OOTY
Terraced botanical garden in Coonoor (19 km, usually 45-75 min by road from Ooty), calmer and less crowded than Ooty's own Botanical Garden. Best saved for the afternoon after the cliff-edge viewpoints.
Inaugurated in December 1874, the park was developed through the efforts of J.D. Sim, Secretary to the Madras Government, and Major Murray, acting Superintendent of Nilgiris forests, and was named after Sim. Originally laid out as a pleasure garden for British officials living around Coonoor, it was gradually transformed into a working botanical garden used to trial exotic and economically significant plant species, and today covers about 12 hectares in a ravine north of Coonoor railway station.
