Spice Village - CGH Earth

Spice Village is a tribute to the ancient ways of life. Curling around a misty ridge 2000ft high in the Periyar vastness, a ranger's home was found, with fruit trees, rare herbs and a profusion of flowering plants. And here, the idea of building a resort came to life. A village, produced whole, using mountain spirit and tribal wisdom as building material. Of course, the comforts of modern hotel exist, but do not intrude. Modern plumbing, comfortable beds and hot showers take their place, but in a settling stripped down to its natural essence. Birdsong takes the place of television. Cold breezes wafting in the air replace air conditioners. want to get away from it all and live in a state of complete tranquility? Spice Village is your answer.

52 individual, tribal-styled thatch-roof cottages with verandahs (with, we hasten to add, modern plumbing, solar-powered hot water and contemporary furnishings). You can choose from:

Room  types-
Standard Villas: These are suite accommodations, with living rooms, a bedroom and a private garden, complete with your own park bench.

Deluxe Villas: These are cozy huts tucked away between fruit trees, herb beds and 50 year-old timbers from the arborarium laid down by A. W. Woods.

Pack a picnic lunch at the hotel, take one of our naturalists in tow, and you're ready for an adventurous and instructive day at the Periyar reserve.

They've got treks, ranging from a leisurely half-day stroll, to an overnight jungle halt where you can experience the rain forest up close and personal.

You can visit a tribal village, for a first-hand experience of a way of life that's fast vanishing from the modern world. Today, these indigenous peoples still carry on their age old practices of herding and bee-keeping in perfect harmony with the environment.

A Spice,Tea plantation is a pleasant days outing from the hotel, to learn how spices cultivated and Tea bushes picked.

You can go on a boat safari in Lake Periyar, a great way to make a quick, comfortable tour of the vast reserve and sanctuary.

Visit a spice or rubber plantation, to see how pepper is harvested, or how your eraser started life.

Learn to cook with spices at our evening cookery classes. The focus is on Kerala cuisine, with the accent being on (of course) the effective use of spices.

Depending on the season, there are other adventures activities like fishing and river rafting too.
Please mail them before you come for details on these.

The 50 Mile Diet-

The wilder side of nature can be found just around the corner. Exit from our gates and you find yourself in the little hill town of Kumily, and a short drive beyond brings you to the gates of the Periyar Reserve, and the boat landing beyond..

Periyar is a designated tiger reserve, one of a handful scattered across India. The sanctuary surrounds the waters of an eponymous lake, covering 777 acres of mixed grassland and vegetation, including some of the most pristine tropical rain forests in the world.

While there are 40 tigers around (according to the last census), they're shy animals, so don't bank on seeing one. But elephants, definitely - herds and herds of them. Not to mention monkeys like the Nilgiri Langur and the Lion-tailed Macaque, deer like the Sambar, Gaur, flying bats, flying squirrels, flying snakes (harmless, really), and over a 143 species of Orchids.