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Friday, May 4, 2012

Kerala Trip

It was a long weekend and wanted to spend a peaceful time away from work, internet, cell phone explore a new place, new culture and people. I have been to all south places except Kerala, the smallest state in South India known for its unique culture and landscape.
So our research began and we decided upon Cochin (Huge harbor/Port), Alleppy (Known for boat houses) and Munnar (beautiful hill station).


Munnar which is famous for Tea plantations and Coir products has a beautiful landscape of Tea estates everywhereJ. Munnar (some 130kms away from Cochin) is in the Kannan Devan Hills covered with clouds throughout and very cool.

Places to visit in and around Munnar;
Ø  Madupetty Dam
Ø  Tea Garden and Blossom Park

Ø  Echo point

Ø  Film shooting point

Ø  Kundaly Lake
Ø  Beautiful Top Station View point

Ø  Tata Tea Museum

Ø  Rajamalai  
Ø  Luckom Water Falls
Along the Thekkady direction there are many places to visit, but we didn’t get time for thatL.

Alleppy (Alapuzha) is a small city some 60kms away from Cochin is known as “Venice of east” and famous for backwaters, lovely boat houses and beaches.
Alapuzha beach gives a wonderful view of the Arabian Sea and you cannot miss the sunset view here, awesome place to spend your evening with friends and family.
If you wanna spend a day all alone with yourself or looking for family outing a day away from home or have a huge friends gang looking for a rocking dayout, Boat house is a place must visitJ. It was great watching the small villages on the way, the localites and the way they would transport between these villages in their smaller boats. Lovely cute houses all surrounded by banana, coconut and mango trees. It’s a bliss looking at them and you wish to spend a day in such amazing environment. You can see that every house there owns a boat as we own a vehicle here in citiesJ. Food at boat houses is yum! It would be a treat for Non-vegetarians, but vegetarians need not worry, the food would include all types of vegetables, very yum and healthy. The entire experience was like in a heaven.


There are varieties of Boat houses, single room, double room, with mini balcony. All that you can imagine a house should have you will find it in Boat houses, but yeah the rates vary accordingly: P

Cochin is a major port city also known as Ernakulam is famous for Fort Kochi.
Architecture of Fort Kochi is of British era kind, it’s famous for churches, and majorly known for fishing. I learned a unique way of fishing here. It’s simply awesome and you can buy fresh fishes then and thereJ. Our trip ended with shopping banana chips, keralite sweets in Cochin City.


How can I end my blogpost without mentioning the beautiful lovely kerala people? People here are very simple, honest and helpful. Malayalam language is very difficult to understand, the only word I learnt is “Chari” (similar to sari in kannada) J. Busses in kerala are different and very accessible from anywhere. Overall, lifestyle here is very simple and sober. My entire experience was really great and memorable.
Kerala thank you for your humble hospitality, yum food, scenic landscape and love J. I would love to visit it again and again :D



Love you Kerala!!