Ooty

Ooty, officially Udhagamandalam, is a hill station at 2,240 metres in the Nilgiri district of Tamil Nadu, established as a British administrative retreat in the early nineteenth century. The Nilgiri Mountain Railway, a UNESCO-listed rack-and-pinion line, connects the town to Mettupalayam on the plains through a series of steep gradients, curved viaducts, and sixteen tunnels. The surrounding Nilgiris are characterised by rolling grasslands and shola forest patches interspersed with tea and eucalyptus plantations.