Palamalai – A Small hill near Coimbatore for the adventurous

Palamalai, A small hill in coimbatorePalamalai, is a small hill near near the sub-urban areas of Coimbatore. From the center of the city, it is located at around 25 KM distance. One needs to go to the Mettuppalayam Road, Periyanayakan Pirivu, Kovanoor and Palamalai. The roads are quite ok, and there was a road going over this small hill – So I thought why not go there and have a look…

On the way to Palamalai, small hill station near coimbatoreThe (far) sub-urban areas of Coimbatore are almost like villages. These are quite different  from the city. You can see vast expanse of fields, lush greenery, small houses all along the way and even Tea shops with a bench – typical village style.

Balamalai, a hill in coimbatore for touristsOnce you cross Kovanoor, there is absolutely no sign of people or houses. Its  just you and the mountains.

Palamalai Coimbatore tourist destination for the adventurous, mountain climbing in coimbatoreI was expecting some people to cross me from the other way (or even by my way), but throughout my way up, I wasn’t able to see even a single vehicle! So, its me. my bike and the hills – Nothing else. I was actually getting a cool breeze at 2 PM in the afternoon, when I went! But while coming back, I saw a couple of Jeeps and bikes coming in the opposite direction. One guy was even driving a TVS 50 over the hills!

Tree without leaves near Palamalai, Coimbatore a small hillIt seems, people can come till Kovanoor by bus and from there they can hire Jeeps to go up. I asked if I could go with a Two Wheeler, and they said yes. It seems, its only a small hill.

Palamalai hill near coimbatore for a short trip over the mountainThe scenery was much better than what you can see in the above photo. Actually I did not plan to go here. I went to the Ramakrishna Mission Ramayan park and was casually speaking to people out there. I saw some hills near by and asked if there was a road going near it, so that I could take some photos. They told me that I could even climb over the hills through a road, and visit a temple there.

Palamalai Temple - Arulmigu Palamalai Aranganadhar Thirukkovil - Perumal TempleYes, there is a temple on the hill. One needs to travel for 4 KM over the hill to reach this place. This temple is called ‘Arulmigu Palamalai Aranganadhar Thirukkovil’ – A Perumal (Vishnu) Temple.

Balamalai view from top of the hill roads and valleyDriving on a mountain was tougher than I thought. I went only for 4 KM over the mountain road, and boy, it was exhausting. Perhaps more exhausting for my bike! Actually there was a road going beyond the temple (in another direction) too, but I did not try it! It seems there are some small tribal villages there. I was able to see one of them from a distance.

Palamalai Mountain Coimbatore - hill viewThe roads were pretty narrow & curvy and one needs a lot of patience (and good breaks) to drive over hills! The way back was even more challenging than going up. The bike would get more momentum when traveling down hill and if you are not on your breaks constantly, the bike might just speed up very fast. Yeah, you can just switch off the bike and ride it down, but I kept it in neutral.

I think, since this place is just around 25 KM from the city, people could just go there for the nice and pleasant view. How much people of Chennai/Bangalore would wish that they had a hill so close to the city! 🙂

You can see some more photos taken by me at Palamalai from the below embedded video slide show (Youtube; 4 min: 09 sec):

Destination Infinity

55 thoughts on “Palamalai – A Small hill near Coimbatore for the adventurous

  1. Ashwathy

    Your post is the stuff dreams are made of….
    Empty wide expanse of road, beautiful scenary….plus you and your bike….cool breeze….wow!! 🙂

    1. Rajesh K

      Ok, that cool breeze part was exaggerated a bit 🙂 But it was a nice place to spend a couple of hours…

      Destination Infinity

  2. vishesh

    Never keep the vehicle in neutral, keep it in gear and it won’t go out of control..at least that’s what we do with cars..

    1. Rajesh K

      That’s right. Since it was the first time for me in hills, I didn’t think of that!

      Destination Infinity

      1. Avada Kedavra

        yeah true.. not a good idea to keep in neutral..

    2. Subbiah S

      Can I go by car. Whether safe parking area available

  3. V Rakesh

    DI – Wow! You surely are living it up my friend! Good going! 🙂

    1. Rajesh K

      All the good things happen in life due to circumstances… Life is a circle. No, circumference 😀

      Destination Infinity

  4. saritha

    Good every week you go into the nature.Loved the pictures….

    1. Rajesh K

      Even next week I have planned to go into the nature, but this nature is right in the heart of the city!

      Destination Infinity

    2. muthu

      hai i am masthi how r y

  5. Bikram

    oooh nice i wud love to go there .. i am a outdoor person 🙂

    loved the pic so much greenery

    1. Rajesh K

      You may not believe, I hate traveling. But I used to travel a lot on my job, and now I travel for my blog. Hmmm…. 🙂 This region, is quite fertile, compared to North TN.

