The Princess of Hill Stations — a star-shaped lake ringed by eucalyptus, Coaker's Walk at the fog line, and the Palani Hills where the clouds arrive before 10am and rarely leave
Kodaikanal (pop. 36,000, 2,133 meters) in the Palani Hills of Tamil Nadu is the cooler, quieter alternative to Ooty — founded in 1845 by American missionaries and later developed by British planters as a retreat from Madurai and Madurai plains. The Kodaikanal Lake, shaped like a star when viewed from above (a five-pointed artificial lake created in 1863), is the social center of the town; a 5-km road around its circumference is the essential Kodaikanal walk, done by boat or cycle or on foot at dawn when the mist is still on the water. Coaker's Walk — a 1-km path along the cliff edge at the to…
The Palani Hills were inhabited by the Paliyan tribal people (a nomadic hunter-gatherer group) long before European settlement. American missionaries from the United States (particularly from the American Mission in Madurai) discovered the plateau in 1821 and established a school that became the Kodaikanal International School (KIS, 1901), which still operates as one of India's most prestigious international schools. The town's character was shaped by this missionary-founder history — modest rather than grand, with an emphasis on walking rather than riding, and a tradition of educational inst…