But you can never leave...
- Lines from the song "Hotel California", by The Eagles
Those were the first lines that came to our mind when we stayed at the Hotel Sky Roca. But wait, we are getting ahead of ourselves. Let us start at the very begining.
We had planned our next trip for August'08, but there was a lot of time for that to come. We were getting restless, we wanted to travel. We racked our brains to think of a place thats not far from Bangalore, and is a good weekend destination. We also did not want to take any leave. We hit upon two options, Yercaud and Yelagiri, both hill-stations in Tamil Nadu. Both are within about 5 hours of Bangalore and the weather at both places is ideal for this time of the year. I decided to do my research on both places, starting with Yercaud.
Off I went, pointing my web browser to HolidayIQ to check out reviews written about Yercaud. I searched for good hotels to stay in there, and I came upon this. Our decision was made. This was where we would go, and since it happened to be in Yercaud, that became our next destination. I went to the official site of the Hotel Sky Roca, to find out more about the Hotel. It looked majestic. I immediately started the process of contacting the hotel to get my booking done. That was easy. I checked the tarriff, and my eyes nearly fell out of their sockets. It was a steal! We had booked ourselves the Roca Royale Suite.
Having booked a room, I started on the research about Yercaud. What were the touristy things that we could do there? I prepared an extensive list of tourist spots that one could see while in Yercaud. You can read about it in this post. It seemed like another great trip in the making. What we were most concerned about was that we wanted to spend as much time as possible in the Hotel, and even planned on reaching Yercaud at 9AM on Saturday, so that we could see some tourist spots before checking in.
We finally left Bangalore at 6:30AM and were headed towards Electronic City. After asking a bit for directions, we somehow found our way to the Silk Board flyover, from where it is straight to Electronic City. Having passed Electronic City, our next landmark was Hosur in Tamil Nadu. We were soon on the toll road, and the toll is Rs. 25 for a one-way trip and Rs. 37 for a two-way trip. This toll is valid for 24 hours. The NH7 is very beautiful in parts and is still under-construction in parts. It's a smooth ride for sure.
Once past Hosur, we came to a BP Petrol pump which had a couple of restaurants and a small, nice park for kids. We stopped there for half an hour and were soon off on our way to Krishnagiri. In Krishnagiri, we were stuck because there was a lot of truck traffic. After getting out of Krishnagiri at a snail's pace, we were on our way to Dharmapuri. From Dharmapuri, we went on towards Salem, once again on a fantastic highway road. At Salem, we had to take a left turn into the city. From there we had to take another left to get onto the Ghat road for Yercaud.
The ghat stretch to Yercaud is about 30kms and would take an hour. It's a very steep road, with 20 hairpin bends.
Pls drive with care, if you are going to be driving on this road. Once stuck behind a truck or a bus, be extra careful while trying to overtake. The ghat road also offers some excellent sight seeing opportunities on the way, so make sure to park your car properly if you want to see the town below.
The Hotel Sky Roca is at the 20th hairpin bend, about 3 kms before the actual town of Yercaud.
The first gate leads to the restaurant, called Uncle Sam's Kitchen, and is open to the general public and not just for the guests. There are two tables along the glass wall that overlook the valley below. These tables are always booked in advance. To get to the reception, go past the 20th hairpin bend, and enter the main gate (two gates down the road). Watch out, because it is a really steep decline. The first impression of the Hotel was great. It looked like a beautiful setting, and the hotel looked really good while not being over-done.
Total Time Taken - 5 hours, 15 minutes
Total Kilometers Driven - 259.5kms
We checked in at 11:45am, and were taken to our room, one of the three Roca Royale suites available. We went to the room in a glass lift, which gives an awesome view of the valley down below. We remember reading some place that not a single tree was cut in the construction of the hotel. We have heard that the hotel is just built around the natural fauna, without disturbing anything. The room we were in was large. It had a large living room space
and an equally large bedroom space. Just beyond the living room space is an expansive, personal balcony.
We were floored. The bathroom is also extremely comfortable and fitted with a shower cabin and a jacuzzi!
