Recently we are back from a long weekend staycation from Bangalore. This was a staycation in Wayanad district of Kerala. The Wayanad region of Kerala is one of greenest places near Bangalore. All the parts of this huge region are surrounded by dense green forests, wildlife sanctuaries, ancient temples, pristine lakes and natural caves like the Edakkal Caves where evidences of pre-historic era lives have been discovered. Whether you seek fresh air, wilderness, a break from the city life or just tranquility in the lap of nature, Wayanad has it all.
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An introduction to Wayanad
Although the Wayanad district is very large, one of the largest districts of Kerala. It is the only plateau region of Kerala. A very interesting fact – it connects the eastern ghat and the western ghat. And it is broadly divided into 3 main regions – (1) Mananthavady (2) Kalpetta and Vaythri (3) Sulthan Bathery and around. All of these areas are equally beautiful. While Sulthan Bathery and it’s surroundings are closest to Bangalore and Karnataka Border. And Vaythri is the farthest.
In this staycation, we stayed for a night each in two different regions of Wayanad – North of Mananthavady in Thirunelli village & in Sulthan Bathery. So, here’s a narration of our experience visiting Wayanad for a staycation.
Route taken for our Bangalore to Wayanad road trip
Around 6:00am, we started from our home in Bangalore, for the first resort in Wayanad – Mayookham resort. The drive was projected to be around 7 hrs in total. There were multiple possible routes for this resort from Bangalore :
We took the first route to Mayookham Resort Wayanad from Bangalore.
Since it was a long weekend, there was a small 20-30 mins congestion on NICE Road where it meets Mysore Road. But once we crossed that, we could soon gain enough speed on the new Bangalore – Mysore – Expressway to makeup for the lost time.
Driving through Bangalore Mysore Expressway
Although the Bangalore – Mysore – Expressway is an excellent expressway that has cut down on the travel time between Bangalore and the royal city of Mysore tremendously. But I wonder what will happen to the multiple restaurants and pit stops which used to come on the way on the older Bangalore – Mysore route. Like the toy stores of Channapatna or the Janapadaloka Heritage Museum or Sula Vineyard where you could stop en-route for a wine tour. Or the Organic Mandya Store in Mandya town!!
Anyways, with all these thoughts racing through my mind, we took the service road around 8:30 am as we wanted to stop for breakfast. Unlike earlier, it is difficult to spot the boards of restaurants on the expressway, that used to lure us to them from a distance. So, we stopped at the first decent enough restaurant we sighted after taking the service road.
We had idli & masala dosa here. The typical South Indian breakfast that we always rely on when doing road trips in South India. There was a lot of rush here, again, owing to the long weekend. After filling ourselves in, we started further on our trip. Reaching Mysore by around 10:30 am. From here, we proceeded further on the outer ring road to Ooty.
Driving through Kabini to enter into Wayanad
And after sometime, took a deviation for Kabini. After around an hour, we were crossing the backwaters of Kabini. We saw the direction boards to several famous resorts of Kabini, including the Serai Kabini, The Kuroova Island Resort and Red Earth Kabini. We also spotted the Kabini river in a distance, full of water and looking mesmerizingly beautiful surrounded by the hills on all sides. This beautiful scene brought back memories of the past from our experience visiting Kabini years back, when we had a staycation in the Peepal Tree Kabini.
Soon we crossed Kabini. And we were on the entry gates to the Nagarhole National Park. We stopped here to take the entry permit to the Nagarhole National Park, that comes at INR 20/- per four wheeler at the time of this writing. And then proceeded further.
A road trip through Nagarhole National Park
We crossed the Nagarhole National Park and continued in the district of Wayanad, soon leaving the plains behind. And navigating the winding roads of the hills of Wayanad. Passing through beautiful green valleys, bordered by the mountains.
We felt like stopping at every few meters to look at the mesmerising views and capture the same in our camera. Driving from Bangalore to Wayanad was such a pleasant journey. Finally, we reached our resort Mayokhoom Resort, Wayanad around 2:15pm. The resort is located bang on the main road.
Myookham Resort Wayanad – start of our staycation in Wayanad
We parked our vehicles and went to the reception. Our rooms were still getting ready. But, this resort only has pre-order lunch option which means we need to place our lunch orders in advance. Which we were not aware of. So, we decided to leave our luggage here and walk out to nearby roadside restaurants for lunch. Almost 200 meters from our resort, we found a basic restaurant where we had masala dosa and some banana fritters. After this, we returned to our resort. And checked into our rooms.
The resort is small, with limited number of cottages, a small in-house restaurant and a small swimming pool in the centre. But it is so beautifully located at a perfect location. Every cottage here had a balcony with stunning views of the mountains beyond. Look at the pictures below to see what I am talking about! We spent the whole evening sitting in the balcony. While the sky kept changing hues. First the clouds hovered, and then receded after a little rain. To reveal a beautiful sunset that painted the western sky yellow, and then orange. And finally red. And while this happened, once again black clouds formed. And then it rained heavily for another few hours until dinner time.
