Year end at Ooty

This is all about last hours of year 2022 and friends. Even though my family had a setback on December, I finally decided to join with my friends based on the year-end celebrations. There will always a year celeb and family union of my college mates and common friends. This time we decided an old, Victorian style resort at Ooty, named Kluney Manor. This resort is close to major tourist attractions here and with a vibe of British architecture. The resort got several blocks of single story buildings with a glass panel doors with a perfectly landscaped garden, which creates a great background for wedding photos. Almost all the rooms got its own chandelier which boosts the ambience, but there is a considerable room for adding modern day facilities. I felt there is a lot of things needs to get attention and requires modernization. More over, it’s around close to 4000-5000 per family for two nights, which I believe it’s an economic one due to the time of stay

Our team is about 15 families with kids and escaped from their work locations. A City, a Rapid, a Polo, 3 Nexons and a Tiago transported people. All vehicles are packed tightly. I joined from a place called Muvattupuzha along with PRJ and family. Due to unfortunate incidents occured in my family, Aswathy & Ahaan was not in a position to join the trip. I started 0300 from Kottayam and reached around 0430 at Muvattupuzha. PRJ was delayed due to some unforeseen situations and reached by 0530-0600.

We then proceeded in his Skoda Rapid and decided to skip the first halting station at Angamaly to avoid the delay. Based on the suggestion from Sayuj, we had our first break at Palakkad for having Ramaserry Idili. Ramaserry Idili was a famous breakfast, made of fermented rice batter. It’s a small shop, a slightly far from the Highway which is one of well maintained roads in Kerala. After having the breakfast, we tried many failed attempts to get close with Sayuj & team.

The highways are pretty good in Tamil Nadu, we bypassed Coimbatore city and finally heading towards Ooty. We had a famous Thalappakatti biryani from a resturant complex hosting A2B on the way. Unfortunately, the biryani never reached the expectations. Then we reached Ooty via Kotagiri.

The resort is a small one, as they’re lacking funds to develop more or one can say they preserve its beauty as it is. As I mentioned earlier, the landscape is wonderful. It got a decent parking space and by evening there is no parking space left. The quality of food served during the night is fine, however the quality and quantity of food served during the year-end celebrations dropped heavily. The resort organized a small music and fun event as part of the celebrations. The restaurant serves a New year special buffet, which includes some Tamil based veg dishes along with two or three chicken based dishes. Since the buffet was part of the stay, I believe it might be one of the economic options in Ooty.

During the day, we went outside, I got a chance to rev Sreejesh’s VW Polo TDI. It’s a fun ride. Since I am not familiarize with the reverse gear, it is difficult for me drive in traffic. The VW & Skoda is a wonderful experience to drive and I never had any tiredness due to this long journey.

After the celebrations, we started departing from Ooty and on the way back, one of the Nexon, got a battery issue and refused to start. Shammith and Vijay decided to stay and started making arrangements to tow it to near service centre while others started descending the hill. Luckly, the issue got resolved and they joined with us later. PRJ dropped me at Angamaly KSRTC and I reached home by around 0600. It was a wonderful reunion with lot of people after the gathering at Nelliampathy.

Thank you!