Travel · Agriculture · 9 min read

Beyond the Tea Hills: Strawberries, Apples and Garlic in Vattavada and Kanthalloor, Kerala's Winter Garden

Past the last tea bushes of Munnar, the hills turn into terraces of carrots and cabbages, orchards of plums and apples, and fields of the famous GI-tagged hill garlic. A journey to Vattavada and Kanthalloor, Kerala's fruit bowl and winter vegetable garden.

By GK Global, Adimali, Munnar · Trails & Tales by GK

Everyone who comes to Munnar sees the tea: endless green hills, clipped and combed into neat rows. But drive on, past the last estates, and the landscape changes in a way few visitors expect. The slopes break into narrow steps of red earth and green leaves, rows of carrots and cabbages climb the hillsides, plum trees hang heavy with purple fruit, and in the cool valleys, Kerala grows the only apples in the state. This is Vattavada and Kanthalloor, Kerala's winter vegetable garden and its fruit bowl.

What makes it possible is geography. Both villages lie high on the eastern side of the Western Ghats, at around 1,500 to 1,900 m, in the rain shadow of the high ranges. The air is cool all year, the nights can be cold, and the rainfall is far lower than in Munnar, giving a climate closer to the hills of Kodaikanal than to the rest of Kerala. Here, crops that belong to cooler lands thrive.

The agricultural marvel

Winter vegetables on the terraces

The farmers of Vattavada and Kanthalloor, many of them descendants of Tamil farming families who settled these hills generations ago, have carved the slopes into terraces held up by stone walls. On these steps they grow the vegetables of a cooler world: carrots, cabbages, cauliflower, beans, potatoes, peas and leafy greens. Much of the harvest travels down to the markets of Kerala and Tamil Nadu, and in many seasons these villages supply a large share of Kerala's hill vegetables. Seen from a viewpoint above Vattavada, the terraces form a patchwork of greens and browns climbing the mountain, broken by the tin roofs of farmhouses and the white of irrigation pipes.

The famous hill garlic

The pride of these hills is their garlic. In 2022, Kanthalloor-Vattavada Veluthulli received a Geographical Indication tag, recognising garlic grown here as special. It is valued for its small, pungent cloves, and studies for the GI registration found it richer in essential oil, sulphur compounds, flavonoids and allicin than garlic from the plains. Sown with the summer rains, the garlic fields are a fine sight as the slender green shoots fill the terraces, and the harvested bulbs are hung up to dry under the eaves of farmhouses. (Read more in the spices of Idukki.)

Strawberries and berries

Over the past decade, strawberries have become the stars of Vattavada and Kanthalloor. Many farms now welcome visitors to taste the berries, pick their own and buy fresh fruit, jams and strawberry crush; the season runs for several months, roughly from the end of the monsoon well into the summer. Some farms also grow blackberries, and newer "tunnel" farms in Vattavada grow strawberries, blueberries and raspberries under cover.

Apples, plums and passion fruit

Kanthalloor is the only place in Kerala where apples grow, in small orchards scattered among the farms. The fruit ripens around July, and many orchard owners leave it on the trees until the Onam season (August–September), when visitors come to see and pick it. Alongside the apples, Kanthalloor and Vattavada grow plums, peaches, pears, oranges, gooseberries, passion fruit and the egg-shaped tree tomato. In the plum season, usually around May to July, the orchards of Koviloor, Chilanthiyar and Pazhathottam near Vattavada are heavy with small, tangy-sweet purple plums, sold by the roadside.

Walking the farms

Many farmers open their gates to visitors for a small fee. You can walk along the terraces, see how garlic and carrots are grown, stand under the apple trees, pick strawberries and buy produce straight from the people who grow it, often at better prices and much fresher than in town. Ask permission before entering any farm, stay on the bunds between beds, and never pick without paying. Kanthalloor's panchayat has pioneered community and women-friendly rural tourism, and homestays let you wake up among the orchards.

The journey is the destination

Getting to these villages is half the adventure. The road to Vattavada leaves Munnar past Mattupetty Dam, Echo Point and Kundala Lake, climbs to Top Station on the edge of the Ghats, with its views over the Tamil Nadu plains, and then runs on through the tiny Pampadum Shola National Park, where the shola forest closes in over the road, before dropping into the valley of terraces. Along the way, plantations of eucalyptus and wattle line the hills, and clouds pour over the ridges.

The road to Kanthalloor goes north from Munnar, past the edge of Eravikulam National Park, through tea estates and eucalyptus groves, and down into the dry, sandalwood-scented valley of Marayoor, before climbing again to the orchards. The two villages can be linked in a long day by the hill roads.

(Read the sandalwood forest of Marayoor, the dolmens, Marayoor jaggery, the shola national parks and the Andavar Kovil cave temple of Vattavada.)

Best time to visit

• September to February: cool, clear weather, green terraces, and the start of the strawberry season; the best months for views and farm walks.
• March to May: strawberries continue, days are pleasant, and it is a good escape from the heat of the plains.
• May to July: the plum and peach season around Vattavada and Kanthalloor.
• July to September: apples ripen in Kanthalloor, with picking around Onam.
• Harvests vary with the weather each year, so ask locally before you go.