After a simple dinner buffet, we slept off.
A visit to Thirunelli Temple
Next day morning post breakfast, we visited Thirunelli temple, one of the most ancient and most famous temples of Wayanad. I will dedicate a separate post to this temple. We walked from our resort, visited the temple and came back. And then checked out from the resort to continue our staycation in Wayanad, in Sulthan Bathery this time – in another beautiful resort named the raindrops resort wayanad.
A drive from Mayookham Resort to Raindrops Resort Wayanad
The drive from the Mayookham resort to Raindrops resort was a 2 hrs drive through beautiful valleys of Wayanad. It took almost 2.5 hours to reach Raindrops Resort. The Raindrops Resort is located just 100 meters inside on a kaccha road from the main road. But the checkin at this resort was so swift.
This resort is built on a rainforest theme. With dense trees all across the property, interspersed cottages and a swimming pool in the center of the property and an open restaurant. Somehow, this resort reminded me of our stay at Gorukana Eco Resort in B R Hills years back.
Our experience at Raindrops Resort Wayanad
Our rooms were already ready here. After dumping our luggage, we proceeded for lunch. Post lunch, we did a tour of the property and then the kids plunged into the pool. Around 4:30pm, we came back to our cottage and relaxed in the balcony. It had started drizzling by now. We enjoyed the sound of the raindrops falling on the tree leaves – making our experience of “Raindrops resort” come real. Most of the evening we spent in our cottage balcony, enjoying the sound of the raindrops on the leaves. Until it grew dark. And we couldn’t see outside anymore.
Post this, we proceeded for dinner. In the Raindrops Resort, our package included dinner as well. The dinner buffet spread here consisted of a salad, a soup, a starter, rice, pulav, dal fry, kerala parotha, chapatis, a paneer vegetable, a few non vegetarian dishes and a sweet coconut pudding which was very delicious. Post enjoying our dinner spread, we walked back to our rooms. By this time, the entire property was fairly dark except for the lit pathway and the dim lights coming from the cottages. By 10 pm, we were all sound asleep.
Next morning, we woke up very early to the chirping and singing of different birds. Soon, we got fresh and got ready to start our day. Abhishek took a refreshing walk into the fields in front of the property. While the kids enjoyed their time on the trampoline. Soon, it was time for breakfast. After enjoying a hearty buffet breakfast spread, we started our journey back home from the resort, completing a wonderful staycation in Wayanad.
Drive from Wayanad to Bangalore after our staycation in Wayanad
The route that we took back home was :
We started from our resort at 10:30 am and reached home by 6:00pm in the evening, in spite of taking multiple breaks on the way. Also, on the way from Wayanad to Bangalore, we passed through beautiful lush green national parks and wildlife sanctuaries where we spotted some animals as well, making the whole drive totally worth it. In Wayanad Wildlife Sanctuary we spotted a beautiful peacock. While in Bandipur National Park we spotted a family of elephants which even had a very small baby elephant in it and a pair of Chital !!
So, overall it was a really great trip. I was initially a little disappointed that we couldn’t stay in a single resort for both the days of our trip. But eventually, it turned out better because we got to experience two very different properties on our Wayanad Staycation. And the drive within Wayanad was itself very beautiful.
General tips on planning a trip to Wayanad or a Staycation in Wayanad
- Although Wayanad is a year round destination, you have to be careful when visiting in peak monsoon season as the region receives torrential rains and gets flooded sometimes.
- Winter months as such will be best to visit Wayanad and so are the spring months. The temperature here never drops as low as Ooty or Kodaikanal. So, you only need to carry a light jacket.
- If you are driving on your own, check the approachability of the resorts or Wayanad Homestays that you are booking. As many of them are sometimes located off the main road, on kaccha / untarred roads. And every accommodation may not have a proper parking within campus for your vehicle.
- There are nice Wayanad family tour packages from Bangalore available. In case you want an agent to plan your trip to Wayanad
- Wayanad is full of all kind of accommodation from luxury resorts to very affordable homestays. You can book one by browsing here.
- Since Wayanad is a popular tourist destination and weekend getaway from Bangalore, book your stay in Wayanad in advance when planning a trip.
- It is difficult to cover all the regions of Wayanad in one single trip until you are planning a 5-6 days trip to Wayanad. So, if you are located nearby like us, then plan multiple trips to Wayanad, each covering a different region. But if you want to cover the whole district in one shot and want to know how to plan a Wayanad trip from Bangalore, what to see and explore in Wayanad then wait for my next post on Wayanad.
Use this link to book your stay at Mayookham Resort Wayanad and click here to book your stay at Raindrops Resort Wayanad
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