Backwaters and beyond

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We left Varkala for Allepey, the "Venice" of Kerala, on 29th Jan. The train took two and a half hours, meandering through small villages and across lagoons. The weather was hot and humid, and it looked like rain. The temperature had become a governing feature of our days, as it was too hot around midday to do anything other than flop beneath a fan.
Allepey felt like the 'real' India again - dirty, noisy with a variety of interesting shops and stalls; making such a welcome change from Varkala's Western oriented ethnic accessory shops: overpriced and overbearing vendors. We had come here to catch a ferry boat to Amritapuri, the ashram that's home to Amma, the "Hugging Mother". She's one of India's very few female gurus, and gives darshan (blessing) by hugging often thousands of people in marathon all-night sessions.The ferry set off at 10.30.
In some respects the allusion to 'Venice' is apt, as the canal waters look, and smell, like soup, with a huge amount of rubbish in it. There is life in it though, with a few fish occasionally surfacing, and the odd intrepid/desperate cormorant .
The boat chugged along at a very leisurely pace, and quite quickly monotony set in as we passed almost identical scenery along the way - houses and paddy fields, with banana and coconut groves interspersed. The local canoes are dugouts, beautifully made. We passed a couple of women making rope from coir, coconut husks, using a wheel and spindle to twist the fibres, After lunch we were told we couldn't continue down the waterway as there was a strike by local villagers, protesting about the need for a bridge for access to schools and medical services, and they'd blocked the river. Luckily, after a three quarter of an hour wait, a cheer went up and the strike was over so we were able to continue, although we did pass a group of rather disconsolate villagers on the bank and it looked as though the police had been called in. We arrived at the ashram to discover a small town with several high rise blocks of flats. We registered, were given a flat at the top of one of the 16 storey blocks - quite a climb, but what a view - a spectacular outlook west to the sea and north to Allepey. The complex houses a temple, a huge auditorium, Western and Indian canteens and several shops. One of particular and peculiar interest specialised in the cult of Amma dolls - dumpy brown dolls made from Amma's cast off saris and towels. Rather creepy totems, which could be supplemented with a range of accessories a la Barbie. We stayed for a couple of days - enough to get a feel of the place - but as Amma was away on tour, we didn't manage to get our hugs!
We then took off on a six hour bus ride up to the Western Ghats to visit the Periyar Willife Park, booking in to a tiny bamboo hut in Kumilly, a village bordering the reserve. Our first venture into the interior was an early morning guided walk. It was lovely to be out and about in the woodland at dawn - and we quickly saw our first large deer, a Sambar. Our guides provided us with khaki over socks, up to our knees, to protect us from leeches and deer ticks. We took off into the forest as a group of six, taking a bamboo raft across a small stretch of water. There was a wonderful low mist over the lake, and the landscape had a very ancient feel. We were lucky to see at quite close quarters, a small herd of elephants, nine altogether with three babies, feeding peacefully on the prolific elephant grass. We also saw langur monkeys, with leonine black ruffs - their gutteral calls echoing around the forest. An unusual sighting was of a Giant Malabar Squirrel, a pole-cat sized creature with a sand coloured belly, an upper body of long black fur with areas of deep red, and a long black tail.We also saw wild boar, sambar, barking deer and a tiger's paw print, reminding us in a very visceral way of its presence and our vulnerability. In many ways, the most impressive experience was simply being in the forest, with vast and ancient teak and cottonsilk trees of such impressive height and girth, and the echoing cathedral-like acoustic, which magnified all the jungle sounds. Having had some doubts about the merits of a guided tour, and prohibited from walking in the reservation unaccompanied, it proved to be an absolute delight, and inspired us to do a night walk with the 'Jungle Patrol'. This actually was a patrol, with a tracker and an armed guard. Capitalising on the wildlife tourist, the sanctuary also protects a large acreage of the jungle where sandalwood trees grow.They are extremely slow growing, very difficult to cultivate commercially, and a fully grown tree is worth a fortune! There used to be extensive poaching, but now there is a 24 armed guard and tonight we were part of that guard...
Once again, we had hummed and ahhed about the value of a night walk, and the likelihood of seeing anything at all, and once again, we were delighted. One of the loveliest sights in the natural world we have personally encountered occurred almost as soon as we entered the forest, and were in total darkness. The jungle floor was alive, completely covered with fireflies! Everywhere these fairy lights flashed on and off to attract a mate. "Magical" is the best though most overused term , but this was quite the loveliest spectacle....
We soon came upon Sambar, the Indian Red Deer, and were amazed that they were quite unperturbed by our presence. They carried on grazing as we moved on . The tracker, a local tribesman, was awesome. He had 2 powerful hand torches that he seemed to flash about in a random fashion, not seeming to bother looking at the beam half the time, but he didn't miss a thing! And all the while our armed guard brought up the rear, and kept a running commentary on all we saw. The walk had actually started off in a fairly unpromising way. I had presumed that we would have to be completely quiet, with absolutely no talking at all, but as soon as we started the guard got on his mobile, while the tracker in front was quite loudly flatulent! The jungle floor was covered in very large, very dry leaves, which we could not help but step on, and yet the animals we came across - several barking deer, sambar, different families of boar; a large fishing owl; porcupines - just weren't bothered! And, of course, all enveloped by a brilliant, unpolluted night sky. another rich and rewarding time in the jungle.
