Ooty

I was worried at the beginning of our little trip to Ooty because it was pouring cyclone rain again and was worried about the possibilities of a dirt road. Luckily, the rain didn't last long and the road was nicely paved with beautiful scenery and monkeys on the railing waiting for food remnants to be thrown their way. I was fascinated by the exotic trees and mountain shapes out the window, but also very aware of speeding around the hairpin bends recklessly. We drove through a collection of towns called Coonoor, which was my first sighting of these amazing areas. The towns were composed of small houses painted all kinds of vibrant colors, and were nestled in the hills surrounded by agriculture. There were squares and rectangles of every kind of vegetable or tea you could think of, arranged in tiers flowing down the hills. It was quite spectacular to see so many shades of one color ranging from yellow to emerald to sage to brown and everything in between.

Our destination town, Ooty, was more of a city than I expected. It was spread over the tops of a few hills and stretched far far back on muddy potholed roads which of course we explored during our one day stay. The beginning of the winter season here was made very apparent in the high hills, and I almost froze with three layers and a blanket. This is the part where I regret not bringing at least a little fleece. I got a nice sweatshirt with PUMA written all across the chest, as did my little bro, and we became the Puma team (sometimes pronounced peuma). There's not much to tell about the city other than, like Coonoor, it was made of small very colorful houses and was surrounded on all sides by acres and acres of vegetable farms.

The drive back to Coimbatore gets first place for the most terrifying drives of my life. We left just as it was getting dark so we were driving down this windy road in the dark which shouldn't have happened in the first place. The longest stretch of straight road was about fifty feet, and we averaged 30 mph around hairpin bends and all. The oncoming buses and trucks were less of a problem compared to passing them on this road because the entire car had to be on the outer edge of the lane going the opposite direction and just pray that no one would come into that lane before you passed the bus. Everyone in India drives with their brights on at night, and Pa, the driver, had to wear sunglasses in order to reduce the glare. I also was wearing sunglasses and was still blinded by the oncoming bus' brights. The motorcycles were the craziest to be on that road I thought, because they just flew down passing everyone and were hard to see. Indeed, about halfway down we had to come to a sudden complete stop because two of the enormous busses were trying to pass each other on the thin road. Unfortunately the moto behind us didn't stop fast enough. After crashing into our car they ended up in the ditch on the side of the road. I was sure that we would slam into one of the brick walls or fall off the unprotected bridges, but thank God we made it down alive. My right hand made REAAAAL good friends with the "Oh shit" handle. I thought we were cool and daring speeding down Independence Pass at 50 mph, but now that seems like baby stuff. For those of you in the Roaring Fork Valley I guess it would be like the pass but with hairpin bends so close together you can't even hardly straighten your car, half blinded by the brights of buses and cars. All I can say is I'm happy it was a good road. Any potholes and we would have been through the roof in seconds.