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Kodaikanal Travel

By air in Kodai

The nearest airport is Madurai, 120 kms south-east of kodai. From there, buses, tourist vans and taxis are easy to get. It is a three-and-a half hour drive. People coming from Bombay fly in to coimbatore, which is a slightly longer drive of about 5 hours. Trichy airport is about the same distance.

By Road

Kodai is 520 kms from Madras, a 12 hour drive. There are regular overnight buses to and from madras. There are also several buses a day to large nearby cities – Madurai, Palani, Coimbatorem Dindigul for example which have buses going in all directions. And if you really want out during a packed season period when tickets are hard to get, go to Batlagundu, two hours by van and head for the big bus station there.

The last lap of journey to Kodai has to be done by road. Just before the ghat section begins there is a tourist recreation area on your left called “Rock Garden” with tea, coffee and toilet facilities. As you leave the plains and start climbing you will see one of the highest waterfalls in the world: Rat Tail or Thalaiyar Falls. It is a spectacular sight in the monsoon but subsides to a mere trickle in the dry season. An hour or so later you will pass Silver Cascade on your right, in Tiger Shola. This is the run-off from Kodai lake, and during the monsoons has a Naiagara-like splendour, complete with roaring sound and foamy spray. Once every few years the ghat road may be closed when heavy rains cause landslips which have to be cleared away. But work is quickly begun and rapidly finished. In any case there is also another escape route out – or in – th Palani Ghat which leads to the town of the name on the plains.

Some distance by road form kodaikanal