Our first anniversary (9th Feb) was coming and we wanted it to be special. But how, was the question... While we were still juggling with the options, I came up with this ... Lets go to Kerala.. And then, there were no more discussions... Kerala it had to be.
The next few days I was busy with some frantic net surfing searching for travel agents, hotel booking sites, airline ticketing sites, blogs of people who had visited the place. Initially we had decided to plan the complete trip ourselves rather than getting a fixed itinerary trip from an agent. The first step was to get airline tickets booked. We got JetLite tickets for 9th morning to Trivandrum and Indigo tickets from Cochin to Delhi for 16th Feb.
After trying for days, visiting various booking sites and calling various hotels, I decided it was not worth the effort and we better avail services of a travel agent. We created a personalized itinerary based of feedbacks we had got and sent it to various agents for price quotes. Eventually we finalized "Kerala Travel Club". Their's was the most competitive price based on the hotels we had selected. Payments were made and bookings were done. We were all set.
9th February : Delhi to Trivandrum to Kovallam
On reaching Airport, we got a big shock. The flight was overbooked and we didn't get a seat. But thankfully they did manage to get us seats on an Indian Airlines flight. We reached Trivandrum at around 2pm (instead of scheduled 11am). Our cabbie "Baijju" was already waiting for us. Our first destination was the famous Kovallam Beach which was around half an hour away. We reached there around 3:30 and checked into our hotel "Papukutty Beach Kiss Resort". It was a nice hotel right at the beach
Kovallam Lighthouse Beach
We spent the rest of the day at the Kovallam beach itself. It is known as one of the world's best beaches. Foreigners outnumbered the Indian tourists, and 90% of the Indian tourists were honeymooners. We had our lunch at a beach side hotel and then went into the waters..Walking hand in hand, Sea water rushing onto your feet, then taking away the sand from underneath, with sun setting in the distance... is one of the (if not "the") most romantic settings .. And we enjoyed it to the fullest..
10th February : Trivandrum City Tour
Baijju was there at the hotel early morning with the cab. We started off after having breakfast for the city tour and visited the following
Sri Anantha Padmanabhaswamy Temple : They made me remove clothes and wear a dhoti and an Angaiah. We reached there at temple closing time and were lucky enough to get inside. Had we been 5 mins late, would have missed it.
Kanakakkunnu Palace & Flower show : A nice picknik spot.
Srichitra Art Gallery : It was a nice gallery with very old paintings from various Indian Artists.
Zoo : We had seen so much wild life on our trip to Singapore Malaysia that we were least interested in it. Nevertheless, it was a nice zoo with some rare species.
Samudra Beach : Finally we reached the Samudra Beach. It is one of the lesser known beaches with less tourist activity (as compared to Lighthouse beach). As a result it was quite, calm and clean. We found this beach better than the Lighthouse and spent few hours there. Waves here were more violent and my wife got a taste of it when she was thrown off the shore by a powerfull one. We were having fun or what...
That night we had the most romantic dinner of our trip. A rooftop restaurant on Kovallam beach, candlelit dinner, with live ghazals in the background and the beautiful night sea in front. For once we wanted the evening to never end.
11th February : Off to Kumarakom : Kerala Backwaters
We started off to Kumarakom early morning. It was a 5-6 hours drive. Our cabbie Baijju was a localite and was acting as an excellent guide. We reached our hotel "Waterscapes Kumarakom" in the afternoon.
Abour Kumarakom
Kumarakom is one of the best Backwater destinations in Kerala (Others being Allepy, Kollam). The area is known as the Venice of the East with small water canals all around the area. That along with the rich flora and fauna make it one of the world's best sceneries. No wonder its called as the "God's Own Country"
About Waterscapes : A KTDC resort
So good was this resort that it deserves a special section in the blog. Its built on the shore of backwater lake Vembanand. Its a 5 star property with small individual cottages built over natural canals. The area is plush with vegetation. Cottages themselves are well built with all amenities. This was undoubtedly the best place we had ever stayed at (And am talking about comparisons with some 5 star properties in USA, Singapore and Malaysia).
We spent whole of 11th at the resort itself. There were indoor games (TableTennis, Carrom and Pool) which we tried our hands at. In the evening there was a local cultural show. We were in heaven or what...
12th February : The houseboat through Backwaters
Next day was dedicated to the backwaters. Our houseboat picked us up from the resort itself. It was a smallish one with a small bedroom and a dining area. We started our journey on the Vembanand lake thru the amazingly beautiful backwaters. Its a huge lake surrounded by coconut trees all around. There was small kitchen as well on the boat where they cooked for us, delicious south indian recipes. At the night, the boat was stationed at a place. We watched a few movies (yes there was TV as well) and then dozed off. The next morning we started our way back to the resort.
13th February : To Beautiful Munnar
We reached Waterscapes back where Baijju was waiting for us. We boarded our cab and started our journey to Munnar (a small hill station). It was a 7 hours tiring drive. As we neared Munnar, we started seeing beautiful Tea Gardens (Munnar is famour for them). So well are these gardens manicured that from a distance, it seems as if a green carpet has been laid over the mountain. Late afternoon we reached our resort "Ayur County". It was a nice resort but was quite some distance away from main Munnar. We had our own cab, so were not worried.
We spent the rest of the day at the resort itself
14th Feb : Munnar tour
The day was dedicated to Munnar town tour. We visited the following
Mattupetty Dam
Echo Point
Kundala lake and dam
Munnar rose garden
Munnar town market : We bought some flavoured tea for all our relatives from the market.
Kerala Meal :
In the afternoon, we sat down for lunch at a local restaurant. There we ordered Kerala Meal. It consisted of Rasam, Sambhar, a couple of vegetables, a host of local pickles and chutneys and rice. What more, all of it was "Unlimited". And guess what..... All of it for just Rs25 (yes Twenty Five). Now this is what I call "Aaj ke zamane mein purane zamane ke daam" (yester year's prices in today's world).
15th Feb : Athirampally Waterfalls
Next morning we headed to our final destination : Athirampally Waterfalls. This place did not appear in any of the planned tours that we saw. But some of our friends had recommended it a lot, so we included it in our itinerary (and removed Periyar wild life resort). And what a good decision it was.
We reached the place at around 2-3 pm and checked into our hotel "Richmond resorts". It was the "worst" resort of our trip. They had no arrangement for food or even tea. The room was dirty and stinking with humidity. The place was haunting at night.
But the bad hotel experience was more than compensated by the "BEAUTIFUL" athirampally waterfalls. I would let the adjacent photo speak for itself. I would recommend every Kerala visitor to visit this place...
16th Feb: Cochin and back to Delhi
The final day, we started our drive to Cochin. Our flight was late afternoon and we spent the morning in Cochin. Did some (in fact a lot of) shopping for clothes and spices (South Indian Cotton and Silk are world famous and so are the spices). Finally we reached Airport and flew back to Delhi.
The trip was better than what we had expected (and we already had huge expectations from it). These will certainly remain one of the best times of our lives.
