Munnar

Munnar, affectionately called as the Kashmir of South India, is one of the main attractions that has contributed to Kerala’s popularity as a travel destination among domestic as well as foreign travellers. It is also Kerala’s most popular hill station. As the name hints, it is a land of three rivers, situated at the confluence of three mountain streams – Muthirapuzha, Nallathanni, and Kundala, perched about 1600 m. above sea level. Munnar once used to be the summer resort of the erstwhile British administration in South India.

This green hill station is surrounded by the country’s highest tea gardens with layers and layers of such tea gardens forming a green sea around the hills. Travelling through the winding roads between the green sea of tea gardens is in itself a refreshing experience. Apart from this, mountain mists, waterfalls and wild life sanctuaries make Munnar surrealistically beautiful and one of the finest tourist destinations in India. The lofty mountain ranges with misty peaks, sprawling tea estates, colonial bungalows, rivulets, waterfalls and cool weather, provides all the ambience of a quiet and peaceful resort.

Munnar is located in the Western Ghats, in the eastern part of central Kerala, mainly in the Kannan Devan hills village in Devikulam Taluk of Idukki district. It is 140 kms. from Cochin and 75kms. from Xaviers Avenue . Let us now explore some of the destinations in and around Munnar that would provide travellers ample opportunities to enjoy this marvellous hill station…

Tea Museum

Munnar is perhaps the choicest of places to preserve and showcase some of the exquisite and interesting aspects on the genesis and growth of tea plantations in the high ranges of Kerala. With special emphasis to Munnar, and to the delight of tea lovers and tourists, Tata Tea group has opened a Tea Museum which houses curios, photographs and machinery, each depicting a turning point that contributed to the flourishing tea industry as seen today in the region. This is the country’s first ever Tea Museum set up at the Nallathanni Estate of Tata Tea in Munnar.

The museum is a fitting tribute to the toils and rigours of its pioneers, who showed utmost determination and resolution in their efforts to transform Munnar into a major plantation centre of Kerala. The thousands of tourists who visit Munnar can carry home impressions of the distant past of this tea planting town in Idukki district’s high ranges. The aim of the Tea Museum, is to depict the growth of the century and more old tea plantation industry here, from the rudimentary tea roller to the present fully automated tea factory at Mattupetty. It also gives first hand knowledge to tourists about tea processing and the operations that go into the making of black tea.

A granite sun dial, made in 1913 by the Art Industrial School at Nazareth in Tamil Nadu, greets visitors at the entrance of the museum. The memorabilia preserved inside include the original tea roller of 1905, the rotorvane (the old time CTC model type tea processing machine), the pelton wheel used in the power generation plant that existed in Kanniamally estate in 1920’s, a rail engine wheel of the Kundale Valley Light Railway, that transported men and material between Munnar and Top Station during the early part of the last century etc. The museum also houses an iron age burial urn from the 2nd century BC that was exhumed near Periakanal Estate in the 1970’s.

One of the museum’s rooms features the old time bungalow furniture, cash safe, magneto phone, wooden bathtub, iron oven that used firewood etc. while another room houses antique office equipment such as typewriters and EPABS of the 1909 telephone system that were in use in the High Ranges. There is also tea tasting demonstration room with a variety of teas on display. The museum also has a mini CTC and orthodox tea manufacturing unit to educate the tourists of the different aspects of tea processing.