Coorg - The scotland of India

Dear all,
Referring to my previous thread in Travel section about a trip to Coorg and managing 2.5 years old, here I am back with lot of details and great and sweet memories !!!
The main aim of this trip is just to be away from Home!! True, we wanted to spend time in Nature.Even we feel that we just wanted to clearoff vacuum happened over a period of time between us, and we needed some space too.
We havebeen thinking for a longtime to go anywhere and break this entire mechanical schedules and life. So, thats how it happened!!

Within no time, a flash came to our mind is none other than COORG!!! which is infamous for Coffee plantations. Sorry for a longest Post!!!

Our bookings were:
- Train from Hyderabad to Bangalore
-Bus from Bangalore to Madikeri
-Resort booking in Coorg
-Return from Madiker to Bangalore
-Flight from Bangalore to Hyderabad

Yes, we took train from Hyderabad to Bangalore on friday night and it was a firstclass A/C coach, which I wanted for a long time to travel...hehee!! True!!! the journey was a bit long but not hectic, it went well. As you know my son is too naughty and just ran in the train here and there....so, time started for us to run behind him and just prayed the God not to trouble us much.
We reached bangalore on Saturday and took Hotel Mayura near to Majestic as we wanted to meet our friends,look after our house, and have good food.
Yes, First we start from hotel to Indira nagar, and had good lunch @ none other than NANDINI. From there, we went to our sweet home and spent some time there as it was vacant for one day gap and got occupied on another day. From there, we met our friends in Total mall on Airport road which is just 5 mins walk from our house.....had a good time!!!The mall is just awesome.
From there we went back to Hotel to get ready for our exotic trip which is the main agenda. As we were quite heavy didn't had any food on night except some llight fruits and took couple of hours rest at hotel. Our AIRAVAT (buses in Karnataka), was scheduled at 11:10 PM to madikeri and it was chilling outside....so took an auto from hotel to majestic with all our luggage and unfortunately bus was delayed for 30 mins. Meantime I was observing everybody who is wating for the bus, 90% of the couples are newly wed and 9% are just married for few months and 1% are with kids....hehe, its WE only!!!
AIRAVAT is really a big bus, lavish and luxurious......boarded th bus at 11:45 PM, and soon after getting we entered to sleeping session!By morning 5:30AM we reached Madikeri/Meracara bus station which we got down. There was a cab waiting for us and Mr.Rajan(driver) came to pickus up to take to Orange County resort, which is worth for every penny, we reached there early in the morning 6:20, its around 30Km from Madikeri. All the resorts are min 30 Kms from Madikeri, may be we would have booked for Virajpet/Sidhapur. It has lot of child play area, and lot of greenery everywhere with nice surroundings.
As soon as we reach there, we got our suit which is pretty lavish and we just needed a blanket and nothing else instantly as it was toomuch chilling and drizzling.
Drizzling hadbeen a part of Coorg people's life may be, beacuse daily we can enjoy drizzling for sometime.

We got good COFFEE to our room immediately, hmmm....it was Awesome, Coorg is famous for its COFFEE. Truely, I was not a coffee lover and hate it aswell. But I really enjoyed coffee in Coorg and just consumed much in my 3 day trip......because its just mindblowing.
We thought it may rain heavily and to our surprise, SUN came out to give us a warm hug!
After a mouthwatering breakfast, we went for sightseeing and followed by a good karnatic lunch. We travelled around 80KM on that day(TO & FRO)
From our resort, we went to Dubare Forest, which is famous for Elephants and boating and Rafting.
But there was no much elephants, only we were able to see a couple of Elephants.
We went in a crocale boat from one end to other and it was a good experience. We didnt' had Rafting as I had to carry my kid aswell.
From ther we moved to one great place called Buddha at Tibetan Monastery , it was just amazing. The second largest Tibetan settlement outside Tibet, complete with a Tibetan monastery with 7,000 monks, a Tibetan village and a flea market. I can't tell in words. It was a Buddha temple, not so old, build by Dalai Lama. The real beauty of the temple is three big golden statues of Buddha and his disciples, and culture of buddist monks, the puja. The jackfruits are so sweet there and we consumed 3 packs of it.
Moving towards NIsargadhama, we had our lunch in nearby hotel Kwality(not big) but dosas are too good at kushal Nagar, which is a 25 acre island formed by river Kaveri with bamboos, teak, sandalwood trees streams and wild life covering it. There was a Hanging bridge to cross the river, it was fun crossing Kaveri river!!! We missed Talakaveri and abbey falls as we got information that its raining heavily there.

