Tourist Places in Ooty:

Rose Garden Ooty/Botanical Garden Ooty

The Government Rose Garden Ooty (formerly known as Centenary Rose Park) is India’s largest rose garden in ooty. It is located at an altitude of 2200 meters on the slopes of Elk Hill near Vijayanagaram, Ooty town. With over 20,000 species of roses and 2,800 cultivars, this garden now has one of the greatest rose collections in the country. Hybrid tea roses, Miniature Roses, Polyanthas, Papagena, Floribunda, Ramblers, Yakimour, and roses in strange colors like black and green are all part of the assortment.

The Government of Tamil Nadu maintains the 22-acre (89,000 m2) Ooty Botanical Gardens, which were put out in 1847. The Botanical Garden Ooty is well-kept, lush, and green. Every May, there is a flower fair as well as an exhibition of rare plant species. Around a thousand exotic and indigenous plant, shrub, fern, tree, herbal, and bonsai species can be found in the gardens. A 20-million-year-old fossilised tree may be found in the yard.

On the surroundings of Ooty Lake is Deer Park. Apart from the zoo at Nainital, Uttarakhand, it is India’s highest altitude zoo. This park was established to host a variety of deer and other wildlife.

Rose Garden Ooty timings: Time to Visit: Rose Garden Ooty is open every day of the week from 9 am to 6 pm. Duration of the visit: 3 hours.

Rose Garden Ooty entry fee/Rose Garden ticket price: The entrance cost to the Rose Garden Ooty is 30 INR per person for adults and 15 INR for children under the age of ten years. There is no admission cost for children under the age of five.

Ooty Rose Garden season: The monsoon season allows the flowers to bloom for a longer period of time.

 Ooty Lake:

Ooty Lake is a 65-acre body of water. The boat house, which is located near the lake and provides guests with boating opportunities, is a popular tourist attraction in Ooty. It was built in 1824 by John Sullivan, the first Ooty collector. Damming the mountain streams that flow down Ooty valley created the lake. A railway line runs along one bank of the lake, which is surrounded by Eucalyptus plantations. Boat races and boat pageantry are held at the lake for two days throughout the summer season in May.

Pykara is a river 19 kilometers from Ooty. The Todas regard the Pykara as extremely sacred. The Pykara river begins near Mukurthi mountain and flows through a steep region, often staying to the north until it reaches the plateau’s edge, where it swings west. The river goes over a succession of cascades, the Pykara falls being the last two, measuring 55 meters and 61 meters respectively. The falls are around 6 kilometers from the major road’s bridge. Tourists are drawn to a boat house near the Pykara falls and dam.

Ooty Dam:

The Ooty bus station is 10 kilometers from the Kamaraj Sagar Dam Ooty (also known as Sandynalla reservoir). On the Wenlock Downs’ slopes, it’s a picnic place and a filming location. Fishing and studying nature and the environment are among the many tourist activities available at the kamraj sagar dam ooty. The town’s primary water source is Parsons Valley Reservoir, which is mostly in a protected forest and hence largely off-limits to visitors. Other lakes in the area include Emerald Lake, Avalanche Lake, and Porthimund Lake.

Tribal huts and museum

On the slopes above the Botanical Garden, there are a few Toda huts where Todas still live. Other Toda settlements can be found in the area, like Kandal Mund near Old Ooty. Although many Toda have replaced their original characteristic huts with concrete houses, there is presently a campaign to rebuild traditional barrel-vaulted huts, and forty new huts have been built and many Toda sacred dairies have been rehabilitated in the recent decade.

The Tribal Museum is located on the Muthorai Palada campus of the Tribal Research Centre (10 km from Ooty town). Rare tribal items and images from Tamil Nadu and the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, as well as anthropological and archaeology primitive human culture and legacy, can be found there. Houses belonging to the Toda, Kota, Paniya, Kurumba, and Kanikaran tribes are also on display in the Tribal Museum.

