Travel from the temple city of Madurai to the mountain town of Kodaikanal, about 120 km, is easiest, and not very expensive, by hired car. The trip takes at least 3 hours, thanks to often heavy traffic and the winding mountain ghat road. Our driver, the excellent Mr. Rahumath, met my daughter and me at our Madurai hotel.
Enroute one passes through several significant country towns, including Vathillagundu, formerly transliterated as Batlagundu. In the 60s the place seemed just a dusty hamlet; now it's a bustling regional center, with regular and serious traffic jams. "No bypass," our driver lamented, and indeed several main roads and the bus station all converge right in the middle of town.
Vathillagundu school kids, like their peers throughout South India, wear uniforms. Girls are always smartly turned out, flowers in hair and cell phones at (or in) hand. These girls' salwar kameez outfits were seldom seen down South in earlier days, but they're everywhere now, North Indian origin notwithstanding.
just before heading up the mountains we like to pause for refreshment at a pleasant eatery, named (a bit non-standardly) for a famous Biblical venue. Note the spelling upgrade (and decor downgrade) sometime between 2008 and 2012. The Tamil characters, by the way, simply transliterate the English name.
Across from the Eden Garden, foothills of the Palni range, which rises above 7500 feets, are visible across a "tank".
Rhesus monkeys are common in South India. Near Chennai we saw one clamber onto a restaurant balcony and dislodge a flower pot. Monkeys hang around the ghat road with its readily gullible travelers and easy tourist-food pickings. Two other monkey species (the Nilgiri langur and the lion-tailed macaque) also occur (but rarely) in the general area.
The ghat road twists and turns and switchbacks, rising about 7000 feet over 30 road miles to Kodaikanal. Here's an almost century-old view.
The present road is paved, but little if any wider, and now bears much, much more traffic.
The cooling air, greening vegetation, and scent of eucalyptus are all delightful, and seriously memory-evoking to one who grew up in these blessed environs.
A famous (but now trash-degraded) tourist spot, Silver Cascade, has been on Kodaikanal tourist postcards for at least 100 years. Here's an old view:
With the present drought, water flow is much attenuated.
Here is our destination. My former boarding schools still exist, very near the iconic Kodai lake --- then mainly picturesque but now an important source of the town's water.
Enroute one passes through several significant country towns, including Vathillagundu, formerly transliterated as Batlagundu. In the 60s the place seemed just a dusty hamlet; now it's a bustling regional center, with regular and serious traffic jams. "No bypass," our driver lamented, and indeed several main roads and the bus station all converge right in the middle of town.
Vathillagundu school kids, like their peers throughout South India, wear uniforms. Girls are always smartly turned out, flowers in hair and cell phones at (or in) hand. These girls' salwar kameez outfits were seldom seen down South in earlier days, but they're everywhere now, North Indian origin notwithstanding.
just before heading up the mountains we like to pause for refreshment at a pleasant eatery, named (a bit non-standardly) for a famous Biblical venue. Note the spelling upgrade (and decor downgrade) sometime between 2008 and 2012. The Tamil characters, by the way, simply transliterate the English name.
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| Eaden Garden, 2008 |
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| Eden Garden, 2012 |
Rhesus monkeys are common in South India. Near Chennai we saw one clamber onto a restaurant balcony and dislodge a flower pot. Monkeys hang around the ghat road with its readily gullible travelers and easy tourist-food pickings. Two other monkey species (the Nilgiri langur and the lion-tailed macaque) also occur (but rarely) in the general area.
The ghat road twists and turns and switchbacks, rising about 7000 feet over 30 road miles to Kodaikanal. Here's an almost century-old view.
The present road is paved, but little if any wider, and now bears much, much more traffic.
The cooling air, greening vegetation, and scent of eucalyptus are all delightful, and seriously memory-evoking to one who grew up in these blessed environs.
A famous (but now trash-degraded) tourist spot, Silver Cascade, has been on Kodaikanal tourist postcards for at least 100 years. Here's an old view:
Here is our destination. My former boarding schools still exist, very near the iconic Kodai lake --- then mainly picturesque but now an important source of the town's water.
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