      Destination Infinity

  6. Sandhya

    Is the name of the place, Paalmalai or Pazhamalai or Palamalai…Tamil or English (!)is a funny language, we have to think before pronouncing the names!

    The scenery is beautiful and I can feel the breeze on the face while riding on a bike. Coimbatore has got number of sight seeing places around it.

    Loved the third picture!

    1. Rajesh K

      Actually its Tamizh ‘Pa’ which can be both Pa or Ba in English. Some people mentioned it as Palamalai and some as Balamalai. Not sure which is the right pronunciation.

      Yeah, there are more sight seeing places in coimbatore than I thought! People here don’t seem to know all of them.

      Destination Infinity

    2. Rajesh

      What’s there in a name… as long as you can get to know what it is ??

  7. Kanagu

    Never heard about this place and no wonder not many vehicles crossed you… its also good as it has very less chance of getting polluted 🙂 Pics are good DI 🙂 🙂

    1. Rajesh K

      It was quite difficult to stop my bike and take the photos – the bike keeps going down on the hill…. but I guess, the trouble was worth it!

      Destination Infinity

  8. Avada Kedavra

    oh yes I wish we had some hill or scenic place nearby.. we have a couple of them I think like Nandi Hills which is like an hr or so drive.. but getting out of the city itself will take an hr coz of the traffic 😛
    Beautiful pics! Driving on a hill is really difficult..have tried once and never tried after that..

    1. Rajesh K

      Driving on the hills is tiring! I have heard of Nandi Hills, but I have never been there! I should have visited more places in Bangalore when I was there! There is always another opportunity 😀 But yeah, the biggest thing there is to actually cross the city and get to the highway! Even with the the huge Mysore road flyover, it still takes a lot of time. Esp to come back to the city!

      Destination Infinity

  9. Anu

    That must be adventurous! I love Coimbatore, although I don’t hail from there. I have a maternal attachment towards the city, and have spent good part of my annual holidays there! But i have never heard or been to Palamalai! The pictures are very scenic, and the mountains at the backdrop look like as if sketched with blue pen!

    1. Rajesh K

      That blue pen effect might have been because of my cell phone camera, which gives such effects naturally! That’s one reason I like it… 🙂 Even I don’t hail from Coimbatore… been here just for more than a year… Forget Palamalai, which I got to know quite accidentally, ask anyone here about the places that one can visit here, and they are clueless!

      Destination Infinity

  10. akshay murali
    akshay murali says:

    i ve been there recently and now the road are well laid but the hill road is still steep and narrow

    1. Rajesh K

      Yeah, the hill road is steep – I was afraid when coming down, my bike was quite uncontrollable. But thankfully I had just serviced and hence my vehicle breaks were in good condition. That enabled me to control the momentum and reach safely! 🙂

      Destination Infinity

  11. Praveen

    Hello All,
    This is a very nice place, roads are good, and one should take care of driving, Another news about this place is, above the Vishnu temple, there is a another temple, where one can only climb the hill by walk, myself and my friends planned to go, soon i will update you all!!! cheers. 🙂

    if you wish the videos and photos of this place, i can upload for you!!!

    1. Rajesh K

      If you can upload photos and videos of this place without any people in it, I can link them from the main article…

      Destination Infinity

  12. Bala

    You should have tried trekking up the hill. Palamalai is still more beautiful…

    1. Rajesh K

      Yes. But since this was my first time on any hill in a bike, I was slightly nervous.

      Destination Infinity

  13. Venkatesh

    Hi Rajesh !!

    Good work man ! Taking picutes of the palamalai.bring it to limelight. it recalls my college days 10 days NSS camp in the temple. there are arounf 6 tibal village in the mountain and One Trucking spot called “Male Mudi” top of the adjacent hill…

    We are planning 2 days night stay truckking to Male mudu hill on August 15th leave
    I had been there in that trucking ten years before. it was nice experience

    We are going have same in couple of days!! we post the photos too

    Venkatesh.C

    1. Rajesh K

      Good 🙂 Enjoy your trip and post the photos. If possible, give a link in the comments.

      Destination Infinity

    2. Rajesh

      You should come now and see the place… No need to walk… you can drive upto the temple now and the roads are pretty decent. Wonderful climate and you will feel the peace…..

  14. izmail

    great blog, was very useful, just had a great time at palamalai – heres my version of the place

    http://livingismyright.blogspot.com/2011/06/palamalai-quaint-little-hilltop-temple.html

  15. karthyahal

    hi pal,
    I came to know about palamalai just before a month. we went there for one day trucking. ur blog is nice but i need to knew the historical informations about the temple and the pond. do u have any info about that buddy?

