Kerala

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The train journey from Mumbai is great. Get to see some beautiful scenery as we go down the coast and the landscape becomes more tropical. We also get some interesting food - BR it’s not!! Veg byriani, masala dosa, veg curry & rice, vada with chutney, and - best of all for C - banana fry! Sublime. They also do great coffee without sugar as a special order; coffee and tea in India are usually served very milky and very sweet. Though trying to get black tea with no sugar was a mission too far! C is suffering withdrawal symptoms as Rooibos has not been heard of in India. We travelled 2AC ie two tier bunks, air conditioned. We were on the top bunks - fine as long as you didn’t need to get up too much in the night. Pretty good night’s sleep though!

Arriving in Ernakulum (Kochi) we get a rickshaw to Fort Kochi and Ham Dale Inn - a very homely homestay we’re booked into run by M/M Rodriguez. Pretty good value at £7 per night for 3 of us! Fort Kochi is a beautiful place. A fishing town with Portuguese history evident in the buildings and the names. Chinese fishing nets are a renowned feature - huge cantilevered contraptions with nets that drop into the water and scoop up fish. (No idea why the nets are Chinese). All along the water front are fish stalls and you can buy fish here to get it cooked at local restaurants. 16 tiger prawns (1kg in weight) for Rs450(£5)!! We pay Rs100 to have them cooked in butter, masala & garlic - scrumptious or what. The fish we see includes kingfish, snapper, calamari, butterfish, blue clawed scampi (a first), lobster, barracuda, tuna etc etc….

The State laws concerning alcohol are bizarre to say the least. The only booze shops in town are run by the state as Bevcos. Officially, you can’t buy a cold beer in most restaurants with your meal unless they have a permit. However, all the establishments find a way around this. The one in Kochi we went to a lot served it in Tea pots chilled. It was referred to as “special tea with no milk and sugar“. Others made you drink it out of a newspaper covered bottle - weird or what - yet everyone knows what is happening & the delivery guy carries stacks of Kingfisher openly on his head to the various eateries.

Some of the menus are also pretty creative in their description of various foods - such as:- Efficiency of Eggs, Sexy sandwitches (correct spelling), Saga of snacks, Royal rice, Marvellous macaroni, Challenging chicken, Loving lamb etc. Our new find in junk food was fresh chips doused in lime juice freshly squeezed - yummy!

We decide to do a walking tour of the town - very, very hot so easily persuaded by a rickshaw driver to take him up on his special offer of a tour including lunch at a great Guajarati vegetarian restaurant for Rs 50 for an hour. We visit Jew Town - or as it’s now known, Kashmiri Town, which features the worlds largest varpu (a huge round copper bowl as big as a pond) and the worlds longest fishing boat. There are only 4 Jewish families left now but the Jews have been around for centuries here. Also the Dutch museum which has some amazing old murals of the Mahabharata; includes some very explicit ones of Vishnu “entertaining” (hands and feet everywhere!) some very well endowed & largely naked young ladies - very interesting given the puritanical approach to sex and the human body that currently prevails. Amazing this is the country that gave the world the Kama Sutra.

There are some great places of worship too, including a Jain temple, a Syrian Catholic church and the Jewish synagogue. And the spice yards - wonderful aromas of ginger, aniseed, pepper, cardamom etc. So much to see in such a small area and with such contrasting cultures, designs and history.

We also take the public ferry the 3.5km to visit Ernakulum (cost Rs2 each) to case the joint for our bus trip to Allepey & enjoy breakfast at the Indian Coffee House & discover an amazing north Indian Punjabi cafe - Tadka where we have lunch; lime sodas, chole battura & cold fresh Rabdri - M is ecstatic & has two of the latter. Our waiter is from Darjeeling.

In the evening we go to see the local Kathakali classical dance performance which is particular to Kerala. Folks can go in earlier to watch/photograph the guys getting ready/painted up. It takes them an hour & a half. It’s quite colourful & spectacular. Drama on good over evil based on the Hindu stories about Ram & Sita - with Ravan the baddie. Its non speaking; the story is told in songs/music & body language & facial expression. Amazing - they all have to train for 6 years before they are let loose on joe public!!

Next stop was Allepey, the centre for rice boat cruises, 1.5 hours by bus. The town itself is very non touristy and the backwaters are beautiful. Very serene and peaceful - even when a convoy of boats leaving town makes it like a watery version of the M25! We go for an afternoon jaunt on a poled boat (our poler is a staunch member of the ruling state Communist Party) and arrange to stay on a rice boat for one night and the other two at Johnsons The Nest; a sort of homestay but on a more commercial basis. Nice big room but shared with about a thousand mossies!! Thank god for Hit!

