Day 40, Madikeri [Saturday 12th January 2008]
Previous day: Day 39, Shravanabelagola [Friday 11th January 2008]
Next day: Day 41, Coorg [Sunday 13th January 2008]
We walk 8km along the hilltop ridge to Abbi Falls. Buses full of screaming kids whizz past us most of the way. Wherever Indians go, there is litter. All around the waterfall, there is litter. But the air is clean here, and the views are far reaching.
Madikeri has the tangible feel of a hill town - rugged, self-contained, relatively remote. It is the capital of the Coorg, or Kodagu, district, a heavily forested area in the west of Karnataka. There is also a lot of wildlife in these forests - tigers, elephants, leopards and deer. This area is sometimes, in the tourist leaflets, called "The Scotland of India".
Dinner at the Hilltown Hotel is some of the best food I've tasted in India - veg malai kofte, palak paneer, paneer kajuwala, veg pulao. We spend the rest of the dark evening playing Scrabble and eating jalebies - sticky orange sweets. We watch Manchester United beat Newcastle 6-0. The newspaper says Sir Edmund Hillary died yesterday.
We've booked a 2 day trek through the Coorg which starts at 8.30am tomorrow.
Next day: Day 41, Coorg [Sunday 13th January 2008]
Previous day: Day 39, Shravanabelagola [Friday 11th January 2008]