Category: Around India

After living in Chennai for eleven hot months, the thought of crisp air and sweaters seemed like a faraway dream.  So we could hardly believe it when after a short plane ride to Coimbatore, followed by a 3 hour car ride to Coonoor, we stepped out into cool mountain weather.  In June, on the heels of the hottest month in south India, no less.  As much as the gloriously cool weather stood in contrast with Chennai, so did the soft and lush environment  For the entire trip colorful flowers and expansive greenscapes surrounded us.

Shortly after arriving in Chennai our first driver told us that this part of the Nilgiris was popular with the British community because it reminded them of home.  After visiting the amazing manicured Botanical Garden in nearby Ooty and relaxing into the cool air I could see why.  We also saw endless tea plantations and visited a fascinating tea museum.  Most of all, I enjoyed the mountain scenery and the weather.

We took this trip when my sister and niece were visiting India from Texas and all had a good time.  We stayed at the Wallwood Garden, a heritage hotel in Coonoor run by the Neemrana group situated amidst its own beautiful gardens.  The property was originally constructed as a home in the 1800s.  Our spacious Cherry Blossom suite overflowed with character and its furniture and decor reflected the building’s history.  A well-tended courtyard full of flowers sat right outside our room and provided great space for the children to play, and for us to enjoy coffee and other refreshments.

 

A gazebo sat just down the hill, and beyond that, the Pomological Gardens.

We had breakfast and dinner at the Wallwood each day.  Breakfast included fresh fruit and juice, a sample of south Indian fare, eggs to order along with other staples, all quite good.

The staff admirably tried to accommodate all of our tastes at dinner.  Dinner in the common area was enjoyable and we appreciated the friendly and diligent service, including the extra and successful effort made to procure some local wine one night.  The food itself was not a highlight of our trip but that was more than made up for by the many other sensory delights of this place.

Nilgiri Mountain Railway

Riding the Nilgiri Mountain Railway, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, topped our agenda on this trip.  The British built the railway in 1908.  It ascends the steep mountain to Coonoor using a rack and pinion (gear) system.  We took the ride from Coonoor to Ooty which continues upward but not as steep.  We thought we wanted first class seats but ended up having a great time up close and personal with fellow passengers on the back bench of a standard fare car.  Having since ridden the Shimla railway, we decided we enjoyed this one much more.

Along the way we saw beautiful green tea and rice fields, and towering peaks and expansive green valleys.  Not mountains that rise straight into the sky like the Wasatch or Rockies, these were more rolling high hills and green all the way to the top (Coonoor itself sits just over a mile above sea level).  And we met lots of nice fellow passengers.

Everyone cheered when we went through the tunnels.  It was a fun ride.   When we got to Ooty we were pretty hungry, but decided to walk through the Botanical Gardens before lunch.

We found a woman roasting corn right outside the gates, unfortunately it looked much better than it tasted.  Worth a try, though, and we had very friendly service.   To the left of the big bowl of cooked corn is a hollow-bottom bowl sitting over a bed of coals, where she put the corn after we ordered, then turned the hand-cranked blower on the right to heat up the coals, and there you have it – made to order roasted corn.  A pretty good setup.

It rained lightly on and off during our walk through the garden, which added to the atmosphere, until it really started to pour at the end.

The Garden has a fossilized tree trunk estimated to be 20 million (!) years old.

After the Gardens we had lunch then went to a tea museum and factory.  We watched the tea making process, beginning with the raw harvested leaves to the final product sealed in a bag destined for sale.  I learned a lot about tea.  I even got very excited about tea.  But hard as a try I remain firmly a coffee person.

We sampled some tea and left with lots of tea: white tea, cardamom tea, tea types I had never heard of.  Almost a year later we are still drinking it.  Then we stopped at the confectioners store for locally made chocolate which tasted pretty good.  When leaving, we were struck again by the beauty of this place.

The next day we spent in Coonoor.  After breakfast we went to the nearby Sims Park, a beautifully terraced space full of flowers, ponds and walking paths.  We actually got lost in this botanical wonderland at one point.  I have mentioned elsewhere that walking is one of the things we miss the most in Chennai, so we really appreciated the opportunity to walk around here.

Later on that day we checked out the open market.  This one was much like others we had been to, but always interesting.

Then we went for lunch, this looks really good to me right now.

Our next adventure happened back at Wallwood Garden.  We had picked up some cashews and brought back leftovers from lunch.  Then some familiar visitors showed up.

As we were cooing at the cute monkeys, suddenly out of nowhere one of them dashed into our room, grabbed our new container of cashews, and so gracefully leapt back up onto the rooftop.  A clean grab.

