Travel in Ooty

Ooty sits at about 2,240 metres in the Nilgiri hills of Tamil Nadu, and one tour in our India programme goes there. That number matters before you read any further. Of our fifteen India itineraries, only The diversity of South India includes Ooty, and it gives the hill station two nights in the middle of a 25-day route. This is a page about a stopover, not a stay. If what you want is a week in the Nilgiris, we are not the operator for it, and a Tamil Nadu specialist will build you a better trip.

Here is what actually happens. Night thirteen is in Coimbatore, the textile city at the foot of the range, with a visit to the Marudhamalai Murugan Temple on its hill outside town. On day 14 you go up by the Nilgiri Mountain Railway, the toy train, India's only rack railway, climbing through tea country at walking pace. That ride is the day. There is no sightseeing programme attached to it, and the itinerary does not name the boarding station, so ask us to confirm which section you ride before you pay a deposit. You arrive in Ooty and check in at the Fortune Resort Sullivan Court, named after John Sullivan, the British collector who opened the place up in the 1820s. Two nights, deluxe room in the standard quote.

Day 15 is the only full day. It is a gentle walk through the country around the hill station, mostly tea and spice plantations, past the stone houses and churches that make the Nilgiris look like the Scottish Highlands moved to the tropics. The afternoon is written as free time, not as a programme. On day 16 you drive on to Mysore.

Now the part that costs us bookings and saves us complaints. The Ooty in the photographs is not in this itinerary. The Government Botanical Garden is not in it. Doddabetta Peak, the highest point in the Nilgiris, is not in it. Ooty Lake and its boats are not in it. Neither is the Rose Garden, a tea factory visit, or anything in Coonoor: not Sim's Park, not Dolphin's Nose, not Lamb's Rock. Nor is a wildlife safari. The road down to Mysore crosses country that holds tiger reserves, but no game drive is booked and no park entry is included. Every trip we sell is private and built to order, so any of this can be added before you book. What we will not do is let you arrive expecting it because a search result showed you a photograph of the botanical garden.

The rest of the tour is what you are really buying, and it is a long one: 25 days from Chennai to Goa, from EUR 2,860. The shore temples at Mahabalipuram, the French quarter in Pondicherry, the Chola temples at Kumbakonam and Thanjavur, the Meenakshi temple at Madurai and its evening ceremony, a boat on Periyar Lake and a spice plantation at Thekkady, a night on a Kerala houseboat out of Alleppey, a beach lunch at Marari, Fort Kochi and a Kathakali performance. Then Ooty. Then Mysore Palace, the Jain colossus at Shravanabelagola up more than 600 steps, the Hoysala carving at Belur and Halebid, the ruins of Hampi, the cave temples of Badami, and four nights on a Goa beach at the end with no vehicle and no guide. Ooty is where the tour catches its breath between the plains and Karnataka.

It is a private trip. A German-speaking guide travels with you, there is 24-hour contact throughout, and it runs on dates you choose, because we have no group departures. International flights are not included. Rooms come as Standard, Deluxe, Superior and Executive; there is no five-star or luxury tier anywhere in our programme, and the Ooty hotel is a comfortable resort rather than a heritage property. If a hill station and a mountain railway are the real reason for the trip, and 25 days in the south is more than you want, the other option is Colourful Rajasthan and Himalayas: 12 days, from EUR 1,910, which stays in Darjeeling and puts you on its narrow-gauge line up to Ghoom.