CURVESCOUT / MOTORCYCLE RIDE
Ordered leg totals agree within rounding. Stop distances are approximate sums of rounded legs. Stops, delays, approach and any separate return travel add time. Basis: producer-declared routed record.
Reading history stays on this device. My road watch requires a separate selection; opening it does not subscribe this ride.
Distance and riding time are measured on the routed road. Check local closures and conditions before you ride.
A one-way ride of 245 km, Cochin to Marayur - roughly 5 h 42 in the saddle. On the way it passes Adimali, Munnar and Top Station. The stored terrain estimate reaches about 1,550 m; a measured road-elevation profile is not available. A steady touring day rather than a sprint.
Expect company on a summer weekend. Early is better than fast. For about 24 km this is Munnar Tea Country Loop, a road with a name of its own and a reason for it.
Kochi is the old spice port of Kerala, and it still has the look of a place where traders from many countries have come and gone. Arab, Chinese, Portuguese, Dutch and British merchants all passed through, and the old quarter around Fort Kochi keeps traces of them: Chinese fishing nets on the waterfront, a Portuguese-era church, a synagogue in Jew Town and colonial houses facing the water. The city itself is spread across islands and the mainland, tied together by bridges and ferries, with a lot of water around.
Read the complete Kochi write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Kochi is where the day begins. Next is Adimali.
Adimali is a working town in the cardamom hills of Kerala, on the road that climbs from the plains near Kochi into the high country around Munnar. It is not a tourist town, and nobody comes here for the sights, but it is a handy, lively place, a trading centre for spices, rubber, tea and cardamom, with a crowded bazaar, a lot of buses and the constant beep of horns. It is also the last proper town before the road begins its steepest climb.
Read the complete Adimali write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Adimali comes up about 103 km into the recorded legs. Next is Munnar.
Munnar is tea country on a grand scale, a high town in the Western Ghats of Kerala, at about fifteen hundred metres, surrounded by steep green hills that are covered, row on row, in a close-clipped carpet of tea bushes. The slopes are so regular and so bright that they look painted, and the mist moves through them in the morning, turning the valley into a soft, silvery landscape. It is cool here, even when the plains below are baking, and the air has a faint smell of tea leaves.
Read the complete Munnar write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
about 127 km into the recorded legs you reach Munnar. Next is Top Station.
Top Station is the high point of the road between Munnar and the Tamil Nadu border, a viewpoint at about seventeen hundred metres, where the Kerala hills fall away abruptly to the plains of Tamil Nadu far below. The name comes from the days when a ropeway carried tea down from the estates to the railhead at Kottagudi, and this was the topmost station. Today, the ropeway is long gone, but the name has stuck, and the place is a favourite stop for travellers going between Kerala and Tamil Nadu.
Read the complete Top Station write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Top Station, late in the day. Next is Marayoor.
Marayoor lies on the dry, rain-shadow side of the Western Ghats, a small town in the Anamalai hills of Kerala where the lush tea country around Munnar gives way to a landscape of sugarcane fields, coconut palms and rocky, scrub-covered hills. It is a different world from the damp green slopes just over the ridge, hotter, drier and quieter, and the change happens within a few kilometres. The people here are mostly farmers, and the pace of life is slow.
Read the complete Marayoor write-up.
May refer to an earlier itinerary; verify against your selected route before riding.
Finish at Marayoor. That is the ride.
Kochi → Adimali is 103 km of getting across. Ride it tidily and keep the enthusiasm for what comes after.
Adimali → Munnar is 24 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Munnar → Top Station is 35 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.
Top Station → Marayoor is 84 km of rhythm rather than effort. Let it flow and let the view breathe.