Ooty is the busiest hill station in the south and it can feel like it. Three days is enough to see it properly if you get two timings right — one of them weeks in advance.
Book this first
The Nilgiri Mountain Railway. It is UNESCO-listed, it is the one thing in the Nilgiris you cannot do anywhere else, and the seats sell out well ahead in season. The Ooty to Coonoor leg takes about an hour and is the easy version. The full climb from Mettupalayam is four and a half hours and runs in the morning.
Day 1 — the town
Arrive and take the easy half. The Government Botanical Garden was laid out in 1848 and holds a fossil tree; the Rose Garden is on the terraced slope above town with around 20,000 varieties, at its best from May to July. Then Ooty Lake for a pedal or row boat — quietest early, busiest after four.
If you arrive late, do the gardens tomorrow and the lake this evening.
Day 2 — Doddabetta at dawn, then down to Coonoor
This is the day that decides whether you liked Ooty. Doddabetta is the highest point in the Nilgiris at 2,637 m, and it is clear before about ten and then swallowed by mist. Go early. There is a telescope house at the top.
Then take the toy train down to Coonoor. There: Sim’s Park, a 12-hectare botanical garden on a natural slope, and the two viewpoints — Dolphin’s Nose and Lamb’s Rock — looking over the Catherine falls and the plains, both best in the morning light but fine through the afternoon. Stop at a tea factory on the road back for the processing floor and a tasting.
Day 3 — Pykara, then down
Pykara is 19 km out on the Mysuru road: a boat ride on the lake and two falls in shola forest. It is the right last morning because it is on the way out if you are driving towards Mysuru or Bengaluru. The tea museum fits on the same road.
If you are heading south to Coimbatore instead, swap Pykara for the Isha Yoga Centre — the 112-foot Adiyogi and the Dhyanalinga sit 30 km west of Coimbatore, at the foot of the ghat, so half a day there costs nothing in travel time and the Dhyanalinga is free to enter.
What to pack
Woollens from December to February — nights hit 5°C and frost is possible — and a light jacket the rest of the year. A rain shell in July and August. Sunscreen, because the sun at 2,240 m burns even when the air is cold.
Getting there
Coimbatore is 85 km below, about three hours up the ghat, and is the nearest airport and main railhead. From Bengaluru it is 270 km, six to seven hours through Mysuru and Bandipur, ending on 36 hairpin bends — and the forest road is closed to traffic from 9 pm to 6 am. From Hyderabad the usual route is the overnight train or a flight to Coimbatore, then the ghat.
Ooty tour packages · 3 day Ooty trips · Ooty with Coonoor · What an Ooty trip costs
