Alleppey

Bus Stop

Alleppey is famed for its backwaters.  It is considered to be the oldest planned town in the Kerala region.  At this part of the trip it began to get very hot.

Waiting for the school bus

Houseboat

Morning ritual *note mirror on wall

The backwaters were beautiful, and we got to see an alternative lifestyle. 







Alleppey itself is situated around 2 canals, the North and South canals.


We went to see a Coir factory, Coir is a natural fibre extracted from the husk of coconut and is used to produce floor mats, brushes and mattresses.  It was fascinating to see a traditional craft still being practiced to this day, and the workers were more than happy to show us around.

Here the Coir shuttles are moved by hand

Use of the feet is required to operate the machine

Detail of the fabric

Here the coconut husk is put into the rope by hand

A machine that thrashes the coconut husk to make the fibres for the Coir

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An example of the labor-intensive method of Coir making, the fibres are twisted by hand to create the basis for the material

Alleppey Beach

 There was a beach we visited, which had a huge military style Mercedes vehicle on it, which we noticed had a Danish license plate on it.  The owners had apparently been travelling for over a year and had stayed there for 5 days.

The Danish van... well traveled

Thekkady

Our next stop was at a place called Thekkady.  Our hotel balcony faced the Periyar Wildlife Sanctuary, which was declared a Tiger Reserve in 1978. 

Unfortunately on our visit we didn't see any tigers, or elephants for which it is famous for.

Shibu, owner of Kerala House, and a nice moustache!!

In order to get into the sanctuary we had to cross a small lake, on a bamboo raft.  

We were a little apprehensive to say the least

 

The Periyar Wildlife Sanctuary has inhabitants, who are permitted to live within the grounds

Kathakali

Another interesting thing we did, was go and see a Kathakali show.  Kathakali is a highly stylized classical Indian dance-drama, it deals with presentation of the stories of Hindu gods Rama and Krishna.

Thekkady itself is a small town, with a few coffee houses and restaurants.  The shops were interesting to look around and the people there were very friendly.

Munnar

We arranged a driver to take us from Madurai to Munnar, and on our way he stopped to have his brakes checked, tyres inflated and filled up on the petrol.  We wondered what the driver was up to, but as we began the ascent up the mountainside to Munnar we were thankful for his caution.

The road up to Munnar

This has to be one of the most spectacular places we have visited whilst here in India.  We were high up in the mountains staying at a place called Kaivalayam Retreat, it is situated within an organic spice plantation and was beautiful.

Tea, as far as the eye can see

A local villager busy working in the field

Inside the tea factory

Riverside trek in the spice plantation

Kaivalayam Retreat

Madurai

After Pondicherry we took a late overnight train getting us into Madurai at 6:30am.  This was our first sight into the Indian rail network, and having run about a mile down the length of the train to get into our carriage we were relieved to discover that we had our own personal cabin.  Unfortunately we discovered in the morning we had an extra passenger in First Class, and he hadn't got a ticket - eek!!

Madurai is the 3rd largest city in the Indian state of Tamil Nadu (they also speak a whole new language).  With a population of over 1.2 million it's very crowded and not very clean. 

Approaching the temples

Details of the temple

All in a days work

Keeping warm

Excavating, the old fashioned way

After seeing the temples we retired to our hotel, order room service for dinner and got an early night in preparation for our long drive in the morning up to Munnar.