As we stood outside having a laugh at ourselves and the monkey, wondering how we let that happen, our two year old daughter squealed from inside “He’s RIGHT HERE in the room!  He’s eating my NOODLES!”  I sprinted inside to find a monkey about the size of my daughter, not five feet away from her, indeed helping himself to the take-out container of noodles.  After jumping in between the monkey and my daughter he took off, but not before grabbing the package of naan that had been next to the noodles.  This one did not even move away from our front door to finish eating.

After that we figured out that we should close and fasten the shutters on our windows, which we did somewhat reluctantly because of the nice weather.  And just a PSA on monkeys, we were very, very lucky that these were not aggressive and what ended up being a funny story could have been a bloody disaster.  Everybody needs to be very careful when living alongside the monkeys.  Fortunately we had learned this by the time we were among the aggressive monkeys in Shimla (but then somehow lapsed on this in Langkawi).

On the last morning of this trip we drove to Dolphin’s Nose, a scenic overlook of the mountains which offered a fantastic view of Catherine Falls.  But first, we happened upon a place on the way that produced eucalyptus oil from the abundant eucalyptus trees in the area.

How lucky – I love eucalyptus.  Even the walls of this place were made of dried eucalyptus leaves.  And to say that good deals were offered on the final eucalyptus oil product would be a huge understatement.

The shop next door, in addition to selling eucalyptus and other essential oils, sold a wide variety of ayurvedic and other herbal preparations, along with spice mixes and more local chocolate.  Like moths to a flame…after this trip we are in good supply of lemongrass, clove, wintergreen, eucalyptus, and citronella oils.

Back to Catherine Falls.  The drive itself was a treat.

At Dolphin’s Nose we could see Catherine Falls in the distance.

Check out the cultivated land in the top right corner of the close-up (above).  Amazing!

 

This was definitely one of my favorite trips in India, made even better sharing the experience with my sister and niece.  There are not a lot of must-see sights to tighten one’s agenda, and instead we just slowed down and soaked up the surroundings.  With the heat rising again I have fond thoughts of returning, but time is running out here.

 

 

Late last summer we visited Fort Cochin, which sits on the Malabar Coast of India in the southwestern state of Kerala.  This is where European trade and settlement first took hold in the early 16th century.  In 1498 the famous explorer Vasco de Gama charted an eastward route around the Cape of Good Hope and after an eleven month journey arrived at Calicut, Kerala, just up the coast from Cochin.  He returned to Portugal with stories of an abundance of ginger, cloves, cinnamon, pepper and and precious stones.  Two years later the Portuguese started trading in earnest in Cochin.  So began a new era in world history.  Spices sold around the world still come from here and that alone made it an ideal destination for me. Its lush beauty and colorful local artistry were also wonderful to experience.  It absolutely deserves its place among India’s elite culinary destinations, especially for the unbelievably delicious and fresh seafood curry.

It was the first week of September there, still monsoon season and the forecasts called for rain every day, rain all day. The same forecast we had for our May trip to Sri Lanka with the same result – sunshine for almost the whole trip.  We stayed at the Malabar House, a heritage hotel with a history dating to 1755 that included the spice and tea trade.  The hotel is known for its food and delivered on its good reputation.

The chef even custom-made a cake with a picture of a pig for our daughter’s 3^rd birthday and she still talks about it! We enjoyed tuna tartare and cooked seafood preparations along with a variety of other tasty dishes. Malabar House offered a variety of wines from India and included an Indian wine tasting as part of our stay.  The staff and restaurant made for a memorable and very comfortable experience in Fort Cochin.

We had an outdoor swinging bed adjacent to our suite, and enough space inside for our two children, my sister-in-law, Sadaf and me to be comfortable.  Watchful folk art made up part of the decor inside.

Around Fort Cochin

One of the area’s signature attractions is the ‘Chinese Fishing Nets’ positioned along the coast. These are giant structures that dip large square shaped nets into the shallow water. When the nets are drawn up the sides come out first, trapping anything that swam into the net. The lift system is often operated with large pieces of stone as counter-weights, along with strong men pulling heavy ropes in unison to raise the nets. A man at a restaurant insisted that much of the fresh seafood came from the nets, although most of what I saw at the street fish market definitely looked like deeper water fish. It was fun to watch the nets operate and we were invited to pull one up, but as is often my experience, no fish.

We also enjoyed strolling the streets and exploring the markets – especially the organic spice market – while in Fort Cochin. The spice market had everything you could imagine and some things I hadn’t – like green peppercorns, all kinds of essential oils, different grades of green cardamom.  Great stuff.  I spent far too much time there.

On my trip to the U.S. later that fall, I made holiday mulling spice gift sets with my purchases from this store.

