Lazing Out @ Horsley Hills

This post has been long overdue; I do not know why I could never sit on this and get it out from its draft mode. Finally, I decided enough is enough and started to pen down all that fun-filled moments that I spent this beautiful place called – Horsley Hills…cool, wet, chill and serene…

When you have a long weekend and you do not feel like being at home, then what do you do? If I were you, then I would pack my backpack and run to nature would be at its best, secluded and beautiful…That’s what we did (Ashwin, Shiv, my kids and me) did. The best part was that we had this place on our mind for a very long time, but whenever we planned it, it would get postponed due to some or the other reason. But, this time we all three adamant that we are going to make to this place come what may...

Horseley Hills, is really not very famous, it is a beautiful virgin hill station in Andhra Pradesh close to Tirupati. It is also known as “Andhra’s Ooty”, and we will talk about its history soon, when we actually reach the place.

It was early Saturday morning; Ashwin was at my home sharp 6 AM to pick us up. I had packed lots of things to eat, as I was sure we had a long way to go with the kids, and yes also I managed to smuggle in a flask of strong hot coffee. We all were set for the trip, and as usual me at the backseat with my notepad where I had made notes about the routes, diversions, eatouts, and what all can be covered during our stay there. And of course, I have a habit (call it bad, if you want to) of making a note of expenses that have been incurred during the trip. That’s the reason; Ashwin and Shiv call me “munimji”.

Horseley Hills is about 500 kms from Hyderabad and we decided to take the Kurnool route to Horseley Hills. We all set out in our Santro and the route that we took was: Hyderabad - Jadcherla - Kurnool - Gooty - Anantapur (on NH7, turn left on NH205) - Kadiri – Horseley Hills. The roads near Kurnool were horrible, and we had to be careful, otherwise the road before that was awesome.

On the way, we stopped to “Ghar” dhaba to have a lunch. We preferred having thali and food was awesome. We refreshed ourselves and moved ahead. We actually missed the turning near Kadri, a small u-turn that we had to take to drive up the Horseley Hills. Once you cross Kadri village, you need to keep you eyes open to see the sign where it says – “Welcome to Horseley Hills” The moment you see the sign, take that turn and viola, you are entering the hills. Drive carefully, as you need to read the signs and enter an archway that takes you through the hairpin bends to reach Horseley Hills. By the time we reached the AP Tourism Hill Resort at Horseley Hills, it was quite late, should be around 8 PM. We were not sure if we would get the rooms or not. We decided to try our luck and asked for the Governor’s Bungalow. Lady Luck was smiling on us and we got the rooms. We drove down to the Bungalow and checked in. Freshened up and we decided to walk down to Haritha Restaurant to have dinner.

There was chillness in the air and I just loved it. It reminded me of my school days, when I used to ride my bicycle to school in the chill weather. After dinner, we walked back as slowly as we could, enjoy the silence…

Next day morning, I am not sure we all got up pretty early, but I was one lazy one out there this time and wanted to sleep for some more time under the warm blanket. Ashwin, Shiv and Adi went for their morning walk and came back all pinky pinky types. They told me that it was worth the effort and they really enjoyed it.

By the time, they came back; I had got up and was ready to start to look around. The place is cut off from rest of the civilization, so a good way to break free from office stress, relax and enjoy oneself with nature. There are few places that you could spend time – Forest area, opposite to Haritha Restaurant, a small temple (little away from the Haritha). And yes they also have activities like adventure sports. Though set up in a small place, but they are maintaining it pretty well.

First thing in the morning, we decided to have breakfast at Devdas, a small eatout just opposite the Haritha restaurant. We loved the hot idlis that were he served for breakfast. After breakfast, we decided to enter the Forest area, where Adi was busy feeding the rabbits, ducks and peacocks. We walked quite a lot and it was nice to see the flowers and nature’s beauty….

This place gets it name from a British collector of Cuddapah – W.D. Horsley. He used to spend his summers at this place. Within the forest area, you can see the place where he used to stay. Next to that bungalow, there is a Eucalyptus tree which is about 150 years old and is believed to plant by Horsley himself.

You get a very beautiful view from this area. The hills, the plateau looked awesome and we just loved it.

Then on an impulse, we decided to drive down the Talakona falls. And we all rushed back to room, picked up a small bag and drove down. We asked for instructions and drove down. As we neared the falls, we heard the waterfall and we all were ecstatic, but it did not last long as reached the falls. All our imagination about the waterfall was broken, when we saw the waterfall - there was not enough water there. Anyways, we discovered another place – I forgot the name, where they had nice log cottages. You can actually stay there and go for jungle safari…

Once we were back to Horseley Hills and spent another day or so lazing around, lapping in whatever Mother Nature had in store for us. Our two days trip was over before we could realize and we had to return home. Before leaving the place, I did a pamphlet, which had the details of booking the room there. I am posting that information for future reference:

For enquiry and reservations contact: Haritha Hill resort, Horsley Hills, Madanpalli, Chitoor Dist, AP. Phone: 08571-279323

Other Central reservation offices:

Office Location	STD Code	Phone	Fax
Bangalore	080	41136373	22385513
Hyderabad	040	65581555, 23450165	23453086
Basheerbagh	040	23298456/57, 657466370
Secunderabad	040	27893100, 27816375
Tirupati	0877	2289120/126/129
Vizag	0891	2788820/21, 98488 13584
Vijayawada	0866	2571393
Kurnool	08518	270104, 273325
Chennai	044	65439987	24353373