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Published: March 10th 2007
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Day 50 - Cochin, India, Day 1
Latitude: 09 degrees 58.11 minutes N
Longitude: 076 degrees 15.96 minutes E
Last night we turned our clocks back by ½ hour! Yes, this does seem strange doesn’t it? We are now 11 1/2 hours (ahead) away from you in CST. It is about 11:00 in the morning and we have slowed down not to a snail’s pace as we come into Cochin or Kochi. In the last two days we have seen the water change from its deep purple to a beautiful emerald green and now to a pond color green as we approach land in India. As we were slowing down, we could see many fishing vessels on the horizon, both large and small. Some even got very close, too close to the ship! One small vessel was in front of the bow so close that we were surprised he was able to get out of the way! It is eerily quiet now that we have slowed down and we can hear the music wafting up from the lower decks. We are going by many smaller fishing boats now that certainly must be in awe of the Queen Mary’s size—we
are! We see land and much sand. We have just embarked our pilot now, who will take us through the channel into Cochin. Kochi (or Cochin) is a city in India that is in the Indian state of Kerala. The city is a major seaport in the country and has a metropolitan population of about 1.5 million. This city was the site of the first European colonial settlement in India. Our arrival in Cochin, India was around 1:00 pm and we arrived to elephants in their full regalia, local music, and women in their saris welcoming us, handing us roses. Our tour in the afternoon, took us 1 ½ hours outside the city of Cochin to another area in the state of Kerala, the back waters of the Allappuzha. After this journey outside the city of Cochin, we SAFELY arrived at the banks of the waterway for our 2 ½ hour trip aboard the famous houseboats of this region. I stressed the word safely because unless you have been in India you may not have experienced the amount of chaos with regard to road travel here. Fortunately, we passed many churches and temples that allowed us to say many prayers
as we traveled in our small minibus to and from our tour destination! Cars, buses, minibuses, trucks, dump trucks, bicycles, tricycles, electric minicabs, people, ox all trying to be first on two narrow lanes of roadway using their horns with gusto!!!! It was amazing! In some ways I guess it should be called organized chaos because everyone seemed to know what everyone else should do and there were no mishaps that we saw. Thankfully. We boarded a traditional longboat that went through Kerla’s waterways. For centuries, this network of rivers, lakes, canals, and lagoons has provided the major means of transportation for goods and people. We cruised the waterways at the end of the day and saw many people returning from their work in the rice fields and the coir factories. Many of the women were doing their laundry along the banks of the waterways and washing dishes. Lots of people were taking their baths along the river as well. We saw much of the rural life in this area and enjoyed our time along the waterways. I was amazed that the lady in the seat next to me on the bus did not need to be revived while traveling
back to the ship—she finally just closed her eyes and quit looking at all of the crazy drivers! Guess our prayers worked. We arrived back at the ship well after dark, happy to be back at our floating home safe and sound!
Day 51 - Cochin, India, Day 2
Our tour today took us to the oldest Christian church established by the Europeans in India, the Church of St. Francis which was founded in 1503. The great Portuguese explorer Vasco de Gama was originally buried there. There was a worker strike in the area on this day so many of the shops and services in the area were closed. Fortunately, the tour operators decided to work to support all of the tours for the QM2 but unfortunately, the street hawkers decided to work and were stuck to all of us like glue! This was very difficult for us because we just are not used to this kind of sales. We know they are just trying to make a living but pestering someone to get them to buy from you just does not always work! We stopped at a public park area named after de Gama and saw the
famous Chinese fishing nets that are cantilevered over the harbour and operate on a system of weights and pulleys. Then we went to the first Synagogue in the area that was built in 1568 which was surrounded by small shops—that were open, strike or not! Again, it was very difficult just to walk in the area for fear of getting herded into a shop you didn’t want to be in. We were happy to see what we had seen but wished that we were not part of such a large group so that we might have “blended” in (?) a little more and wouldn’t have been bothered so much by the merchants. Our departure from India was grand with an Indian band playing for us under beautiful skies and lots of people out and about on land and in the water! Since many of the people in the area were on a worker’s strike, it seemed as if ALL of the people in the region turned out to bid the QM2 farewell!
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Katherine and Scott
non-member comment
Thanks!
We've not added a comment in a while, but wanted you to know that we're reading your blog - and looking forward to them between arrivals!! Thank you for keeping us updated on what you're seeing with fun quibs about your companions. I'm sure we are not having as much fun following your journey as you are living it, but it is fun for us, nonetheless. We miss you all! -Katherine and Scott