Continuing the theme of spices, we visited a place that receives and ‘processes’ dried ginger. The ‘processing’ consisted of sifting the dried ginger of dust in a wood frame screen, weighing it, and placing it in giant bags to be carried out to the trucks.  Seriously labor intensive and all natural.  Some friendly women completed this work, and they were kind enough to pose for pictures and even played with our children.

We visited a laundry washing operation.  According to our driver the purpose of the facility is to provide work for people in need.

We enjoyed breakfast and dinner each day at the Malabar House.  For lunch we visited Old Harbour Hotel, a beautiful example of Portuguese-style architecture in Kerala situated across from a park and near the water.  According to the hotel website, the building is approximately 300 years old and once served as residential quarters for the English tea trade.  We loved the food as much as the verdant courtyard and pond, so we went back there the next day.

The fish curry was easily one of the best dishes I’ve had in India and probably the world.  A perfect balance of spice and not weighed down with too much rich coconut.  And look at that presentation, artistry in itself.  We all had dreamy servings of homemade cinnamon ice cream for dessert.  Hotel and restaurant staff played with our children feeding the fish and frolicking around the pond.

Near the famous synagogue in Fort Cochin, which was closed on the day we were there, we explored some shops with a variety of local art, hand-woven white cotton towels and shirts, and I found an antique bronze rice cooking pan.

We also visited St. Francis church, the oldest European church in India.  This church’s own rich and storied history offers a vivid reflection of India’s broader colonial history.  Following Christopher Columbus’s westward attempt to reach India in 1492, Vasco de Gama sailed east in 1498, successfully reaching Calicut that year.  De Gama failed to establish a favorable relationship there, and in 1500 Portuguese explorer Pedro Alvares Cabral reached the same place with similar failed results.  He sailed down to Cochin and secured permission from the Rajah of Cochin to engage in trade and, in 1503, to build a fort at the mouth of the river.  Inside the Portuguese fort a wooden church was erected and dedicated to St. Bartholomew.  Then in 1506 the Rajah allowed the Portuguese Viceroy to build more permanent brick and mortar structures which would include a new church.  The Portuguese finished construction of the church in 1516 that remains in Fort Cochin today, and dedicated it to St. Antony.

Vasco de Gama died in Fort Cochin on Christmas Eve in 1524 and originally was buried in this church, his remains later returned to Portugal.

The church remained under the stewardship of the Catholic Order of St. Francis until taken by the Dutch almost 150 years later.  In 1663 the Dutch gained control of Cochin from the Portuguese and converted the church into a government (Protestant) one.  Then in 1795 the British took Cochin from the Dutch, and in the early 1800s the church became part of the Anglican Church.  The first reference to St. Francis as its patron saint came in 1870, and it remains active today as part of the Church of Southern India, which has its roots in the Church of England and a community of other Protestant churches.

Months after this trip I made a return of sorts to this area, at least in my mind, by reading Arundhati Roy’s powerful novel The God of Small Things.  The story offers a compelling exploration of caste, love, patriarchism, politics, and loss, and so much more, all in an eloquently depicted setting of Kerala.  Ms. Roy’s descriptions of the lush flora and weather alone make the book worth reading.  But the story and the dynamic relationships that unfold throughout simply take you away.  If you want to experience Kerala but cannot quite make it here, definitely read this book.

We enjoyed our visit to Fort Cochin and it will be the trip that keeps on giving as I continue to cook with the amazing spices we brought back from there.  We continued from the Malabar House in Fort Cochin to its sister property Purity at Lake Vembanad, a little over an hour’s drive from Fort Cochin.  The transfer arranged by the hotel was seamless and easy.  That trip is explored in a separate post.

 

We visited the mountain town or ‘hill station’ of Shimla in late November 2015.  From Chennai we reached Shimla via a one-stop flight to Chandigargh.  Before boarding our early morning flight we stopped at the airport Krispy Kreme where I had to try the locally featured ‘Elaichi Pista’ (Cardamom Pistachio) donut.  Even though I am not much of a donut fan, I do like cardamom and all things green.  It was sweet, really sweet, too sweet.  But an excellent presentation.

Our flight was followed by a 3 1/2 hour drive that covered a short distance but traversed many, many switchbacks up and down the foothills of the Himalayas.  Motion sickness is rare for me but threatened as the drive wore on, and two of our travelers did not fare so well.  Our day-long journey ended, thankfully, at sunset at the Oberoi Cecil Hotel.

