Day 12: Elephant Rides and near death experiences

Aug 10

We got up at 6:45 to go see the famous rock that the men here kept telling us about. We were laughing a lot about it, because when we were being taken around the resort yesterday, the man kept telling us about their rock and how we need to go visit “the rock.” So that was the plan. We had one of our servants… I mean one of the staff, lead us on a 10 minute hike to this special attraction. It was a big rock! They told me it was 2 hectares in size. It was all one rock. We walked from one side to the other in about 10 minutes. The view was amazing. The clouds were all under us through the hills.

We walked back and had our own breakfast served to us inside a bamboo hut that was out over a cliff. Zab was scared that he would fall through. He said they do not have building codes here. I loved it. It was raw and beautiful.

We had a crazy ride down the hills in the pouring rain. The jeep did well through the creeks and rocks we had to get across. We stopped at a beautiful waterfall. I almost slipped and fell down it, but the guide grabbed my arm and held me from falling. What a kind man! Haha. It was here that zab lost the cover to his camera lens. We looked for a long time, but we could not find it. This worried zab a lot. We do not want it to get damaged. We will have to go and get one in a city if we can. I got a leech on my leg. I didn’t notice it till we got to the bottom of the hills, so it must have had a good dinner. I flicked it off. It is all good, another experience!

We then went to an Elephant Training Centre. Here they had 3 elephants tied to trees. One of them was just a small 3 year old. It was super cute. It knew some tricks: shake a trunk, salute, and run your head. We then got rides on another elephant. It wasn’t very comfy, and I felt like I was going to fall off. It would not be my favorite mode of transportation, but it was fun and hey, now I can say that I rode an elephant in India. Very cool. Oh, and the third elephant there was 50 years old and had, as we were told, killed 2 people! I am glad we did not ride that one!

We drove 5 hours NE towards Munnar. The trip was only 180km, so you can calculate how slow we were going. The roads were very windy, and it was raining and foggy the whole way. People who get car sick would not have done well on this trip. (Julie Renee would have been so sick! This was one of the few times I was glad that you were not on the trip with me.) We had many close calls. I loved it!
We passed rubber, pineapple, coconut, papaya, banana, and orange trees. At one point we stopped to relieve ourselves, and along the side of the road there was coffee trees, and on the other side there was pepper trees! I love this place. I ate some green pepper from the tree. It was wonderful.

As we drove through the hills of Munnar, we saw fields and fields of Tea plants. The sides of the hills were covered in these plants. As far as the eye could see there were Tea plants. It is really neat to see. It was still raining, foggy, and cold. The temperature was around 10 degrees we think. We did not pack for cooler weather, so we are hoping this doesn’t last too long. I thought India was supposed to be hot! Haha I think we somehow have been transported to Peru.

Benny our driver has been sick with a cold for the last few days. I think it is because of the air conditioning in the car for us. We had another driver come with us to Munnar, and then we dropped him off and he took the bus 6 hours back to his home. Benny was a great driver, and he spoke English. Our new driver does not. This is sad.

We arrived at Sienna Village Resort in the hills above Munnar. At check-in we were given some amazing fresh mint tea. It was some of the best tea I have ever had in my life. And it was hot, on a cold rainy day in Peru, this is just what a guy needs. Our new place reminds me of an Italian villa. It has a really tall ceiling over the sitting room, and there is a half level over looking it with a table and chairs. Underneath this is the bedroom and bathroom. We have a queen sized bed to share. Snuggle up Zab! We have another patio that we think would have a nice view, but all we see is fog and rain.

We had another amazing buffet. I am really going to miss this food. We went to the computer to do some blogs, but the dial-up internet was not working, so I just typed some up, and then went to bed at around 10.