Travel

Teanest sits snug in the middle of tea estates in upper Coonoor. To reach it, one must take a small detour (3 km) from the scenic mountain road between Mettupalayam and Ooty.

Closest Airport: coimbatore (74km)

Closest Railway Stations: mettupalayam (34km) on the main line and coonoor (3km) on the toy train line between mettupalayam and ooty (22km)

The toy train

When you travel on the toy train in the nilgiris, the journey is indeed the destination. For this quaint little train that recently chugged into the listing of unesco world heritage sites, brims with raj nostalgia. Built over a century ago, the 40 km track that ducks through 16 tunnels and trundles over 362 bridges, snakes up mountains that are carpeted with virgin forests, rolling meadows and the neat geometric patterns of tea plantations. And if you are lucky, you might even get to see a herd of wild elephants crossing the track.

According to discovery channel, the narrow gauge track between mettupalayam and coonoor is one of the steepest in world and it was one of the very first railway projects to use the cogwheel to negotiate the incline.

The toy train is a year-round service. It chugs out of mettupalayam every morning and returns in the evening. Its timings tie in with the overnight nilgiri express between chennai central station and mettupalayum via coimbatore.

The railways run an additional service between mettupalayam and ooty to cope with the summer and diwali vacations rush.

In addition there are morning and evening shuttle services between coonoor and ooty – 19 km apart.

Getting to teanest by road

(Distances in Kilometres)

Time taken to travel by air and rail to coimbatore

(The closest airport and main-line station to the resort)

Time in Hours

The drive from coimbatore to the homestay is about 2 hrs

Location

Latitude : 11.353002
Longitude : 76.795909
Altitude : 6000 feet or 1850 meters above sea level.

Map