Hyderabad: Eco-tourism enthusiasts from the city are heading to Adilabad this winter to enjoy the chilly weather at the Pethe Metta waterfalls deep inside the forests of Sirupur (U) mandal.
Temperatures there are usually around 8-10ºC in winter and sometimes it dips to 4-5ºC. However, reaching the waterfalls is not easy as one has to drive about 20 km through the forests and then trek for another 6 km. And this is what makes it an adventure.
A Telangana Tourism department official from Adilabad said, "It's mostly youngsters looking for adventure and secluded places who visit the falls. Apart from Hyderabad's nature lovers youngsters from nearby districts like Nizamabad and Karimnagar also come here. The number of tourists visiting the falls increases in winter when temperatures fall drastically. The waterfalls were not known to many until recently."
But, one has to plan to return early from the waterfalls because there are no places there to stay overnight. The closest where one can find a hotel is Utnoor, which is 60-65 km from the waterfalls and nearly 90 km from Jannaram.
Pethe Metta is one of the most-visited waterfalls and it forms part of a group of seven waterfalls known locally as Sapthagundalu. The other waterfalls require risky treks and are not visited by many.
Telangana tourists interested more in religious spots
Telangana’s tourists are a religious lot, that is what the revenue figures of the tourism department indicate. The tourism department has 31 tour packages of which six are in Hyderabad city and the rest to locations in TS and other states. However, all the 25 packages are not operated regularly. The services which earn revenue for the department are the tours to pilgrimage destinations in TS, AP and Maharashtra.
The tourism department offers packages to eco-tourism spots like the single day Farahabad Wildlife Tour and the two-day Jannaram wildlife package tour in Telangana and the Papikondalu road-cum-river cruise and Konaseema tour in AP.
It also offers packages to archaeological sites. However, they do not bring in revenue. 13 of the 25 tour packages outside Hyder-abad operated by the TSTDC are to pilgrimage spots as they have more demand from TS tourists. Packages which have the greatest demand are Hyderabad-Shirdi, Hyderabad-Tirupati, Warangal-Shirdi and Srisailam.
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