Ooty

The upper Nilgiri plateau was never empty wilderness. For thousands of years it was home to the Toda and four other indigenous communities, long before the East India Company's John Sullivan first climbed the hills in 1818. Sullivan bought land from the Toda, built the first European house — the Stone House — in 1822, and dammed a stream to create Ooty Lake.

Captivated by the cool, temperate climate, the British developed Ooty as a sanatorium and, before long, the summer capital of the Madras Presidency. Each hot season the administration decamped here, the Governor residing at Government House. The town became a municipality in 1866 and the Nilgiris a separate district in 1882.

That colonial century left a distinctive skyline: St. Stephen's Church (1829, built with teak salvaged from Tipu Sultan's palace), the Lawrence School at Lovedale (1858), and the Ootacamund Club, where the rules of snooker were first codified in the 1880s.

Ooty is the mountain terminus of the Nilgiri Mountain Railway, a UNESCO World Heritage Site and the steepest railway in Asia. Opened in stages between 1899 and 1908, it climbs roughly 1,900 m over 46 km from Mettupalayam through 16 tunnels and around 250 bridges.

On the lower section it is the only rack railway in India — a toothed central rail gripping a cog beneath vintage Swiss-built steam locomotives. The full ascent takes nearly five hours; the scenic Coonoor–Ooty leg is the easiest to sample if you are short on time.

The nearest airport is Coimbatore (~88 km, about three hours by road via the Mettupalayam ghat); Mettupalayam is the railhead and the start of the toy train. Central and well-connected, Ooty is within easy reach of Coonoor, Kotagiri and the high-grassland reserves.

Come April–June for the warm season and the May flower show, or October–February for crisp, misty, quieter days. Pack warm layers year-round — nights are cold — and expect heavy rain during the July–September monsoon.