The following day we went up into the hills to see the tea plantations, being curious about the whole process involved in the making of our favourite brew. The tea growing district has rolling hills of red soil covered with a satisfyingly symmetric pattern of perfectly groomed tea bushes. We visited an old wooden factory which housed the tea processing plant in the middle of a tea plantation. The machinery and building both had an air of the industrial revolution about them; primitive and noisy machines in a dark and dusty atmosphere. It was a very interesting process - beginning with a huge drying room where the fresh leaves - each bush has the new tips picked every 15 days - are laid out on long mesh tables and fanned for 24hrs at a low temperature. The still moist leaves are then crushed and sieved several times, before being put into a huge wood-fired oven for half an hour. It's then much drier, and the chopped leaves go through several more processes of sieving and grading, using huge cylinders to which the leaves adhere by static, eventually being given a final blow to remove the dust before being packed into sacks. Although each of the machines are motorised, there are a lot of labourers moving the tea about from machine to machine in huge baskets, or sweeping and shovelling it into heaps on the floor. Everywhere there is a thick coating of orange tea dust.The end product is an Orange Pekoe in a variety of grades - apparently all tea bushes are the same species, it's the processing that produces different flavours. Fascinating.
We then went on to a spice garden, where our guide very knowledgeably showed us growing examples of peppers, all-spice, curry leaves, cinnamon (the bark renews itself when removed) cardamon (growing in spires from the base of a tall leafed plant), a nutmeg tree (the nutmegs grow rather like conkers), vanilla pods, coffee and cocoa beans, and a clove tree. John also sampled the hottest chilli he'd ever tasted! It was tiny, no more than 1/2 inch fully grown, and he took only one seed, but that was enough to make a very hot vindaloo!The guide went through all the processes from picking through drying to uses. It was fascinating, and he was an excellent guide, really knowing his stuff, and giving us ample opportunity to smell and taste. Much to John's disappointment, as his attention was elsewhere, a snake zig zagged across the path in front of Penny. It was about a metre away from her, about a metre in length, and was a dull mustard colour - so quite possibly a Spectacled Cobra!
One of the reasons we chose to stay in the garden of this particular guest house, was that it had a tree-top hide overlooking the jungle. It was a great vantage point, from which we saw boar, barking deer mongooses and the reported sighting, one night, of a leopard (unconfirmed!) Sitting there in the daytime, you were surrounded by very tame Bulbuls, a beautiful little bird with a black crest, blood red cheeks and an equally red bum. As tame were the Jungle Babblers, a browny-grey starling- like bird that, as it name suggests, babbles all the time! Every once in a while, one of these birds would venture into the hut to satisfy a curiosity, come close enough to touch, and when the curiosity was satisfied, fly off ....
The garden is full of these and other birds, as well as equally tame chipmunks. A Great Pied Hornbill flew over occasionally, as did the Pitta, described as, "the loveliest bird in India". It is quail like in shape and size, with an irridescent turquoise back, very like a kingfisher, with a rump of brilliant red.
Back to Cochin on the 4th Feb. to meet up with our dear friends the Smiths, who were leaving snow bound London to spend a holiday with us. On the way back from the airport we saw a temple festival procession in the street; several drummers and a double row of dancers with very tall feathered head dresses all doing a kind of Hindu line dance. What a welcome for the Smiths!
The following day we decided to find the temple from which that procession belonged. En route we passed a temple elephant we presumed was off to a festival closer by, so, after a brief review with the rickshaw driver, who found out where the elephant would be going, we took off.
We arrived at the temple to find 2 elephants already there. Preparations were still under way, and soon the 3rd elephant arrived to be tarted up. they were decorated with a head piece made of embossed gold on a red cloth background, running in a triangular shape down the trunk. They were also adorned with chain shackles to the front legs, and a chain running round the girth down to the hind legs ...All 3 animals were bulls, and their tusks had been shortened and smoothed round. Each beast had a mahout to handle them and they seemed infinitely tolerant. In order to mount it's back, the elephant was tapped on the back leg, upon which he immediately bent the leg up and back and curled his tail which would act as a step and a handle to assist in the mounting. All the while, they just stood and ate vast quantities of palm leaves and bananas. When they were dressed the elephants left the temple, accompanied by drummers and 2 shennai(oboe) players and processed for about a km along the road, and then came to a halt . At this point they were joined by another group of musicians, this time different drums, several long crescent shaped horns, and cymbal players. The 'music' is fast, frenzied, and very rhythmic, quite trance-inducing....The procession then turned back to the temple, stopping at various points en route to do several small pujas, possibly outside the house of a local 'noteworthy' who'd paid for the privilege. When the elephants finally reached the temple, a large crowd had gathered for what was reported to be a night long ritual. We headed for bed.......
