Well we have been truly amazed by India this past week. The Southern Indian state of Kerala is so diverse and has so much to offer. We started the week in Fort Cochin, a colonial seaside fort area with quaint streets and nice and quiet. Here we saw the old Chinese fishing nets, crane like structures built out over the water to lift the nets in and out of the water. They take half a dozen men to operate and we saw one in operation. We also went to an evening of local Kathakali dance. They have great costumes and musicians play and sing along as the actors act out the story. I also went to a demonstration of Kalarippayat, the local version of martial arts, which use poles, knives, swords and shields and a nasty looking weapon consisting of three or more flexible blades, three or more feet in length and whirled around ones head to lacerate and otherwise assail your opponent. On the Wednesday we left Fort Cochin by taxi and went down to Alleppey, the backwater country as they call it. It’s an inland lake and canal waterway system running a couple of hundred km up and down the coast. Some of it is reclaimed land that is used to grow rice and other crops. The canals run around the reclaimed land that is about one or two metres below water level. Anyway this is an Ideal area for house boating. We hired a boat for three days and two nights. The boat consisted of two bedrooms (aircon) and a dinning and lounge area open at the front and an upstairs veranda and viewing platform. We had a crew of three people looking after us. Needless to say we were fed well with three meals a day plus morning and afternoon tea with fried banana. The scenery around this area is real picture book stuff, every time we turned around there was something more amazing to look at. We passed duck hearders, duck farms, men climbing coconut trees, barges which are more like big canoes loaded to the gunnels with produce or sand, building materials, you name it. Even the mundane things like washing bathing, going to school were interesting to see. This is defiantly in our top 5 things of great stuff to do.
Well all great things must come to an end and we stayed overnight in a local homestay, a bit of a letdown after the houseboat, but we managed. Saturday we moved on north and into the hills on Munnar, a hill station area now holiday spot high up in the cool of the mountains about 1500 m up. It’s also a big tea growing area. The drive up here is truly a unique sight, after the coming through the heavy jungle areas on the way up the mountain you suddenly come around a corner and there are hills as far as you can see all neatly manicured tea plantations, it’s a fabulous sight. Well more about Munnar next week. I have made a few video of our India experience so far but have been unable to post them despite India having a big silicon valley, IT reputation, they have the worst internet facilities we have come across yet. The connections are so slow and unreliable. We also bought a sim card here for our phone, a Vodaphone card and it has also provided terrible service. I’ll post the video’s as I am able.
All the best Ric & Louise
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