The ruins you see at Top Station are the remains of an engineering miracle.
The Kundala Valley Railway
In the early 1900s, the British had a problem: How to get tea leaves from the high hills of Munnar down to the ports?
They built a Monorail (pulled by bullocks!) in 1902, which was later converted to a light railway.
The Ropeway
The train brought tea to Top Station. From there, a massive Ropeway dropped the goods 5,000 feet straight down a cliff to Kottagudi in Tamil Nadu. It was the steepest, most dangerous supply line of its time.
Today, you can still find the rusty anchors and wheel stations hidden in the bushes at Top Station, silent witnesses to a bustling industrial past.
