To Ooty and Beyond

Four of us hired a car and driver on Friday morning, after led class, and drove up to Ooty. Ooty is the foreshortened name of a hill-top town surrounded by beautiful, steep mountains which are terraced with tea plantations. The route up crosses a wildlife sanctuary, where we saw elephants and monkeys. It is supposedly a tiger preserve, but we saw no striped predators.

Ooty was one of the English hill stations, towns to which the English colonialists retreated during hot weather. Some of the British architecture remains, although the Raj is long past. We stayed in a British-era hotel up very high, and it provided a welcome counterpoint to the heat, bustle, and dust we experienced during the drive up; exactly what the British had in mind. Contemporary plumbing, hot water, and cold beer were also welcome.

After a sound night's sleep, we had a terrific breakfast, cooked to order, in the gazebo of the English-style garden. We were joined by an American couple, both of whom have traveled extensively in India. He is spending five months teaching at a college in Chennai (Madras), as part of an exchange program. Two of our guests debated Mahler, Wagner, and Leonard Bernstein's music extensively.

After breakfast, we read in the garden as the morning sun burned off the evening cool. I was reading E.M. Forster's "A Passage to India," a classic tale about the interaction of cultures in India during the era of the Raj. The Brit hotel garden was a most appropriate setting.

After checkout, we took the narrow gauge railroad from Ooty down to Coonor -- the hills are too steep for standard tracks. I posted a photo of myself below, with a slightly manic grin as we descended the mountainous terrain.

After the train ride, it was a long drive back to Mysore, via a new route which featured 36 hairpin turns and would have been perfect for a Tour de France stage.

Practice notes: I tweaked my right knee mildly on Friday (led class) so I'm doing a few modifications, but no problem. My level of energy for the full primary series in now much better, and I can hold headstand comfortably for Saraswathi's very long count. Her fifteen is someone else's fifty.





Cheers.