Kolli Hills is the road with 70 hairpin bends
Kolli Hills Road (Road MDR181) is the name of a dangerous mountain road located in Kolli Hills or Kolli Malai, a small mountain range located in central Tamil Nadu in Namakkal district on the east coast of South India. The road features 70 continuous hairpin bends.
How long is Kolli Hills Road?
The road is 46.7km (29 miles) long. It starts at Kalappanaickenpatti and 70 continuous hairpin bends take you to Kolli Malai or ‘the mountains of death’. Riding through these hairpin bends is an exhilarating experience. Up to around the 25th hairpin bend, the road is great. After that the road is quite bad - pot holes and patches. Some of the hairpin bends are very narrow and do not have space for two vehicles to take the turn. The views of the plains below are beautiful and the dense green tropical forests surrounding the hairpin bends adds to the charm. The road is a ghat road: the name of the access routes into the mountainous Western and Eastern Ghats mountain ranges of the Indian Subcontinent. These roads are remarkable feats of engineering and most date back to British times. Ghat roads were built to connect to the famous Hill Stations of the Indian Subcontinent.
Is Kolli Hills dangerous?
It’s a difficult road, with uncountable turns and twists. The roads are pretty decent except for some slightly bad stretches hitting the hairpin bends. The 70 hairpin bends, which are spread across a little more than fifteen kilometres are nearly continuous and it is indeed a pleasure to drive on these winding roads. The spot is famous for Agaya Gangai waterfalls and a Shiva temple. It can be visited all round the year except for the month of January as the temperatures drop down considering the altitude of this picturesque destination. The hairpin bends are numbered.
How many bends are in Kolli Hills?
The road is called MDR181, also known as Kolli Hills Road and Kollimalai Ghat Road. It’s paved with some steep parts. Starting at Karavalli, at 238 meters above the sea level, the ascent is 20.4 km long via 70 hairpin turns, ending at 1.198 meters, at Solakkadu. The elevation gain is 960 meters. The average gradient is 4.70%.
Pic: http://travelfreeindia.com/tag/kolli-hills/