So, we were exhausted with journeys and back to resort and took rest there. We got our dinner ready by 9PM, hmm...hot delicious rotis(dont know how they prepared there only two layers),biriyani with mix veg curry,cabbage fry and rasagulla. We took rest on that day and next day we planned to visit rest of the places and not to go toofar as its rainy too and as we need to depart next day.
So, by 11 AM, we had a walk through coffee planations, cardmom trees,orange plantaions and by lunch time we started for sightseeing in Madikeri. Had our lunch in Hotel Athidhi. This place is good for non vegetarians I believe. Very few PURE VEG hotels we found. We went to Omkareswara Temple, but it was closed as we went in OFF timings. It was a big temple constructed in 1824. This has both Islamic and Gothic style of architecture. There is a tank in front of the temple. There is a footpath leading to a small "Mantap". The walls of temple are decorated with intriguing paintings, including Sai Baba and Raghvendra Swamy. A huge tank situated opposite the temple is populated largely by fishes; devotees are allowed to feed them. According to the legends, the Shiva Lingam worshipped in the temple has been imported from Varanasi.

Rajas seat is popular coorg attraction. We went there sometime around 4 PM there but as it was too cloudy in Coorg, we havent' seen anything in raja's seat and we feel that we are in CLOUDS. This garden spot was apparently a favorite of the Kings of Kodagu. If you want peace and quiet there, it's best to go in the morning. Just opp to the park, there was a mini train which we can raid on it inside of the park, so it was fun again getting into mini train.

As it was raining, we wanted to go to resort ASAP as it will tough for us to carry kid in rain. Throughout our trip, Mr. Rajan(Cab driver) was there with us to take us from one place to other. Next day morning we took bus back to bangalore and it was around 5 and half hours journey. As the bus came through Mysore,sriranga patnam,Mandya,Ramnagar,Bidadi...so have seen all these places from bus. Bidadi is infamous for Nityananda swami, Mysore places,mandya sugar city,Ramnagar silk city etc etc.....We watched 3 kannada movies too in bus.......hehe, as we know kannada, really enjoyed watching them........Krishna,Mungaru malai and Chellata....all starring GANESH.

Things to get from Coorg: Honey,Spices,Coffee powder
Places to visit : Dubare,Tibetan moestary,Nisargadhama,Tala cauvery,rajaseat,a walkthrough coffee plantations, Omkareshwara Temple.
If you are taking kids: Take some instant fods,biscuits, cheppals,sweaters,umbrella,socks and caps,full cotton and woolen clothes, generic medicines like vicks, halls,cough & cold syrup etc....Because getting a doctor is also really difficult near by.

We got down in bangalore around 1 AM at majestic and went to have our lunch at Kamat hotel which is just opposite to busstand. Ofcourse we locked our luggage in Clock room. From Kamat, we went to KSIC showroom to buy a Mysore silk saree...and somemore shopping for good jerkin for my kid and some roadside shoping too...hehe!!!
From there, a cab came to pickus up to Yelahanka international Airport which is almost 1 hour 25 mins from Majestic......The airport was just astonishing and did somemore shopping there....I really enjoy shopping in Airports. We boarded the flight at 7:10 and reached Hyderabad International airport by 8 PM and home by 9 PM. Mom was ready with our dinner and had it and just went to sleep and today I am really reacharged with lot of enthu to come back to office

Cherry really enjoyed this whole trip and well planning is really required if you are going with family and wanted to make it as a sweet memory. This is a much romatic place for newly weds, sight seeing place for middleaged people, beautiful picturesque for nature lovers, Excellent coffee place for coffee lovers, pilgrim place for old people.
So, this is blend for everybody and no doubt, COORG is a scotland of India.

 

Sweety dear,
Go ahead and plan it!!! But we went in off season, the season time is Nov-March.
Yes we went for a short period.....2 Nights and 3 days at Coorg and one day in bangalore.
We started on friday night and came back tuesday night. I haven't calculated the prices....but the cottage was on a coastly side....I think you can check for cottage prices from google, because we can get good budget hotels/homestays/resorts too.....for rest of budget details..have to check with my DH, my estimation is beyond 60K for entire trip.........well plan in advance so that we can get airfares pretty cheap.
Let me know if you have any further queries, so if you both, it will be 60-70K.
Coming to rafting, the area is less for rafting......but I think its adventurous and ppl really enjoy it. They provide rafting jackets aswell, I couldn't do this because of my son.