Trip to Kerala

It was our first trip together. A Honeymoon trip, as some may want to call it to the god’s own country. It was my second and Bindu’s first visit to Kerala.

A long weekend was made longer and we could somehow find 5 days for the trip. The plan for the trip was conceived and the arrangements were made on April 10^th, just a day before our departure. Thanks to Pavan, we could get the things going right away.

Day 1: We started at home in Hyderabad. We boarded the flight at the new Airport and reached Kochi by around 3.00 p.m. The Cab was ready and we started to our first destination, ‘Munnar’. ‘Munnar’ is a hill station known for its vast landscapes filled with Tea plantations. It was a three and half hour journey and we checked into the ‘Tea and U’ resorts by 7.00 p.m. It was very pleasant, unlike the last time when it was freezing. We had dinner at the restaurant in the resort before going on a small stroll outside the resort.

Day 2: The day started early and we went to the ‘Eravikulam’ national park. The park, famous for the ‘Nilgiri Thar’ is around 15km from Munnar en route to Coimbatore. It engulfs South India’s tallest peak, ‘Anaimudi’. We returned to ‘Munnar’ and had a sumptuous Lunch at a ‘Marvadi’ Hotel. To make things better, we rented a bike for a day. In the afternoon session, we biked to the ‘Top station’. It was around 30 km from ‘Munnar’ towards ‘Kodaikanal’. The route has many other attractions like the ‘Mattupatty’ dam and the ‘Echo point’. Bindu was particularly enjoying the bike ride. It was a very lonely drive back to the hotel.

Day 3: After an early breakfast, we started again on the road to ‘Coimbatore’, this time on Bike. We went to places as far as 25 km from ‘Munnar’ and returned by around 11.30 a.m. Bindu sprained her leg on the way back, posing for snaps. We checked out of the hotel and started towards ‘Thekkady’. We had Lunch in a resort on the way. ‘Thekkady’ has the ‘Periyar’ wild life reserve, known for Elephants and Tigers. The 3 hour journey offered the best landscapes of Tea estates. The journey was through a place named ‘Poopara’, which was made famous by Pavan on our last trip. We reached ‘Thekkady’ and checked into a hotel named ‘Cardomon county’ by 5.30 p.m. It was a painful walk for Bindu from the reception to the room. We had dinner served in the room that night.

Day 4: We started early to the ‘Periyar’ wild life reserve. We took a two hour ferry ride along the ‘Periyar’ lake. We could spot some Elephants, Bisons and Deer. Periyar, a 97 sq km reserve, offers quite a lot of things for the adventure oriented. We chose to play safe and got contented with the ferry ride. We returned to the hotel, had breakfast and started to our final destination, ‘Kumarakom’. We reached ‘Kumarakom’ in 3 hours. ‘Kumarakom’ is famous for its backwaters. We checked into a house boat at around 2.00 p.m. It was a relaxing boat ride on the backwaters. The ride was made more memorable by a small detour on a smaller, manually driven boat. The crew was very friendly and they arranged a north Indian dinner for us that night.

Day 5: We reached ‘Alleppey’ at 9 a.m. The cab driver was waiting for us there. We started towards Kochi to take our return flight. We reached Kochi by 11.00 a.m. We spent some time at the beach, perhaps thinking about the next trip, looking at a large cruise ship. We took the return flight and reached home by 8.00 p.m.

It was a memorable trip and no wonder why it took sometime for me to come out of it and blog :P