Over The Canopy

I stumbled upon this unique home stay at a coffee estate in Coorg , India, named Honey Valley.

They named it ‘Honey Valley’ because they used to produce the largest output of honey in south Asia in the eighties & it’s situated in a valley between misty hills. (yes, it is as stunningly beautiful as it sounds)

What attracted me to the place was that they produce their own electricity from a stream using a small makeshift hydroelectric plant. Ive never seen this kind of effort to be self sustainable in any indian resort :)

They bring in potable water thru a 3 km pipe laid from a natural levee up in the mountains, and the gas used for cooking is methane from cow dung!

The rooms have hot water for baths by burning firewood collected in the forest thru an ingenious copper boiler system.

A maximum of 40 guests can be accommodated in the estate and all their needs are met by these self sustaining energy resources.

Plus they even grow almost all of their food ,fruits,vegetables and eggs and milk.

This was all in an effort to live as close with nature without leaving an impact on it and after seeing the movie inconvenient truth recently, it all started making a lot more sense.

Being a city bred guy from Mumbai, I discovered in one of my long chats with Mr. Suresh Chengappa, who runs the estate, how much of an ecological footprint we leave behind while living in cities. Leaving lights on in rooms when no ones around and an almost endless use of water without knowing its a precious resource.

Water table depletion will be one of the biggest problems India will face in the future.

Considering how pristine and beautiful the place looks, I hope honey valley becomes an example on how ecologically friendly estates and resorts can be run without putting pressure on our non renewable resources.

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