Maravakandy Dam

Moyar Falls is a remote cascade on the Moyar River within the protected Mudumalai landscape, where access is governed by forest and wildlife rules. It lies below Theppakadu, about 5 km from Masinagudi as the crow flies. Visitors should not attempt to find an independent route through the reserve; ask authorised safari or Forest Department staff which public views are available on the day.

The elephant camp on the bank of the Moyar inside Mudumalai, 6.7 km from the Masinagudi bus stand, which the Forest Department calls the oldest elephant camp in Asia. It keeps 28 elephants including two calves, and they are working animals rather than an exhibit: they are the kumkis the department sends to drive wild elephants away from villages and to help in captures. Visitors may watch the feeding at 8.30 to 9.00 in the morning and 5.30 to 6.00 in the evening. It became famous far beyond the Nilgiris when The Elephant Whisperers, filmed here with the mahout couple Bomman and Bellie and the orphaned calves Raghu and Ammu, won the Academy Award for best documentary short in March 2023.

A tea-estate area west of Ooty toward Gudalur, known for scenic valley views, a reservoir, and rolling tea gardens.

A waterfall on the Ooty-Gudalur road near Kalhatti village, plunging beside an old Shiva shrine set into the rock.

The Pykara river drops here in two stages of 55 and 61 metres, on the Mysuru road 22.5 km from the Ooty bus stand by routed road — the municipality publishes it as about 20 km. The river above the falls is held sacred by the Toda.

The national park and tiger reserve that Masinagudi sits at the edge of, running along the northern slopes of the Nilgiris where they fall away to the Mysore plateau, at the meeting point of Tamil Nadu, Kerala and Karnataka. The National Tiger Conservation Authority gives it a core or critical tiger habitat of 321.00 sq km and a buffer of 367.59 sq km, 688.59 sq km in all, and it joins Bandipur in Karnataka and Wayanad in Kerala to make one of the largest stretches of protected elephant country in Asia. It was made a sanctuary in 1940, a national park in 1990 and a tiger reserve in April 2007.

A small reservoir and dam near Ooty on the outskirts of town, popular as a quiet picnic and photography spot away from the crowds.

The reservoir on the Pykara river 22.2 km from the Ooty bus stand by routed road, with a boathouse running motorboat trips over water ringed by pine, shola and grassland; gaur graze the banks. The river above it is held sacred by the Toda, and the falls two kilometres downstream are part of the same site.

A dense stand of tall, closely planted pines on the slope below the Shooting Point area on the Ooty-Gudalur road. Its symmetrical rows of trees and filtered light have made it a favourite spot for photography and countless Tamil film songs. It is usually visited together with the adjoining 9th Mile Shooting Point.

Rolling open grassland west of Ooty named after a former Governor of Madras, used for golf, horse riding, and as an ecologically sensitive shola-grassland tract.

The steep mountain road between the Masinagudi side and the Ooty plateau is subject to an official vehicle restriction. A Nilgiris district notice dated 29 April 2026 says tourist vehicles are not permitted; only TN-43 and local vehicles may use it, while eligible local residents with other registrations require a police entry pass. Visitors travelling between Masinagudi and Ooty should use the Gudalur route rather than following a shorter navigation suggestion onto Kalhatti Road.

The gorge the Moyar has cut along the northern edge of the plateau, running roughly 85 km east from the reserve towards Sathyamangalam and forming the corridor elephants use between the Western and Eastern Ghats. It matters for something most visitors never hear about: the cliffs and the riverside Terminalia arjuna trees hold the largest nesting colony of Gyps vultures left in peninsular India, and the Forest Department is building its first Vulture Safe Zone around this valley. There is a viewpoint marked on the map north of Masinagudi, but it is inside the reserve and there is no public way to it: one routing engine refuses it outright and the other only reaches it by forest track. In practice you see the gorge from the safari or from the rim on the Sigur side.