to take the train from ooty to coonor. So I started from my hotel at around 8:30 to catch the 9:15 train. (I was staying at Kings Cliff, which should not take more than 10-15 mins to reach station from there). But the roads were extremely crowded and narrow to handle the ever growing traffic because of the huge number of tourists. We hit a traffic jam because of which we got 15 minutes delayed and reached the station at 9 AM. But by that time the train was completely booked and they had stopped the counter. They don’t even allow to book tickets in advance. So unless you decide to stand in a huge Q for 1 hour before the counter opens, you can forget about taking the train.
Since we didn’t get the ticket, we decided to go to the lake for boating. Well, the place was extremely crowded...And so much of people...but you won’t find a toilet inside the park. There is a toilet outside the park, but you have to pay for it. And more over if you are inside the park and have to go to the toilet, then you will have to purchase the entry ticket again !!
Anyways the lake was also very crowded with no place to relax..even inside the lake...
Then we thought to go and visit the Botanical garden. Again another big mistake..I will not write anything about it but just see the attached photo of the garden....
If you are a nature lover, who is looking forward to relax in a serene and quite environment, then ooty is not the place for you anymore....