Ooty Special
Today on the eve of Christmas we started with a delicious breakfast which was crisp ‘dosas’ and fluffy ‘idlis’. And at 9:30 a.m. we took off to Ooty [Udhagamandalam or Ootacamund] to visit the Radio Astronomy Center in the TIFR [Tata Institute of Fundamental Research] campus. It was really inspiring as we learnt about the half km long Radio telescope which is the largest of its kind in India. We understood the structure of the telescope and how it works through a brief introductory video. We also took lovely photos of the telescope and enjoyed a few minutes trying to gauge the magnanimity of the telescope with as far as our eyes could see,even as we knew that it was 532 kms long.
From here we went to the backwaters of Pykara, which is a wetland and had huge expanses of water. However, it was disturbing to note that as we saw the nice view of the lake, it was interrupted by the garbage strewn all along the banks thanks to the irresponsible tourists and garbage which was dumped in this water body in the higher reaches. We have realized that it is our Fundamental Duty according to Article 51 to save and conserve our Environment and also be aware and well informed as we saw a powerful film “ The truth about Tigers” by Shekhar Dattatri. Hence, we have vowed to write a letter to the municipal corporation and the minister of the forest department of District Nilgiri via Registered Post to take cognizance of such an appalling situation and rectify it. After this trek in the forest we reached a shady place where we could enjoy our lunch and stretch our legs a bit!
Later we went to the Ooty Boat House for a fulfilling boating experience in Ooty and enjoyed the lovely scenery and took various photos to capture the lovely memories which we can remember for a lifetime. Then we reached “The Ooty Coffee House” established in 1969, which is the oldest coffee house in Nilgiri. The food was very appealing, specially the dosa. It is indeed remarkable that we were a group of 22 teachers + 2 teachers and our total bill ran into less than 1500 INR!
Afterwards we took the famed UNESCO World Heritage Nilgiri Blue Mountain experience train, which was one of the mountain railways in India. It was a once-in-a-lifetime experience where we all enjoyed the toy train.
We reached our campus by 8 pm, this was cruelly followed by our daily debriefing…in which we saw the film, “ The truth about Tigers.” We also planned our itinerary for the next day, within which we were playing games with children from an orphanage. This will include a day picnic to the SIMs Park.
The surprise of the day was yet to come, close to Midnight, when we all went to the Anglican Protestant Church, St George’s Church which was established in 1885. We sang hymns and read out Psalms to herald Christmas this year by attending the Midnight Christmas Mass.
The challenge today is that we are retiring late and must be up and about tomorrow at 8 30 am sharp as we are spending quality time with the students from an orphanage till early evening.
Today on the eve of Christmas we started with a delicious breakfast which was crisp ‘dosas’ and fluffy ‘idlis’. And at 9:30 a.m. we took off to Ooty [Udhagamandalam or Ootacamund] to visit the Radio Astronomy Center in the TIFR [Tata Institute of Fundamental Research] campus. It was really inspiring as we learnt about the half km long Radio telescope which is the largest of its kind in India. We understood the structure of the telescope and how it works through a brief introductory video. We also took lovely photos of the telescope and enjoyed a few minutes trying to gauge the magnanimity of the telescope with as far as our eyes could see,even as we knew that it was 532 kms long.
From here we went to the backwaters of Pykara, which is a wetland and had huge expanses of water. However, it was disturbing to note that as we saw the nice view of the lake, it was interrupted by the garbage strewn all along the banks thanks to the irresponsible tourists and garbage which was dumped in this water body in the higher reaches. We have realized that it is our Fundamental Duty according to Article 51 to save and conserve our Environment and also be aware and well informed as we saw a powerful film “ The truth about Tigers” by Shekhar Dattatri. Hence, we have vowed to write a letter to the municipal corporation and the minister of the forest department of District Nilgiri via Registered Post to take cognizance of such an appalling situation and rectify it. After this trek in the forest we reached a shady place where we could enjoy our lunch and stretch our legs a bit!
Later we went to the Ooty Boat House for a fulfilling boating experience in Ooty and enjoyed the lovely scenery and took various photos to capture the lovely memories which we can remember for a lifetime. Then we reached “The Ooty Coffee House” established in 1969, which is the oldest coffee house in Nilgiri. The food was very appealing, specially the dosa. It is indeed remarkable that we were a group of 22 teachers + 2 teachers and our total bill ran into less than 1500 INR!
Afterwards we took the famed UNESCO World Heritage Nilgiri Blue Mountain experience train, which was one of the mountain railways in India. It was a once-in-a-lifetime experience where we all enjoyed the toy train.
We reached our campus by 8 pm, this was cruelly followed by our daily debriefing…in which we saw the film, “ The truth about Tigers.” We also planned our itinerary for the next day, within which we were playing games with children from an orphanage. This will include a day picnic to the SIMs Park.
The surprise of the day was yet to come, close to Midnight, when we all went to the Anglican Protestant Church, St George’s Church which was established in 1885. We sang hymns and read out Psalms to herald Christmas this year by attending the Midnight Christmas Mass.
The challenge today is that we are retiring late and must be up and about tomorrow at 8 30 am sharp as we are spending quality time with the students from an orphanage till early evening.