    1. Rajesh K

      I don’t have any historical info on those sites… I just got to know about the place from someone in Ramakrishna Missions, when visiting Ramayana park there.

      Destination Infinity

    2. Rajesh

      There is a story behind this Palamalai temple…… You should visit the temple and buy the book where they have written about the history of this temple and the Pond…..

      Its interesting and i am sure that you will feel some kind of a vibration here….

  16. vbsenthilnaathan
    vbsenthilnaathan says:

    If you had been to this hilly site visit the pond near the temple a awesome one
    *VBSN*

  17. govind

    It felt like i visited palamalai my self. In 1970’s i was living at the foot hills of this lovely beauty ful mountain, Looking forward to visit god willing may be very soon

  18. Hariharan

    its real god

  19. divvakar

    super ..i will go every week end…..it help to lose weight ….

  20. Satheesh

    Hello,

    I visited this palce yesterday. It is a nice place for day picnic (Chill breeze and no pollution). It is not a popular picnic spot as it has the temple alone. No other sight seeing spots. One has to be prepared before going up the hill. No cell phone signal, No tea/anyother shops, no restaurants at the top. The temple is a very old temple constructed about 400 years ago and is well maintained. The temple is opened from 6M to 8PM every day. I heard that there are couple of tribal villages, but not visited those.

    The roads are decent and are very steep. One should have tight brakes in their vehicle to climb down the hill.

    Overall, it was a nice experience.

  21. Pratheesh

    While you drive on the road up the hill, there’s a detour on the left (after couple of KM’s up the hill). It’s just a mud road and I feel only Jeeps can drive in that terrain. You can also park your vehicles and walk. You will find another temple “Arulmigu Sengothai Thayaar Thirukovil”. It’s a suyambu of devi and the temple and it’s surrounding was excellent. You won’t find people visting this temple much and hence only we were there. Try this out.

  22. Vijaya

    From all your comments, I wish I should visit this place. Can anyone tell me which is the right time to visit this place. Plan to go this wkend

    1. prasanth

      u go on tamil month chitrai.its car festival on chitrai pournami

  23. david young
    david young says:

    Hi
    Way back in the 1950’s when I attended Stanes High School in CBE. We were taken on a hill climbing excursion. The peak that we attempted to climb was called “Lambtons Peak”…..Is this the same one you describe in the above article? ……PALAMALAI

    1. Rajesh K

      I don’t know what the Palamalai was called earlier, if it was called by some other name. Actually, I am not a native of Coimbatore, and hence I am not familiar with old names. But in case I come across the name of that peak anywhere else, I will reply here. Thanks for your visit to my blog…

      Destination Infinity

    2. arun raj

      Rajesh I ve been in CBE for 20 years and iam still clueless about this place,Thanks for this posting.
      David “Lambtons Peak” you mentioned and palamalai is located on the same range of hills , but are spaced out by about 20km. Trekking up the Peak is very resticted now.

  24. N.Duraiswamy
    N.Duraiswamy says:

    Very nice photos and very useful information about Palamalai Aranganathar Temple which we visit every week ends. Also, Melmudi Aranganathar Temple which is situated to the left of Palamalai Hill, rocky Peak may be named after the Englishman who planted coffee plants years before.

  25. Vecto

    Its Paazha malai, I and my friends climbed that hill when are doing eigth grade. I remember those reading ur article. Thank u

  26. deepak

    is this place worth to visit along with my girl friend?

    1. Anandhan

      @Deepak: Yes, provided she is a doctor!!

  27. Rajendran

    This is my native village.The God (Idol) in the temple is like Lord Venkateswara.Please visit one time.

  28. Shiva kumar

    I visited this temple hill in the last week of August and It was noon time and cool. Absolutely a very calm place to spend your time. No traffic on the way up or down and quite a tough one to drive. It was first ever hill drive on my Honda city.

    I visited the pond, down hill which is a half a kilo meter from the temple. I was told that just a couple days back, elephants were roaming near the temple entrance at night and were still in the area.

    I will post about the trip in my blog.

  29. Anandhan

    One of the worst places to go for cycling.. Please dont go to this place for cycling!..

  30. Gowtham

    Hi dude,

    Very nice photo collections. I often go there. I think u have missed many places. There is one more temple there (sengothai amman thirukovil).. we have to walk deep inside the forest, and there are many tribal villages (perumpathi, perukambathi, pasumani, maanguli, etc..).. Dont miss next time :-).

  31. Vimal

    Thanks for the post, will be trying the place for some photography.

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