Kolukkumalai Tea Estate

The road gives up about 12 km short of the tea, and the rest is a jeep-only track that rattles you to roughly 2,200 m. The estate is widely cited as the world's highest tea plantation. Sunrise runs leave Suryanelli around 4:00–4:30 AM, when the ridge sits above a floor of cloud and the plains surface only as the light arrives. The jeep fleet is licensed and regulated, around Rs 3,100 per six-seater as of December 2025. The estate lies in Tamil Nadu though the only access road is Kerala's, and its old orthodox factory still works: belts, wood, warm air, and tea you can buy where it was made.

Above the cloud line at 2,200 m, with a working orthodox factory at the end of the jeep track