The Nilgiri Mountain Railway is the highlight of a visit to the popular hill settlement of Ooty, in India’s southern state of Tamil Nadu.
The Nilgiri Mountain Railway (NMR) was built by the British in 1908. NMR is the only rack railway in India. Although the railway was proposed in 1854, it wasn’t completed until 1908, as the rocky terrain and thickly forested hills made the work difficult. A Swiss inventor, Riggenbach, worked on the first part of this mountain railway, and built up the initial line up to Coonoor by the year 1899.
The railway mostly relies on its fleet of steam locomotives. Covering a distance of 46 km in around 5 hours, the Nilgiri Mountain Railway takes tourists from Mettupalayam to Ooty. This is a truly amazing journey that takes tourists from a height of 325 to 2203 metres. The uniqueness of this rail line lies in it being the steepest one in Asia. It covers a total distance of 116 km and crosses 250 bridges and 16 tunnels.
Picture credit: google