Ooty is the queen of the Nilgiris in the way that British hill stations liked to be queens, which is to say it is cool, slightly eccentric and wildly overcrowded at the weekend. Its official name is Udhagamandalam, and it sits at roughly 2,240 metres on a plateau in the Blue Mountains of Tamil Nadu. In the nineteenth century it was the summer capital of the Madras Presidency, and the colonial administrators built churches, clubs, cottages and a famous botanical garden in a landscape that reminded them of home. The hills were originally the territory of the Toda people, pastoralists with their own customs and beautiful barrel-vaulted huts, and some communities still live in the surrounding hills.
For motorcyclists the appeal is in the approach. Whichever way you come, the road climbs through tea, eucalyptus and pine, with the temperature dropping at every hairpin, and the final arrival in a town of nearly a hundred thousand people is a little anticlimactic. The centre is a tangle of narrow streets, one-way systems and honking traffic, particularly in May and during school holidays. Park the bike and walk if you want to see anything. The lake, the botanical gardens, the racecourse and the old church are all within reach, and the town's tea shops and bakeries sell fresh bread, cakes and homemade chocolate.
Do take the time to ride the Nilgiri Mountain Railway by eye, if not by seat. The narrow-gauge rack-and-pinion line runs from Mettupalayam through Coonoor to Ooty, and it is one of the UNESCO-listed mountain railways of India. You will cross its path several times if you come up the Coonoor road, and a steam engine puffing past in the mist is a glorious sight.
Fuel and food are no problem here, with pumps on the main roads and plenty of restaurants. Hotels are numerous but fill up quickly in the high season, so book ahead if you plan to stay overnight. Nights can be cold, even in summer, and in winter frost occurs on the higher ground, so pack a jacket.
The best months to ride are October to February for clear skies and cool air, and the mornings are the best time of day, before the traffic fills the lanes. In the monsoon the whole district disappears into cloud and rain, which has its own moody charm if you do not mind getting wet.