The road from Mysore to Munnar was always going to be interesting, we were climbing from 770m to 1600m and travelling once again through the beautiful Western Ghats. All across India we have experienced roads which offer great promise for the future but are generally “work in progress”. The roads of Karnataka were no exception:

It wasn’t long before we were in the Ghats:

and very soon afterwards we saw the almost mandatory truck accident:

There are several wildlife reserves in southern India and we seemed to drive through all of them in quick succession:

The scenery was wonderful, it would have been easy to imagine we were in Africa:

 Thuvanam Falls

Eventually we reached tea country, we found the tea plantations to be far more attractive than the coffee plantations, something to do with the vivid green of the bushes:

More hills, more accidents:

Cars going off the road is not such a surprise once you start looking closely at the tyres many of them are sporting:

We arrived in Munnar early but by the time we had detoured around height restrictions and weight restrictions it wasn’t early anymore!

Next day we went off to ride an elephant (very touristy but irresistible!):

and do a little sight-seeing:

After lunch we decided a massage would make sense. If you have been following this blog you will know we haven’t had great success with Indian massages but we decided to persevere. Bad decision!

We went again for an Ayurvedic massage (everything is Ayurvedic here, I even have Ayurvedic toothpaste!). The technique seems to be to soak you in oil and then do long sweeps from the tip of the fingers up the arm, down the torso and all the way down the leg. And repeat. And repeat. And ….

It turned out to be ninety minutes of misery. The rooms were cold. The music – what music. My masseur seemed to forget all his training and started making up new (ineffectual) moves. At one point I looked at him, he seemed to be in a trance although I think he was actually just bored! The combination of cooking oil and a very strange massage technique just didn’t work. By the end I was resolved never to have another Ayurvedic massage – and I’ll probably throw away the toothpaste!

The final part of the treatment was a steam bath. This turned out to be a steam cabinet:

 Note small hole for head and neck!

Inside was a seat which was supposed to be adjustable. Even on the lowest setting I didn’t fit in the cabinet (and I’m not tall!). I spent the next twenty minutes twisted up like a contortionist trying frantically to keep my feet away from the steam source. At one point my contortions resulted in me banging my knee against the door which brought the masseur rushing into the room looking very concerned. Anyway it’s official – that was our last Ayurvedic massage!

One very interesting thing I noticed (or not depending on your point of view) was the steam generation system for the steam cabinet. This was it:

 A hotplate and a pressure cooker!

By now we really needed to be spoilt so we went for dinner at The High Range club just outside Munnar:

This place was a blast from the past. There was no alcohol (although we did succeed in procuring some), the staff would have graced Downton Abbey and the whole feel was truly eccentric – we loved it.

Before dinner Leishia and I snuck into the Men Only bar which was undoubtedly the best room in the place, here we are:

 Poor shot but it was rushed!

Dinner was variously said to be at 7pm, 8pm and 8.30pm. It turned out to be at 8pm and was typical Indian fare, enjoyable but served at a bit of a sprint! There were just two resident guests (Nathan, an economist and his girlfriend Vanessa, a lawyer both from London) so we sat together and set the world to rights.

We were minding our own business drinking a pot of tea in the lounge after dinner when, at 9.20pm precisely, the Club Manager appeared and announced that the club closed at 9.30! So that was an enjoyable evening cut somewhat short! Despite the early finish it was certainly a memorable few hours.

The next morning we were on the road early once again driving south through the beautiful Western Ghats towards Kanyakumari. There were some great sights along the way:

 A three storey Christian shrine, prolific in S. India

 Beautiful country

 A very common sight

 A shop on wheels

 Another accident

 And another wonderful elephant!

The drive from Munnar to Kanyakumari (at the very southern tip of India) is long and especially via the scenic route we chose. Nevertheless we managed to reach the tip with daylight to spare. The last 50km stretch was amazing, we were constantly passing windmills, there were thousands of them, this is a dusk shot showing just a few:

So 120 days after arriving in India we finally made it to the southern tip, the place where the Arabian sea, the Bay of Bengal and the Indian Ocean meet. We were happy!