Allepy

Published: February 7th 2008Asia » India » Kerala » Kollam
February 7th 2008

Backwaters in style

After the our last, long-winded blog we thought that we would give you a nice relaxing cruise along the Kerala Backwaters. We stayed the night in Allepy which bills itself as the Venice of India. While the place holds a higher esteem for itself than we did, it was not entirely without charm.

The real purpose of an Allepy visit is to get out on the backwaters in a special houseboat with a cook and captain (bathroom too). Some of the boats are huge and have four bedrooms and satellite tv. Ours, named Moonshine, was more humble but did the trick.

The cruise is slow and relaxing with little to do but look out at the occasional village, read and dip one's feet in the water.

A nice swim would have been great, but we weren't up to it considering that every village drains and washes in these waters. We could have also used a nice bottle of wine, but we settled for the folk songs of the crew and a few different coconut curries. This would be a great rest for weary travelers, a bit long and slow for two who had just come off ten laid-back

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Varkala beach days.



We took a long, sticky train ride to Cannoor the next day where we found a nice sea fort with lovely gardens but little else of note. One exception: we did finally eat at the famed Indian Coffee House but were thwarted in our attempts to order the famous vegetable biriyani. Thwarted is a major theme in India and we once again were in our attempt to see the (reputedly amazing) Theyaam temple dance.


The next morning early, early a big bus ride to Coorg country . . .Love T

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