Page 2 of jenstanley Travel Blog Posts
Keralan fishing nets
Hello Folkes. Yay! I'm nearly up to date with my blogs. It would be great to hear fRom you all so I know how you are. Grandad - How are you? Chris - hope your recovering well. Phil - you smell. Uni people - where are you? Hope you are all well anyway. Something that you can't miss in Keralla is the backwaters. Basically they are a strip of inland water very close to the coast, infact you can see the sea form them in some places. We got on a boat in Kollam and had a lovley three hour boat ride to the Amritanandmayi Ashram . This is the ashram set up by the wolrd famous huggy mother who people call Amma (mother). She started out pretty young by feeding the poor and generally comforting ... read more
My t-shirt being panited
So, what so you need after a few days walking in the woods? A beach of course. With this in mind we set off from Periya to Kovallam on the Kerelan coast. The eight huors bus ride actually fine and we arrived in one pice. Kovallam is lovley despite being full of package tourists, white, burnt and beer swilling. But appart form that its a little cove full of hippy shops and cafes witha working fishing beach and lots of freshly cuaght seafood on offer. We mamaged to haggle down the price of a room with a balcony with a view of the sea. It was half way up a hill but awau from the main beach so nice and quiet. We spent most of two days window shopping, shopping, sitting in cafes and on the ... read more
Henna on my hand
I know this is very late coming but i am now catching up with my blogs. I have updated the last two aswell so check back if your interested. By the time we got to Madurai the pollution and dust proved too much for my poor sinuses and I felt rotton. Luckily we landed a room in a very nice hotel using our theory of ' cheapest room in a nice hotel where Indian people stay'. We had cable tv and room service all for very little money. This was just as well as we all spent a whole day doing nothing at all and bearly leaving the room (hurray to room service). This did us all a lot of good and in the end we did make it to the big big temple we had ... read more
Giant Indian Squriel
After some re planning and some insistance on my part we decided that the most southern tip in India actually souded pretty boring so we didn't go there as we had periviously planned to. Instead we headed for the Kerilan hills to the Periya wild life sactury. This turned out to be a very good move. It was lovely and cool up in the hills, the coldest we have been since we left home! Very exciting. We installed our selves at Coffee Inn a few hundered meters from the Sactuary gates. This turned out to be an equally good move. Apart from having lovely rooms they also serve up proper brown bread, tomatoe soup and pasta suace that actually tasted italian. Home anway from home. Our first day in the park started off well with a ... read more
Temple at Thanjuvar
Next stop after Pondi was Thanjuvar. Another temple town that looks like every other town in Tamil Nadu. We ended up arriving very later having been told that the bus took 4 hours when it actually took about 6. Luckily the bus dumped us in the middle of town right next to a comfortable guest house that didn't mind opening up and making some beds at half past midnight. Our only reason for coming here was to see a big, old temple. This was really good and woth the effort to see. It is huge and wonderfully carved. No one quite knows how the stone on top of the main tower got there as in wieghs and aufll lot. Some people recon a 6 kilometer ram got it up there. Anyway the thing is very impressive ... read more
Silk looms in Kachanpuram
Hello all and Merry Christmas! I haven't had a chance to blog for ages as we've been on the go rather a lot (ok well sitting by a hotel swimming pool doesn't exactly count as 'on the go' but it does count as 'to busy to blog'). Firstly things are looking up in India and i am enjoying things more than I was at first. Partly becuase we met our friend Racheal who has things pretty planned out and does most of the thinking and partly becuase we have discovered the joys of eating in 5 star hotels and partly becuase i've just got used to it all. We'er actually in Pondicherry at the moment but I need to back track rather and write about Tirupati, Chenni, Kachanpuram and Mamallampuram first. Next stop after Hyderbad was ... read more
Sam and Rach putting up the chirstmas tree
Well we spent christmas in style this year in a small village/backpacker heaven called Mamallumpuram (spelt something like that). We had booked a hotel but yet agian it turned out to be a dump so we found a very nice hotel as a treat for christmas. It cost about 5 times what we would normally pay but it was air conditioned, had 24 hour hot water, a TV with english language mive chanells and we had use of the hotel pool. On arrival we put up our 4 inch tall christmas tree that Racheal had bought, put up the tinsel and prepaired christmas stokings that we made out of pillow cases. We weren't going to let this christmas go by un-noticed! Mamalumpuram is right on the beach and is very touristy. It was a tottal cultuer ... read more
Childern using the Gandhi memorial as a slide
At last! A blog to go with the photos! Several weeks late but finaly i have got round to sitting down and writing. Pondicherry is pretty easily sumed up really as there isn't much to do there. It is interesting becuase it was still under French rule until 1957 when it became part of India proper. Hence why the town is know for its wide, tree lined boullavards and for the fact that the police stil wear silly french hats. My one and only mission in Pondicherry was to eat croissant. This was achived on our first day by a visit to 'Hot Breads' where we gorged ourselves on pastries and french bread. Finding a room was very hard as christmas to new year is fully booked up everywhere by package tours. After about and hour ... read more
Golconda Fort
Hello again, still no photos i'm affriad, but more words. As i siad last time, we stopped off in Hyderabad for a few days. It was a nice place on the whole although every town/city here is badly polluted and noisy. Hyderabad is still a muslim stronghold in India. I've never been somewhere with so many fully vield women. It's pretty wierd when most women you pass are dressed in black from head to foot with only thier eyes showing. It's like being back in Manchester! The first day was spent sleeping and eating and doing little else. On our sencond day we went to the Salam Jung Museum which was interesting. It's a huge museum displaying all the tresuers acumulated by a rich muslim family who where Moghul rulers in Hyerdabad. They have loads of ... read more
Sam admiring heavenly godess
Hey peeps, i know this blogg has been a long time coming but India is not blessed with an abudance of internet ascess. Since my last blogg I've been amazed, entertained and moved to tears by sheer fustration in this wierd country. I can't say i've been enjoying myself overly but it is interesting and certianly an experience. This place is so full of contrasts. People have either been horrible and annoying or embaressingly nice. This is confusing as it is easier to either hate (like vietnam) or love (like Laos) and country. But this bloody place requires you to do both at the same time which is asking to much in my opinion. We certianly havn't had a moments peace as everyone seems to have something to say to us (good or bad). Being english ... read more
