Friday, June 18, 2010

Kerala Trip Part 7 - Rajamalai, Munnar & then back home


Day 6 (contd)

The first (and the last) stop was Rajamalai wild life sanctuary. The mountain covered with green grasslands is a sight to behold. A spectacular sight !
This park was established to protect the endangered Tahr (rare mountain goat). And also  famous for the unique species of flower, Neelakurinji, that blooms once in 12 years.

The buses from the base take you only up to a certain point. And from there on, we need to walk up the hill for a couple of kilo meters before one can sight a Tahr. But Tahr, or no Tahr, the walk up the hill is fantastic and a real paradise :) Beautiful environment and the park surroundings were clean as well. I was very impressed with the maintenance of the park. No littering and no plastics. It was a welcome change :)

All these are shots from various vantage points from the hike !









And the Tahr...





We saw 2 of them actually, but at different spots










And then, it was time to return to Chennai. Our flight to Chennai was at 8:00PM from Coimbatore and we had ample time to reach Coimbatore from Munnar. The route again was scenic and here are some of the scenes! The only stop was for lunch at Udumalpet!















 

And Jillu again experimenting with her favorite new hat, albeit inside the car :). We had fun during the long drive : singing all her rhymes, songs, idle chit chat, games and what not:)



And then, it was time to board the plane and return to Chennai. 

She had to do it ! Didn't let us touch the cart :)
I shall leave you with this image of the little cart pusher at the airport.

5 comments:

Swaram said...

The cart-pusher is very very cute :)

U got to see the tahr .. thatz nice :)
We dint :( :(

Anuradha Shankar said...

the thar was one thing we missed on our trip, considering that we gave the park a miss... it was just too crowded.. happened to be the xmas weekend!
and jillu looks really cute in that pretty hat and dress..... and samhith insists on pushing the cart too... unless of course, he is in the mood to ride in it!!!!

Lavanya Sriram said...

Swar : Some one else also said they didn't get to see the Tahr. I guess we were lucky

Anu, they are so fascinated by the cart na ? but in Jillu's case, the cart was too heavy for her and she still wanted to push !

SG said...

I read your letter to your MIL. It is sooooo nice.

Lavanya Sriram said...

SG, welcome to my space. Thanks for delurking and thank you for the compliment!