Travel Virus

The very wellknown beach of Varkala is quite nice but there are way too many white tourists. The atmosphere is a bit hyppie and not at all indian. However it was nice to be there for a day. The weaves are very big, some austrialians were body surfing, while the indian aunties with kids come to the beach to see what are all those white people doing The only good restaurant is the Cafe del Mar.

On the way south, after Varkala I stopped in Kerala’s capital: Trivandrum. As all big cities there are more annoyance and the feeling of beeing cited all the time. There is a nice zoo, several musems, the raja palace (with guide) and a big temples where tourists are not allowed (but everything is possible in India). The palace is quite nice, with a mix of italian marble, belgium cristal and colorful indian deities. The hotel Manjalikulam is really crap, very unfrendy staff and overpriced.

After the peaceful backwaters I head to the city of Kollam, which I liked very much: it’s a perfect mixture of city-backwaters-sea! All in a couple of kilometers… fantastic. Nobody was swimming in the sea, maybe it’s not a popular activity for indians. I stayed in an idillic homestay with backwaters on three sides (like a small peninsula). Still, this paradise is quite unexpolred by mainstream tourism, who prefer to go to the westernalized beaches of Varkala and Kovalam. If you plan a trip to Kerala, this is a place I would strongly reccomand.

Finally I’m in Kerala on the backwaters!! It’s a paradise! After a short stop in Delhi, I took a flight to Cochin (Kochi), the biggest city in Kerala, in the south west of India. I went back to Fort cochin, a beautiful area (full of tourists) and took a ferry to the city (ernakulam) for 2.50 Rs (=about 0.40 euros). Then we took a local bus to Aleppy, “the Venice of India” and in about 2 and a half hours I arrived in this amazing place on the backwaters (mix of river and sea water). There are coconut trees, mango trees, a hamac in the garden and delicious food. Today the host of the homstay, Mr. Thomas of Green-Palm Homes (see the lonely planet), took us for a bike ride in the countryside of Aleppy… awesome!! We biked for three hours between the local houses, all facing the water and the rice fields. After the ride, for relaxing there is nothing better than a swim in the backwaters, as you can see from the picture. As in India there is a full body coverage tradition I’m swimming with all the cloths, which was fun and also useful since they needed to be washed anyway ;-) Then I did some proper washing at the river like the indian aunties do… provoking some laugh of the indian tourists passing by on the beautiful luxiurios houseboats.  

As you see in the picture, Aleppy is not called “Venice” by chance, in fact the boats really do look like gondolas and the houses are built almos in the water. The main difference is that here there are 30 degrees all year and it’s 100 times cheaper!