India Guide
Tamil Nadu
The Ghats
Sixty or more million years ago, what we know today as peninsular India was a separate land-mass drifting northwest across the ocean towards central Asia. Current geological thinking has it that this mass must originally have broken off the African continent along a fault line that is today discernible as a north– south ridge of volcanic mountains, stretching 1400km down the west coast of India, known as the Western Ghats. The range rises to a height of around 2500m, making it India's second-highest mountain chain after the Himalayas.
The Ghats (literally "steps") soak up the bulk of the southwest monsoon, which drains east to the Bay of Bengal, and allows for an incredible biodiversity. Nearly one-third of all of India's flowering plants can be found in the dense evergreen and mixed deciduous forests heree.
The abundant game, and cooler temperatures of the high valleys and grasslands, attracted the sun-sick British. As the forests were felled to make way for tea plantations, permanent hill stations were established. These continue to provide welcome escapes from the fierce summer heat for middle-class Tamils and foreign tourists.
Much the best known of the hill resorts – in fact better known, and more visited, than it deserves – is Udhagamandalam (or "Ooty"), in the Nilgiris (from nila-giri, "blue mountains"). The ride up to Ooty on the miniature railway via Coonoor is fun, and the views breathtaking, but the town centre suffers from heavy traffic pollution and has little to offer.
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