An adjunct to this ....Whilst watching the elephants standing and munching away, seemingly oblivious to the chaos and cacophany all around them; people climbing all over them; being prodded with sticks every 5 minutes, John was reminded of a video clip he'd seen on one of those"Ten worst animal encounters" type of programme that seems to abound on National Geographic channel. A circus elephant had finally had enough, and ran amok, killing several, injuring many, before the poor, crazed animal was itself killed. The next day, we read in the local paper that an elephant had done exactly that, at the temple festival we never got to. One of the attendants had accidentally stuck an umbrella in it's eye, and the poor creature went crazy. It also said in the paper that this was not uncommon in the festival season....
We booked a jaunt down the backwaters, somewhat reluctantly, as they seemed overhyped, and we hadn't much enjoyed our ferry ride from Allepey to the ashram. In fact, it was a delight. We were picked up at the guest house, and driven to a large river the other side of Ernakulum, where we boarded a beautiful bamboo house boat. We immediately saw a large turquoise kingfisher, pointed out by our guide, who had a very eccentric grasp of the English language, ("Fully moving through the brackish water, stopping for lunch. Fully eating, thereafter onto smaller boat") . The houseboat consisted of a lounging area at the front, and a small double room with en suite. It would have been quite comfortable for an overnight stay, but those sort of jaunts are hugely expensive. We got off to take a look at another spice garden, where John had a pinch of snuff, and we saw several spices we hadn't seen before. We also saw nutmegs drying, with fibrous outer coverings that are mace - very beautiful. After a lovely lunch at someone's house - a Keralan thali on a banana leaf - we transferred to a canoe and were punted up the narrow backwaters. It was quite a task in the midday heat. We had just one stop to visit a 'factory' that processes clam shells, burning them to make calcium carbonate, a constituent of plaster of Paris and pills etc. Very interesting. The scenery was mainly coconut and banana groves, with rice paddies. There was no 'wild' land. This is a part of India that has been cultivated for a very long time. Many people living by the waterside, are either on it in boats of differing shapes and sizes, or in it, dredging up river sand by hand, collecting shellfish, or doing their laundry and ablutions. We also saw some boat building and repairing, one boat being made waterproof with boiled down fish oil. Enduring image; enduring smell..
Four days later, we caught a sleeper train to Karwar in Karnataka. The 16 hour journey was helped along by the company of a very jovial Keralan man, who was also a very good English speaker. It was a change to go beyond the usual niceties of conversation here, and we were sorry to see him go when he got off at Calicut. We arrived at Karwar @ 5am, and took 2 'retiring' rooms in the station and retired for a couple of hours til 8am when we caught the bus to Gokarna. It's a scenic route, with the Ghats to the east, and the coast to the west. What was immediately and noticeably different was the discrepancy in the level of affluence, or lack of it, between Kerala and Karnataka. Kerala is obviously doing well with it's very developed tourist trade, and Karnataka obviously isn't. We spent about five days in Gokarna with the Smiths. It was a great reminder, seeing their delight, disgust and wonder at all that India offers in the epic and the mundane, to keeping looking and reminding oneself just how extraordinary it is to be here and witness it.
On their last afternoon with us, we took a boat ride to the next beach along, ordinarily a 10 minute ride. It turned out to be a real white knuckle ride! The water was quite choppy before we got in, but the fishermen who had agreed to take us said nothing of the conditions, so we presumed they were ok......
The boat was launched from the beach by slipping it along on greased logs. It was a big canoe, about 20 feet long and 5 wide. As the surf was high, it was exciting to get a taste of what was to come. The further out we got, so the sea got bigger, and the boat was plunging to and fro, and we were very soon soaked! As the water was tepid, this was not a problem, however when the engine momentarily died, things took a darker turn. Fortunately, it burst quickly back to life, and we continued. It did feel like we were on one of those rides at Thorpe Park where you plunge down a chute in a plastic log, to be soaked on impact with the 'pond' at the bottom! The time flashed by, and the Smith's fledged and took off for the remainder of their holiday alone, while we stayed on at Gokarna to celebrate Shivaratri.

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Photos

Alepphey
shrine to Ganesh

Amritapuri
view over the ashram and beyond

Periyar Tiger Reserve
sunrise on the morning walk

Periyar Tiger Reserve
jungle

Periyar Tiger Reserve
Macaque monkey

Kumily
Bamboo grove, Periyar

Tea plantation
first drying

Tea plantation
tea worker

Kumily
sunrise in the tree hut

Kochin
Temple elephant

Kochin
Temple elephants

backwaters
river traffic

backwaters
river traffic

backwaters
3 go bananas in backwater

backwaters
house boat

Backwaters
house painter

backwaters
village girl

backwaters
calcium carbonate from mollusc shells

Alepphey
3 sisters

backwaters
downsized onto a punt

Comments

[jenny Deadman]

Waving vigorously
Hi John and Penny, I just wanted to say how much I loved your description of the jungle and the river...I felt as if I could hear it and smell it. Magical. And these are some seriously beautiful photos too. Well done for your lovely travellers' tales. Go travellers go! xxxxx Jenny.