Driving from Ooty to Kotagiri via Doddabetta

Doddabetta is the highest peak in the whole of Tamil Nadu.  Even though it is part of Ooty attractions, tourists skip this location because of the traffic blocks on the way.  The road to Doddabetta begins from Charring Cross junction in Ooty.  You can move in Stone House Road with St.Antony’s church as a landmark.  Very soon you come across the tea museum where tourists are allowed enter a working tea factory and look at the way tea is being prepared.  They also give you free tea to prompt you to buy the first quality right from the horses’ mouth.  There are seven hair pin bends on the way up with little teashops like ‘Three Bay’ on the way.  The vegetation is mostly beautiful shoal forests.  There is a medicinal park on the Dodda Betta four-road-junction.  The road to the right takes you to Dodda Betta and the second road to the right takes you to Kotagiri Hills.  Three kilometres left takes you to Iduhatti village.  The wood house is also on the left road.  You can also get rooms here at places like The Highland Hotel and the R.J.Inn but they are a little pricier than downtown Ooty. 

After visiting Dodda Betta peak, you can also visit Kotagiri Hills.  The road from Dodda Betta to Kotagiri completes the remaining six hairpin bends down the hill.  You have scaled only one of the seven hairpin bends so far.  You can see a small village called Perar which was adopted Rotary Clubs of Nilagiri district.  The next villages are called Bhagy Nagar and Ambedkar Nagar.  Katta Pettu Junction is the next landmark where there is a cute little Srambia or wooden mosque.  The road on the right takes you back to Ooty and so you have to proceed straight to Kotagiri hills.  The aptly named ‘Byangi’ village is on the way with a special Byangi Post office.  Other villages like Attavala, Orange Pekie, Ora Sholai, Nihung and Pudiyangi dot the landscape.  There are also some international schools in this locality like St.Judes School, Kotagiri Public School and the Riverside school. The Charo Art Gallery and the Pandiraj park are the other landmarks.  There another very scenic village called ‘Krishna Pudur Village’ some five kilometres on the diversion.  You enter Kotagiri town with suburbs like Kannagan Nagar and the view from KPS College Hill is really spectacular.  Kotagiri bus station is a characterless place with little lodges like the Akshaya Lodges and the Akshaya Restaurant.  So don’t stop here, move another one kilometre straight to access better hotels and restaurants.  The bus station is located on a very scenic location with a spectacular view but the tasteless bureaucrats  have built an uglyl bus shelter without windows here completely masking the view.  More beautiful are villages like Donington further two kilometre on the Coimbatore road.  Good accommodation and food is also available in that direction.