Kodaikanal - The Prince of Hills

There were four of us, myself, Renju, John and his wife Raji. We started on the morning of the 8th of November and reached Kodai around two in the afternoon, close to 440 km. Everybody had been to Kodai at least once before in their school/college days.

There are many resorts in Kodai today and only a few of them can be booked on the web through secure means. The resorts look very beautiful on their web sites, but in reality they can be quite small.We had booked two cottages and finally they turned out to be two rooms on one side of the main building! But the place looked good.

Crowds at Kodai have grown. The charm of renting a cycle to go around the lake is extremely reduced nowadays due to the heavy traffic around the lake. We took a walk around the lake and it turned out to be a looong one. The shape of the lake is like an amoeba (they say it looks like the India map) with small limbs protruding in all directions that a person looking at it from the banks never gets to see it in complete. So you are easily fooled to make the decision of trying to take a walk around the lake. In our case, this walk set the tone for the entire trip and we kept on walking for the rest of the trip.

There are more things you can do in Kodai other than the traditional boating and visiting various parks. We went for a trek through the hills on the next day morning. Our guide, Periyasami, had an adventurous streak in him and was also a keen photographer. Many of the spots we went to and some of the beautiful pictures we took were all due to him. The trek, or rather the walk, was vigorous enough that we decided to close the shop for the rest of the day after we reached the hotel in the evening.

On the final day, after checkout, we took Periyasami to show us the highlights of Kodai in half a day's time. He planned and executed that admirably. As we drove down from Kodai, there were certain things we had missed. One was boating in the lake, we never reached the place before 4 in the evening. Second was the Coaker's walk, we were staying right next to it and after the second day no one wanted to take another walk! But in spite of all that, we did enjoy what we were doing and that's what we went to Kodai for.

Before I sign off, here are some pointers to people visiting Kodai.

• Irrespective of how they look on the web, most of the resorts are small affairs and charge you much more than the hotels. So be careful while selecting a place to stay.
  
• Think twice before deciding to take a walk or a cycle around the lake, specifically if you have someone in your group who is not very keen in walking.
• Its probably not a very good idea to send kids alone on cycles around the lake. There are many huge SUVs racing the horses all around the lake.
• Take a guide. That does not add much to the expense, but it can really enhance the experience.
• Eat lots of corn, mangoes, chilli bajjis and bread omlettes while you walk around. Also, have some masala tea once in a while. They are good for you.
• Finally, if you are driving, ensure that you have a good torch in your car with good batteries. We spent two hours in the middle of the night trying to change a flat tyre using the mobile phone's display light. Yes, I know, everyone other than myself carries a torch. So, this pointer is to myself.