Located in the Annamalai range in Tamil Nadu, Valparai is a tiny hill station that is home to several tea estates and plantations.

We spent a lazy and green weekend in the first week of June enjoying the beauty of the place. Cyberscorpion had organized the accomodation in a bungalow, situated the middle of a tea garden.

We (Apra, Deepsan, Cyberscorpion, Reena and I) hired a vehicle so we could save the time in taking public transport as we only had two days to spare.

The drive up 41 hairpin bends after Pollachi up to Valparai was beautiful and afforded some gorgeous views of the Aliyar reservoir, blue skies and the green hills around. We stopped for a while on the 9th bend and drank in the view.

The bungalow that was organized for us was a charming little place – it had a lovely garden with a swing, a patio and a dining room with lovely views of the tea gardens and the hills beyond. The weather too sided with us and we had loads of sunshine, intermittent with clouds and a light drizzle : just perfect for walking around.

We walked around, played badminton, lazed around, read, sketched, went looking for a mysterious tunnel, walked, ate mangoes and generally had ourselves a really nice weekend.

We left the place around 2 in the afternoon and reached Bangalore late on Sunday night. A quick trip where we covered around 1000 kms on the road, but enjoyable none the less.

More:
– My Valparai Album on Flickr
– Reena’s Album
– Deepsan : Words & Pictures
– Cyberscorpion : Pictures