The hotel itself began as a structure built by the British in the late 1800s and Rudyard Kipling reportedly spent time there writing.  Of Shimla he wrote “My month’s leave at Simla, or whatever Hill Station my people went to, was pure joy—every golden hour counted. It began in heat and discomfort, by rail and road. It ended in the cool evening, with a wood fire in one’s bedroom, and next morn—thirty more of them ahead!—the early cup of tea, the Mother who brought it in, and the long talks of us all together again.”  We could certainly relate to an arduous journey followed by the welcome cool evening, and more distantly back in Texas, to re-joining our parents for long conversation over coffee or tea after being so far away.

The wonderful people at the Oberoi Cecil made for an unforgettable stay in Shimla.  They served delicious food, offered elegantly appointed and tremendously comfortable rooms, and even trained and certified our young children for basic bar tending skills!  The hotel has been restored to its earlier grandeur.  The setting reminded me of The Brown Palace hotel in Denver which is a high compliment to both places.

 

Shimla sits a little over 7,000 feet above sea level.  The cool weather – especially in the mornings and evenings when the temperatures hovered in the low 50s – provided a refreshing break from the south Indian heat.  Even at such a high altitude, and somewhat to our dismay, it warmed up to the low 70s during the day.  All in all, though, the weather remained pleasant.  It is easy to understand why Shimla served as the summer capital of British India and remains a popular destination today.

Mall Road and The Ridge

We spent a good deal of our time in town walking up – way up – and then back down the famous Mall Road.  In addition to the welcome exercise, Mall Road offered shops, restaurants, and lots and lots of monkeys.

A friend warned us about the aggressive monkeys here.  One monkey in a tree saw me take a picture, stared at me for a few seconds with an angry look, then threw down the nut he was eating and started towards me.  Another monkey managed to terrify and disperse a crowd of about twelve people on the road.  Not to worry, they are manageable, but watch out for the monkeys in Shimla!

Mostly, it was nice to get out into the fresh air and stroll around the Mall.  We also found some of Shimla’s amazing embroidery and woolen apparel in the many shops there.

Hanuman, the Monkey God, stands high over Shimla on Jakhoo Hill at an altitude of 8100 feet, himself 108 feet tall.  Apparently the Hanuman Temple is where you can really find some monkeys.

We enjoyed more than one meal at Wake & Bake on Mall Road, which offered friendly service and an extensive menu.  We also paid repeat visits to a coffee house and ice cream stand, the latter conveniently adjacent to a shop selling beautiful hand-woven cotton blankets.

People stayed out on Mall Road well into the night.  The lights and cooler air made for pleasant evening strolls.

The Ridge continues upward from the highest point of Mall Road.  It is known for its amazing wooden crafts at the Lakkar Bazaar.  We needed an extra suitcase after leaving this shop.

Also situated on The Ridge is Christchurch Cathedral, built in 1857 for the British Christian population there.  It remains active today and is the second largest church in Northern India.

The Viceregal Lodge

We arrived here by walking up another steep incline in the opposite direction from Mall Road.  The British built this lodge in 1888 and it now serves as a center for the Indian Institute of Advanced Study.  Significant historical events took place here including the 1947 meeting focused on the partition of Pakistan.  Walking through the outside grounds and the hallways of the lodge made it easy to imagine this place during the time of the British Raj.  Shimla had such appeal that in addition to being made the British summer Capital in 1863, the Indian Commander in Chief made its headquarters here, and the government of Punjab in 1876 relocated its summer Capital here from Murree, in present-day Pakistan.

Kalka-Shimla Railway

We went on a few excursions during our five days here.  We took a train ride on the Kalka-Shimla Railway, a narrow-gauge British era UNESCO World Heritage Site train.  We traveled from Shimla to Tara Devi, crossing dizzying high bridges and enjoying spectacular mountain views.  Throughout the trip some local riders kept to the practice of hanging out the open doors for what must have been an even more exhilarating experience.

Tara Devi Temple

A car met us at Tara Devi station and took us to the famous Tara Devi Temple.  ‘Tara’ in Sanskrit means ‘star’ and this high up we felt closer to the stars.  The temple sits high on a mountain top, and ascending to it in the car alone offered plenty of excitement.

Wildflower Hall

We indulged in lunch and the lush grounds of Wildflower Hall one cool afternoon.  It is about a 45 minute drive and a little higher up from Shimla.  It too has a storied history dating from the 1800s and the decor reflects its British heritage.  Its open green space made for great running and playing for the children.  The restaurant offered breathtaking views of the mountains.  The food which included many local choices lived up to the scenery.

Back in Shimla

Our last night and day in Shimla we spent – where else? – back on Mall Road and The Ridge.  We miss going on neighborhood walks and tried to get as much walking in as we could before leaving.

Shimla has never been easy to get to, from the 1800s up through today.  Having been there, all the efforts people have made over the years to relocate to Shimla or visit it make perfect sense.  It is definitely worth the trip.