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Published: December 13th 2014
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Feeling slightly guilty about cheating with a train, we boarded to find people sitting on luggage racks, feeding us with crisps and cucumber (all with chilli powder), giving up their seats to have us sit close to them. Arriving in the dark we had a bit trouble to find our couchsurfer’s home, as he wasn’t a white man and Madurai is a big city…after losing each other for 1 minute as Yvi followed another man on a bike… we finally arrived at Raj’s house where his lovely wife fed us with around 100 homemade dosas and his Mum lurked in the background. We went on our first auto rickshaw to the Ghandi museum and returned on our first bike rickshaw which we massively overpaid for as we felt sorry for the old bloke having to get off and push us through the city. Later on we bumped into our Londoner friends Andy and Rosana from Thanjavur (coincidently in an internet café) and attended another run through a busy temple with an elephant (an idea that the church should perhaps consider) and had another night out in dark Indian bars….
The next day started relaxed after we met the couple again
(coincidently off course) – booking train and taking a camera to a shop to fix. 3 hours later, 30 minutes before our train was due to depart, Jude’s bike took a glancing blow from a stationary barrier, removing one of his panniers. Making do, we rushed to the train station, and whilst Yvi sorted our bikes and luggage, Jude skipped off to pick up the rejuvenated camera. Arriving at the shop, a man with a tiny screwdriver and magnifying monocle gripped in his eye socket was bent over a camera in more pieces than was conceivable, especially 15 minutes before the train was due to depart. Jude expressed his concern and was told with a shrug of the shoulders that Casio’s were complicated. The man worked at pace, snapped something, glued it, screwed it and within 8 minutes all was good. Jude ran back to the train station and 3 minutes before departure we found each other, sprinted to the last gate and caught our train. With legs hanging out of the train door we rode through the Indian countryside to Rajapalaiyam.
There we stayed in a ‘bed coffee and break fast hotel’, ‘bed coffee’ meaning getting woken up
at 6.15 for complimenatry bed coffee!!! We started our educational day by learning the Tamil word for super glue from a nice Indian guy who followed us around a bit and invited us for super posh ice-cream. In the afternoon our hotel manager took us to his farm house out of town, no animals but mango/lemon and jackfruit trees and a water pool for animals. He showed us a little waterfall and then returning with his auto rickshaw mate, who bravely let us drive, we stopped at the important spots where he explained how fresh water arrived at the city.
We nearly got cooked dinner at the mangers house, but sadly his wife went to a temple instead.
Next morning we left to reach our next destination Courtalam, where the holy waterfalls promise you eternal beauty…the queue for the women was massive, all waiting to get pounded by the water. On our way to Ambasamudrum we got lost for the first time for 25 km but found a rural road to our destination, luckily arriving before it got dark. We found a skanky hotel with a red sleeping light in the bedroom and telephone numbers on wall. It
did however serve great parothas and gravy.
Next day a 90km ride to the end of India, Kanyakumari, cruising through the biggest private wind farm in Asia along the motorway, luckily no rush hour. We flew along the streets and thought we’d treat ourselves with a nice sea-view room. Jude enjoyed a refreshing beer on the balcony, looking out over the end of India, the meeting of 3 seas whilst a man went for a poo on the beach below.
Falling into a well-deserved sleep with the waves, we got woken up at 4am by some blaring Hindi tunes from a local church, possibly the start of a wedding. Next day we changed room to backside which gave us enough rest to go on our first proper coastal ride – The Monster Journey, hills up and down along fishing villages we cycled 85 km to Kovalam.
Descending our last hill and looking particularly ragged, a young Russian couple on a moped took pity on us and invited us to stay at their house…so we did… for 5 days. It turned out they were couchsurfers and journalists. Julia, being wedding photographer on the side, asked us if she
could photograph us on the beach one day and we reluctantly agreed. This turned into a 2 hour photo shoot with us rolling around on the grass in some luxury resort trying to be natural.
The rest of the days were spent doing yoga, getting massaged, chilling on the beach or in their lovely house whilst Gregory told us one of his many mental travelling stories like sitting on Sadam Hussain’s still warm throne before getting checked into Abu Guraib.
After total relaxation we left this lovely town to get into Kerala’s capital Trivandrum. There we went shopping in the Indian version of Harrods. Over-decorated with Xmas stuff we found some new threads and spanked more money at Domino’s Pizza for dinner. Next day we went to Asia’s best zoo for 20p and saw loads of different tigers and monkeys…for 20p!! In the afternoon at 2 we left, got lost and finally found ourselves on a rural coast road through super rich villages. We underestimated the time and arrived in Varkala in the dark. We spent 6 days here, went to meditation class, did yoga on the beach, played beach volleyball daily, saw dolphins sort of up close
and ate a lot fresh grilled fish… The meditation was actually really good, apart from Jude nearly cracking up in his Peep Show mind conversation about the group. We also did some surfing which Jude took so serious that he broke the board into 2 pieces.
Varkala is a black hole for backpackers and hippies, the alcohol is cheap and we’ve been out every night including a beach party under the full moon. People get stuck here and we’re determined not to do the same so tomorrow we’re back on the bikes for the backwaters of Kerala.
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