here the link to the photo album
The bus reached Munnar at about 11am, and my friends awaited me at the bus stop. After leaving my stuff in our hotel room, we went for the first thing to do in Kerala: having a nice meal of beef fry! Strengthened we took an auto-riksha to get to the top station. The ride took about 40 min and lifted us another few hundred meters to about 1900 meters above sea level. Since it was still monsoon season, we could not benefit of a great view, but rather had the nice experience to stand in a cloud. On the way down, it should become better. The sun broke through the clouds and we could enjoy the beauty of nature. The place is known for its tea fields and I never saw before such fields. With these paddies of green. the hills looked fluffy like sofas. Times on time, we saw little group of women working in the fields, cutting away certain parts of the tea plant. They used a great tool for it: hedge clippers with a box connected to one of the blades in which the tea leaves fall after cutting.
Sometimes, we saw a cow walking along on the street, and I was amazed to see how well fed they looked and how much they reminded me of black-white cows from northern Germany (Bunte Kühe). And sometimes, we had the luck to get across an ice cream vendor, who drove down the same road and brought cold, sweet relief to the field workers and to one of us as :-)
Towards the evening, the clouds became denser and darker, and it started to rain. We got out our rain gear and continued our track, but when we found a little hut, we were happy about the dry shelter. The rain intensified and did not show any sign to get over soon. the hut was a little tea stall where a few villagers sat and waited also for the end of the rain. We decided then to have a chai - without milk- and which was delicious. After the first round of tea, we also tried omelette, which was prepared on a stove heated by wood fire, and which tasted very good. This break was a really nice experience with the special ambiance of the dark hut, the smell of burning wood and fresh tea.
When the rain lost intensity, after about 40 min, we decided to continue our trip. The plan was to reach a place where buses leave towards Munnar, and which should be 5 km away. Well, the information about the distance to the bus stop was very optimistic. We walked and walked, soon again in heavy rain, and the bus stop came never into sight. And on top of it night started and we had to continue in the dark. Finally, we saw a little check post belonging to the forest rangers, and it was a big relief to find some rangers on duty there. They were very kind to us and explained to our surprise that there are no buses anymore. They told us that it is not so safe to walk around after 5.30pm (when it becomes dark), because of the danger of wild elephants and other animals - oups. To our luck, there were a few shops close to the check point, and the rangers arranged for us that we could get a ride in the jeep of a shop keeper who was about to leave towards Munnar. Like that we had also a great ride in a Mahindra jeep through heavy rain and reached at 8 pm Munnar. Reached there, we changed our clothes and went out for dinner. We found a street restaurant consisting of a set of 20 tables and three different cooking stations. The beef fry, parathas and curry tasted specially well after all the efforts. And as a cherry on the cake, we tasted a coffee prepared with ginger. A very refreshing taste experience.
The next morning, I first discovered the city Munnar and walked around through the streets, tasted some nice tea and enjoyed the morning sun. I met the others for lunch and we headed out for another little track - our bus would be in the afternoon. We went downhill and found after some while a nice path into the tea-hills. It was a nice walk, and it was surprising to see landscapes similar to hilly regions e.g. in Germany. There were rich green fields, happy cows and little nice houses.
But soon after we started to walk up the tea hills, the sky became darker and it seemed that it would rain soon. With regards to our bus trip back to Bangalore in the late afternoon we turned around and went back to the main road. From there, we took an auto-riksha back, and shortly after the rain started to pour down again. We have spent the remaining hours in Munnar in a cafe and with shopping local specialties: tea, chocolate and spices.
Well rested, we entered the bus back home and had a furious ride down the hill. sitting in the back row, we felt every bump of the streets with amplified intensity, which made us jump up the seats several times. In addition there were the dark clouds, sometimes lightnings broke through and it became dark. This was great fun. After two hours of this crazy ride, we reached the highway and had a night break, where we could calm our souls with a hot chai. The rest of the ride was quite smooth and we reached Bangalore at 6 am. Just right to start a new week of exciting science....