We rested for a while and then decided to go to Uncle Sam's Kitchen for lunch. We checked out the rest of the Hotel on our way to the Restaurant. The Hotel is large, very esthetically built within the dense greenery of the mountains. They have a conference room as well and a skywalk. The skyway is a glass walkway above the valley. It is quite an experience to stand in the middle of the glass walkway with the view of the valley far below you.
After lunch, we relaxed some more. In the evening, we decided to go for a walk and see the hotel in its entirety. We were treated to the most beautiful sight of nature. Down in the valley, in the distance, we could see dark clouds and could also see the rain fall.
We kept our eyes on the rainfall, and we could actually see the movement of the rainfall towards us.
Within 15 minutes, the rain clouds were over us and we were getting drenched. 5 minutes later, it was all over. The clouds had passed over us at amazing speed.
On our way back to the room, we stopped by their library, where they have a Sony PS2 and a good collection of books and magazines. We picked up a couple of books and continued onto our room. We were enjoying the stay here so much that we had not yet stepped out of the Hotel, even for sight-seeing!
Dinner was once again in Uncle Sam's. We tried to get the tables next to the glass wall, but they were already booked. The restaurant was getting quite crowded and the service was suffering. We placed our orders and headed back to the room so we could eat in peace. Even before we reached the room, there was our food waiting for us! The food in Uncle Sam's might seem a little expensive at first, but their quantities are humungous.
After dinner, we relaxed in the living room area, reading our books, watching the Asia Cup 2008 on a great 32 inch plasma TV. The next day, we planned on getting up early so we could catch the sunrise. We were up early around 5:30 and it was dark.
It seemed like the time at which sunrise would take place. We went onto the balcony to see the sight and once again we were treated to a sight of nature. There were clouds in our face. We were actually in the clouds!
We sat on the balcony, trying to capture the scene in our camera and we bagan to notice the cloud cover clearing up. Within half an hour, it was all clear, and bright and sunny. Unfortunately, the sun rose on the other side of the hill, and so we missed that sight.
It was such amazing weather that we decided to go for a walk. We headed out to the main road, which is really the highway heading to Yercaud. We walked in the direction of Yercaud, hoping to maybe hit the city and see what we had missed so far.
We walked for a couple of kilometers, before turning back. It was after-all time for breakfast! Breakfast was once again in Uncle Sam's, a good buffet spread before us. We enjoyed the breakfast buffet, quite heavy I must say, and then got ready to pack up and leave.
We packed up and planned on doing some sight seeing so that we could have something to report back about Yercaud. We got out our list of tourist spots and zeroed in on a couple. We would go to the lake and then to the Shevroy temple. We set out from the hotel after checking-out and we were at the lake in 5 minutes.
Had we walked 100meters more in the morning, we would have reached the lake. The lake, at this time was crowded and seemed like no fun. We instead went to the flower market and picked up a couple of saplings for home.
After about half an hour, we headed towards the Shevroy temple. The road to the temple is quite a sight. It is thinner than the highway and probably steeper, but the views it offers are quite majestic. The Shevroy temple is on top of a peak, from where one can see 17 villages down below. There was so much wind blowing, that it was difficult to walk straight. After clicking some pics, we were back on our way. On the way back, we stopped at Uncle Sam's once again for lunch.
A quick lunch, and we were on the road to Salem by 2:15pm.
The drive back home always seems shorter. This time however, we decided to look for the Dharmapuri bypass. Dharmapuri is a small town that comes on the way. On the way to Yercaud, we were stuck in a lot of truck traffic, and did not want a repeat of that. Parts of the Dharmapuri bypass road is under construction, but it is open for traffic. This road however, does not take you back to the toll road which is part of the Golden Quadrilateral. This road, leads to the old highway to Hosur. This highway road is much thinner (one lane on either side, with no divider in between), but is very green. We enjoyed driving on this road as well, lots of bends and ups and downs.
The old highway road, opens up at Hosur, and meets at the point just after the toll tax booths. So in case you don't mind spending Rs. 25, you can use the new highway. However, if you want to save on that, you can use the old highway.
Once we were in Hosur, we felt as if we were back home. It still took us more than an hour to get home from that point. We were back home by 7:00pm, a drive of 4 hours, 45 minutes. That brought another wonderful trip to an end.
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