So we woke this morning for our 2 day 1 night trip to see the elephants and head off into the mountains but as my alarm went off at 5.15am a sudden flash filled the room….it was absolutely chucking it down outside with a full on thunder n lightening storm going on!!!!!!! We just sat looking at each other what the hell is gonna happen here – no elephants are gonna like the thunder and no mountain road is gonna like heavy heavy rain!

So the driver turns up he said we can head to the elephants and then decide if we want to go to Munnar – elephants are an 1 .5 hour drive and Munnar is amother 3-4 after that. We had packed the bags so we thought fook it lets go to the elepahnts see how it goes – so we are driving along in the heaviest rain ever on roads of complete flooding it was like driving through a river – eventually as we reached the elephants the rain had stopped and the sky had brightened woo hoo – we decided lets go to Munnar too if we cant see nothing there cause of the rain then so what at least it will be cool (15-20ish degrees there)

Marc had drifted off to sleep so when we arrrived at the elephants he was woken as we parked, we got out the car and walked down to the river which aparently had swelled loads since the driver was there 2 days previously cause of the rain – sleepy Marc is just kinda standing looking at the river waking up when I said "oo here they come" Marc turned round and nearly fell over with fright - a giant elephant had just appeared from the path right in front of him – bless him all sleepy and confused that certainly woke him up .

Five elepahnts were brought down the path, some giants and some younger ones – we opted to clean the younger smaller sized ones cause the others were massive haha – we got in the river and got to clean them they seemed happy enough – they are part of a training camp where orphaned elephants are brought to be trained to work. I find out there is a baby elephant back at camp just 8 months old and we headed up there to see it – I thought this is it finally I might get to touch a baby elephant – but no – not any offer of any backhander cash was gonna let me get to touch it they were having none of it – aparently the inspector was there watching and if he hadnt been there then I would have been allowed, GUTTED !!!!!!!!!!!!!   Everything else is backhander cash in India but not the baby elephant L still it was lovely we got to see it.

So we head off after for our 3ish hour drive to Munnar as I said its in the mountains so it was a steep ascent where overtaking on a blind corner was ok so long as you toot your horn, the road was tarmac at least but at points really narrow and a steep drop off the side of you were not careful – no walls to stop you rolling down the mountain – somehow once again I managed to drift off to sleep – don't know whats happened since I got here but the bumpier and noiser the road the more I seem to sleep – god knows how hard I was rocked to sleep as a child !! Mum Dad ???

Anyway Marc spent most of the journey making noises at every blind bend in the road when we overtook stuff it seemed like we might crash head on but the tooting the horn thing just seems to work – it kinda makes sense – I am no fan of a road that has cliff edges at the sides but our driver was good he was not driving fast so that helped .

We arrive in Munnar some hours later totally way up in the moutains the pics don’t do the views justice it was amazing and best of all cools we had finally stopped sweating!! We head to the Tea Museum the area itself is famous for tea plantations before we could even enter we were the star attraction nevermind the museum – these indian familes spotted us and were all over us asking “what is your good name”, “where do we come from”, “what is our profession” and “are we married” (these are the standard questions everytime you meet someone)– which by the way we now are married!!   Its just easier to say yes than explaining that in the UK its ok to live together and not be married – we tried to expain this before to other people on many occasions and the reaction from Indias when we said we weren’t married and I was 34 was total confusion – just cause I am 34 does not mean I am not wanted hahahahaha – they cant believe I am this old and not married !!!!!!! So after the guy telling Marc he was very handsome and then saying the same thing to me they took a million pictures of us with their children, grannies and god knows who else we finally get into the tea museum .

We learned about tea then visited a few sights in the area a huge amazing waterfall, a dam and this place where you shout and it echos really loudley but by now we were shattered after travelling all day and up so early so we headed to the homestay for the night. It was amazing super clean proper toilet, our personal chef and the view from the balcony was amazing looking into the hills, we changed into long trousers and I put on my hoodie so we could sit outside at last we were cold J

Dinner was cooked for us and we had a great feed then chilled out and slept like babies, next moring was meant to be more sightseeing but we had our train to Delhi to catch so we had a huge pancake breakfast cooked for us and headed off – the drive down was not too bad, Marc still making his noises but before long we were back in the hot sticky weather and dropped off at the train station………next stop Delhi.

Tour cost - £30 each including all food and room