Nilgiri Mountain Railway

The British built the Nilgiri Mountain Railway in 1908, and it was initially operated by the Madras Railway Company. The railway’s fleet of steam locomotives is still in use. The newly constituted Salem Division has authority over NMR. After meeting the requisite requirements, UNESCO added the Nilgiri Mountain Railway as an expansion to the World Heritage Site of the Darjeeling Himalayan Railway in July 2005, and the site became known as “Mountain Railways of India,” forcing the modernization plans to be abandoned. Diesel locomotives have been replacing steam locomotives on the route between Coonoor and Udhagamandalam for several years.

Tea Factory OOty:

The Ooty Tea Factory, which covers approximately an acre of land, is located close to Ooty town. Visitors can learn about the history of tea in India as well as the origins of several types of tea leaves from around the world. Tea processing via Cut, Twist, and Curl (CTC) machinery is vividly visible in the facility. At the conclusion of the tour, visitors can sample several types of tea and purchase tea gifts. Doddabetta Tea Factory and Benchmark Tea Factory are two other adjacent tea factories.

Stone House OOty:

The first bungalow built in Ooty was Stone House. John Sullivan designed it, and the tribals dubbed it Kal Bangala (Kal means stone in local tribal language). In 1822, John Sullivan began construction on Stone House after purchasing land from the Todas for one rupee per acre. It is now the principal’s official residence at the Government Arts College in Ooty.

Churches in OOty

St Stephen’s Church OOty:

St Stephen’s Church is situated in Ooty, Tamil Nadu, India, on the way to Mysore. It is one of the Nilgiris district’s oldest churches in Ooty . St Stephen’s Church Ooty  was built in the nineteenth century. The foundation stone for the church was placed on April 23, 1829, on King George IV’s birthday, by Stephen Rumbold Lushington, the then governor of Madras, who saw the need for a cathedral in Ooty that was entirely for the British. On November 5, 1830, Bishop John Matthias Turner of Calcutta consecrated St Stephen’s Church Ooty. On Easter Sunday, 3 April 1831, it was opened to the public for public communion. In 1947, it became part of the Church of South India.

st stephen’s church ooty timings: 9.30 am – 5.30 pm

st stephen’s church ooty address: Near Collectors office, Club, Road, Ooty, Tamil Nadu 643001

St Thomas Church Ooty

The foundation stone for St Thomas Church Ooty, a parish in the Anglican diocese of Ooty, was placed on May 1, 1867, by Lt. Gen. Howard Dowker. The building was finished on October 20, 1870, and the inaugural service was held in 1871. The graves of Josiah John Goodwin, Swami Vivekananda’s British stenographer, and William Patrick Adam, the British governor of Madras, whose tomb is crowned by the beautiful pillar monument dedicated to St. Thomas, Ooty’s highest building, are among the renowned graves in the churchyard. A Passage to India, a 1984 film directed by David Lean and based on E. M. Forster’s novel of the same name, featured the church’s graveyard as a scene.

Mudumalai National Park:

Mudumalai National Park and Mudumalai Tiger Reserve is located on the Nilgiri Hills’ northwestern flank, some 31 kilometers (19 miles) from Ooty. The Mudumalai National Park and Wildlife Sanctuary, which is also a designated Mudumalai Tiger Reserve, is located on the northwestern edge of the Nilgiri Hills (Blue Mountains), in Nilgiri District, Tamil Nadu, India, around 150 kilometers (93 miles) north-west of Coimbatore.

Mukurthi National Park:

Mukurthi National Park (MNP) is a 78.46 km2 (30.3 sq mi) protected area in the northwest corner of Tamil Nadu state, in the Western Ghats mountain range of South India, west of Ootacamund hill station. The Nilgiri tahr, the park’s main attraction, was established to safeguard it.

Mukurthi National Park is famous for which animal: Mukurti National Park is home to the regal Bengal tiger and Asian elephant, but the Nilgiri tahr is the park’s main attraction. Nilgiri Tahr National Park was the park’s previous name.

Mukurthi National Park established: 12 December 2001

Reserve forests

Tropical forests abound in Ooty. Doddabetta (2,623 m) is the tallest peak in the Nilgiris, located around 10 kilometers from Ooty. It is encircled by dense Sholas at the crossroads of the Western and Eastern Ghats. The pine forest, located halfway between Ooty and Thalakunda, is a little downhill region with neatly planted pine trees. Wenlock Downs is a grassland area with gently sloping hills that is indicative of the Nilgiris’ original bioscape.