It appears the internet can only give you so much information and local knowledge goes a long way, especially on the less trodden paths(at least tourist-wise). I like to think I’m pretty good at good old Google-fu but nowhere could I find a nice easy way to get to Mysore from Munnar (using forums, travel and government websites), the quickest option I could find included 3 bus journeys and actually going past Mysore to get a connection back again so we’d arrived in Munnar with the intention of staying an extra day purely for the purpose of resting up in preperation for a monster journey on public transport. As soon as we got to the guest house in Munnar we were told a direct semi-sleeper bus goes to Mysore everyday from the bus station at the endof the road – less than 100m away!
With ticket in hand (~700 rupees each), we headed to the bus station half an hour before departure as instructed…we forgot to take into account that we were now working on India time. When we Brits say 3o’clock, we usually mean 3o’clock (or shortly after), a sticker in the bus station window summed up India time perfectly… “When’s the next train? After some time” – even though the back of the bus ticket says about being on time.
After a few false starts – the bus set off (without us) at 3.40pm on what seemed to be a quick test run – checking the brakes, only to return an hour later with half of the town’s mechanics on board! After an hour of tinkering but the Indian version of the Super Mario Bros, the bus stopped near us, we were motioned to get on only for the bus to suddenly set off again, full throttle, the full length of the forecourt to emergency stop at the end and reverse it’s way back again to collect us – apparently the brakes work fine…all aboard!!
So the journey begins…(2 and a half hours late with only a couple of giggles and shrugs of shoulders for an explanation)…oh wait, the bus drives through the town, does a U-turn and drives back past the station we got on at half an hour later, now the journey begins…
10 hours of diesel fumes, winding roads, over-taking at high speed on blind corners in the pitch black. FUN! #Indianbustravel
We made it, feeling a little worse for wear, I couldn’t decide if it was motion sickness, the diesel fumes or the malaria tablets kicking in after starting on them that morning but I felt sick the whole way…nothing a little nap at MTR residency couldn’t fix…after we managed to get the tuktuk driver to take us to the right MTR and wake up the staff (they were all fast asleep in the lobby when we arrived – the website said 24hr check-in but we weren’t expecting 5 or 6 members of staff to literally be at reception 24hrs a day).
The guidebook says that if you haven’t been to Mysore, you just haven’t seen South India – Let’s see…
