Day 7 to Day 9 of Ewan and Al’s ride across India

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Day 7: Madurai to Theni 58 miles

It was an enjoyable ride. Mostly on quiet small roads. We gained height over the day and it was hotter, around 32. Sweeping round a corner as we descended a ridge and we startled a troop of macaques.

The scenery has changed a lot over these days. crops around. The video (with sound) is just in passing and shows drummers for a wedding. We too frequently come across loud speakers blasting out noise at full volume. They vary between being for weddings, temples, or political.

We stopped near the water for a drink and saw this white throated kingfisher.

Day 8

We left Theni and we soon got on to quiet roads through small villages. We rode over 30 miles before the start of the main climb, 2000 ft in 6 miles.

This photo is of a couple of children off to school.

These women were just waiting. I think saris are so simple and yet elegant and often colourful.

This statue was by a shrine and the owners were happy for me to take photo.

Coconut husks drying. Google tells me it has many uses.

A photo of our first view of the route up, though the road isn’t clear. Photo of the climb with 18 hairpins. Not too busy but quite a lot of trucks. Steady climbing at around 8-9%. Glad of our low gearing as we spun our way up. Unfortunately it was too hazy for a good view over the plains.

Lunch at the top and then along the escarpment wth some quite steep hills as we climbed total of 4000 ft.

The last five miles was a whee down to our delightful eco hotel with langur monkeys eating the berries in the trees outside our balcony.

It is pleasantly cooler up here.

Day 9 to Kuttikanam.

Yesterday we crossed in to Kerala from Tamil Nadu. It is unusual as it has a democratic socialist government. It has some of the best educational outcomes in India and is also well known for its effective approach to public health. It seems well organised.

We rode 31 miles today and climbed just over 3400 ft, but we came down about 2800 ft so there was a lot of ups and downs.

First stop was to buy snacks and water for the day. Our usual snacks are bananas, though we found the hard way today that the bigger ones aren’t sweet. We get through quite a lot of biscuits and we like balls of peanut brittle, when we can find them.

We climbed up through what felt like original forest. Far more bird life. In some stretches there was a strong scent of cardamom which is grown widely as well.

The photo shows a hillside of cardamom under the larger trees. The capsule grows at the base of the plant.

Then we broke out into a new world of tea plantations. Valleys and hills covered in tea and some much wider vistas. Not many people in the plantations, but it’s not the time of year for picking tea.

Our hotel is part of a tea estate. All nicely done.