Yercaud - the poor man’s Ooty

If Ooty is the `Queen of the Hills`, then Yercaud is a princess. The other districts of the region are hot and humid with the only silver lining, Yercaud.

Yercaud is how the Brits got around the tongue – twister `Yericaud`. Yercaud got its name from the combination of two Tamil words `yer` and kaddu which correspondingly mean lake and forest.

Yercaud is one of the India’s cheapest hill station destinations. Yercaud is so rich in its natural charm and its potential for bountiful discovery that to label it `cheap` would be truly insulting. It’s sometimes referred to as the ``Poor man’s Ooty``, but ``smart man’s Ooty would be nearer the mark. .

In southern India when ever some one talks about a hill station then the two names that come into mind are Ooty and Kodaikanal. No mention is ever made, even in passing, of Yercaud. A majority of people don’t even consider Yercaud as a hill station. Yercaud is as beautiful as Ooty and Kodaikanal but is remarkably cheaper than both of them. May be this is the logic behind calling it as the `Poor Man’s Ooty`.

All along the route to Yercaud one will find monkeys playing high jinks and trees with violet flowers make one wonder where one is heading towards. There is greenery every where which is a new experience, for the city bred. Yercaud is famous for coffee and pepper in much or less the same way, Ooty and Kodaikanal are famous for tea.

The Britishers used Yercaud as summer retreat and their inheritance is all over the place. Rows of houses, much like ants moving in files, speckle the entire hills. The number of places to be seen in Yercaud may not be many, but each one of them is really worth the visit. "October and November are the best months to visit Yercaud. Yercaud is a less expensive place than other tourist destinations in Tamil Nadu and is preferred by the middle class. The entire family can tour Yercaud on a budget of about Rs.1000 by a car. An annual flower show is organized in the month of May. Another major difference between Yercaud and any where else in Tamil Nadu is the difference between the prices.


Located: 35 kms from Salem
How to Reach: One hour by bus from Salem
Altitude: 1500 metres

“YELAGIRI” – A Paragliding Hotspot

The recently developed paragliding destination in the Yelagiri hills, which lies midway between Chennai and Bangalore, conducted an international paragliding festival from 5 to 7 September. Fortunately I was in the region on a vacation with my friends. So I got a chance to witness the festival. It was a beautiful and a wonderful experience to see so many colors in the sky.

Yelagiri is a hill station where an adventure sports club was formed three years ago. Earlier the region was only famous for the hills, the scenes, boating in the stream and the lake etc. But today it is famous as the paragliding center. It’s the third paragliding center in India after Panchgani and Bir Billing (Himachal Pradesh).

We a gang of 5 friends, (Hum Panch) after finishing our work in Bangalore decided to visit Yelagiri for some adventures. We had a workshop in Bangalore for 3 weeks and we wanted to see all the near by places. A colleague told us about paragliding in Yelagiri. But as the place is still in the developing phase and we were new in the region, we were a bit worried about how to reach there and where to stay. The language was also a barrier as we speak only Hindi, English and Punjabi.


While searching the Internet for the information on Yelagiri, I came across the website of Indiahotelreview.com Deepti a member of hum panch contacted IHR. The counselor at IHR just asked our dates for the visit, number of people and our budget and I must say she made every thing so easy. They arranged for a cab and told us that it would come to pick up at 5.30 in the morning of 6.

Can you believe the cab was exactly on our hotel gate at 5.30 am. “How he was so punctual??” Gajju asked the driver. As Gajju was the one who got up late at 5.25. and we all had to wait for him. We moved at 5.45 from our hotel…


We reached Yelagiri at 10.30… we wasted a lot of time as another member of the gang Pooji is a big foodie and we had to halt in between to satisfy her hunger…Yelagiri is a beautiful place. We stayed at the Sterling Resort and I think it was the best hotel of the region. The staff was very hospitable. They gave as a warm welcome... Must say thanks to India hotel review…

We stayed there for two days had fun out there. The boating in the stream and the lake was so fun; the Mughal garden was so nice. In the evening we went to get our selves registered so that we can do paragliding. But we couldn’t do that as there was an international paragliding festival going on. But we were allowed to witness the festival. It was so thrilling yet scary to see people flying in the sky. But the management has taken care of all the safety measures. It was such a wonderful and a mind-blowing experience all together. Next time whenever we’ll be visiting Yelagiri Hills once again we will definitely try Para-gliding.

The sky was so colourful with so many Paragliders in the sky from so many countries…
Finally the festival was over and our weekend too. We had to leave for Bangalore. None of us wanted to return but we had to...
Yelagiri is a must to visit place for those, who want to try some real adventures. Thanks a lot to my colleague who told me about the place and thanks a lot to India hotel review for making our trip so memorable and comfortable.