We also had a rickshaw tour of the area which was very informative & interesting for Rs 300 for the half day. Saw some amazing temples and an art centre with a very bizarre entrance of a woman’s torso with a tree growing out of her head! Visited a coir matting weavers which seems as if time has stood still - still using old hand looms, and a family who keep elephants for ceremonies etc. One male elephant is in disgrace as he had pushed over a 4 wheel drive jeep at a recent parade when he got bored!! Finished off at the “Secret Beach”; which everybody knows about! A very long beach (stretches from Kochi to Trivandrum apparently) with hardly any development along it - amazing.

The rice boat comes with a crew - captain and cook (Madhu and Reghu) who look after us brilliantly. Awesome food! Fried pomfrets for lunch and we buy some blue clawed scampi from a local villager for dinner - served with real home style cooked rice and veg and chapattis. They also make banana fry for afternoon tea - C thinks she’s died and gone to heaven! We watch local fishing families in oracle style boats casting long lines of nets, and everyday life along the river banks. It’s so easy to lose oneself in this place.

Next stop is Trivandrum, which we plan to use as a base for day trips to Kovalam, the main beach area. The benefit to us of the communist regime is in highly subsidised bus fares for the public, so a 4 hour journey by “ Super Fast” bus cost us about 40 pence each!!!

Had our worst meal of the whole trip in Trivandrum! Prime Square which was highly recommended by Lonely Planet - usually a very reliable source. They had an extensive menu but nearly everything was “out of season”. Basically we could have fish fry (more like cremated), chicken fry (clearly cooked some time ago), daal fry (unlike any we’d had before) and paratha (cold and chewy)! LP if you read this you might like to update your notes.

Unfortunately, this was our last dinner with Satish as he heads off to Goa tomorrow to meet up with M’s sister, Romi and her partner John. Fortunately, next day we find the Sri Krishna vegetarian restaurant which is awesome for breakfast & the Sea Shore restaurant in Kovalam and have a fantastic fish lunch there with some nice cold beers before he catches his train.

Kovalam, where we decamped to for our final two nights in Kerala, is an attractive village/beach. Several bays linked together and thick with coconut palms and bananas. It’s also an active fishing village so lots of boats coming in and out and nets being hauled in onto the beach. We also get a taste of monsoon 2 months early with a terrific downpour for half an hour. Somehow rain doesn’t seem so bad when it’s warm though.

While we’re here we treat ourselves to an ayuervedic massage; lovely! C almost goes to sleep during the foot massage! M does. They last 1.5 hours each & cost Rs 600 each (£7.50).

Kerala is unique in that it has had a communist local government democratically elected for years. It boasts a literacy rate of about 98% largely due to subsidised education which is great. However, we are surprised at how few people spoke either Hindi the national language or English - it’s Malayalam or nothing which may restrict the opportunities for the local folks in the new India. This is unlike Chennai in Tamil Nadu where English & Hindi in addition to Tamil are widely spoken.

M is very taken by a T shirt for sale with the Dalai Lama’s words printed on it. They seem quite pertinent today.

Went to the Sea shore for our last nights dinner in Kerala. Have our favourites: butterfish curries, Chettinandu & Pollichattu, with coconut rice & butter nan. One of the best meals in M’s life - “Eat your heart out Gordon Ramsey” was his comment. The food cost a princely Rs 450 - about £5 - awesome value & delicious or what!!! Got the recipe from the chef the next day. Sitting on the top level of the restaurant looking out to see the arc of fishing boats with their lights on give the impression of a lit up causeway across the bay. Lights bobbing on the sea, it’s a great sight.


Had a great flight from Trivandrum to Chennai with India Airlines, airport experience, aircraft comfort & service including lunch on this 1 hour flight was superb. Then caught the suburban train from Tirisulam to Egmore station & went past Nungumbakam station; it was strange for M to see his old university largely unchanged. Went to Buhari’s for dinner (prawn & mutton biriyani) - a Chennai institution - M had his 21st birthday at one of their branches - just a couple of years ago!!!.
After a great breakfast at Vasant Bhavan - a vegetarian house with superb traditional South Indian grub, we leave for Male in the Maldives via Colombo tomorrow & leave one bag at the Hotel Park Plaza where we have booked to come back to on our return to Chennai on the 8th March. This will help a lot - its also a far better place than the dive we booked online via Hostel World. However we can’t win ‘em all!!

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